Your guides into history

IT’S HALLOWEEN – the scariest day of the year – and folks all over are donning ghost masks, ghoulish makeup and spooky costumes.

At the Fai Fah Chan Learning Centre in Bangkok, youngsters are taking the notion of the “day of the dead” to a literal level, with a guided bicycle tour of the cemeteries and other historic sites of the South Sathorn neighbourhood. 

“Tam La Ha Kwam Lon” (“The Haunted Trail”) is one of the eight bike trips being organised as part of TMB’s “Dek Phuen Mueang” project. It will see cyclists set off at 5pm from the 200-year-old great banyan tree near the centre. They will pay their respects at the Luangpoo Thepa Damthung Shrine before riding to the Bangkok Protestant Cemetery near Asiatique where American missionary and physician Dr Dan Beach Bradley is buried, and along Chan Road to Kubo, the Muslim cemetery, before finishing at Teochew Park Cemetery, Bangkok’s largest, at 8pm.

“The trail is a by-product of the community mapping we did last year,” says Supatjaree Jantana, who heads TMB’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) intiatives. “We discovered several cemeteries around Baan Bab, Rong Nam Khaeng [Ice Factory], Wat Prok, Saint Louis and Don Kusol Pattana.

“The Wat Don cemetery is particularly famous for its ghost stories. A monk told us corpses used to float down the canal while a motorcyclist swore he was hired by a passenger who disappeared during the ride. It was really scary. We also heard about several hungry ghosts wandering around an alley beside Wat Prok. We want to show tourists that the living and dead can live together in the same area and help them to understand why the community isn’t afraid of ghosts.”

Dek Phuen Mueang, which loosely translates as “youth helping to recover the community”, is among the 18 CSR programmes in line with TMB’s motto of “making a difference” and bringing lasting change to communities. It is the first to be initiated by the Fai Fah Chan youths, who annually come up with projects that allow them to acquire knowledge and skills while helping their neighbourhood.

In 2013, the Fai Fah youths, together with 250 volunteers and residents of Baan Bab, worked to turn a wasteland and broken-down playground into a creative park. Last year, they mapped out the community and collected information from residents and religious places. That led to the creation of “The Journey”, a cycling project designed to bring in tourists while also highlighting the four religions and five distinct cultures in the South Sathorn neighbourhood.

 “Since we launched the first activity at Baan Bab last year, our young people, who pass the community all the time, have paid more attention to the Hindu and Mon residents,” says TMB’s Supatjaree. “One boy, Beer, told us he’d never been interested in history before but that the activity made him want to survey several communities.”

 This year, the youngsters have turned their attention to social enterprise and eco-tourism to create eight bike trips. In addition to the Halloween graveyard tour, other trips are “Secret Garden”, “Tamnan Wat Don” (“Legend of Wat Don”), “Hindu Hindi”, “Im Aroi Yol Sathapatyakram” (“Full with Food and Architecture”), “Yon Roi 9 Ratchakarn” (“Places Associated with the Nine Kings”), “Unseen Sathorn” and “Wai Phra Sathorn Tai” (“Pay Homage to Temples in South Sathorn”).

“The tourists can really touch the soul of the community. The price for each trip might seem a little high but it is in-depth and exclusive. Incomes from fees are spent in developing and supporting our youths’ products, while the money made from selling the products are put back in the Dek Phuen Mueang Fund,” says Supatjaree. “The youths have produced five patterns for five communities. We conducted a public hearing and asked the residents about the advantages they felt they could get from tourism. We are very concerned about disturbing the community.”

Beer, whose full name is Suwarat Suwanosot, says his life has changed for the better since he became involved with Fai Fah Chan.

“I had never even heard of the centre until a friend of mine persuaded me to study music here. Both visually and psychologically, Fai Fah Chan is much more than just a centre for learning. Yes, it teaches plenty of subjects but it also works on community development and social assistance,” says Beer, 18. “Whatever I learn from the centre, I pass on to the community, for example teaching art to the children and putting together this bike trip. I’ve also learned how to improve the quality of my life, how to build teamwork, and how to cope better in my daily life.

“I used to be addicted to games and hated everything about history,” Beer continues. “On my first day here, I took part in developing a community in Suan Phlu and the happiness and smiles on the faces on people I didn’t know made me feel valuable. There are five teams for five communities. I’m responsible for conducting the survey and sharing the work with the other teams. The information about several places on the trip is based on school textbooks or comes from the Culture Council Association of Thailand, as well as from our experiences after talking the community people.”

Veerapat “Mix” Thepbunchornchai, 17, is also involved.

“I live in [the St Louis church area], so I’m responsible for designing a community route as well as a bike route. I started asking the shopkeepers for information about the past but in fact all the residents are happy to pass on their memories. My grandfather sold noodles here and his sister sold kuay tiew rad na [fried noodle with broccoli]. The highlight of St Louis is a street packed with food shops near the Bun Tao Kong Chinese Shrine. It’s particularly famous for khao tom pla [rice porridge with fish]. I used to pass the road on my way to school but I never knew anything about it. The interesting places tourists will see on this bike trip include houses that date back more than 100 years in the Baan Bab community and the alley near a banyan tree,” Mix says.

Supaporn “Oil” Sirisophitkun served as a guide on the trial run for the bike trip on the nine kings.

“I still need to find out more about several places so I can be sure to give the right information to the tourists. I also have to practise speaking politely and behaving myself and I need to manage the travelling time better,” Oil says.

 The “Yon Roi 9 Ratchakarn” trip takes in Wat Don, built during the reign of King Rama I, Wat Suthiwararam (constructed under King Rama II) and Wat Yannawa (King Rama III). The other sites are Bangkok Dock (King Rama IV), St Louis Hospital and the Jawa Mosque (King Rama V), Wat Suthiwararam School (built under King Rama VI, and the first school in South Sathorn), Wat Prok and Vishnu Temple (King Rama VII), Wat Suthiwararan School (King Rama VIII) and St Louis Church, which was built during the present His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej’s reign.

 

SADDLE UP

 

- To join a Fai Fah Chan bike trip, call (02) 286 7172, (089) 479 8784 or e-mail [email protected].

- For more details, check www.tmbbank.com/fai_fah/home.