Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
ing post, and in the seventeenth century British, Portuguese and Dutch merchants had es-
tablished factories there. It was also a centre for Buddhist study and pilgrimage, Wat Phra
Mahathat being as old as the city itself and housing a tooth relic of the Buddha.
The former residence of Rama I at Wat Rakhang, converted into a library.
Taksin had the Buddhist scriptures, the Tripitaka, brought up from the south for the
monks to study under the supervision of a learned monk named Phra Archan Si, who was
appointed abbot of Wat Bang Wa Yai. Rama
I
continued the royal patronage of the temple.
During the late Thonburi period he had used a set of timber buildings near to Taksin's
palace as his residence, and he moved these to the temple compound for use as a library.
During the renovation work a particularly melodious bell, or
rakhang
, was found in the
eastern part of the compound. The king ordered the bell shipped across the river for in-
stallation in the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, and had five new bells sent back in ex-
change. He also decreed that the temple be renamed Wat Rakhang, the Temple of the Bell.
The most picturesque way to approach Wat Rakhang is by ferry, boarding at Tha
Chang Pier and disembarking at the jetty with its two uniformed matelot statues, for the
pier also services the Naval Hospital next door, which provides medical treatment for sail-
ors and their families. Vendors line the short distance from the jetty to the temple, and
weekends, especially Sundays, are a lively time to visit for there is something almost like
a carnival atmosphere. Several vendors sell turtles that merit-makers buy and release into
the river, and a number of urchins stand by with wide grins waiting to dive into the warm
brown waters and retrieve the hapless creatures ready for the next worshipper. Being a
turtle in Bangkok is not exactly a blast. There are bells everywhere. Two beautiful blue-
and-gold bells hang in front of the
ubosot
, there are bell designs on the door and the win-
dow shutters, and if devotees ring each of the long row of bells hanging in the courtyard
they will be blessed with good luck; which explains why the air is continually filled with
the tinkling and clanging of bells. The five bells presented by Rama
I
hang in a bell tower
to the front of the temple, four of them painted a light blue, the centre bell a dark blue.
