Bangkok’s lovely Museum Siam, which we visited a couple of years ago, has a very interesting temporary exhibition on at the moment.
“Thai Dialogue: Foreign Quote” is a free exhibition, exploring Siam’s history, culture, and identity through the eyes, journals, and artefacts of foreign visitors—including merchants, diplomats, missionaries, and scholars—across different eras.
It is fascinating and quite interactive, and what I really liked was the way, for example, 17th century European observations about Thailand are questioned and put into a sympathetic context.
For example, there is an interesting juxtaposition of 2 early differing European views on crocodiles, with one explorer saying that the crocs ate people and the other saying that because the villagers fed the crocs, they didn’t attack or eat them.
Since we don’t know if either of these 17th century gentlemen actually witnessed a crocodile eating a human (indeed, did they even see a reptile for themselves?) or whether their statements are based wholly on (translated?) hearsay, how do we know whom to believe? As the museum says, we have to flip things around and look from a different perspective.
Sometimes, the pronouncements of the early Europeans are breathtakingly (& embarrassingly) arrogant, such as the Frenchman Nicolas Gervaise’s remarks about mosquitoes.
Let me quote the exhibition here:
”Nicolas Gervaise chronicled that from dusk until dawn, an army of mosquitoes would follow people everywhere. Even when bundl;ed in three or four layers of fabric, there was no escaping their bites. The constant buzz, the sting, and the rich rendered the tiny insect more vicious than wild beats, which could at least be spotted and evaded.
The Siamese knew how to curb this nuisance with smoke.
Gervaise believed mosquitoes targeted Europeans rather than the natives because the Europeans possessed “finer blood” and “more delectable flesh.”
Even as an insect magnet, the outside maintained the proud perception of being a premium meal.”
“Even as an insect magnet…”. Isn’t that concluding sentence brilliant?
The early Europeans noted and wrote about all the new things they saw in Siam – like mangoes, which (understandably) they can only describe through familiar fruits, such as pears, peach, apricots and almond. This, concludes the museum, ”exposes how we familiarise ourselves with the unknown through something known.”
I like their philosophical take on all this!
Black teeth certainly puzzled early Europeans, including the Scot George Finlayson who, in 1821, wrote that black teeth “gives to them a disgusting appearance.”
Interestingly, Nicolas Gervaise had earlier noted that some Siamese found the white teeth of Westerners unattractive, comparing them to wild animals.
As the museum notes, “people from different cultures can look at the exact same teeth and see completely opposite meanings.”
As an aside – this was my first black teeth exposure, and given the even-handed approach of the museum, I deliberately didn’t “ooh” and “aah”…
Also on a personal level, I learned about Corrado Feroci, an Italian sculptor born in the late 19th century, who would later take Thai citizenship, change his name to Silpa Bhirasi and go on to design many of the city’s national monuments. Since I recently saw an Instagram post about a museum dedicated to his work, this all seemed very serendipitous.
I tell you, every day I learn something new.
A fun exhibition, which encourages today’s visitor to look at things differently and less judgemental-y.
If you’re in town, it’s well worth a visit. As is the rest of the Museum, I hasten to add.
The exhibition is on until October 4, 2026
Opening Hours: 10:00 AM – 6:00 PM Closed Mondays
Obviously no-one at the Museum knows that I blog and review, and as I mentioned, it is free.