City of Contrasts and Crocodiles: Bangkok’s Chinatown (1), Thailand

Bangkok Skyline: Wat Sam Pleum and Bangkok River Park Condominium, Thailand

Bangkok’s Chinatown Skyline
Bangkok is a city of contrasts: here, October rain clouds sit over the relatively modern (1994) 36-floor Bangkok River Park Condominium and the ornate red and gold of the ancient Ayutthaya-period Wat Sam Pleum.

Bangkok is one of those incredible places where – no matter how much time you have spent there – there is something wild and unexpected around the corner.

After years of living in this amazing city, and more years of visiting, I feel pretty comfortable in my own little corner, but I haven’t really even scratched the surface of the rest of this sprawling metropolis.

On my last stay in the city, I got lazy: rather than try to find something new and different on my own, I put the call out for friends who wanted to do a “photowalk” somewhere interesting. I got lucky – another former-resident was passing through, and we met up for lunch and a wander into the always-photogenic Chinatown, better known locally as Yaowarat (see: A Day in the Life). Our aim was to find Wat Chakkrawadrajawas Woramahavihara, which neither of us had visited before. Although the temple is known for its excellent examples of classic Thai Buddhist Temple architecture, it is probably more famous (infamous?) for its nickname: “Crocodile Temple” and the crocodiles that are kept on the grounds in cemented pens.

Wat Chakkrawadrajawas Woramahavihara (วัดจักรวรรดิราชาวาสวรมหาวิหาร) or Wat Sam Pleum, dates back to the Ayutthaya period (1350-1767). In around 1819, a devout general, Chao Phraya Bodin Decha (Sing Singhaseni) started rebuilding the site. The work was completed in 1825, and it was presented to King Rama III (reign : 1824 – 1851) as a royal temple.

The temple once housed the Phrabang, or “delicate Buddha“, an 83cm statue, covered in gold leaf, crafted in Sri Lanka (Ceylon) between the 1st and the 9th century, and gifted to the Realm of Angkor. Luang Prabang in Laos was renamed to honour the sacred Buddha image when it first arrived there in 1359. The statue was seized by the Siamese (Thai) in 1778, and again in 1828; in 1867 the Thais returned it to Luang Prabang, where it remains, revered as the mystical national emblem of Laos. To fill the gap at the temple here, another precious Buddha image, the Phranak, was moved from inside Bangkok’s Grand Palace.

As convoluted as the stories behind the Buddha-images in the temple are, finding the reason behind the crocodiles at the complex is even less straight forward. One explanation I found was written by Morgan Thanarojpradit, a Bangkok-based writer, journalist, and artist. According to her, the keeping of crocodiles here goes back to the “legend of the one-eyed croc”.

During the days of the Ayutthaya Kingdom, many crocodiles lived along the Chao Phraya River. One in particular, ‘Ai-bod’ (One-eyed), preyed on people on both sides of the river, killing many and causing widespread terror. Tiring of the carnage, men went out to hunt the man-eater. They chased him into what was then known as Wat Sam Pluem, where he hid under one of the monk’s houses. In the name of the Buddha, the monk asked that the crocodile not be killed; the people were happy to oblige – provided the animal was kept away from the community. So, a pond was dug underneath the monk’s house and a fence was erected.

A more prosaic story (Portal to the Past) is that a Buddhist monk from Cambodia was raising crocodiles in the temple compound early in the 19th century. Somehow, the crocodiles dug a way through to the nearby canal, and escaped into the Chao Phraya River. The tunnel was sealed up, and today, one male is the only descendant of the original group.

Apparently, Ai-bod is stuffed and on display. We didn’t see him – but we did see the monks feeding his living friends.

Join me for a wander through some unexpected Bangkok streets.

Baan Chao Praya Rice Barge, Chao Pray River

Baan Chao Praya Rice Barge
Bangkok is built on water: the Chao Praya River and the network of canals are the lifeblood of the city. As we make our way up towards Chinatown, we watch the other public ferries and high-end resort shuttle boats slide past the high rise developments and the old shop-houses. The converted rice barges are my favourite.

Chinese Temple on the Chao Praya River, Bangkok Thailand

Chinese Temple on the Chao Praya
In the 1820s, ethnic Chinese were roughly 75% of the Bangkok population. This proportion has dropped over time, but the evidence of Chinese influence is everywhere.

Old Yaowarat Street
Bangkok sprawls in all directions; the first trick is finding a way through it. The main roads are choked with traffic any time of day, so we walked through the honeycomb of back streets towards the temple.

Powerlines and Textures
Everywhere you look in Bangkok, there are phone and powerlines in abundance overhead.

Air Con Gone Wild
There is an irony to finding an old air conditioning unit outside a window with no glass, on a building that the jungle has reclaimed and the vines have grown through.

Wat Chakkrawadrajawas Woramahavihara
The arch over the temple entry advertises the three main attractions: Buddha’s footprint, a revered Abbot, and the crocodiles.

Crocodile in Wat Chakrawatrachawat Woramahawihan
The enclosures that the crocodiles live in are not as bad as I feared they might be, and it is relatively cool and quiet in the temple grounds.

Crocodile at the Wat
The crocodiles are kept away from each other – and from us – by means of strong, climb resistant fencing.

Wat Chakrawatrachawat Woramahawihan
The old buildings inside the compound are quite beautiful in a traditional Thai manner.

Laughing Monk in a Niche
In the temple gardens, in front of the monks’ quarters, there is a cave formation housing a small statue of a fat monk. According to the story, there once was a devout monk who was so slim and good-looking that local women would pester him constantly. So, he took himself off to a nearby ravine where he gorged on food. Once he became very fat, he was no longer attractive and could meditate in peace.

Phra Puttha Chai – The Buddha’s Shadow
The little cave complex also shelters a depiction of the Buddha’s shadow, where people leave offerings.

Prang on the Mondop
A prang is a conically shaped tower originating in Khmer architecture. This one sits atop the mondop or mandapa, the pavilion housing the Buddha’s footprint and Ai-bod’s stuffed body.

Prang behind the Ubosot
The Ubosot, or Ordination Hall, in the temple is decorated with stucco work depicting incarnations of the Buddha.

Fishing on the Klong
Back outside the temple grounds, life goes on. People are fishing in the filthy and polluted waters of the klong (canal) that we cross. I can’t imagine eating anything caught there!

Chinatown Shopkeeper

The Nightingale–Olympic Co Ltd
The brightly coloured façade of the oldest continuously-operating shopping mall in Bangkok drew us across the road. We weren’t allowed to take photos inside: …

Shop Window: Nightingale–Olympic
… suffice it to say, it was a surreal throw-back to the past. The staff were ancient: wrinkled and gray, and dressed in dull clothing, like something out of a horror movie. The upstairs could have been a museum: full of antique musical instruments and covered in a light film of dust. Even the windows displayed items no one could possible want to buy!