Conversation with Hermann Hesse

For some reason I did not like to read when I grew out of childhood. I always felt losing out on something else, like hanging out with friends. In fact, reading is time consuming as long as you do not experience the journey taking place in your mind. Worse, in highschool we were tasked to read and quote certain classic literature. Indeed, I did hate school at that time, not only because I was up to the age of 16 at the lower end lining up at gymnastic classes. Imagine, mixed classes ... and most girls up on the line.

But one day I met Siddhartha. Hermann Hesse's highly recommendable novel as pocket book edition (now also available as ebook for free). I still remember the blue cover with the author's portrait that appears to me like an hommage to Ghandi. It was the time when I painted the famous Che Guevara profile on the back of my leather gilet jacket and listend first time into my elder brother's double LP of the legendary Woodstock Festival.

The reading experience did not turn me into a better person. Already before my meeting with Siddhartha I created a world around myself where - in my childish behaviour - I held a funeral after the saddening death of a bee, laying it to rest in an empty matchbox . But the novel gave me some support in a difficult time as adolescent, contributing to a more holistic awareness and understanding as human being. Growing up in a dominantly roman-catholic country at a time where religion was a subject to be tested and marked - based on the doctrine of cathechism, full of drawings like the snake offering Eve the tricky apple - drove me into a somewhat alienated relationship with religion in general.

 

Walking through the streets of Chiang Mai, I felt surprised not only by the number and variety of temples throughout the old part of the city, but also its finishing, influenced by different dynasties and people over centuries. Though travelling equipped only with my simple 2-megapixel camera of my Nokia E61i - to avoid getting distracted in search for the best "shot" and "zoom-in", but same time cutting off the rest of the surrounding reality - I could not resist to take several pictures while walking through the sacred grounds, by day and by night.

The plated gold on statutes and buldings was too shiny for my camera, but this only underlines that one should take the time for admiration in person. Another surprise was that Buddha statutes are not necessarily something ancient: as you can see they are still built in simple but fascinating local techniques ... in the middle of nowhere (countryside up a hill above Pai), as only a falang foolishly may say.

Links to pictures of temple sites (taken with my Nokia E61i):

Tempel sites in Chiang Mai by day

Tempel sites in Chiang Mai by night