cart will depart from the premises and deliver them to shops in the locality.
The Kudi Cheen houses in the vicinity of Santa Cruz are smart and have a prosperous air about them, and as there are no roads here, only footpaths, there is an agreeably sleepy atmosphere. This is still very much a Catholic community, even though the blood of those Portuguese settlers has long since mingled with Thai and Chinese blood, and Christian images can be seen on the houses and fences. Each of the tiny lanes is neatly numbered, although many are cul de sacs, and charting a way through the maze is not easy. Soon, though, the path emerges onto the riverside walkway. There is an intriguing old house here that looks as if it has been abandoned for many years, but in fact is still occupied, after a fashion. Standing on church land, the house is constructed of golden teak and is founded upon a solid stone platform, which has protected it from the waterlogged ground. Faded and blackened with age, its shutters firmly closed, its front door occasionally open to allow the river breezes to blow through, this is Windsor House, or Baan Windsor, a classic example of the gingerbread style that is known as Ruen Manila. Louis Windsor, a wealthy British merchant who had settled in Bangkok during the reign of King Rama IV and who married a Thai woman, Somboon, built the house. Their home was passed down the generations to the modern-day Jutayothin family, who leased it to expatriates during World War II and have ever since lived in a nearby residence, leaving caretakers in place. There has been a recent move to register Windsor House with the Fine Arts Department and turn it into a museum for the Kudi Cheen area.
The riverside shrine to Kuan Yin is in a classic Chinese design.
A few metres along the walkway the Catholic community ends at a small waterway and the Chinese district begins. Taksin had encouraged the Hokkien Chinese to settle here. Residents had originally built two shrines on this site, but during the reign of Rama III the shrines were pulled down and replaced with a single temple to the goddess of mercy, Kuan Yin. Over the course of a number of years the temple fell into a state of dilapidation until the reign of Rama V, when one of Siam’s best-known historians, Prince Damrong Rachanuphap, passed through the community on his way to neighbouring Wat Kanlayanamit to take part in the casting of a large bell. He noted the decayed condition of the building, the cracking of the mural paintings, the deterioration of the carvings on the roof, and the depredations of rain and bats, and he urged the conservation of the temple that was, he said, a masterpiece created by skilled artists who even then were becoming hard to find. Today, the temple remains faded on the exterior, although a bright red archway has recently been added at the walkway, leading through to a red-tiled courtyard. Two dragons writhe on the roof. There are some beautiful bas-reliefs and murals on the exterior walls, framed in blue, but they have become weathered and much of the paint has disappeared. Inside, seen through swirling clouds of incense smoke, the wall paintings are vivid, traditional golden silk lanterns hang from the roof beams, and a one-metre-high statue of Kuan Yin sits serenely at the back of the altar, facing the river. The shrine is cared for by a local family and has a steady stream of Chinese visitors, albeit ones with a tendency to become somewhat agitated when a large foreigner hoves into view with a camera.
From the walkway of the Memorial Bridge, Wat Kanlayanamit, an enormous barn-like structure that rises above the neighbouring rooftops, dominates this part of the riverbank. Oddly, though, it is easy to walk straight past the entrance when following the riverside pathway, because it is an unassuming one next to a clutter of wooden shops and eating houses, and the temple is set further back from the river than it appears from a distance. Passing through the gate one is within another distinctive aspect of the Chinese community. A Chinese nobleman named Toh Kanlayanamit, who owned a residence on this piece of land, founded Wat Kanlayanamit in 1825 and the design is a blending of Chinese and Thai styles. At the river entrance are two Chinese pavilions, built from brick and encased in mortar to give the appearance of stone, and next to the small wiharn to the rear of the compound is a Chinese chedi. On the other side of the wiharn is an elegant bell tower housing the giant bell, the biggest bronze bell in Thailand, which Prince Damrong had watched being cast. Inside the wiharn are murals dating from the founding of the temple. The gable of the ubosot is Chinese in style, the distinction being the lack of finials and overhanging eaves, and a floral design covers the flat gable frontage. The ubosot also has murals depicting life from the time of Rama III, but parts of them are sadly deteriorated. Beneath the floor is reportedly the basement of Toh Kanlayanamit’s house. Wat Kanlayanamit is a second grade royal temple, and it is the royal wiharn, the hall of worship, that towers over the compound. The reason for its great size soon becomes clear, for the wiharn was built to house a huge Buddha image, 15.2 metres (50 ft) high and 11.6 metres (38 ft) wide, which almost fills the entire structure. Fashioned after a Buddha figure in Ayutthaya, the image is named Samporkong, and attracts crowds of Chinese devotees during the Chinese New Year period.
Leaving Wat Kanlayanamit by the side gate takes us straight to the bank of Bangkok Yai canal, where one will see the lock gate used to control the water flow, and envy the gatekeeper who has a cosy little office on top of the structure. Following the pathway will take us to Arun Amarin Road. Cross over here, following the narrow waterway that runs briefly alongside Bangkok Yai, and we are in another distinctive community in this most ethnically diverse of districts, for this is Kudi Khao, one of the oldest Muslim communities in Bangkok. Three religions—Christian, Buddhist and Muslim—live peaceably together in an area that can be traversed on foot within half an hour.
The Muslims of Kudi Khao are Sunnis. They are Cham in origin, whose ancestors migrated from Borneo, some going into Vietnam and Cambodia, and others finding their way to Ayutthaya, where they became traders and farmers, living on rafts on the rivers and canals of the capital. Early settlers had also made their homes on the Bangkok Yai canal, and when Thonburi was founded more made their way down the Chao Phraya to join them. The largest community formed on the north bank, around the Tonson Mosque, but others settled here on the south bank, where in the time of Rama I they built their own mosque, officially Bang Luang Mosque, taking its name from the early name for the canal, but usually referred to as Kudi Khao: the word khao meaning “white”. There are no roads in this tiny community, only narrow pathways built around the course of the waterway, which forms the shape of a square and which is worryingly unguarded for much of its length. Kudi Khao is in the centre of this maze of timber houses, in a small clearing of residences and shops and so tightly hemmed in that the thoroughfare is only a few metres wide. This is no conventional mosque for at first glance it could easily be mistaken for a Thai temple, the architectural form following the traditional Thai style. The structure is entirely white, except for the roof, whose tiles are of an Islamic green. Closer examination reveals the symbol of Islam on the gable, adorned with Chinese-style stucco flowers. Thirty pillars support the structure, signifying the thirty principles of the Koran, while the twelve windows and one door represent the thirteen principles of daily prayer. On the north side of the mosque is a timber sala, or pavilion, serving as a gathering place for community members. The only mosque in Bangkok built to this style, Kudi Khao is an architectural gem that draws Muslim visitors from throughout Asia.
It is possible for the most adventurous of us to chart a way through the back lanes from Kudi Khao into another of Thonburi’s oldest communities, for Bang Sai Gai is only a few minutes away on foot, and the campus of Bansomdej Chao Phraya Rajabhat University is the main landmark. We are, however, looking for a village within this village, and it can be found along Itsaraphap 15, alongside the university, where there is a roadside shrine and, quite possibly, the sounds of someone down the tiny alley opposite tootling an experimental tune on a flute. Ban Lao is a settlement that has its origins in the time of King Taksin. One of his first campaigns was against a rebellion in Vientiane, and he had sent General Chakri there to bring back the Emerald Buddha, which had been taken by Lao invaders from its Chiang Mai temple two hundred years before. The soldiers stormed Vientiane and along with the holy image they brought back with them a considerable number of prisoners of war. Some of the Lao were skilled in the ancient craft of making flutes from bamboo. They settled in this little area near the canal junction and their ancestors remain here to this day, still making their flutes. I had last entered this little alley, or trok, a dozen
