Thailand Cultural Show

A display outside the Sirm Niramit Cultural show

This was technically the last day of my stay in Bangkok (details to follow).  I needed to finish the project that I had been given at the school, so I spent the majority of the day working.

 

Cathy McConnell offered to go out with me in the evening.  After some research on the net, trying to find fun evening events in Bangkok, we decided on the Siram Niramit Cultural show.  It had received rave reviews on trip advisor and other places (including the largest stage in the Guinness world book of records) so we bought 2 tickets. 

We took the river boat from the school to Cathy’s apartment.  She gave me the grand tour.  Her place is amazing; 31 floors (she lives on the 31^st floor), with a view over the river (priceless), 2 roof top pools, a fully equipped gym, sauna, squash courts, badminton courts, a track for running, etc.  Its nuts.   She said, “only in Asia could she ever afford something like this”.

Cathy quickly changed and off we went to grab some dinner.  Cathy was craving western food so we went to this shopping mall on our way and ate at the “Black Canyon coffee shop”.  Not what you would expect, as it has a full diner menu plus coffee.    I had a Thai dish with noodles and prawns, she ate a club sandwitch.

After filling our bellies we ran off and took the BTS (skytrain), a subway, and a shuttle bus to get to the Thailand cultural Center, where the show "Siam Niramit" was taking place

The evening’s entertainment started with the Thailand national anthem.  With a video showing the great lengths that the king of Thailand king will go for his people.  Then the show started.  It was absolutely fantastic.  The show was broken down into different scenes, which showed or demonstrated various cultural aspects and the unique characteristics of each of Thailand’s provinces.  Including the Chinese influence on Thai culture. There was also a portion about Thai myths and beliefs (interesting to say the least … there was a scene with the devil and what will happen to you if you do bad things like steal, lie, commit adultery, etc.).  The show also included live animals like goats and elephants.  At one point the elephants were walking around the audience with their trainers on their backs.  Amazing.   They also had a stage that would cover with water for the scene with boats and to show the low lands and river communities in Thailand.  It was a spectacular event, full of brightly colored costumes, fantastic dancing, beautiful stage props, etc.  I thoroughly enjoyed the evening events.  I would definitely recommend this show to anyone going to Thailand. 

An elephant from the show; not a great picture, but the only one I had of the elephants.