Raiding the Archives

I thought at first that this was some kind of Thai joke, but I realised that it was in fact a reference to the King of Thailand, who used to play the saxophone and even jammed with some jazz musicians in New York when he was a young man.

Bangkok Art and Culture Centre

I was caught in another torrential downpour on my way to the boat. Usually it’s a quarter of an hour’s walk from Apple guest house to the boat that takes you into the centre of the city. But in the rain the pavements turn into skating rinks and progress is slow. I was drenched to the skin, despite my umbrella. This kind of rain falls so hard and fast that it bounces off the pavement and splashes you right up to the waist. The ticket sellers on the boat were wearing plastic raincoats that only covered them to their waists. Their trousers were soaking.

Bangkok Art and Culture Centre is a gleaming new building with white marble floors, a huge central atrium open all the way up to the roof, with escalators connecting the various floors.

Raiding the Archives was an event featuring presentations by members of the film archive, curators and film historians, interspersed by short films, some experimental, some low budget local Thai, some documentary.

I was disorientated when I emerged from the Centre since the roads at this point are crossed by a kind of spaghetti junction of overpasses and walkways on multiple levels. A busker was playing a set of plastic dustbins and a skateboard at ground level. A huge audience lined one of the walkways above, their cheers rising above the noise of the traffic. I negotiated various staircases, walkways, a department store, more walkways and staircases and eventually found my very wet bus stop. The bus ground slowly through the traffic, past thick crowds of young people, all waiting for some form of transport to take them home.

Another overcast, thick, muggy day today. More rain coming.