Kat Kong Ta, Walking Street of Lampang, Thailand by Suthida Auttaphut

Ratchadapisek Bridge

During the reign of King Rama V, Gong Ta was the main commercial centre of the northern Thai teak trade and home of several large British and Burmese logging companies. Chinese traders were also prominent amongst the growing trading community of the 19th century, providing food and merchandise necessary for life at the time and giving the road it’s other name of Talad Chin (Chinese Market).

Yean si ti ki

Yai Dang’s Shophouse

I have spent a lot of time in Lampang over the past 35 years, particularly at the house above belonging to one of  Lampang’s former Chinese merchants. You can read more about  Yai Dang’s adventurous and unique story and the history of this area here http://wp.me/p1dW6C-176 .

Yai Dang’s former wooden house opposite her old shophouse

The interesting mixture of this colonial trading community is represented in the well-preserved buildings and houses dotted along the road, constructed in a variety of Chinese, European and Burmese architectural styles, some of which have been tastefully renovated into gift shops, cafes and guest houses.

Mong Ngow Sin

Old Chinese Herbalist Shop

Inside the Chinese Herbalist Shop

Every weekend evening, the street is closed to traffic from 4pm to 10pm and transforms into a Walking Street Market (similar to the one in Chiang Mai) and fills up with local traders and craftsmen selling souvenirs, handicrafts, clothes, antiques and local food. The market also provides nightly traditional Thai musical entertainment along the river bank.

Early Sunday evening, Kad Kong Ta transforms to a Walking Street Market

Local handicrafts

Fresh pineapple

Outside the Lampang Cultural Centre

A man from Sri Lanka selling egg custard tarts. He’s been living in Lampang for 10 years with his family!

If you don’t feel like walking along the 2 kilometer road, then there are plenty of horse drawn carriages to choose from! Amazing Thailand!!!

Horse drawn carriage

The city of Lampang is located 100 km south of Chiang Mai in the northern part of Thailand. It’s easy to get to via bus, train or private transportation. The guest house is located right on the river and conveniently located for shopping, eating and sightseeing.  It’s just next to the walking street area, Kongta street, which is held every Saturday and Sunday night.

Sunset on the Wang River

Once you arrive at the Riverside Guest House, you will feel that you have stepped back into the last century with the traditional Thai teak architecture and Lanna Thai decorum. The surrounding gardens are a slice of Zen peacefulness, tastefully landscaped with plenty of space to lounge about.

There are a variety of rooms to choose from, all without TV or fridge, but with the option of air-con or fan. I had room No.7 which has a large balcony overlooking the Wang River, which I highly recommend. The owner speaks English, French, Italian and Thai and has lived in Thailand for over 30 years.

Travel tip: make sure you try Lorenza’s homemade banana and ginger jam with croissants! Need more information? Here is the link to the Riverside Guest House official website where you can make your booking: http://www.theriverside-lampang.com/

Reblogged from Steve McCurry's Blog:

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Bamiyan, Afghanistan

Every moment and every event of every man's life on earth
plants something in his soul.
- Thomas Merton

Jodhpur, India

This moment is your life
- Omar Khayyam

India

Know the true value of time;
snatch, seize, and enjoy every moment of it.
- Lord Chesterfield

Monk at Jokhang Temple, Tibet

Life is not made up of minutes, hours, days, weeks,

Read more… 257 more words

More links:

http://www.visit-mekong.com/laos/luang-prabang/dining.htm

Reblogged from one photo @ a time:

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My favorite city in India (probably the world) is Varanasi. Here are just a few images I was lucky enough to capture on a recent trip at the end of last year.

Manikarnika ghat is the most important of all ghats in Varanasi. It is said to be the place where the earth was both created and where it is destroyed.

Read more… 190 more words

Reblogged from Steve McCurry's Blog:

The Hawal Mahal as seen from outside the palace

The friendly and helpful ticket collector at Hawa Mahal. We opted for the audio tour which provided us with 2 pair of headsets attached to a single device.

Entrance to Hawa Mahal is from the City Palace side, through a stately door. Façades of Jaipur and surroundings typically have gokhdas (sitting spaces) on either side of the entrance. Ganesha (opens gate to material success and is the spiritual guide), Shiva, Laxmi on moon (symbol of beauty), Vishnu and Kalki are etched on the chatri (elevated, dome-shaped pavilions).

A young boys peers through one of the palace’s 953 façade niches with Its intricately carved Jharokhas (windows).

The building, standing on a high podium, is a fifty-foot high thin shield, less than a foot in thickness, with small intimate chambers , which give this palace its unique facade. There are no regular stairs to reach the upper floors, only ramps.
Though often described as merely a screen, the Hawa Mahal is in fact a structure built around two courtyards,  with a vast screen-like facade on the east, overlooking the street. The 5 storied pyramidal shaped monument built in red and pink sand stone to keep with the décor of the other monuments in the city.

Hawa Mahal

Hawa Mahal

Hawa Mahal – one of the many chatris (elevated dome-shaped pavilions). Chatri in Hindi means umbrella or canopy.

View of inside the courtyard. One very interesting feature of Hawa Mahal is the fact that the elaborate and decorative element exists only on one side. There is a total lack of ornamentation on the inner face of the building. The chambers are plain with a mass of pillars and passages leading to the top storey.

The second storey is known as Ratan Mandir because of the dazzling glasswork on its walls.

The fifth storey is known as Hawa Mandir after which the whole structure came to be known as Hawa Mahal.

Hawa Mandir

The view through one of the windows onto the streets of Jaipur.

View of the market outside the palace

The small windows circulated cooler air during the months of summer season. The original intention of the lattice was to allow royal ladies to observe everyday life in the street below without being seen.

Looking down upon the courtyard with Jantar Mantar in the background. Of the five storeys of the Mahal, the top three storeys have the thickness of a single room while the bottom storeys have courtyards.

The interior of the Hawa Mahal is stark and plain with passages and pillars reaching to the top storey. The building does not have stairs to reach the upper floors; the storeys are connected by slopes.

Hawa Mahal

Interior corridors surrounding one of the courtyards of the Hawa Mahal

Hawa Mahal

View of Jantar Mantar from the Hawa Mahal

City view

Our very friendly and helpful rickshaw driver who patiently waited for us at each and every site we visited in the old city.

The Hawa Mahal is open everyday (including public holidays) from 9:30 am – 4:30 pm.

Map of Jaipur – click to enlarge

Worshippers pay homage at a temple inside the old city

Diwali decorations for sale on the street

Diwali decorations on display

The festival of Diwali extends between 4-5 days, depending on which region in India. The fourth day – the main Diwali festival day – marks the beginning of the new year according to the Vikrama calendar.

The huge crowd of holiday makers on Diwali in the old city of Jaipur as seen from the top of the Palace of Winds.

Merchants perform religious ceremonies and open new account books. Diwali marks the end of the harvest season in most of India. Farmers give thanks for their harvest and pray for a good one for the year to come. Traditionally this marked the closing of accounts for businesses dependent on the agrarian cycle and is the last major celebration before winter. Lakshmi symbolizes wealth and prosperity, and her blessings are invoked for a good year ahead.

Waiting for customers

A garland vendor

Diwali is the time for visiting and exchanging gifts. Traditionally sweets and dried fruit are very common gifts to exchange. In Jaipur, sweets such as like Mawa Kachori, Til Ke Laddo, Gonth ke Laddu, Piste ke Launj, Moti Pak, Pheeni, Sohan Papdi, Besan Barfi, Jalebi and Shakarpara can be found in most sweet shops during Diwali.

A sweet merchant proudly displaying his delicacies

A wide range of Diwali sweets for sale

The box of sweets given to us by a local shopkeeper

A street vendor selling Diwali sweets

Diwali is also traditionally a time to redecorate homes and buy new clothes.

A mother and daughter proudly wearing their new clothes at Diwali

The name of the festival comes from the Sanskrit word dipavali, meaning row of lights. Diwali is known as the ‘festival of lights’ because houses, shops and public places are decorated with small earthenware oil lamps called diyas. These lamps, traditionally fueled by mustard oil or ghee (clarified butter), are placed in rows in windows, doors and outside buildings to decorate them.

Woman selling clay diyas

The lamps celebrate the return of Rama after his exile. To welcome his return,  diyas  were lit in rows of 20. They are also believed to help Lakshmi – the goddess of wealth and prosperity – find her way into people’s homes.

Shops and houses all through out Jaipur are brightly decorated for Diwali

Fireworks are a huge part of the Diwali celebrations. The illumination of homes with lights and the skies with fireworks is an expression of paying respect to the deities for the attainment of health, wealth, knowledge, peace and prosperity.

Our hotel in Jaipur on Diwali

Fireworks illuminated the skies of Jaipur for our entire stay

For more information about the festival of Diwali, see Wikipedia.

Chinese and Burmese merchants began building businesses at Kad Kongta during the late 19^th century. Lured by Lampang’s flourishing teak industry and thriving river trade between Paknampho and Lampang, the Burmese came first and soon were followed by the Chinese. Large trading companies, like the Bombay Burmah, British Borneo, and East Asiatic, placed numerous employees in Lampang to operate teak concessions, all of whom needed essential goods and services.

Burmese merchants, who initially provided goods and services for the ex-pat community and nobility of Lampang, built large, ornate teak shophouses at Kad Kongta. They sold goods like cloth, cotton, tobacco, lacquerware, medicinal herbs and other forest products, as well as imported goods brought by Chinese Muslim traders from Yunnan, such as tea, silk, copper utensils, clothing, vegetables , beeswax, walnuts, felt mats, hats, iron and salt.

Chinese merchants, who followed the Burmese into Lampang’s commercial hub, built double-storied brick and concrete shophouses, with plaster walls, wooden shutters and stucco ornamentation, alongside their Burmese counterparts. Many of these early migrants married local women and lived above their businesses with their families. The fronts of buildings looked out onto the busy street, while the backs were constructed to serve as depots bordering the river for easy transfer of goods off cargo boats. These were then loaded onto oxcarts and elephants to travel farther north.

Wooden shophouses in Lampang’s main market district circa late 19th/ early 20 century.

Ah Gong Phanichphant was one of the first Chinese traders to establish a shophouse at Lampang’s Kad Kongta market. Born in a small town in Guangdong Province, Southern China, c. 1859, he subsequently migrated to Jakarta to work under Dutch colonialists. Not long after becoming a Dutch citizen, Ah Gong moved to Thailand where he decided to try his luck in Lampang. He started a Kad Kongta market business, selling hardware and imported merchandise, including lanterns. Following the unfortunate deaths of his first three wives, he married the youngest of three sisters—Dang—a 21-year-old Thai-Chinese woman who lived nearby. They had two sons before Ah Gong passed away at age 64, only a few years after their marriage.

Dang’s father, a Chinese trader originally from Hainan, owned a small barge that he poled along the river between Lampang, Paknampo and Bangkok. As a young girl, Dang accompanied her father until she was old enough to navigate the river on her own. After the death of her husband, Dang continued the long trips to Bangkok to buy imported goods. On the way down-river, she sold her famous fermented fish paste, which made her a welcomed and familiar face along the river, keeping potential bandits at bay. The return trip would take Dang up to three months or more, travelling against the current with a heavy boat full of goods.

Dang often encountered elephants along the river. Elephants were a major form of trans-frontier transportation in the region during the mid-19^th century. They were highly valued by the former northern Thai tributary rulers and Burmese teak merchants, who utilised them intensely in teak forests of Northern Thailand for logging operations and for breaking up log jams along rivers and streams. Teak logs from upstream were collected in Lampang before being rafted down the Wang River to Paknampho in Nakhon Sawan Province, and then on to Bangkok for milling.

The northern Thai Chaos (tributary rulers) acquired immense wealth from their control over the teak forests and their ownership of elephants. The Chao Luang (tributary king) of Chiang Mai, who reportedly owned over three hundred elephants during the mid-1870s, made a fortune selling them to Burmese teak merchants.

I first met Dang Phanichphant in Lampang in 1981; at the age of 92, she was a gracious, kind-hearted, sharp-witted woman who enjoyed chewing betel nut.

Dang Phanichphant in 1981, aged 92

She declared that, as a young girl living in Lampang during the late 19^th century, royal elephants were the biggest obstacle during daily expeditions to the old town to sell sweets.

 When I was eight or nine years old (ca.1897-8), my mother sent me out all around town (Lampang) to sell kanom (Thai sweets). When selling these sweets, I had to pass the palace of the Chao Luang every day, which frightened me very much because I heard people say that he had a furious temper. Whenever he was angry with someone, the person was whipped or punished in some way.

But not only was the Chao Luang brutal, so were his elephants. This was especially the case for elephants with drunken mahouts, which became intoxicated as well, being very fond of fermented rice wine stored in earthenware pots. Whenever a mahout and his elephant became inebriated, they would go out and cause trouble for local people by destroying fences and banana orchards.

Villages were not able to claim compensation, because these elephants belonged to the Chao Luang. Whenever they got a whiff of alcohol in somebody’s house, it meant that this house had to be rebuilt. In a couple of cases, the intoxicated elephants strolled into the Wang River and destroyed rafts carrying miang (fermented tea) and tobacco from Chae Hom District because they thought they smelt whisky aboard. When the elephants couldn’t find any whisky, they would overturn the bundles with their trunks and then stabbed at them with their tusks. These actions disturbed the people.

After the turn of the 20^th century, when the local rulers of the northern territories lost their teak royalties to the Siamese government in lieu of fixed salaries, royal elephants were converted to a source of debt repayment for the Chaos as they turned their interests from forestry to gambling.

Once, a Chao Nai paid off a gambling debt to me with two elephants. The mahouts took the elephants to my orchard close to the river and left them there. The elephants ate up all my plants and then ate up the neighbour’s orchard. I had no use for the hungry elephants so I begged the mahouts to sell them for cost, from which I paid off the damages

The love of gambling by the former nobility is a recurrent theme in northern Thai history. Teak wallahs like Louis Leonowens, son of the legendary Anna Leonowens (English teacher for the Siamese royal court, portrayed in 1999 by Jodie Foster in the movie “Anna and the King”), acquired entire teak forest concessions through their gambling ventures with Lampang nobility. Dang also confessed that her main income came through gambling debts with the Chaos, particularly after 1904 when fixed salaries, she said, only gave them more leisure time.

Whenever Dang visited the palace, she brought along long strips of rolled-up newspaper to carry back hundreds of gold and ruby rings the Chaos paid her for incurred debts.

One could string 30 to 40 rings on one strip of newspaper. Each ring was worth 2-3 baht in those days. I then would sell the rings by the hundreds to the East Asiatic Company, where foreigners would buy them for 5-6 baht each. From the Chaos, I also collected valuable sarongs woven with gold and silver threads, as well as swords and spears made from gold and silver. Also I got their lacquerware trays of up to one metre in diameter.

Nevertheless, this was not the way Dang liked to have royal debts paid off; she preferred payment in land. In this way, Dang attained several plots lying outside the town, which her family still own today.

Dang’s shophouse 2011

With the northern rail network extension in 1916, a train station was built five kilometres from the old town, creating a new area for wholesale merchandising and industries such as sawmilling. River transport also declined as freight charges on trains decreased and roads began to develop. Consequently, Kad Kongta reverted to a modest retail market, and then gradually transformed into a quiet sleepy street. The teak industry was eventually taken over by the central Siamese government. Elephants were replaced by bulldozers and no longer can be seen wandering the town.

Dang never remarried after her husband’s death. She continued trading at their shop at Kad Kongta market where she lived until her death at age 96 in 1985. Her grandson, Dr. Vithi Phanichphant, remains passionate about conserving treasures Dang obtained from local nobility, and ensures that the century-old shophouse his grandparents built remains in good condition. Today, one can visit Lampang’s fascinating old commercial district during the street market held each weekend. Pay close attention; beyond the everyday street clamour, you just might hear faint echoes of drunken mahouts and rampaging royal elephants.

© Marti Patel 2012