Thursday, April 09, 2009

Not the History of a Colour!

This post was going to be about colour - my favourite colour in fact.
Yep ...you know the one.
It was also going to be yesterdays blog post, but glass got in the way. A great start, huh? It's not about the history behind my favourite colour & it's not Wednesdays post.

While thinking about the wonderful colour 'orange' & not only it's history, but also when & where my love of it truly took root I had to take a trip down memory lane....way down into the dark little nooks & crannies of almost half a life time ago.


Those thoughts were triggered by recalling a favourite photo of mine taken during a trip to South East Asia.
It had all started with an early morning escape from the hotel, where my far less adventurous travel companion was still sleeping ,& an encounter on the streets of Bangkok with some wonderful Buddhist monks resplendent in their saffron colour robes.

Something in that moment struck me - the calm serenity of those men. Tranquillity on the normally hectic streets of Bangkok was not a usual occurrence. My search for fresh fruit at 6.00am opened up a whole new world to me..... a world serene & peaceful Bangkok.
Later I made it a mission to take a photograph of a monk - I am not sure that I should have & to be honest it was the only time in my life that I have ever taken a close up photo of a person without asking first.
The calm & gentle look the monk glanced up & gave me afterwards was accompanied by a twinkle in his eye. I took to mean that perhaps I shouldn't have - but he was used to it happening.

So instead of the history of 'orange & saffron' I politely asked the mailleman to scan some old photo's, most of which he had never seen before & I'm sharing some of my favourites from that trip.


I realised in looking back through the photo's that some of the experiences & things, such as the facial expressions & looks that people would give me as I attempted to ask in my very small smattering of Thai if I could take a photo of them, I could recall with perfect clarity...as if they had happened yesterday. It was almost as if I was there again. Yet other photo's I didn't even remember taking them or visiting the place where they were taken. It's amazing what the mind files away as 'important' & what it relegates to the 'not so important' pile.

The Colour of Thai Life



Buddhist Monk at The Grand Palace


Demon & Monkey caryatides at one of the two gilt stupas at The Grand Palace in Bangkok


The intracacies of hand carving furniture.



A Baby Elephant - I can still almost feel it's coarse prickly hairs!


Now this was a dream come true!



As was this!

I can also clearly hear Campbell, a guy we met on the trip saying "you must be mad to even want to hold that thing". Pffft ....men!!



The mailleman also named the actual image files - just sayin' ;o)

2 comments:

angelinabeadalina said...

What an amazing trip! Oh, and the mailleman is a good one...I think you'd better keep him :)

rosebud101 said...

You're a braver woman than I am. I would have never touched that snake! OMG! Besides, it wasn't orange. rofl