In Thailand, a bpai tiao is a trip of any length. I’ve written about some of my more significant bpai tiaos to tourist destinations here, to be used as travel ideas and tips.
As I posted on Tuesday, last weekend was a long weekend because it was the queen’s birthday which is observed as Mother’s Day. My friend Jill invited me along to visit Nong Khai, the Thailand side of the Mekong River opposite the first Thailand-Laos Friendship Bridge of Vientiane, the capital of Laos.
On our way there, we stopped in Ban Na Kha in Udon Thani, a village well known for the sale of traditional Thai fabrics and clothes made from them. There was lots of beautiful stuff and I have a video in the works.
We did stop and sit and talk with this really amazing woman. She was running a shop with some of the local products, labeled as One Tambon One Product (OTOP) which is a national program to promote local handicrafts and cooking enterprises. Apparently, she had lived in the US, Montana and Texas, and she told us about her sisters that ran the adjacent shops, about Nong Khai and the different fabrics. I really enjoyed chatting with her.
We went to Nong Khai because Jill was interested in visiting Sala Kaeo Ku, a sculpture park classified as a visionary environment. Thirteen years ago, she had visited the sister park in Laos, Buddha Park, but she had forgotten her camera and so was keen to get photos at this one.
The artist, Luang Pu Bunleua Sulilat, according to legend fell into a cave and met the hermit Kaeo Ku. After learning from the hermit, Bunleua Sulilat emerged in 1958 to go and begin the creation the sculpture park in Laos. Twenty years later, he fled to Thailand for political reasons and began work on Sala Kaeo Ku, named for the hermit mentor. He is called by the prefix used for a monk, though he never was ordained because he said he was half-human, half-animal. According to Buddhist beliefs, animals cannot be monks.
The sculptures throughout the garden depict various scenes from the intertwined histories, myths, legends and stories of Hinduism and Buddhism. The tallest sculpture, a depiction of the Buddha meditating under the protection of the Naga snake, reaches 25 meters in height. There are several large Buddha images and many, many smaller, life-size ones. The sculptures are made of cement, reportedly because of the material’s inexpensiveness.
One of the more interesting pieces is a circular area that has representations of life events, Buddhist elements and six senses around the outside. Near the entrance of the circle is a Buddha image stepping over and out of the wall that encloses the circle. The circle represents the circle of life and reincarnations and the Buddha image represents that the only way out of the loop is by following the Buddha’s teachings.
Many people, inspired by Bunleua Sulilat, come to the park to meditate and live, helping to tend to the grounds and build the sculptures. After a fall from one of his materialized visions, Bunleua Sulilat’s health deteriorated and he died in 1996. His mummified body is housed on the third floor of a museum of sorts on the park’s grounds.
Walking through the park is an extremely surreal and unique experience. As many people have said, it is almost indescribable and the pictures cannot even come close the the feeling, but they will give you an idea of the sculptures.
