Saturday, October 3, 2015

A Plethora of Penises

Disclaimer: I did not intend to find this awesome phallic oasis today, it is one of those adventures that just happens and needs to be written about.

Second Disclaimer: I had to look up the plural of penis.  In my entire life, I have never had the chance nor need to write the plural of penis, let alone use the word plethora in the same sentence. Great alliterations should never be turned down.

I think that this post needs to start off with how we wound up walking a half a kilometer down a small alley that led us to the Swissotel Nai Lert... 

My friend Eddie and I had been out geocaching all day, along with using our various models of fitbit to try to get in a certain amount of steps.  Suddenly I remembered an item that had been on my "bucket list" for quite some time.  I am not sure where I first caught wind of a penis shrine in Bangkok, but I for some reason the memory came back to me with a vengeance.  We looked up the location, and we were within a few kilometers.  What luck?!?

We decided that we had no choice but to walk the streets of Bangkok in search of... a shrine.  (I know what you thought I was going to write there... but that joke would have been way too easy).

After finally wandering around the quite lovely Swissotel Nai Lert (no, that is not a typo, there really is no "h" in Swissotel), we asked a groundskeeper where the penises were.  Thankfully we had a picture, as I don't think we know or ever wanted to know what the word "penis" is in Thai.  

He quickly escorted us off the grounds and pointed us in the right direction.  As the hotel is quite expensive and features an exclusive resort, I have a feeling that we were just a bit unwelcome wandering around in the guest area looking for wooden phallus objects.  

I can only imagine that TripAdvisor comment:

"Had a great stay at the Swissotel Nai Lert, except for the two random people who were wandering around searching for penises.  Not sure if they were crazy or bored, but it put a damper on my ingesting gin and tonics while sitting by the poolside."

While it was a bit awkward to walk around asking random people to show us where the penises were located, the eventual finding of the shrine was quite worth it. 

Needless to say, if you ever want a good laugh, walk up to someone in another country who speaks another language, while covered in sweat from walking around in a very humid and hot environment, and ask them where the penises are located.  Trust me, quite funny.  

Now, the shrine itself is a dedicated to a Goddess of Fertility and as such, people bring lots, (yes, lots), of different penis offerings.  Now, before you get all Lorena Bobbitt on someone to make yourself more fertile, the offering of a carved wooden, stone, or other artsy phallus is quite acceptable.  Make your choice, but make it wisely. 

Most of the penises, (I still want to say something like penisi, like octopi), are pretty normal, just scaled up or scaled down version of their human counterpart.  However, some look like an art project gone wrong.  I was going to search a version of that on google, but decided against it as I really did not want to see any art projects of this type either beautifully done or gone wrong. Feel free to do that on your own if you so desire.     

Without further teasing and/or gratuitous use of the word penis, here are some of my better penis pictures.   


A great feature for your backyard 

Carved... Wooden...

Must be a connection

I am not going to pretend to explain this one...

I like how this blends into the tree

Be careful climbing the tree

A display case

No clue why they are red...

The ribbon is a nice touch

I like how this shot framed Eddie

Bucket List:
See a penis shrine

I am sure it is going to be hard to top this one, but don't worry my dear readers, I shall try.  Until next time, be careful who you go up to in foreign countries asking to see penises. 

Well, this blog post had more references to male genitalia than I have ever used before in paragraph form.  A quick count has the direct references, not including photos at 16.  The things I do for my readers at home...  

For those of you who find yourself in Bangkok with a few hours to kill, here is the map of where you go to see this lovely feature for yourself.  You know, because you are bored and want to be able to tell this story to your friends as well...



1 comment:

  1. "...hard to top this one..." haha, I see what you did there, sir.
    ;)

    ReplyDelete