เมืองโบราณ Mueang Boran - The Ancient City

I didn't get the chance to get bored after my holiday to Singapore. A Thai friend, Pinky, invited me to visit Mueang Boran (The Ancient City), somewhere I've really been wanting to see for a long time. It's in Samut Prakhan, about a 30-minute taxi ride past the furthest BTS stop. It really feels far away from Bangkok.

Mueang Boran is the third installment in the late Mr. Lek Viriyaphanat bizarre "Holy Trinity", the other two parts being the Erawan Museum and the Sanctuary of Truth. Like his other works, the Ancient City is a really special and unusual place. It's basically a giant 3D map of Thailand and is full of replicas of some of the kingdom's most famous buildings in the correct location on the map. Many of the buildings are replicas, but a large portion are actually the real buidings which have been saved from ruin, restored, and moved to Mueang Boran!

the market village

The market village, one of the first spots we stopped to explore on foot, is actually rebuilt and moved from its original location to the park. Walking through the shaded alleys, you can buy food or souvenirs at the little shops.

the Grand Palace

I easily recognized the mini version of the Bangkok Grand Palace! You are free to enter and explore the interiors of these buildings as well.

Some of the buildings I didn't recognize. I didn't feel too bad about this though, because Pinky didn't know some of them either. Although it was a hot day, riding the bicycles around to explore the park was so much fun!

Many of the buildings were palaces, some were houses, and a few were temples. It seemed possible that the temples were functional, as there was incense burning and my friend Pinky would wai towards the Buddha statues that we passed.

an old wooden house from Chiang Mai

We came to an old wooden house in the northern part of the park. The old house was authentic and had been moved piece from Chaing Mai. It really creeped my friend out. She said that she could never live in an old wooden Thai-style home because there was too much history there. It's really interesting, because that's what some of the Thai teachers said about our assistant headmistress' home, which had been reconstructed from Ayutthaya. They swear that it's haunted!

We ate lunch in a well-shaded northeastern Thai village. We had som tam and chicken with sticky rice. Aroi maak (very delicous)!

northeastern Thai lunch