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nly at The Met,” proclaims Thomas P. Campbell, director of the largest museum in the western hemisphere, much of which is now graced with mesmeric Hindu-Buddhist sculptures. One can forgive the self-congratulatory tone. Monumental in scale, “Lost Kingdoms: Hindu Buddhist Sculpture of Early Southeast Asia,” brings together more than 160 of them lent by five countries in Southeast Asia – Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Malaysia – along with other examples from museum and private collections in France, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Coming at a time when Southeast Asian nations are forging stronger political and economic alliances, this superb show feels timely. It also serves as a reminder of the diverse heritage of Southeast Asia. While paying tribute to past scholarship, it brings together the most up-to-date research by leading art historians,
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The Metropolitan Museum of Art pays homage to sculpted expressions of Eastern religion and mythology. by shane suvikapakornkul
archeologists and epigraphists to revisit the concept of the “Indianised states” of Southeast Asia. From the fifth to the eighth century, these emerging kingdoms achieved a new level of artistic refinement, particularly in sculpture, and it is this artistic landscape that “Lost Kingdoms” nimbly navigates. John Guy, The Met’s Florence and Herbert Irving Curator of the Arts of South and Southeast Asia, spent more than five years preparing “Lost Kingdoms.” Now into the seventh year of his tenure, Guy is, perhaps, better known for his previous stint as the senior curator of Indian & Southeast Asian Art at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum, as well as being a prolific author of books on Indian and Southeast Asian textiles and ceramics. “An exhibition of this scale takes at least three years to prepare,” he told me. “It took three years to narrow down the list and make a wish list; another two to contact and liaise with each country’s authorities, from museums to ministries.”
all images courtesy of the metropolitan museum of art
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To guide visitors through such complex histories, and without overwhelming, Guy divided the exhibition into seven sections, each section in a separate gallery: Imports, Nature Cults, the Arrival of Buddhism, Vishnu and his Avatars, Shiva’s World, State Art, and Saviour Cults. Entering the exhibition, the visitor is greeted with an enlarged black-and-white colonial-era photograph of a 7thcentury temple found in central Cambodia, fronted by a large, dramatic Dharmacakra (Wheel of Law) of a similar age found in Petchabun province, Thailand. The stories are told with a sense of adventure as the visitor enters the realms of “lost kingdoms.” In Arrivals of Buddhism, we encounter a 6th-century funerary casket of King Sihavikrama of the Pyu kingdom and a large, 1.6-metre-tall low-relief sandstone relic-chamber cover, excavated in 1911 and 1926 respectively, when Myanmar was under British India rule. In the city of Sri Ksetra, centre of the Pyu civilisation (2nd/3rd-9th century), the Archaeological Survey of India headed by Charles Duroiselle found some of the oldest Buddhist relics at the Khin Ba stupa site to the city’s southeast. On display from the excavations are a 6thcentury preaching Buddha in sheet-silver, repoussé gilded-silver figures of Dvapalas (guardians of sacred space), and miniature silver model stupas. Too fragile to travel but included in the catalogue are the spectacular inscribed repoussé gilded-silver reliquary and the delicate silver lotus flower and stem. These Khin Ba stupa finds are extremely rare and many from the excavations are still unpublished to this day. Sandstone statues of the Buddha from various sites in Thailand, Cambodia, Myanmar, and Vietnam give us glimpses of the satellite Buddhist kingdoms in
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mainland Southeast Asia. Four important Buddhist statues evoke a sense of various flourishing kingdoms. One is a headless Buddha from Myanmar’s Sri Ksetra – the only complete sandstone Buddha image to have survived from that site. It sports lengthy Sanskrit inscriptions in Pyu script, with the accounts of the ancestral kings of the Vikrama dynasty. Another is from Wat Kampong Luong, Angkor Borei, Cambodia – a powerful seated Buddha with distinctive hair curls and top-knots making the abhaya mudra (gesture of protection/ fearlessness). It’s one of the earliest examples of this type of Buddha in Southeast Asia. Similarly, from Wat Phra Borommathat, Surat Thani province, a late 6th-to7th-century seated Buddha in meditation posture on a lotus throne mirrors one in similar posture from Phnom Cangek in southern Vietnam. The rulers of Southeast Asia’s early kingdoms adopted the Brahmanical god Vishnu as a model for divine kingship. In Vishnu and Kingship, we have a chance to see the loan sculpture of Vishnu for the first time outside of Vietnam. The 7th-to-8th-century Vishnu piece was excavated from the Go Thap site, Dong Thap province, and there was evidence of other icons in wood and temple jewellery use at the site. From the moated city of Muang Si Mahosot, Thailand, a very large, muscular Vishnu represents a transition of this type of statue, which has a supporting arch or frame, to a freestanding one. From Si Thep ancient settlement in Phetchabun province, there’s an undecorated and bent-posed Vishu standing on two feet on a small rectangular base, another transition in style that suggests varying contacts among adjacent kingdoms in the mainland. As the kings immersed
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Sandstone statues of the Buddha from various sites in Thailand, Cambodia, Myanmar, and Vietnam give us glimpses of the satellite Buddhist kingdoms in mainland Southeast Asia.
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themselves in worshipping Hindu gods as a key to their ruling success, more figures emerged to share the expanding iconography. Shiva and his wife, Parvati, and sons Ganesh and Skanda became major figures in Southeast Asia. Significant shivalingas (phallus) are ubiquitous; two of the finest examples of this period from Vietnam and Thailand are on display. In the Shiva’s World gallery, we see works the priests and artists modified to suit the region’s devoted rulers. The 7th-century Shiva’s Footprint (shivapada), found in Stung Treng, Cambodia, marks Shiva’s presence and confirms the practice of the “footprint” concept that textually exists. Also found in Strung Treng, a life-sized statue of Shiva as an ascetic, reaffirming the influence of the aescetics, Shiva rishis, from the Pasupata sect (descended from India) who became powerful in the courts of Southeast Asia. One also cannot ignore the eminence of Ganesh worship in Southeast Asia. The elephantheaded son of Shiva and Parvati, Ganesh is revered and featured
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in temples Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand. Amongst the most sophisticated is the 7th-century Ganesh sculpture found in My Son, Quang Nam province, Vietnam. It is fortunate that we have a 1903 photograph by Charles Carpeaux of this statue in situ. Though the statue now has damage to its arms, it is among the most important early Ganesh sculptures, testifying to the artistic devotion this beloved god inspires. Thailand is the foremost lender to“Lost Kingdoms,” with some 40 objects from seven different museums. This is evident in the gallery State Art, where Dvaravati sculptures and Dhammacakra wheels of law define some of the greatest artistic contributions to Buddhist art in the region. Dvaravati, also known as the Mon kingdom, is a term existing in early Chinese texts and other inscriptional evidence. Dvaravati Buddhist sculpture sources its style from the Sarnath school of the Indian Gupta period (ca. 320-550 AD). Classic features of Dvaravati sculpture – distinctively serene, balanced face with downcast eyes, as if drawn by only single- or double-refined lines – are apparent in various Buddhas found in west and central Thailand, Ratchaburi, Nakon Pathom, Ayutthaya, and to the east and northeast in Prachinburi and Burirum. The 7th-century standing Buddha that graces the catalogue cover is one of the most elegant. Though preserved at Wat Na Phra Men, Ayutthaya, it may have been found elsewhere as it is a common practice to bring important Buddha images to the capital of the ruling reign. Dharmacakra and the narrative stele distinguish Dvaravati art. Apart from single-image Buddhas, the Dvaravati period saw artistic expressions of the “Wheel of Law” concept, and narrative scenes depicting Jataka tales and miracles
of the Buddha. One such piece found at Wat Chin in Ayutthaya depicts the Sravasti twin-miracles episode, where a mango tree grew immediately from a seed to shelter the Buddha to quell nonbelievers. As for the Dharmacakra that set the Buddha’s First Sermon in motion, its artistic form unites the teaching of dharma and the concept of the universal sovereign, or cakravatin, and elevates it into a symbol of state authority. These stone representations of the Dharmacakra are uniquely Dvaravati, not to be found anywhere else in Southeast Asia. The Saviour Cults gallery is devoted to the cult of Bodhisattvas – beings on the path to Buddhahood. Amongst the gallery’s highlights are the two 8th-century bronze statues of the four-armed Maitreya Buddha, or Buddha of the Future, and one four-armed Avalokiteshvara. They were found around 1964 in Prasat Hin Khao Plai Bat II, a Khmer temple south of Prasat Hin Phanom Rung in Buriram province, Thailand, and subsequently scattered in the collections of three US museums. Standing on average around a metre tall, here they are united for close examination. Upon exiting the last gallery, three bronze Avalokiteshvara statues amaze the viewer in three beautifully lit glass cases. They not only exemplify some of the best-preserved bronze statues of the type, but also attest to the phenomenon of saviour-cult worship that spread throughout the region down to the southern peninsula. Guy has succeeded in balancing diplomacy, aesthetics choices and the need for solid scholarship, which is evident in the eponymous major catalogue. The catalogue for “Lost Kingdoms” has 22 contributors, including renowned scholars Hiram Woodward,
Peter Skilling (a 30-year resident of Thailand, and respected Sanskrit and Pali scholar), and ML Pattaratorn Chirapravati. Others, from the US, UK, France, Indonesia, and Myanmar, share their expertise in various areas, making this catalogue an indispensable reference work. River Books of Thailand co-published the book, making it widely available to the regional public. “I hope an exhibition such as this will help stimulate interest in Southeast Asian studies,” said Guy. In the US or UK and Europe, where Asian Studies is an established field, East Asia (China, Korea, Japan) has long claimed a majority of the interest and Southeast Asia a minority. Guy enlisted a Thai SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London) graduate, Sutima Sucharitakul, to maneuvre the complex administration in organising this show – a tremendous training opportunity for a new generation of Thai museum professionals. Recently SOAS also received a generous gift of £20 million from the Alphawood Foundation, Chicago, for which a Hiram Woodward Chair in Southeast Asian Art was appointed. With such international awareness, there is hope for the field of Southeast Asian studies. The growing ASEAN community has a greater need than ever to train qualified personnel in the field of archaeology, art, history, humanities and other areas of social studies. “Lost Kingdoms,” along with the institutions and sponsors that have supported it, has commanded a new lead, but is above all an example of how Southeast Asia’s rich and diverse past can still inspire us. “Lost Kingdoms: Hindu Buddhist Sculpture of Early Southeast Asia” runs at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art until 27th July.
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Sala Sudasiri Sobha Concert Hall
Musical Paradise A neoclassic concert hall in an unlikely part of town creates a rare connection between audience and performer.
by appy norapoompipat / photography by sunya thadathanawong angkok is full of little surprises, and one of the most enjoyable in terms of nostalgic design sits down a residential backstreet in Lad Phrao: Sala Sudasiri Sobha. Often mistaken for a renovated 19th-century royal residence, this incongruous regal structure is actually a newly built and privately owned, 200-seat concert hall replete with world-class acoustics and an atmosphere befitting a period novel. Architecturally, the provenance of this two-year-old building is also surprising: its owner, the award-winning Thai classical pianist and composer Nat Yontararak, was its sole designer. Taking us through the high-ceilinged arcade that leads to it, Nat, a trained architect, humbly recalls the story of how it came to be. After, for many years, renting concert halls where he could stage events for his piano school from the Thailand Cultural Centre, he decided he wanted to have a concert hall of his own, one that would not only house a beautiful piano but actually have the acoustics to do it justice. The hall would also help give exposure to young Thai artists, introduce them
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to the public, and bring in internationally acclaimed artists to both perform and share their knowledge. After twenty years of getting all the elements in place (the land, the piano, the materials and, of course, the money), his dream finally came true. Princess Sudasiri Sobha had been a patron of Nat’s music career right up until her passing, so the name came naturally. As for the hall’s design – an understated blend of European neoclassical tropes and Thai motifs – this pays homage to her grandfather, King Chulalongkorn (Rama V), the modernising monarch who introduced a distinctly European strain of thought, architecture, fashion and social mores into the national fold in the early 20th century. Doubtless, he would have approved. The exterior of the building is a particularly elegant fusion of the above,
as are the double teakwood doors you pass through, and curving teakwood staircase that greets your arrival. To the left, through another set of doors, sits a sun-drenched reception hall. Going up the stairs, I pass a practice-room and encounter a teakwood foyer with more stairs leading up to the mezzanine of the concert hall. And on entering the main hall, I am struck by the wood carvings and mirrors on the walls and ceilings throughout the room, as well as a nine-foot Steinway Concert Grand and an ornate harp, both taking pride of place on an elevated teakwood stage. The feature that has classical-music lovers raving, though, are the acoustics. They are flawless. Whether you’re listening to a bellowing opera singer, or a harpsichordist playing at a faint pianissimo, every sound comes out balanced and crisp.
What’s even more amazing is that the hall does not use noise-cancelling materials. “A room’s proportions are essential to good acoustics,” explains Nat. “Get them right and you don’t have to add anything.” How did he get them right? “I did a lot of research into buildings with the best acoustics in the world, and discovered that their halls were basically this shape – a rectangle. That’s probably one of the most important aspects of why the acoustics are so good,” he says. “We were so nervous and excited the first time we brought the piano into the hall to test the sound. No one can tell how these things will turn out. Even the London Festival Hall has some problems. It’s not that the people are not good at their jobs, but these things are uncertain.” Helping matters are the woodcarving patterns on the walls (designed by his
late father) and three giant wooden panels suspended on the ceiling (remains from an Indian palace he found in an antique shop). They help disperse the sound, explains Nat: “If the sound just reflects off walls, it comes out rough and matte. If there are ornaments around the room, the sound will disintegrate, making it soft and full of detail. What’s strange about the hall is the ceiling. The panels are the main things that make the acoustics so good.” It also helps that the floors of the hall (like most of the building) are lined with golden teakwood, a rarity in this day and age. The porous wood also helps mellow and soften the sound, Nat adds. By a stroke of luck, Nat didn’t have to buy a single panel of the rare wood – or even fell a single tree. His mother-in-law, Chao Duangduanna Chiang Mai, the last Princess of the
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Having a reception hall turns the music recital into a social gathering where people can meet, talk and be stimulated aesthetically.
Arcade leading to the hall
old Lanna Kingdom, had a collection of teak wood panels from her old houses. With the houses long since dismantled, she let Nat take as many of the panels as he wanted. “There are two types of wood in the building; 85% is golden teakwood, and 15% is rosewood. The story is miraculous when you think about it, because they are not sold anymore,” he laughs. Another way in which the Sala Sudasiri Sobha differs from most concert halls is its reception hall. Being a worldtouring musician himself, Nat realised that something vital was missing from most of them. “Often when I go to a performance, there simply isn’t one,” he says. Nowadays when a classical recital ends,
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audiences tend to go home straightaway, leaving the artist feeling like a wind-up monkey. But by having a reception hall, performers can connect with the audience. “The reception hall is where we treat guests to food after the concert,” he says. “You get a warmth from it, and the performers are happy because they can interact with the audience after the show. Praising the performer is extremely important. It gives them encouragement. It turns the music recital into a social gathering where people can meet, talk and be stimulated aesthetically,” he explains. Everything about the building is aimed at enhancing the experience of both performer and audience. There is even a guestroom above the practice room where performers can reside, and Nat and his family take care of the artist themselves. “A lot of the performers
remark that ‘this is paradise, a musical paradise,’” says Nat’s daughter Paranee, who co-manages the hall. “Everyone seems to feel what I had intended for them to feel,” Nat adds, proudly. “They feel that the hall connects the performer and the audience as one through music.” Sala Sudasiri Sobha holds concerts every month, with proceeds going to The Gift of Life Foundation, a charity formerly chaired by H.H Princess Sudasiri Sobha. The charity helps patients with rare blood diseases such as leukemia thalassemia, and aplastic anemia. All the artists perform without pay,in accordance with the foundation’s philosophy of giving “gifts” to help other people’s lives. Sala Sudasiri Sobha 158/20 Ladprao 41, Yaek 7-2Chatuchak Tel. 0-2541-8662 www.salasudasirisobha.com
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Four decades after the Khmer Rouge took and terrorised Cambodia, Rithy Panh has told the story, his own story, of the boy who survived it all. In doing so, he has made perhaps his most powerful and idiosyncratic film yet.
by lary wallace / photo by Šcorbis / profile
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ust minutes from here is where the bodies were buried. It’s where they were buried until the Khmer Rouge ran out of room in the ground for burying them, and then they were taken to a place just south of here, and buried there. The burying stopped but the torture continued. And the bodies remain. Rithy Panh was among those tortured, but he was not among those buried. Much of the rest of his family was. Today, from the offices of Bophana, Panh’s filmheritage-preservation center, you can get in a taxi and within minutes be at the site of S-21, which for the larger part of four years — 1975-1979 — was perhaps the most feared destination for any Cambodian (and even some non-Cambodians) not favored by Pol Pot’s regime. Now they call it the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, and you can witness there the instruments of torture that were used on all the families like Panh’s. You can witness the filthy, claustrophobic cells, and the grim blackand-white portraits of prisoners — many of them, like Panh himself at the time, just children — that were taken upon detainment. Most hauntingly of all, you can witness the skulls stacked behind glass in a huge cabinet, several rows high, row upon lengthy row of nothing but skulls, an astonishing testament to the grim possibilities of human hideousness. They say 17,000 prisoners passed through here before the horrors finally ceased; the skulls in this cabinet represent only a sliver of those, even as they manage to represent all of them.
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It’s a crime you can’t put into numbers, but you can put it into words. Panh has put it into words, in his memoir The Elimination: A Survivor of the Khmer Rouge Confronts His Past and the Commandant of the Killing Fields (2012). When he confronts the commandant, a high-ranking jailer named Duch, he asks if he experiences nightmares “from having authorised electrocutions, beatings with cords, the thrusting of needles under fingernails; from having made people eat excrement; from having recorded confessions that were lies; from having given orders to slit the throats of men and women lined up blindfolded at the edge of a ditch and deafened by a roaring generator.” (Duchy, for his part, answers flatly and in the negative.) So it can be put it into words, this crime, but it can no longer be put into pictures. The time for that has passed. Many pictures were taken, by an official cinematographer who was later inexplicably tortured and killed. Other pictures were lost, or destroyed, or, more often, never taken at all. That’s where Panh got the title for his most recent movie, a documentary called The Missing Picture, nominated this year for the Best Foreign Film Oscar and honoured at Cannes with the top prize among the Un Certain Regard selections. In the film, Panh actively engages and challenges what must be the single most vexing conundrum for the filmmaker in his particular position: how do you make a documentary about events for which so little documentary evidence is available? And he’s answered the riddle by
Rithy Panh was among those tortured, but he was not among those buried. Much of the rest of his family was.
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To properly chronicle the horrors inflicted by the Khmer Rouge requires an iron constitution. transcending the very limits of photography itself, with the kind of profound ingenuity that emerges from only the most desperate circumstances. here is a gravity to him. Of course there is. But there is also a levity, a big-bellied buoyancy of spirit touched with enthusiasm and humor. Meeting him, it’s easy to forget this is a person who was 11 when his family was rounded up and imprisoned — who watched his father take his literal last breath after vowing, “I’m not eating anything that doesn’t resemble food fit for human beings,” and who watched his older sister die, too, and then his mother, and then his nephews. It’s easy to forget this is someone who wrote, in The Elimination, of this trauma “manifest[ing] itself as unending desolation; as ineradicable images, gestures no longer possible, silences that pursue me.” To properly chronicle the horrors inflicted by the Khmer Rouge requires an iron constitution and an encyclopedic understanding of what was endured there. Rithy Panh has both, and so he’s been able to chronicle it, not just in The Missing Picture but in a handful of other films. Until The Missing Picture, the most notable of these were Bophana (1996) and S-21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine (2003), the latter a documentary in which he confronts the former torturers of Tuol Sleng (and which serves as a kind of companion piece to The Elimination). “In film, I don’t usually tell my own story,” he says. “It’s
the first time I’ve made a film like this. There are two missing pictures. One picture is the missing photography of this time. The other is of my own family. I would like to see my grandfather, for example. It’s important to talk about what people knew at the time, because the young people want to know what happened. You can see the young people come and say thank you.” He doesn’t want to be known as “the genocide director.” He’s made plenty of films, fiction and nonfiction alike, about plenty of other subjects, and he will make more. He knows he can’t let the Khmer Rouge consume his life. To do so would be to concede defeat, to wear his history like a suit of clothes, becoming the person many expect him to be, the person many still living would like to see him become. “You can live, you can smile, you can love,” he says. “That is surviving. That is how you fight back. Not to be depressed and make everything about the Khmer Rouge. I make pictures on many things, but when it’s necessary….” he Missing Picture may just change the way documentaries are made. That sounds like a foolish forecast, and maybe it is, but when you watch the movie and admire the elegance of its central technical solution, you can’t help but hope — and believe — that documentarians everywhere will employ a similar strategy: letting clay figurines (or something similar) stand in for the places in the story where footage is unavailable. Panh says the idea to do his movie
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this way came to him more or less by happenstance, when he asked a member of his staff to show him how certain scenes from the period would look constructed of clay. Then the idea occurred to him, and that’s how it began. There is very little precedent for this kind of thing. The most literal precedent would be a movie of entirely different tone and subject (a movie that is, in fact, for copyright reasons, no longer even in circulation): Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (1987), in which Todd Haynes had Barbie dolls act out scenes in place of human beings. A much less literal and less obvious comparison can be made to Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel Maus, about the Jewish Holocaust (1991). Although not even a film at all, it too is a personal retelling of genocide that replaces humans with a toy-like conceit. Where Panh uses clay figurines, Spiegelman uses cartoon mice, but the effect is very much the same. It’s a counterintuitive move, risky in the extreme. The danger is that such a conceit will only neutralise the material — or, even worse, actually ridicule and trivialise it. But in The Missing Picture, as in Maus, what happens is the opposite. What happens is, the cartoonish quality somehow enhances the reality, and hence the tragedy. For one thing, the clay figurines don’t stand alone. They share the movie with actual documentary footage; sometimes, they even share a frame with such footage, one superimposed on the other. This can have a haunting effect, that of innocence trampled by reality. Sometimes the effect is more subtle
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but just as haunting, deriving from the mood the toy-like constructions summon from the photography, making it ominously present and actual in a way it never could be standing alone. Panh, for his own part, fancies the symbolic significance of clay coming from the earth and, just like humans, returning to the earth, each of them returning to the same place. It’s a dynamic he understands intimately, having personally buried his share of the 2 million bodies wasted by Pol Pot’s regime. It’s no accident, then — and a matter of no little poignancy — that one of the concluding sequences of The Missing Picture is a montage of these clay prisoners, one after another, being laid to rest beneath shoveled clumps of dirt. n the bookshelf behind Panh’s desk are two figurines made for the movie but whose sequence, finally, was never filmed. It was to feature a young man bringing a bucket of bran to a pig who eats almost as well as himself, his meager proportions of rice not even enough to properly sustain him. The young man would like to eat the pig, and the pig, we can be sure, would like to eat the young man. But neither can eat the other, and they are both being eaten alive by the Khmer Rouge killing machine. Rithy Panh escaped from the killing machine, essentially by outlasting it. Once the Khmer Rouge fell, he fled to Thailand, but that came with some troubles. The Thai military kept rounding up him and others like him and
The cartoonish quality somehow enhances the reality, and hence the tragedy.
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returning them to the Khmer Rouge. Today, Panh has a fondness for Thailand and visits often, but back then his experience, as he remembers it, was quite different: “I did not understand why the Thai government would take us back to the Khmer Rouge, but when they arrested us they would steal everything they could find. They took gold. They looked everywhere, for money, for gold. It’s terrible, terrible.” This happened three times. The final time, Panh said to his captors, “If you want to send us back to the Khmer Rouge, kill us.” They put them in a pagoda in the middle of the jungle, and it was there that they were discovered by a journalist and reported to the Red Cross. At a refugee camp in Mai Rut, they were fed and given medical care. Because of familyreunification laws, Panh and his one living sister were allowed to move to France, where two of their brothers had gone to study just before the Khmer Rouge came through Cambodia. Panh studied there too. He was at last safe from the Khmer Rouge, but he would never be safe from his own memories. “The world was wobbling,” he writes in his memoir of this time. “I nearly suffocated in the plane. I fell several times while walking in the street. In Paris, I avoided the subways and buses. I’d stare at the crowds of people and tremble. Where were they all going? And where had they come from? The slightest noise would make me jump. I held on to metal, to tiling, to wood, to my relatives, to my books, to paper; I held on to the night.” At first he took up drawing and woodworking, but those “were pushing me into silence.” Film is different — film “shows
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the world, presents beauty, and also deals in words.” Painting was an art that kept costing him money, but once he had that first Super 8 camera, he could just let it run and run and be no poorer than when he started running it. All he needed to feed it was film, and the film always lasted. s he sits in his office telling you about all this, relaxed and sweet-tempered, you’d never guess this is a place where the killing machine visits him still — a place where, as he’s written, “Images come,” and where “I chase after them. During the day, under the fan in my office, I unfold a cot and fall onto it. That way I don’t have to fear vertigo. I’m not tempted to put an end to it.” Those four years “are neither dream nor nightmare, even though I still have plenty of nightmares. Let’s call it a complicated chapter in my life. And one which I’ll never forgive. For me, forgiveness is something very private.” “We are not talking about a little crime,” he says. “We are talking about genocide. It’s like you’ve died already and [been] born again, but you’re born with this death inside of you. You cannot really forget it. So we try to deal with that. We try to live with that. I don’t want young people to [have to] ask me what happened to their grandparents.” That’s why Panh has made the films about the Khmer Rouge he’s made, and why he maintains the film-preservation centre here at Bophana. Not because he’s intent on casting himself as victim, but because he knows that witness has to
Panh fancies the symbolic significance of clay coming from the earth and, just like humans, returning to the earth.
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By purposely going after the brightest among its citizens, the Khmer Rouge wiped out so much of Cambodia's culture.
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be paid, and an understanding of what went on has to be reached. “What I’m looking for is comprehension,” he wrote in a note to himself while filming S-21; “I want to understand the nature of the crime, not to establish a cult of memory. I want to avert repetition.” By purposely going after the brightest among its citizens, the Khmer Rouge wiped out so much of Cambodia’s culture, in both its actual and potential forms. No one knows the exact cost, and no one ever will. When Panh takes me around the centre, which occupies both stories of a large open-air building on a side street in Phnom Penh, he shows me a theatre on the first floor full of young children. They watch cartoons here, and educational films, and any other kind of film that’s deemed appropriate. This is where they come to learn about themselves, because, as Panh likes to say, you don’t know who you are if you don’t know where you came from. “A lot of them,” he tells me, smiling with pride, “this is the first time they’ve ever seen a movie on a big screen.” He wants them to know what movies look like writ large, and he wants them to know, too, what it is to make them with painstaking care. On display throughout the first and second floors of Bophana — in addition to model sets from TheMissingPicture — are vintage cameras and editing tools, clunky relics from an age before filmmaking became automated in so many of its facets. “We have a new generation of filmmakers that are very dynamic,” he says. “They use good film and go around the world.” That said, “The young generation does not know how we made films before.”
Of course the knowledge he imparts extends well beyond calls to caution and gratitude, into technique and how to coax the most from your art. “When I teach, I tell students, ‘You don’t make films with people; you make films aboutpeople.’ When you make films about people, it takes time. It takes time to be with them and understand, to share ideas. It takes time. And you’ll get out of the experience much richer, with a stronger sense of humanity. That’s why I like documentary films.” Panh wants to make, next, a filmabouttheeraofcolonialism — about how it hasn’t really ended in Cambodia, that old divide between rich and poor not just remaining but actually increasing. “I’d much rather be making musical comedies,” he says. “They’re more fun. But this is a part of my life, and I have to deal with it.” I ask him about the response he’s received from The Missing Picture — specifically, from those who also survived the events depicted. “They are very touched,” he says, “very sincerely touched…. They are very proud of the film. Obviously it’s a sad story, a very tragic subject, but when you are able to face such a story, you become stronger in the end. And that’s what they felt.” It was a big gamble, telling this story in clay, because it was not just an artistic gamble; it was a moral gamble too. But it was a gamble that paid out and whose validity has been acknowledged and appreciated by the only constituency whose opinion on this matter really counts. After time and destruction have rendered these atrocities almost literally surreal, Rithy Panh has dug into the earth and managed to make them real all over again.
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ANDALUSIAN PASSION A great pilgrimage and an entrancing city. by keith mundy
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The El Rocio Pilgrimage in Andalusia’s Huelva Province
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n the early summer of Andalusia, just before Pentecost (aka Whitsunday), great processions of swaying wagons adorned with flowers come together in the dusty wilderness of the Guadalquivir estuary, beside Spain’s largest nature reserve, the Doñana National Park. They are on a pilgrimage to the basilica of El Rocío, as part of what is surely Europe’s biggest and most colourful religious festival. Even more numerous than the floral oxcarts and the gypsy caravans are the proud horsemen riding Andalusian thoroughbreds, attired in the wide-brimmed hats, short jackets and tight-fitting trousers of Andalusia, with women riding side-saddle behind them dressed in long, tight, flouncyhemmed skirts, their hair tied back flamenco-style, with a red flower in it. And then there are all the camp followers from the rest of Spain, Europe and beyond, in their SUVs or buses or whatever else will get them there, so that the El Rocío Pilgrimage is today not so much a Catholic ritual of old Andalusia, Spain’s southernmost and sunniest region, but more a hedonistic binge on a gigantic scale – around one million participants – with live TV coverage, booming music and fireworks. It’s a far cry from its origins as a gypsy homage to the Virgin of El Rocío, a return to nomadic roots on an annual journey of religious celebration. But still many pilgrims say the best part is the journey, with its overnight campsites in wayside olive groves, drinking, singing and dancing to guitars and tambourines, which becomes a huge party once everybody converges at the town of Almonte close to the Virgin’s shrine. The cultural and emotional core of the pilgrimage is provided by the Catholic confraternities of
The El Rocío Pilgrimage is today not so much a Catholic ritual of old Andalusia, Spain’s southernmost and sunniest region, but more a hedonistic binge on a gigantic scale.
A crowd surrounds the Simpatico Wagon during the Pilgrimage of the Dew
Andalusia, religious groupings based in all the region’s towns and cities who are dedicated to worshipping the Virgin through the annual trek to the Atlantic coast. It is they who ensure the keeping of the centuries-old rituals at El Rocío, a village of just 2,000 souls dominated by the great basilica called the Hermitage of El Rocío. In this whitewashed sanctuary, built in the 1960s on the site of earlier churches, upon a lavishly sculpted altar painted in glistening gold, stands the gilded image of the Virgin, Our Lady of the Dew. Legend says that the statue was found on this spot by a 13thcentury shepherd; the wooden image resisted all attempts to move it and so a shrine was built around it, followed by miraculous healings of its worshippers. A remote spot on the edge of the great wetlands of the Coto Doñana, El Rocío hit the map, with organised treks to it beginning in 1653, culminating in today’s mega-fiesta. The climax comes on the
Saturday night, as each of the confraternities in turn proceeds to the basilica to pay homage to the “Blanca Paloma,” the White Dove, to give the Virgin her fondest name. Then, in the early hours of Whitsunday, with the celebrants gripped by religious fervour, partying fever or drunken stupor, the Virgin is carried out of the shrine and paraded around the village, visiting each confraternity house, with heaving multitudes of devotees crying out, “¡Que viva la Blanca Paloma!” – “Long live the White Dove!” Andalusia’s most emotional event as well as its biggest, it all begins about a week before Pentecost in towns and cities throughout the region, when the local confraternities have ceremonial send-offs – despedidas – with processions through their streets, lively with singing and dancing, solemn at the ritual blessing at an important church. Malaga, Ronda, Huelva, Cadiz, Cordoba and dozens more all come alive with this festive opening
of the pilgrimage. As the regional capital and biggest city, Seville – only 64 km inland from El Rocio – has probably the biggest and most impressive despedida, with hundreds of participants, dozens of horses and thousands lining the streets. It has a few more attributes too, this city on the River Guadalquivir which became immensely rich from the gold and silver of the Spanish Americas shipped into its port. Seville is an extraordinarily beautiful city that holds within its time-honoured streets much of the rich tradition the world associates with Spain: Carmen, the seductress emblematic of Spanish passion. Don Juan, the original great lover. The Alcazar, an ornate royal palace of Moorish inspiration. La Maestranza, a historic bullfighting arena. The Archive of the Indies, an iconic monument of imperial Spain. Flamenco, nurtured in the gypsy quarter of Triana. Seville is the home of all these things so strongly associated with
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The Virgin of El Rocio
Seville is an extraordinarily beautiful city that holds within its time-honoured streets much of the rich tradition the world associates with Spain.
FACT FILE Getting There Thai Airways flies non-stop to Madrid four times weekly, details at www. thaiairways.com . From Madrid to Seville there are frequent flights or the AVE high-speed train, details at www.renfe.es. Where To Stay Seville’s classic grand hotel is the Hotel Alfonso XIII, commissioned by King Alfonso for the use of VIP guests to the city’s 1929 international exposition. Full information at www.hotelalfonsoxiii.com . When To Go Seville has a Mediterranean climate with low rainfall, mild winters and hot summers. The best times to visit are mid-March to early June, in the festival season, and mid-September to November. 210 210
Flamenco venues Los Gallos (tablao), 11 Plaza Santa Cruz; www.tablaolosgallos.com La Carbonería (bar), 18 Calle Levíes; www.levies18.com Torres Macarena (peña), 29 Calle Torrijiano; www.torresmacarena.com Flamenco Dance Museum, 3 Calle de Manuel Rojas Marcos; http:// museodelbaileflamenco.com Major Festivals Holy Week (Semana Santa), the week before Easter. April Fair (Fería de Abril), two weeks after Easter. El Rocío Pilgrimage (Romería de El Rocío), seven weeks after Easter.
Seville Cathedral and the La Giralda bell tower/minaret, a UNESCO World Heritage Site
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Spain. It is a city where history envelops you like few others in Europe, a city whose centre is a labyrinth of narrow streets graced with splendid monuments dating all the way from the 12th to the 20th century, streets which open out into grand squares and gorgeous gardens, offering endless surprises and pleasures, a glorious cultural, historical, living kaleidoscope. The richness of Seville, both historical and contemporary, is astounding – in its architecture, its culture, its arts, its way of life, in a traditional urban pattern and ambience that has disappeared in most of Europe. Yet despite its age, the old city is filled with vitality, as the buzz of commerce and a vibrant bar-and-cafe society mingles with its old palaces, monasteries, colleges and churches. Seville retains a glorious heritage from the centuries of the Moorish Caliphate, the medieval times of the Catholic Kings, the Golden Age of imperial Spain, and the later centuries as the chief city of Andalusia. Four great buildings most clearly represent this history, located in the heart of the old city. Dominating the area is Seville’s gigantic Gothic cathedral built in the 15th century, the world’s third largest church, with its Giralda bell tower which rises 97.5 metres. Spain’s tallest building for eight centuries, this tower was originally the minaret of a great Moorish mosque, and the views from the top are spectacular. The cathedral’s aromatic Orange Tree Courtyard is also a legacy of the Moors. When you go inside the main structure and look along its long aisles and up to its soaring vaulted ceilings, you are astounded by its magnitude and the ambition of its builders. Fittingly, buried in a grand tomb here is that man of great ambition, Christopher
Columbus, whose expeditions resulted in Seville becoming the fabulous city that it is. Powerfully impressive though it is, the cathedral is outshone in beauty by the wonderful royal palace and gardens of the Real Alcazar. Once here, you know why the name Alcazar is given to places all over the world – hotels, theatres, cabarets, nightclubs – which wish to claim a special brilliance. Started by the Moorish rulers, the palace was expanded by the Catholic kings, leaving a series of exquisite halls, salons and courtyards. Dazzling geometric tiling and ornately carved stucco cover the walls, pillars, arches and ceilings. Four-square, stone-built, located right beside the cathedral, the Archivo de Indias (Archive of the Indies) boldly projects Seville’s leading role in the colonisation and exploitation of the Americas [Indias = Americas in old Spanish]. Completed in 1598, this imperious edifice was originally a trading place for the wealthy merchants dealing in the goods coming from the New World; in 1785, after the River Guadalquivir had silted up and cut off most of the ship traffic to Seville, and therefore most of the trade, the building was turned by King Carlos III into the repository for all the important official documents relating to the Spanish colonies in the Americas. Only scholars may look at the priceless and fragile records like Columbus’s letters to his sponsor, Queen Isabel, but for public viewing there are fascinating displays of old maps and pictures. The fourth great historic building, completed in 1781, is the Royal Tobacco Factory (Real Fabrica de Tabacos), the secondbiggest building in Spain after the huge Escorial palace near Madrid. Once housing the Spanish tobacco monopoly, producing all Spain’s
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Today the flamenco flame continues to burn strongly in Seville, despite much commercialisation. A living culture that is part folk tradition, part high art, its insistent rhythms and anguished songs lend Seville its passionate soundtrack.
Flamenco dancer
cigars and cigarettes, this splendid square building is where the fiery gypsy Carmen worked in Bizet’s famous opera – rolling cigars on her thighs in the more outlandish versions of this classic story of Andalusian passion. Now it is the main building of Seville University and you can walk in on any teaching day and look around. Carmen also haunts La Maestranza Bullring, one of Spain’s oldest and finest bullfight arenas, located beside the river in the Arenal district. In the opera, Carmen was stabbed to death outside the bullring by her rejected lover, Don Jose, whilst her new lover, the bullfighter Escamillo, was stabbing a bull in the ring. Rich in tradition, beautifully proportioned, La Maestranza is the perfect place for a first experience of bullfighting’s
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theatrical splendour. The fighting season runs from Easter Sunday until October, but at anytime you can visit the bullring and tour its museum which has fascinating displays of bullfighting objects and history, including a matador’s cape painted by Picasso. A statue of Carmen stands opposite the bullring, on the river bank. Western Andalusia is the cradle of flamenco, an intensely emotional art form created amongst the gypsies, long a powerful presence in Seville who until recently were concentrated in the old district of Triana on the Guadalquivir’s left bank. Evolved from Indian, North African and Iberian roots, today the flamenco flame continues to burn strongly in Seville, despite much commercialisation. A living culture that is part folk
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tradition, part high art, its insistent rhythms and anguished songs lend Seville its passionate soundtrack. At flamenco’s heart is the duende, a dark, impassioned force related to the spirits of death and creation, described by Andalusia’s great 20th century poet, Federico García Lorca, as “a struggle, not a thought.” Easier to recognise than to define, it inhabits and inspires the plaintive, desperate singing, the guitarist’s rapid-fire playing and the wild yet tightly controlled stamping of the dancer’s nailstudded shoes. Seville rings to the sounds of three kinds of flamenco venue: tablaos, peñas and flamenco bars. Tablaos are restaurants offering flamenco shows with professional, choreographed Seville Cathedral
A man views a bullfight poster in Seville
performances. Peñas are cultural associations dedicated to flamenco, featuring authentic local talent in a more relaxed atmosphere. Flamenco bars are the least formal venues where performances are off-the-cuff, and anyone may jump up and join in. One of the loveliest characteristics of Seville is the decoration of walls and floors with colourful ceramic tiles known as azulejos. Many houses, hotels, bars and restaurants are beautifully decorated with azulejos but the finest place of all is the Casa de Pilatos. This opulent palace was created in the 16th century by a rich nobleman, the Marquess of Tarifa, and its ornate style was very influential in the design of later buildings in Seville. It is open to the public daily. Full of wonderful sights, Seville is also famous for being a joyous city. The people are known for their wit and sparkle, and they put on extraordinary
performances throughout Holy Week (Semana Santa), the Easter festival famed for its processions of men in long robes with tall pointed hoods and huge baroque floats on which sit images of the Virgin Mary or Jesus Christ. Then at the April Fair (Fería de Abril), there is a week-long party of drink, food and dance, day and night, where the men parade on fine Andalusian horses and the women turn out in brilliantly coloured gypsy dresses. Seville is a city of great sights and spectacles, but perhaps the greatest pleasure is simply to roam the narrow old streets – largely free of motor traffic – where every bend and crossroads offers enticing new vistas, stopping in a pastelaria for a pastry and coffee, in a bar for some tapas and a fino (dry sherry), admiring the traditional tiled decor, hearing only voices and footsteps, sometimes the clip-clop of horses’ hooves, soaking up a wonderful old way of life.
photo: ©corbis / profile
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Alternative Pilgrimages
Like a spiritual seeker abandoning the well-trodden path, you’ll have to go out of your way to arrive at these destinations of worship and reverence.
The Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Mexico City The Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe is a National Shrine of Mexico in the north of Mexico City, on the site of a 16th-century “miracle”. An Indian peasant called Juan Diego encountered the Virgin Mary, so the story goes, who told him to build a church on the spot. As Mary’s likeness was mysteriously imprinted on Diego’s cloak, local believers promptly erected a church. Pilgrimages have been made to this shrine ever since 1531 and today the site houses a huge new circular basilica, in which the central image of the dark-skinned Virgin is worshipped and Diego’s cloak is on display, even though many people dismiss the whole thing as religious fantasy. One of Catholicism’s most important pilgrimage sites, particularly for Latin Americans, the basilica is visited by up to 20 million people annually, especially around 12 December, Our Lady of Guadalupe’s feast day, and is approached by the most devout pilgrims on their knees.
The Temple of the Tooth, Sri Lanka Seated in Sri Lanka’s central highlands, Kandy is the soul of the nation, the last capital of the Sri Lankan kings. In what was the royal palace complex, protected behind a moat and crenellated walls, stands the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic, the nation’s foremost site of religious pilgrimage and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. This Buddhist sanctuary holds the country’s holiest relic, an eye tooth of the Buddha. Few persons ever see the tooth itself, for it resides within a reliquary inside a series of jewel-encrusted golden caskets. At certain times of day, pilgrims may enter the Inner Temple, reach the Hall of Beatific Vision, and file past the doorway of the reliquary to catch a brief glimpse of the outer casket alone. On poya (full moon) days, which are national holidays, an endless stream of pilgrims pays homage in this way.
The Ise Jingu Shrine, Japan Surrounded by woods and consisting of simple wooden structures, Ise Jingu is Japan’s most sacred Shinto shrine. Located between mountains and the Pacific Ocean, it stands near Ise, “The Holy City,” on Kii Peninsula, Honsh Island. With two parts, it consists of the Outer Shrine (Geku) dedicated to Toyouke, the deity of clothing, food and housing, and the Inner Shrine (Naiku) honouring the deity Amaterasu, the sun goddess. Shinto myth says the goddess travelled throughout Japan seeking her eternal resting place, and finally chose Ise. The Naiku, dating from the third century, and Geku, from the fifth century, are rebuilt every 20 years in accordance with ancient Shinto tradition. Ise Jingu Shrine’s supreme holiness draws about six million Japanese pilgrims each year, with around one million journeying to attend Hatsumoude – the first prayers of the New Year. Hugely popular too is a visit to the nearby Meoto Iwa, “Wedded Rocks,” two sacred offshore rocks that represent a husband and wife, connected by a heavy shimenawa rope.
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Artisanal goods are more than just hipster accoutrement – the trend of buying carefully crafted, locally made products has deep philanthropic roots.
by bek van vliet / illustrations by thanawat chaweekallayakul
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ith the mercury nudging 38 degrees, you’d think Bangkokians would stay indoors. But on a sweltering Saturday afternoon – one of the hottest of the season – K Village is packed with people browsing the stalls of the farmers’ market. Natalie Glebova is here, supernaturally well-composed in the humidity. Joe Sloane of Sloane’s sausages is here, too, toiling over a barbecue probably not much hotter than the tarmac. Weaving in and out of the crowd you can also spot Ryu, one of the event’s founders, recording the action on his cell phone and posting updates to Facebook. The stalls here offer home wares, perishables, bread, clothes, shoes, toys and more – everything from organic greens to oysters – all made, farmed, baked and butchered by the emerging artisans of Bangkok. When vendor Joe Sloane arrived in Thailand seven years ago, there was no farmers’ market, no artisanal “scene,” and organic produce was expensive and rare, available almost exclusively from upscale supermarkets. Thankfully, this is no longer the case. Since the Bo.lan farmers’ market kicked things off a few years ago, the trend towards buying organic and/or artisanal produce and products has steadily gained momentum, making them exponentially more accessible. And why shouldn’t they be? If there’s any country in the world where handicrafts, food and markets are treasured, it’s Thailand. The elevation of all three to artisanal level seems culturally preordained. Sloane’s is one of the greatest success stories. Their sausages and charcuteries are distributed across the capital, a refrigerated truck making deliveries to restaurants and private homes from a central kitchen in Bang Na. The business is looking to distribute to Hua Hin and Phuket soon, building on what started as a hobby just a few years ago.
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On leaving his head chef’s position at The Landmark to be a “full-time father,” Joe began making sausages at home while his baby daughter slept. He sold the overstock to friends for a “bit of beer money” – his main clientele were expat colleagues of his wife, a teacher at Bangkok Patana School. At the time, the only authentic British sausages in town were imported and expensive, their locally made counterparts massproduced in factories and “made for 99-baht breakfasts.” What’s so bad about a factory-made sausage? Well, aside from the dubious ingredients and the flavour, “no love, care and attention have gone into it,” says Joe. “All they do is get packet mix, stick it in the machine, and the machine spits it out. There’ll be different chemicals in it so it can rotate for hours without getting dry, which works well for 7-Eleven, but that’s not what a traditional sausage is like.” Also, he adds, mass-produced sausages usually contain MSG and their casings are artificial. As an artisan – someone who “fell into” making sausages for the craft of it – the massproduced versions are conspicuously soulless. “Everything I do is by hand,” he says. “There are no large machines, no additives or preservatives, and I only ever use natural sausage skins. It’s simply meats, herbs and spices and salt and pepper.” The care taken by Joe in creating each sausage
“I don’t believe organic food should just be for the elite. I think it should be standard for everybody.”
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is passed onto the consumer, who must take equal care in preparing it. Unlike the rubbery pseudo-food that constitutes a convenience store wiener, if you overcook a Sloane’s sausage it will be dry. It demands the same respect as a steak. “It’s tough to get used to,” Joe concedes, “but people realise the taste is superior.” Joe also makes home-cured pork products – bacons, hams, pancetta and pastrami – utilising the charcuterie skills he honed as a chef in London. There, he would order the pig by the breed rather than the kilo. “We’d order a Middle White or an Old Spot – that was amazing,” he recalls. In Thailand, he conducts business in a similar vein by visiting local farms and sourcing his own free-range, hormonefree, antibiotic-free pigs. While it’s technically impossible to get organic pork in Thailand, given that the necessary certification doesn’t currently exist, Joe makes sure his suppliers are operating in as ethical a manner as possible. He also visits the abattoirs to make sure they are “doing things properly.” The way the pig is slaughtered makes a difference to the taste of the meat, he says. “I’m a huge advocate of eating meat and I’m not a fan of vegetarianism in any way, but I don’t think an animal should ever suffer.” As Sloane’s grows, Joe hopes to see his suppliers’ farms grow in turn. The bigger they get, the more visible – and viable – ethical farming practices become. In an ideal world, this would encourage others to follow suit. He also hopes to see more grassroots operations cropping up, offering homemade meat products. He could use some help challenging the notion that organic automatically means vegetarian, a popular perception even today. No matter how Sloane’s grows or what competitors join the market (or the Market), Joe’s adamant the company will stay true to its artisanal values. Sausages will always be handmade, ingredients will always be as organic as possible, and the price will always be competitive – right now, gram for gram, he’s cheaper than S&P. “I’d rather more people have access to better quality food than making it something just for the elite,” he says. “I don’t believe organic food should just be for the elite. I
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think it should be standard for everybody.”
ood brings people together – that’s one of the main tenets expounded by co-founder of the Bangkok Farmers’ Market, Ryu. He launched the monthly event with big-picture humanitarian ideas for getting the community to invest in itself, both financially and emotionally. “The whole idea of the farmers’ market is to go from producers to consumers,” he says. “But the true benefit is something you can’t buy.” For him, the farmers’ market and its affiliated projects – some 80 of them across Bangkok – are about fostering a sense of community and improving the lives of residents on a daily basis. To see tangible proof it’s working you need only look at the market products themselves. The best-selling item from vendor Urban Pantry, run by Benjamin Lord and Apinun Srisamutnak, is the smoked bacon and cheddar whole wheat. The bakery sources the bacon – a US-style dry-smoked cured belly bacon – from “our friends at Sloane’s.” That particular bread was supposed to be a one-off experiment, but ended up getting more orders than all their other breads combined, earning a place in Urban Pantry’s permanent menu. “It’s not rocket science,” says Ben. “Not counting vegetarians, who doesn’t love bacon?” The menu at Urban Pantry changes every week, allowing the team to test-run new items regularly. The operation doesn’t have a storefront or café – aside from market stalls and wholesale distributors they have a delivery-only model. Every Monday a menu is sent to their mailing list, with orders filled by the end of the week. Urban Pantry, like Sloane’s – or any store at the farmers’ market for that matter – started out as a hobby. “I began to bake for
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myself because I enjoyed it and it was relaxing,” says Ben. “I used to take loaves to friends’ houses for dinner or as holiday gifts and people started telling me how much they loved it and that I could sell it. I didn’t think anyone would take me seriously.” As word of mouth spread, demand for Ben’s bread outstripped what the ex-financial portfolio manager could supply, so his partner Apinun learned how to bake, and they both quit their day jobs and moved the operation into a dedicated bakery/shophouse to focus on it full-time. Apinun, who graduated in the dramatic arts and had no prior experience in the food industry, now handles the entire production side of Urban Pantry. Though the 5am starts aren’t easy, he considers it a privilege to be able to make something “with my own hands, in my own house” that people love to eat. Urban Pantry is a great example of how hobbyists can turn their passion into something that benefits an entire community. Buyers get unique gourmet bread, often made with organic ingredients, and their money goes straight to the vendor, bypassing the pockets of big-business middlemen. They promote their goods via Facebook and Twitter, with various market and fair appearances that allow new customers to sample their products. The community aspect of the business is, in fact, an unexpected perk of the job. “We get to meet clients and their families on a one-to-one basis,” says Ben. “We learn what they like and what they don’t, and even what their kids are allergic to. It’s a very personal business and it’s great to have relationships with people like that who appreciate what you are doing.” There’s a profound satisfaction in creating something by hand – something that brings immediate pleasure to others. “As the baker in the business, it’s my work they are tasting,” says Apinun. “It makes me very proud when they like it.”
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The beauty of interacting so closely with customers is that if they don’t like something, that something can be changed. Just as the weekly production cycle of ordering, baking and delivery needed to be constantly adjusted at the beginning, new additions to the menu can also be tweaked. And, if something’s really popular – a cheddar and cured belly bacon whole wheat, for instance – it can find a permanent home on the menu. For as long as its artisanal ingredients are available, that is, and in the case of the bacon, the source seems sufficiently secure. Urban Pantry’s loaves cost from 130 to 165 baht each. It’s tough to say if that’s more expensive than its equivalent supermarket bread, since the latter doesn’t exist. There are obstacles that prevent the large-scale production of highquality European-style breads here in Thailand, the climate being one. “It’s hot, so you have to learn how to adapt,” says Apinun. “The sourdough is especially difficult as different weather from week to week can even affect it.” The effort that goes into each batch, whether it’s getting a new recipe right or straining kilos of Thai pumpkin for the pumpkin bread, has given the pair a deep appreciation for the work of their fellow artisans. At events like the farmers’ market they get to share this love with like-minded people, “engendering a sense of community,” Ben says, “not only with the other vendors but with the people who come out to support us.” As to whether or not they plan to expand, the answer is simple: no. The quality of their product would suffer and they’d have to sacrifice relationships with their customers, says Ben. “Basically the nature of our business would lose the charm that made us so successful.” t may sound heretical to some, but not everything is better with bacon. Alisa Phibunsiri’s handmade soaps, for instance, won’t be incorporating pork products anytime soon.
“We get to meet clients and their families on a one-to-one basis. We learn what they like and what they don’t, even what their kids are allergic to.”
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Bacon soap was a real-life request for her company Soap Kitchen, which creates bathroom soaps using kitchen products. “It’s a great idea,” says Alisa, “but it’s not exactly what I would want to shower with.” Alisa started making soaps with her mum in 2012, a mission that aimed, claims the Soap Kitchen website, “to reduce air pollution in Bangkok one shower at a time.” The mother-daughter pair were both avid soap collectors, so converting their shared passion into an artisanal business was a natural progression, even if some of their earlier attempts turned into fudge or started attracting ants. Using classic recipes from books, the pair started out making soaps just for themselves. “We went through about 100 different recipes,” says Alisa, “first according to the books and then making adjustments ourselves.” The base recipe they’ve developed is “quite delicate,” a balance of olive oil, coconut oil, shea butter, sweet almond and “stuff like that.” You need a specific ratio of these, and lye. “Once you get that down, you’re okay.” Soap Kitchen is another Bangkok Farmers’ Market regular that does most of its business online. They have a display at Rain Hill, but orders are placed primarily through their Facebook page and website. The bars look as if you could eat them with a dollop of clotted cream. Some smell so appetising – the apple crumble, the Beerlaos Dark and the rice pudding bar, for instance – they warrant a warning, however tongue-in-cheek, not to eat them. Other bars have more traditional soap smells, though each of the 12 are beneficial for the skin, free of unnatural detergents and containing natural glycerin. Store-bought body washes
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usually add artificial glycerin, but the type in Soap Kitchen’s bars is a natural result of saponification, the chemical reaction that turns lye and fat into soap – “how the Romans made it ages ago.” These beautifully marbled, aromatic, natural soaps, of course, come at a price. At around 180 baht a bar, not only do they retail for a lot more than your supermarketbought pump-action detergent, but they need to be looked after. “We can’t just wrap them in plastic because they’ll lose their scent,” says Alisa. “Also, the moisture will be trapped in between the layer of plastic and the soap, ruining the shape and the colour. We have to sell them very fresh, so they’re like a fresh food product.” The consumers have to treat them carefully too. “They can’t just leave them sitting in a puddle of water. The soap’s not going to be there the next day if you do that!” A soap that makes you smell like almonds and cocoa, or that looks like a slice of orange cake, is generally one you want to make last as long as you can. With more than 27,000 Facebook fans, Soap Kitchen is ready for a physical store – it’s something Alisa hopes to make happen by the end of the year. And, just like her farmers’ market friends, she vows the expansion won’t come at the cost of product quality or the joy she gets from creating handmade soaps with her mum. “Artisanal products are from the heart,” she says. “They’re made by people who actually care deeply. We’ve got all these products that are creative, that are new, that are different and real, you know? It feels fresh. It feels the way it’s supposed to. It’s not driven by the profit-andbusiness aspect of it, and that’s a nice feeling.”
“Artisanal products are from the heart. They’re made by people who actually care deeply.”