Michael Batson

Ayutthaya (or Ayuthaya, or even Ayodhaya. No matter how you spell it, its pronounced ah-you-tah-ya.) was the former royal capital of Siam from the mid-fourteenth century until the late eighteenth century.  You wouldn’t know it to visit it, but the city is more-or-less an island bisected by a myriad of canals. 

Located an hour’s drive north of modern Bangkok, at its height the population approached one million, at a time when London’s was barely half that.

Ayutthaya is a relatively low-key site. For 500 baht, you can take a day’s tour by mini van for Khao San Road, which takes in all the main sites.  You can spend a leisurely day here, or a quick stop, all with relatively low pressure compared to many other tourist sites, such as Angkor in Cambodia or Borobudur in Java.  Alternatively, there are more expensive tour options which include return journeys to Bangkok by boat, the choice is yours.

The old city itself was founded in 1351 on an island about 4 kilometres wide, formed by the confluence of the Chaophraya, Lopburi and Pasak Rivers. A wall once encircled the entire island, though only a few bits of it can be seen today.

The city was once known as the “Venice of the East” presumably by European visitors who began arriving in the mid-seventeenth century.  The Kingdom of Ayutthaya had endured for 417 years through five dynasties and 34 kings, until the Burmese realised grandiose ambitions to obliterate their rival capital in 1767.  To achieve this they sent three armies which laid siege to the city for two years before they achieved their goal of vanquishing it and enslaving the survivors.

I was collected from my hotel on cue at 7.30am by “Billy”, our guide. By training, he was a lawyer and had taken up work as a tour guide in order to start his open company, but for the time being ‘was working for his friend’. My other companions for the day were a Korean couple, two Korean graduates from Seoul, and three generations of a Filipino family from Cebu.

After we hit the outskirts of the city we made a comfort stop at a petrol station, but largely this was so they could fill up the van.  I’m always amazed they don’t fill up before they leave or the previous night but most trips in Thailand include an early perfunctory gas stop.

An hour or so after leaving Bangkok we turned down the quiet streets of Ayutthaya and our first stop for the day, Wat Phu Khao Thong or “Golden Mountain”, and prelude for the first of Billy’s introduction to Thai-Burmese relations for beginners.  Unfortunately, such was his level of English, or more precisely, his pronunciation, most of the message was lost in translation.  At lunchtime the Korean graduates asked me if I understood what he’d been saying.  I confessed I’d gleaned half of what he’d been saying.  They confessed they’d not understood one word.

The monastery was established in 1387 and following the Burmese victory over the kingdom, the victorious Burmese king, built a huge pagoda in Burmese-Mon style to celebrate in style.  Whitewashed, the structure has distinctive rabbetted edges, like deep grooves cut into it.  A climb to the top in the blistering heat reveals a great view of the area.  Once on top my peace was interrupted by errant Thai schoolboys who appeared to be skipping classes, who spent their time whispering in the corners out of the sun.

The approach to the pagoda crosses a small waterway filled with schools of large fish.  These fish detect foot traffic on the narrow bridge, so much so that if you view them from one side and then the other, they follow you.  Swimming is out of the question, not only because of the water quality, but such are the size and numbers of the fish, should you fall in they’d probably eat you alive.

Wat Mahathat is a collection of ruins most notable for the sandstone Buddha head embedded in a bodhi tree, its body long since disappeared.  Usually, it’s the heads that befall that fate, plundered over time by looters, and the site is riddled with decapitated buddhas on entering the site, vendors snap a photo of all farangs entering.  When you leave your image is presented for sale to you cast on the face of a plate.  I refused to pay and said I prefer permission asked first, but this just met a blank stare.  One wonders what happens to all the rejects.  Perhaps all the images are transferable and replaced by that of the next unsuspecting tourist.

Nearby are elaborate monuments made of flat brick, and chedis, bell-shaped stupas.  The Buddha figures largely show the results of years of neglect and thievery.  I was thinking how clean the site was and quiet, that is until busloads of school children arrived in ubiquitous dark blue and white uniforms seen all over Southeast Asia.  Warily a uniformed official watched proceedings.  I thought how good it was that thousands of visitors weren’t clambering all over the ruins, standing on the stonework and brushing up against the facings.  Then, right next to the sign that said “no climbing” there they were, tourists climbing over the ruins and posing for photographs, all of which the official either ignored or hadn’t seen.

All is not rosy with the Thailand’s world heritage sites – the kingdom currently has five of these. There is the ongoing dispute with neighbouring Cambodia over the Preah Vihear temple, which Thailand claims but currently doesn’t “own”, regarding access covering 4.6 square kilometres, which has threatened to break out into all out armed conflict. 

According to a recent article in the Bangkok Post (July 2010), officials fear that Thailand could end up losing world heritage status over Ayutthaya because of the eyesore caused by up to 400 unlicensed vendors who resist attempts by authorities to remove them. 

The main problem is that vendors, like the plate sellers, have set up shop too close to the heritage site, especially at Wat Mongkol Borpith.  The temple is the Ayutthaya historic park's main tourist attraction, visited by millions a year. It is also a magnet for vendors selling souvenirs.  World Heritage recognition can be removed by UNESCO if a country fails to take care of a listed site. 

Next year at the World Heritage Committee (WHC) of UNESCO meeting in Bahrain, Thailand has to present a report on how it is managing its five world heritage sites, including Ayutthaya.  At stake is millions of baht in tourist earnings and hundreds of local jobs.  Any site failing to impress the committee will receive a warning. The host country has three to five years to clean up its act.

If there is no improvement, the WHC which presides over such matters, can put the site on its danger list. The final punishment is removing the site from the list.  Officials fear it will be an embarrassment for Thais if Ayutthaya is put on the danger list.

Most tours include lunch.  There is usually a set menu and drinks are extra.  I was about to tuck into the food when the Filipinos began saying grace.  When they referred to me they did so with the formal title “sir”.  Whenever Billy finished presenting an introduction to a site, they’d immediately break into Tagalog, I assume in an attempt to decipher what had just been said.  They took photos of everything and then more photos of themselves standing by everything.  They told me that Thailand was more expensive than the Philippines, and that Cebu was a great place to visit.

After lunch things all became a bit of an effort.  The food slowed everyone down and the constant getting in and out of the air-conditioned van became increasingly tiring, especially as by now the sun was at its hottest.  We stopped at a large reclining Buddha, only to be molested by hawkers.  Worse still were the packs of Thai dogs that inhabit the site.  Thai dogs are a menace and should be avoided, especially at night. When they weren’t eyeing up the tourists they were fighting amongst themselves. 

At Wat Tummickarat, I took shelter from the sun with the two Korean graduates in a gazebo.  The Koreans were grabbing some leave time from the helter skelter that is life in Seoul and were heading to Cambodia the next day.  The stone lions and large wooden cockerels, symbols of prowess, were just a visible out of the sun as standing under it.  Overlooking the site were double-storied classrooms of the local high school, the voices of the students echoing across the site.  Nearby was a curious vehicle, a tuk-tuk but with fairings that made it resemble a cross between an East German Trabant and the three-wheeled English Reliant Robin.

Entrance to the Summer Palace at Bang Pa-In can cost extra, depending whether you purchased that as part of the tour, but is well worth the 150 baht entrance fee, for the sheer novelty value.  It’s like going to Jacko’s Neverland ranch, only the animals are carved from trees as if cropped by some Thai Edward Scissorhands, and not prowling around the grounds. The buildings, arranged around waterways are an odd collection neo classical Greco-Roman, Baroque and traditional Thai.

As it is used occasionally by the Thai royal family, security is tight, with units of the Thai army stationed at the entrance and inside the grounds.  A young recruit stepped out from his sentry hut to adjust his uniform in a car window, turning from side-to-side to admire his profile.  The whole site is like something out of fantasy land, and seemed a million miles from political protests, Muslim separatism and poverty, reinforcing the distance that wealth and privilege extends in Thailand.

Many of the accessible buildings won’t allow photos to be taken.  This includes the Phra Thinang Varobhas Bimarn, residential hall, with its Greco-Roman neo-classical façade and pastel colours.  Inside the throne room – it’s well air-conditioned – are thick carpets and drapes.  Turning back towards the doorway, a green plastic bucket had been precariously placed under one of the air-conditioning vents, presumably to prevent seepage.  Ina room from a time where a commoner would have their arm amputated for merely touching royalty, the bucket looked rather comical.

The Devaraj-Kunlai Gate next to the residential hall looks like it belongs to some Miami mansion, its white façade semi-circular to the water’s edge.  The grounds swarmed with school children, who seemed as taken with the farang visitors as they were with the opulence of the palace grounds. The manicured lawns were as smooth as a bowling green.  A fortune must be spent maintaining the site.  Individual residences for the current royals dot the perimeter, while the king stays in the largest pavilion located almost dead centre.

The history of the royal palace at Bang Pa-In dates back to the seventeenth century when, according to the chronicle of Ayutthaya, King Prasat Thong had a palace built on Bang Pa-In Island in the Chao Phraya River, the river of kings.  The king founded a monastery on the island on land belonging to his mother, and then had waterways dug and a palace built to the south of the monastery.  The palace was revived by King Rama IV of the Chakri dynasty, better known in the West as King Monghut (ruled 1851-1868), who had a temporary residence constructed on the outer island.  His son and heir, King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) also added to the site.  Rama VI was an ardent Anglophile who had been educated at Eton, Oxford and Sandhurst.  He was the subject of the King and I, played in the original version by Yul Bryunner, and later in the remake by the wonderfully named, Chow Yun Fat.

Ayutthaya was described by Western travellers – the Dutch and Portuguese were there in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries –  as a breath taking cosmopolitan city of more than one million, more populous that wither Paris or London at the same time, that included over 500 temples and monasteries, 24 fortresses and about 100 gates and 77 kilometres of boat-filled canals.  The ruins are worth a visit.

Highlights of the inner city at Ayutthaya include:
Wat Phra Si Sanphet
The three bell-shaped chedis of Wat Phra Si Sanphet have practically become a symbol of Ayutthaya. The temple stands almost in the center of the main area of the old capital.
Wat Phra Ram
Just across the street from Wat Phra Si Sanphet is the towering prang of Wat Phra Ram, an excellent example of a Khmer style temple from the begining of the Ayutthaya period.
Wat Ratburana
Closer to the current city center, Wat Ratburana was built in 1424 to hold the ashes of the king's two older brothers, who killed each other fighting over the throne.
Wat Mahathat
The temple was built in the early days of Ayutthaya in the late 14th century by King Borommaracha I. The story goes that the king had a revelation, and relics of the Buddha then suddenly appeared. The temple was built to house the relics.

Highlights at Ayutthaya across the rivers:
Wat Phanan Choeng
On the south side of Ayutthaya, right where the Chaophraya and Pasak rivers join up, is one of Ayutthaya's oldest temples, and one of its most lively to this day. The huge Buddha image around which the temple was built was cast in 1324.
Wat Yai Chai Mongkon
At the southeast edge of town lies the huge bell-shaped chedi of Wat Ya Chai Mongkon. The chedi was built in 1592 by one of Ayutthaya's greatest kings, Nareusan the Great, to commemorate a victory over the Burmese won in the same year. The temple itself was established earlier, in 1357, by King Ramathibodi as a meditation site for monks returning from pilgrimages to Sri Lanka.
Wat Na Phra Mane
This small but interesting temple just north of the royal island has played a very pivotal role in the history of Ayutthaya.
Wat Phu Khao Thong (The Golden Mount)
Out in the flat plain of rice fields and fish ponds northwest of town rises the stark white chedi of Wat Phu Khao Thong. The name literally translates to "Golden Mount."
Wat Chai Wattanaram
Standing right on the river, Wat Chai Wattanaram is, in our view, one of the most impressive of the remaining monuments of old Ayutthaya.
Wat Phutthaisawan
Almost due south of the old town, on the south bank of the Chaophraya River, is the very old temple of Wat Phutthaisawan. With its freshly whitewashed classically styled prang, the temple is easy to overlook. Most guidebooks do, but don't you make that mistake. The temple, with its skewed architecture, is quite interesting.