Bangkok, The Palace of Siam

We went on an excursion into Bangkok to the Grand Palace. However, the real story today was the crowd. This palace-temple complex includes the former palace of the Kings of Siam. Built in the 1750’s it contains what I regard as the most beautiful building in the world. But, as I said, the real story today was the crowd.

Our guide told us that ordinarily this temple receives on average 30,000 visitors each day. This morning the palace was closed to the public for the funeral of a member of the Thai royal family. So all of today’s visitors were dammed up at the gate until the grounds opened around 1:00 pm. I would be very surprised if there were only 30,000 there today. Kids were out of school today, and there had to be at least twice that number of people, all pushing into an area of maybe four acres.

This mass of humanity was funneled into a ticket gate four lanes wide. It was at that point that we went from being a crowd and became a mob. I felt myself getting pushed harder and harder by the group of Chinese tourists behind me, so I just dug in my heels to stand my ground and to keep from pushing the folks in front of me. I took a quick glance behind me and saw that the guy who was pushing me was himself being pushed by the people behind him. I couldn’t resist the current of the stream. Had I not begun taking little baby steps, pushing into the people to my front, I would have toppled over, I would have fallen to the floor, and I would have been trampled by the mob. We were not just standing chest to back and shoulder to chest. We were PACKED shoulder to shoulder and chest to back, being carried along in a river of people, all jammed into an irresistible current. I took no photos because the pressure from the crowd against my arms prevented me from raising my camera. In the confusion a child lost his parents. Glenda, from whom I got separated in the crowd, snapped a quick picture with her iPhone. She saw an older woman near her being overcome by the heat and the force pushing us all together into a tightly packed mass. Glenda held her hand and made sure the woman did not fall. They became buddies for the afternoon. Everyone started getting a bit tense. Some folks started trying to turn around and go back to the street which we had just left, but there was no swimming against this riptide. It didn’t help when a young Chinese girl just to my right, who didn’t seem to be experiencing any distress greater than the rest of us, issued a melodramatic, blood-curdling scream. I felt the crowd tense up, it got noisy and I felt that things were getting dangerous. People started pushing, and pushing back, all around me. I kept repeating in a fairly loud but soothing voice, in the best Mandarin I could muster, “Everything is all right. Let’s just take it easy and we’ll all get through.” The folks around me looked surprised that this foreigner was speaking their language. I think they were shocked, and things did ease off just a touch.

Just enough.

The Chinese around me calmed down a bit, and although we were still caught in an inexorable stream, at least we were now moving more or less calmly. With the pressure of the crowd, our group from bus #2 got all stretched out in the stream. After maybe fifteen minutes we got through the ticket gate, reversed the spaghettification of our group, collected our members, our composure and our thoughts, and formed up around our guide in a place wide enough to allow us to relax for a moment.

With the danger over, we began to explore the complex. The hordes of tourists did prevent us from spending as much time as we would like in this extraordinarily beautiful place, though. The first temple we saw contained the so-called emerald Buddha, a national symbol of Thailand, clothed in his golden robes. Then we glimpsed, looking over 500 heads, the almost unbelievable glory of the middle court. The Chakri Maha Prasat, built by King Rama V in the nineteenth century, is the most successful fusion of neoclassical and oriental architectural styles ever attempted. It is glorious beyond description, and no photograph can do it justice.

Despite the difficulties of today’s excursion, however, seeing these unimaginably beautiful structures was well worth the inconvenience. We just hope to come again when things are not so crowded to enjoy at greater length the splendor of this ancient and mysterious kingdom.

Special thanks today to our guide, a Thai woman named Lucky, who kept us together and safe, and lived up to her name.Read more