The Stranger in Bangkok finds himself immersed in the realm of Thai spirits

When one thinks about Thai movies, Mr Tony Jaa springing around smashing baddies comes to mind. But the next thing that pops up would probably be the internationally-acclaimed horror flicks like Shutter and more recently The Coffin. My local friend tells me that the reason why Thai horror stories are so real and spine-tingling is because they are created by people who have genuinely embraced the idea of ghosts for many generations.

Which brings me to my point of this post. There's this small exhibition hall (called TCDC) on the top level of the Emporium in Sukhumvit which never fails to mesmerize me. This year, it has held a showcase for Japan's dying art of bamboo weaving, followed by introducing Thai creative design commercial products to the public. This time, it took things up a notch and transformed itself into a creepy spiritual realm.

I brought Li Li and my mom here with a casual mindset. To me, it was supposed be a day of fun at an upscale shopping mall with a walk through the interesting exhibition followed by chilling out at a chic restaurant with some wicked Italian food. However, the organisers really caught us cold. Beyond that sliding door you see above is complete darkness, so dark that I did not dare to step forward. It was like something would appear and scare the crap out of us at any instant. Anyway, with some difficulty, I eventually led the 2 ladies through 2 turns in the darkness before a decent amount of light greeted us again.

The first part of the displays was really ok, perhaps they were warming us up before the real thing came. This was the only section where I could bring myself to snap some pictures.

The exhibition ended with a section with all the mystic Thai spirits, which were so freaky I did not want my camera to have anything to do with them. Imagine a lady's head with flowy long hair and only her internal organs (a flashing beating heart and intestines included) hanging off her neck. Worse thing is, she was floating around in circles in the room, catching people by surprise, resulting in an exhibition littered with shrieks of fright. I attempted to look for this particular's pictures online to put on this post, but I gave up prematurely as the images spooked me out again, sorry guys. If you are really interested, please google Kra Sue and see what you get. Much sympathy is offered to the security guard at the exhibition who was dedicated to follow Kra Sue on her journeys to ensure no one got hurt.

There was really an element of relief when we finally stepped out of the showcase, where we were greeted by a DIY desk, and guess what they were teaching kids to make...

A BLOODY SEVERED FINGER. Come on, give me a break!

BOO!