Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
in a wood fire with strips of copper. After filing and polishing, the bowl may be dimpled
with a hammer and buffed up to a metallic sheen, or coated with several layers of black
lacquer. A craftsman can make one or at most two bowls per day, and factory-made bowls
long ago took over as they are faster and easier to make, and cost far less to buy: a factory
bowl will cost only 400-500 baht, while a hand-crafted bowl will start at that price and go
up to about 3,000 baht for a large one. But although the size of the community has shrunk
to the bare minimum, there is still a demand for the traditional bowls. Many temple ab-
bots support the significance of making them from eight pieces of metal, and some, when
ordering from Ban Baat, ask for the bowls to be finished with a rubbing of oil, in order for
the seams to be more visible. Other than the temples, tourists have become enthusiastic
buyers, and the bowls can be bought here from shops or from the craftsmen, the main
retailer being Somsak Bupachot, who has a small shop at the entrance to the community,
with an attractive selection of bowls on display.
Parallel to the trok of Ban Baat and only a minute's walk is another tiny community,
Ban Dok Mai, the Village of the Firework Makers, the Thai name for fireworks being
dok
maifai
, or “fire flowers”. Once a prosperous and busy community, for fireworks were as
popular in the Rattanakosin era as they are now, this district bears little sign of its former
occupation, and is no more than a
soi
and a small alley. The popularity of Ban Dok Mai
had continued after the end of World War
II
., when older inhabitants can remember fire-
works being made here and sold for the festivals and also for the rice harvests, when farm-
ers would travel up the canal by boat and collect their supplies. Much went into the art
of firework production, the graceful colours and shapes that could be created, rather than
the loud bangs. In 1961 there was a serious fire in the community, and after that the gov-
ernment banned production in the city. Manufacturers and traders were forced to move
into the provinces. here remain a couple of fireworks shops here, Nai Tuan and Por Pan
Chinda, but they are the offices of companies that arrange displays.
A watchtower of the old central prison, now converted into Romaneenart Park.
