I first visited Wat Phai Rong Wua in 1975. In those distant, happy, briefly democratic days, one could not reach it by road but only by taking a boat up the Ta Chin River and then veering into a tributary which ended up as a short, new canal alongside the extensive grounds of the wat (Buddhist temple). Some friends had said with cheerful Bangkok condescension: ‘It’s in the middle of nowhere but it’s really worth a look!’ They described a vast complex of buildings, created by Luang Phor Khom (venerable monk named Khom), a charismatic abbot with a strong following in the Bangkok moneyed elite, to show Buddhism in Siam in a new, global light. Unlike the usual Thai wat, exclusive in spirit, Wat Phai Rong Wua was, they said, ecumenical, centred on Theravada Buddhism but offering space for Mahayana Buddhist and Brahmanic Hindu shrines, statues and images, and even, at the margins, emblems of Confucian Taoism, Islam and Christianity. This outlook seems similar to what today Thai call the sakon (international) ambition, which includes a demand for world recognition and offers a reciprocal recognition of the world.

My first reaction was simply astonishment at the sheer scale of the wat, and its spick-and-span look. The second was the strange feeling that I had wandered into a sort of religious Disneyland. A gigantic simulacrum of a Hindu temple in India was just that. There were no devotees and the interior decoration was perfunctory. It looked like a set for a historical film. What were two large concrete camels, painted red, doing at one of the main gates? No one but a few curious tourists had any visible interest in the Chinese shrine. Even stranger was Luang Phor Khom’s personal museum which included, side by side, an upright human skeleton in a glass cabinet and a life-size replica of  Michelangelo’s gigantic nude David wearing fashionable red underpants from the top of which poked part of a swollen, un-Florentine penis. The initial Disney effect was, however, undercut by a general emptiness: only a few monks, no novices, no nuns and very few lay persons.

For whom was the wat— in this (then) hard-to-access corner of rural Suphanburi—intended? I had no idea.

I did not go back to Wat Phai Rong Wua till the 1990s, not long after the death of Luang Phor Khom in January that year, at the age of 88, after 68 years as a monk. General Suchinda Krapayoon’s disastrous coup as only a year away in the future. The place had started to decay. Quickly made cement statues were crumbling, paint was flaking off everywhere, the vast open spaces were littered with used plastic bags and other wrappings, empty bottles, bits of newspaper, fragments of flip-flop slippers and so on. Only a handful of listless vendors could be seen. The whole place seemed desolate. Later it occurred to me that Luang Phor Khom had probably never calculated the mainte- nance cost of his colossal wat and, even more probably, was not capable of raising lots of money in his final days perhaps because of his age, perhaps because the Siam of  the 1970s was gone for ever. Big money had begun to come into the province but it was going to the city of Suphanburi, home to Banharn Silpa-archa, the powerful, ambitious Sino-Thai politician who eventually became prime minister (1995–96) and whose lavish pork-barrel projects were making people joke that the city’s name should be changed to Banharnburi.

Walking round in a slightly gloomy mood, my eye was caught by some noisy activity in a part of the complex that I had previously overlooked. A cheerful, tough-looking guy, heavily tattooed, was busy shaping a new statue to join the dozens of others representing evildoers being ferociously punished in ‘hell’. We chatted briefly and I asked him why the wat was so empty. He said something that stuck in my memory: ‘This part of the wat, at least, always has plenty of visitors.’ ‘Who comes?’ ‘Mostly parents and school- teachers bringing youngsters to see what will happen to them if they turn bad.’ What I noticed, but did not dare ask about, was that all but two of the tormented ‘sinners’ were stark naked, and that the males among them were given unusually large and sometimes swollen penises.

Hell was still growing, but monumental construction seemed to have long ground to a halt.

Almost 10 years after that I went back again with the idea of writing something about the wat, especially its unusual Narokphum (hell). My friends Mukhom Wongthes and May Ingawanij kindly went along to guide and help me. The wat itself seemed to have recovered a bit: some repainting, extensive tidying up, many more Buddha statues—both Hinayana and Mahayana—and quite a lot of monks. But still no novices or nuns. Narokphum seemed to be growing but very slowly.

It was at this juncture that the three of us started to think about investigating this rural hell within its local and wider contexts. The first puzzle was why all of Narokphum’s horribly tortured victims had ‘captions’ inscribed on their bodies in which they were referred to as praed (hungry ghosts). In everyday speech of the street sort, one can often hear people being cheerfully greeted as ai praed. Ai is a colloquial term of address to males, and can express either contempt or close friendship in the same cheerful tonality as ai ha (ha is literally ‘small pox’ or ‘plague’), ai hia (hia is a large, water monitor lizard that feeds on carrion) and ai krador (krador means ‘penis’). Nothing particularly terrible. The general lay idea is that the praed are ghosts of people whose sins were minor. Their sad and bleak afterworld is still close to the human world and they meet with no torturers. The figure for their condition is a spirit ravaged by perpetual hunger, especially for blood and pus, but with a mouth the size of a pinhole.

We decided to tackle the puzzle by making an inventory of all the captions. What sins would the list encompass? Could the list tell us something about the attitudes and intentions of the creators of Narokphum? Would it also have sakon characteristics? One thing was obvious after a single count: there was no great gender discrimination. The male praed outnumbered their female coun- terparts but not in a conspicuous manner.

This extract has been taken from ‘The Fate of Rural Hell — Asceticism and Desire in Buddhist Thailand’

by Benedict Anderson

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Well, why not begin with Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, who said in his Confessions: ‘Never did I exist so completely, never live so thoroughly, never was so much myself, if I dare use the expression, as in those journeys made on foot. Walking animates and enlivens my spirits; I can hardly think when in a state of inactivity; my body must be exercised to make my judgment active. The view of a fine country, a succession of agreeable prospects, a free air, a good appetite, and the health I gained by walking; the freedom of inns, and the distance from everything that can make me recollect the dependence of my situation, conspire to free my soul, and give boldness to my thoughts…’

Rousseau wasn’t the first to associate walking with ease of thought, but he was the first significant writer who reflects on what walking means; he imbues it with a romantic value: one gets closer to nature; to one’s origins, and immediately one feels a well-being, a feeling of pure happiness, one is also free. The walker experiences freedom. He can choose his own road. And then it’s good for the intellectual processes and the health to move about on foot. It’s best to walk out of the city, out into the air, out into the country-side and out into nature: it liberates thought and brings good appetite. But what shall we eat? Jean-Jacques was nature’s friend and advocate, but he was no vegetarian. We find an inn in the text, and imagine a fine meal with lots of good drink. So we aren’t in the clutches of nature, we’re a good distance away from the wilds: in other words we find ourselves somewhere in between. And this in between is the haunt of romanticism. We’ve enjoyed a good stroll out from the city but wild untamed nature is a fair distance ahead. We are somewhere in between the city and its opposite: wilderness. Here, in between, man is freed from the demands of knowledge and culture. We have deserted the theatres and museums and the art that adorn the ugliness of modern life. But we’re not so far removed that we can’t get back to the warmth of home and the evening’s notes. We inhabit an idyll. A landscape where one pleasant view supplants the other. We can’t see the city. We look out across a cultivated scene with farms and small country cottages. Here is an inn, a church with a steeple. ‘Absolute silence,’ Rousseau writes, ‘engenders melancholy. It is an image of death.’ But we can hear the birds and the stream that runs through the fields. Over there, a flock of sheep is grazing, and at just the right distance we can see horses and cows. But loveliest of all is the view of a small lake where the lonely wanderer has a boat waiting. He rows out alone with one oar and spends hours lying on his back in the bottom of the boat, until he exclaims in ecstasy: Oh Nature! Oh my love!

Jean-Jacques is fond of nature. It is, in a sense, his love. He loves nature like a woman. For Rousseau nature is first and foremost a concept. It is pure and unproblematic, devoid of conflict and impurity. For Rousseau, nature is a notion of a better and more unsophisticated place for human beings. It seems that Rousseau sees nature as an absence of towns, of all he despises: vanity and debate, society and art. Gone are the streets and the noise, the bustle and all the insincerity; merchants and lawyers, journalists and artists. Gone are industry and technology. Here, without all that, man is in his natural state: ‘he wanders about the forests, without industry, without speech, without a hearth, without war or ties. He has no need of others, neither has he any desire to harm them.’

The wanderer is, according to Rousseau, a plain, peaceful man. He is free. He has left the city, has left family and obligations. He has said farewell to work. Farewell to responsibility. Farewell to money. He has said goodbye to his friends and his love, to ambition and future. He is really a rebel, but now he has bidden farewell to rebellion as well. He wanders alone in the forest, a vagrant. He walks the roads, without too many belongings, he has taken possession of the world and its possibilities. He carries all that he needs in a sack on his back.

Jean-Jacques leaves the inn. The rebel and nature-lover, simply dressed in a long, light brown fustian coat above short breeches and long woolen hose. His shoes are thin but good. He leaves the inn. Now he must decide whether to turn and go home, or whether to go on a bit further. Jean-Jacques turns, he wants to get back to the house and his desk. No sooner is he back at home; he’s borrowed a small palace from a rich lady friend, than he seats himself behind his desk by the window. Here, in Meditations of a Solitary Walker, he writes: ‘When, therefore, I had sat down to describe my mental state in the most extraordinary situation a mortal man can find himself in, I found no simpler or surer way of achieving it than by making detailed notes about my lonely wanderings and the reveries that fill them when I allow my thoughts to run completely free and follow their natural course, unhindered and untrammeled. These hours of lonely meditation are the only ones in the course of the day in which I am entirely myself, and belong to me without constraint or diversion, and during which I can say that I am what nature has intended me to be.’

This extract has been taken from TRAMP.  by Tomas Espedal.

Translated by James Anderson .

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This town is so small that after one walk, every corner is familiar. I have already discovered an old, very pretty courtyard behind the church, and the best barber here who lives in a cobbled side street. I walked a few paces from his shop and I was suddenly on the edge of town:there were just a few red-brick villas, and a street that was sandy and looked like a cart track. Beyond this began the woods. I turned around, went back past the church and already knew my way around very well. The old courtyard leads you to the main street, and now I am sitting in the cafe Zum Rotem Adler to write for awhile. In my hotel room, I am always tempted to throw myself down on the bed and spend the brief hours of daylight idle. It requires great effort for me to write as I have a fever and my head is pounding as if from hammer blows.

I think if I knew someone here, I would soon lose my composure; but as it is, I don’t speak a word to anyone, and walk around unclear about my emotions.

The cafe seems quite an odd place to me. It appears to be a patisserie, with cakes displayed in vitrines and a shop girl wearing a black woollen dress and a white apron. In the corner, there is a light blue tiled stove, and sofas with upright, cushioned backrests lining the walls .A young puppy runs around yapping loudly, an unkempt, wretched creature. A grey-haired woman tries to stroke him but he runs away from her, his back arched in fear.The old woman follows him, coaxing him with a lump of  sugar and speaking loudly to him all the time.

I think she is insane. No one in the cafe seems to take any notice of her.

I have only written two pages so far and the pains are already beginning again, stabbing pains in my right side that cease as soon as I lie down or drink strong liquor. But I don’t want to lie down. I could write so well now, and it makes me terribly low to be so idle and all alone.

The insane old woman has left. I’d like to see how she crosses the street and if she talks aloud to herself outside too, like the grey-haired beggar women in Paris.

I never used to be able to tell the difference between insane people and drunkards; I would watch them in a kind of awestruck horror. But I’m not afraid of drunkards any more. I have often been drunk myself; it is  a beautiful, sad state in which we gain clarity on many things we would otherwise never admit to ourselves,emotions that we seek to hide, and that are not the worst in us after all.

I feel a little better now. I ask the reader to forgive me for what I write today; nevertheless, Sibylle said that even the bitterest experiences and the forlornest hours in my life shouldn’t be completely futile. This is why it’s so important to me, even in this hopeless state, to give in to my weakness and later, to put these pages to the only test that matters to me: whether I succeed, just once, in any way, to be taken seriously by Sibylle.

This extract has been taken from Lyric Novella

by Annemarie Schwarzenbach, Translated by Lucy Renner Jones

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People have very surprising as well as curious natures. Each person is a mixture of many and variegated traits. The same person’s character may have greed, contempt, ferocity side by side with compassion, sympathy as well as empathy. All of these remain mixed; people are, in most cases, hardly entirely good or bad. But in those who have a strong character (a straight and strong backbone, so to speak) and who have developed a set of values, ideals will keep the negative traits under control. These are the people in whom decency prevails. Moreover, this is as true of people as it is of individuals. I have seen this in Delhi, in Calcutta and in Santiniketan. It is, in fact, true everywhere. Nevertheless, the nature of a particular place, the mentality and lifestyle of its residents, the economic and political conditions—all these contribute to the special character of the life and mentality of its people. To say nothing of the changes time brings about. When I first went to Delhi, what used to strike me was the sheer number of cycles on the road. They were the very symbol of movement. These days, the number of motorcycles and cars must have increased vastly. Speed has obviously gone up, but this fast-moving life allows less peace and relief while competition grows ever sharper. Yet the sheer speed of life gets rid of pettiness and inertness; the draw of the life force increases. Thus speed has made a special and positive contribution to Delhi life. It did even in those days. But the excessive cultivation of success and the placement of monetary success above all else means that there were obstacles to achieving a mature and profound philosophy of life in Delhi. That’s how it seemed to me, to us. That difficulty is now universal.

What would a true philosophy of life be like? Would it not be one that looks not just for success but also for fulfillment? Success is not the same thing as fulfilment. The message of fulfilment goes far deeper. People want to improve their lives, to look for pleasure, and to this end they work. The desire to enrich their life provides zeal and perseverance. The ingredients and objects of sensual pleasure are limited in nature, which is why the desire for such leads one into the world of severe competition. It is only by fighting tooth and nail that one gets the taste of victory. But does the conquest of success give one everything? For dissatisfaction and want exist in the midst of success and the joy of advancement. We cannot find completion or fulfilment through worldly success or consumption. Indeed, frequently enough that road becomes increasing convoluted. In the same way, worldly success and fulfilment are separate in both an artist’s work and life. Very large earnings, great fame and recognition do not necessarily bring an artist significance or aesthetic achievement. The achievement of aesthetic realization through unrelenting devotion to one’s art is a rare and almost quasi-divine experience. During the time I’m speaking of, worldly success was not only a rare commodity in artistic endeavour but its extent was far more limited, especially in West Bengal. Now it is much more widespread, indeed to a hitherto unimaginable degree. This is what, in my opinion, one saw to some degree in Delhi those days. Similarly, the great number and variety of work results in a positive lively aspect but also has a problematical side. I am firmly convinced though, that all this churning will give rise to wonders. The very fact that so many are working in so many different ways is itself a matter for rejoicing.

After five or six years in the city, we had become a part of Delhi life, working and remaking our lives through all the cut and thrust. I had in the meantime joined the St Thomas School, on a part-time basis, and was enjoying it. It seemed a full life, with work, with occasional time spent at my parents’, with visiting historical places around Delhi like Agra, Mathura, Rishikesh, and the odd solo show (once Somnath’s, once mine). Once we returned from a visit to Calcutta only to finish the remainder of our holiday in Shimla. I enjoyed it immensely and I lost a lot of weight going up and down the hills in those four or five days. A few days later I fell rather ill and it was only afterwards that I realized I was pregnant. By then I was 36 or 37 and Somnath was 41 or 42. Chandana came late, and I suffered because of my age. Ma insisted we stay with them, even though she was quite ill herself. Despite her condition, she would make all sorts of arrangements to make sure I was comfortable. I still find it difficult to believe how much care she took of me. God knows how she managed! My parents were very close to Justice Hidayatullah of the Supreme Court and his wife Pushpa—they shared a deep and abiding friendship. I realized how close they were and how fond they were of me during Chandana’s birth, when their support proved crucial. Severe complications arose but, in the end, Chandana was born without any surgical intervention (thanks to the skills of Dr Pathak and Ma’s constant care). This little infant, with her pink face, a head covered with black curls, two inquisitive bright eyes and an unending hunger, first kept Safdarjang Hospital, then my parent’s house (for the next week) and, finally, our new flat at Hauz Khas, agog.

When he learned that Chandana was due, Somnath located and rented the flat at Hauz Khas. Our previous flat at Kamla Nagar was more than adequate for our purposes but its one drawback was that not a beam of sunlight would enter. This made little difference to us, since our time was spent working, wandering about and staying out of doors. But a baby had different requirements: she needed the sun, especially during the Delhi winter. This house was absolutely perfect: two storeys, with a courtyard and a pocket-handkerchief-sized garden. The ground floor, with two large rooms, kitchen, etc., was ours. It had plenty of sunshine and fresh air and was in a nice secluded area. On one side was a wall from an earlier era, and peacocks would step down from it and come into our courtyard. Above us lived a Bengali couple. We became fast friends in a short while and would stand by one another at times of need. I remember hose days clearly. Chandana’s presence changed our lives; she was the centre of our universe. Her first requirements were food and sleep. Between nursing her, caring for her, as well as constantly keeping an eye on her, I did manage to save a few bits of time for my work. A well-wisher told me, ‘Forget about work for the time being.’ As it happens, this was not true in my case. The mixture of joy and love which occurs when one is holding one’s child and which occasionally spreads to other relationships as well, would seek release. In any case, weariness seems to decrease if I work. So even in the middle of a thousand chores I would find time to do some drawings or small paintings on the roof. And my child’s many excitements and abilities—one never knew what she would do next! So many amusing incidents! Through all this I still wanted to paint. With parenthood, another sort of experience came into our lives. Everyone who has been a parent at some time in their life will know what a different feeling this is. Chandana was an active, happy-go-lucky child. Her mother never had to worry unnecessarily about her. She would spend time on her own, drawing. And this would give me time as well. I’d be at sixes and sevens, however, if she fell ill. It’s difficult not to feel very distressed when such a frail tiny creature feels pain or discomfort. All rational thoughts cease at such moments. But even then there would be friends to stand by us so far from home. I’m not even thinking of my parents—they were our principal support. Apart from them, in times of distress, especially if Chandana fell ill, the Nanda family were always there to help look after her. Mrs Nanda—Leela—was particularly fond of Chandana. Many of the other neighbours, Bengali and non-Bengali, were also very supportive. It was as though by becoming parents we had got integrated into a larger community. Ma used to call it ‘passport’. And, in truth, Chandana was, in those days, our ‘passport’, both to other people and to the world of feelings.

This extract has been taken from the catalogue published on the event of Reba Hore’s current exhibition running at the Seagull Foundation for the Arts.

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