Thailandia Dreaming: a new beginning

Thailandia Dreaming: a new beginning

Amazing landscapes, white sandy beaches, bustling metropolises and majestic temples: Thailand is a fascinating place and on this trip I want to discover the history, culture, nature and above all I want to understand spirituality.

Bathed by the Gulf of Thailand and the Andaman Sea, bordering with Laos, Burma, Cambodia and Malaysia, the Land of Smiles, is a land of ancient culture: its original settlers, in fact, inhabited around 40,000 years ago in the Paleolithic and remains of ancient civilizations today are in Ban Chiang a prehistoric village northeast of the country.

I will take a flight of 10 hours from Venice to reach the capital Bangkok, but I can’t wait to depart. The country has an area of about 500,000 square km but develops in latitude and for that presents very different landscapes: from the northern mountainous areas, you go to the great plains dotted center of rice fields to finally get to the paradisiacal beaches of the South.

In this new adventure I want to learn more about the spirituality of the country that is linked deeply with its history: Thailand, in fact, was gradually populated by monks and Khmer tribes and Thais who came from China through the fertile Mekong River valleys.
In the eleventh century, the Khmers were the dominant force, but their power lasted until the twelfth century when the Thais began to build small villages of Lanna, Phayao and Sukhothai. The warrior chiefs Thais, however, rebelled against the Khmers and established their first independent state near Sukhothai literally means “Dawn of Happiness”. From there began their expansion along the basin of the Chao Phraya River and started to spread Theravada Buddhism practiced today.
Following, Sukhothai was conquered by the young kingdom of Ayutthaya, whose archaeological site is now Unesco heritage.Their kingdom was one of the longest in Southeast Asia and lasted until 1767. Since 1932, Thailand has become a constitutional monarchy, and the current monarch, His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej, is much loved by his subjects.