Our Treasure Mission to Ayutthaya

On 19 to 22 June 2019, I went to Ayutthaya for my character-based gamification research together with a part-time Lecturer, Janielyn, who is doing her research on sounds. We are going to carry out our research experiments in a project module on Ayutthaya in this coming August semester (Aug 2019).

I designed the gamification concept and framework for the module. The main concept of the gamification is students embark on a Treasure Mission to hunt Ancient or Current Treasures in Ayutthaya that will inspire them to create new Treasures for today's society or for the future.

Below is...

MY AUTO-ETHNOGRAPHY ON LEARNERS’ IDENTITY (TALENT) THROUGH CHARACTER-BASED GAMIFICATION:

About 1.5 months before the trip to Ayutthaya, I was not interested to visit Ayutthaya at all until I saw one photo online which is taken in Ayutthaya. Here is a similar photo taken by me:

A Buddha head entwined within the roots of a tree. "What an extraordinary sight! This is the Treasure that I'm looking for in Ayutthaya!", I exclaimed. I'm always attracted to trees. Trees...Books... Now, I have something to look forward to or investigate in this trip. I found the meaning and the purpose of going to Ayutthaya.

Jan and I searched for information, photos and watch videos about Ayutthaya. Jan asked me one question I couldn't answer - why there are so many headless Buddha statues. I'm curious as well. Yea, why all or almost all of the statues are headless? Is it the heads are made of gold and are looted during the last siege? This question stimulates my curiosity to find out if the head of Buddha statues are made of gold.

The Buddha Head Tree and the question about whether Buddha heads are made of gold made my decision call to go to Ayutthaya!

Before I begin sharing my journey in Ayutthaya...I want to share my talent...

I am "Investigator Communicator" as my top talented character (the name is for academic research purpose. They are different from my public research). In other words, "Investigator Communicator" is my talent.


DAY 1 of Treasure Mission in Ayutthaya:

I did not switch my role of a lecturer to become a learner and my talented character, that I supposed to for my auto-ethnography research and test-playing my gamification work. I am not learning! Wait! Having said that, I told myself aren’t we always learn and be ourselves subconsciously most of the time? I believe some slow learners, like me, will have the problem of not able to quickly relate to the new class they are being assigned to and the new lesson that they enrolled. Learning is best when we are learning subconsciously. Don’t you agree? I realize the power of character-based gamification is that you are who you are - you do not need to consciously become someone else or act like an archetype of a grade A learner. We are who we are, we do what we do, and we learnt what we learnt subconsciously. We have different ways of learning. We are unique.

The first stop we went to is Wat Phra Ram, located on Ayutthaya’s city island inside the Historical Park in Pratu Chai sub-district. We arrived at 1:30pm. In spite of the unbearable heat, I took as many majestic architectural shots of the temple ruin as I could. I also took all the information boards of each part of the temple. I did not read them on the spot unlike what I usually would do. I told myself that I can read them back in the hotel. This is what an Investigator Communicator would do. Have all the information collected as the most important task to do and then study them later.

This is the first time I saw so many headless, arm-less and even body-less Buddha statues lining neatly on the brick stands. I felt sadness swelling inside of me. I quickly ‘shut off’ the feeling and took pictures of them. Those missing Buddha statues are being replaced by broken pieces of other statues and even bricks to represent the Buddha. I found this very creative and high adaptability to show their Buddha statues. Their creative and adaptability spirit has to be shown and communicated to the students. These are also some of the key learning points of the project module that focuses on alternative application, want to impart to the students. An Investigator Communicator will communicate what they investigate as useful information to their audience.   

Our next stop is Wat Maha That, a restored ruin of a Buddhist monastery located on the city island in the Historical Park of Ayutthaya in Tha Wasukri sub-district. As I mentioned earlier, I came to Ayutthaya to see this famous Buddha Head Tree. 

I am very excited and eager to know more information about the Tree and saw it with my own eyes instead of seeing its pictures online. I learned that doing research is not just searching online, but also go down to the place and experience it and its surrounding. The body of the Buddha head has disappeared and all that remains of this sandstone Buddha is part of its head. It lies beneath a Bodhi tree and supported by the tree roots. Before coming to Ayutthaya, I investigated and found my reason of coming to Ayutthaya - it is to uncover my ‘Tree’ roots, meaning, my spiritual roots. It got clearer when I am at Ayutthaya and finally found my spiritual roots! I'm not going to share my spiritual roots here. Back to being a learner. Learn and research directly on the subject is the best and one will get their idea or answer from there. With the new idea or answer, one can explain differently based on his or her perspective. An Investigator Communicator is able to use a new unique perspective to communicate the information in a fresh approach. 

The rest of the sights at Wat Maha That is almost same as Wat Phra Ram where there are broken Buddha statues and damaged bricks of the architectural structures of the monastery. Something different between the two sites is that towards the back of Wat Maha That, there is a huge unbroken Buddha statue worn with a yellow robe. Honestly, I’m surprised that it is unbroken. Is it because it is near to the back of the monastery? I’m curious to know why? Investigator is curious in nature - that is how we learn or how we make learning not like learning - something fun and natural.

Travelling via Tuk-tuk is also my first time. Janielyn told me that she felt Tuk-tuk is a motorbike converted to 3 wheels vehicle. Intrigued by her conversation on Tuk Tuk, I asked a question: Why are they called Tuk-tuk? I did a quick search on Wikipedia. 

Tuk-tuk is known as auto rickshaw. It is a motorized development of the traditional pulled rickshaw or cycle rickshaw. Most have three wheels, open air and do not tilt. Japan has exported three-wheelers to Thailand since 1934. It is called Tuk-tuk because of the sound made by their small-capacity, two-cycle engines. 

I have found the answer to my question again! You can see how curiosity helps an Investigator to learn.

Bang Lan night market is our next stop. I filmed Janielyn to share how she felt that the night market is a Treasure to her. It is an important culture and lifestyle of the Thai people. The night market is lively and crowded with people. As an Investigator Communicator, I do not like to be in crowded places. What I have discovered at the night market is that there are stalls selling mostly prepared food, fruits, tourist items to clothing.

Our Tuk-tuk driver, Ms. Joy, drove us to a place to watch Muay Thai. It is not planned in our itinerary. We took photos of their boxing gloves, punching bag and the boxing ring. 

We asked an experienced trainer some questions about their Thai boxing. He and another trainer also did a demonstration of their training. It is an eye-opener to see Muay Thai in action from the Thais. I can see and sense their spirit of pride on their Thai boxing. 

I filmed the Muay Thai training – this is a good example for the students to develop their pride on their masterpiece they create. In turn, strengthen their motivation towards learning.

DAY 2 of Treasure Mission in Ayutthaya:

The start of day 2 of Ayutthaya is the topic on Tuk-tuk. Janielyn and I have a casual discussion that we can use Tuk-tuk as one of the Quest on creativity instead of using the Pen Pineapple Apple Pen concept as it is more related to Ayutthaya, Thailand. I said that Tuk-tuk is like a combination of motorbike and pickup. It is easy to hop down and up for Tourists. If the ‘Treasure’ is useful, it is going to last for a long, long time. This is what I want to tell the students. Is this the unique ability of an Investigator Communicator? Communicate information using a unique approach.

Our first stop is Ayutthaya Railway Station. A big signboard on the wall shows the layout of Ayutthaya Railway Station. It captured my eyes immediately at the entrance of the station. “There is so many information in this layout!”, screaming excitedly inside of me like a child seeing their first toy. 

The next thing that captured my attention is Time Table of Ayutthaya Station. Also, it tells a lot of information such as places of departures and destinations, duration of travelling, departure time etc. I believe I am activating my Investigator Communicator’s abilities. Do you know that as an Investigator and a Communicator, information is fuel to our knowledge, and we believe knowledge is power! There are interesting floor tile patterns that I thought will be useful for the students thus I took some photos of them.         

The next stop is Wat Chaiwatthanaram. It was a royal temple complex during the Ayutthaya Period. It is situated on the west bank of the Chao Praya River, off the Ayutthaya city island in the western area in Ban Pom sub-district. 

It is as majestic as Wat Maha That. Here, the Buddha statues are more seriously damaged. This is my first time to see Janielyn getting emotional about what she saw. Her Talented Character is "Associate Scholar". She engages and immerses herself with Ayutthaya ruins. She asked why would they "destroy" one another whom worshiped and taught by the same Teacher? She revealed her traits of "Associate Scholar" when asking the question. 

A great discovery! I have found the answer to our question..yes again! Before the trip, Janielyn told me that she suspects all the headless Buddha statues are made of gold. This is the reason why all the head of Buddha statues disappeared as if they are being looted. One of the statues answered our question. Top half of the head is gone, left with lower part of the head with a peaceful smile. It is made up of sandstone like its body. 

From here, we are being revealed to a key insight into the history of Ayutthaya – the ruins are not caused or just caused by greed, but more of jealousy (I might be wrong. Don't believe what I said. Go and find out yourself). I am glad that I found this half-headed Buddha statue as it gives me a Treasure lesson! It teaches me a lesson that jealousy is a dangerous trigger of evil doings. You see, my talent is an Investigator Communicator, I need to share this Treasure lesson! Without coming to Ayutthaya, I will not know this key insight to Ayutthaya history as the books we borrowed never stated this. I also discovered that how the olden times used stucco relief panel (top, middle, bottom) to depict the scene. This can be innovated to create some illustration masterpiece for telling story.

The next stop is St. Joseph’s Church, situated on the banks of the Chao Praya river opposite the South West tip of the historical island. It is founded in 1666 which served as the center of the French Catholic mission for about a century until the Burmese destroyed Ayutthaya in 1767. Its bright yellow enlivens my sadness.

The last stop is Wat Niwet Thammaprawat (Church Temple). It was built in 1876 in the reign of King Rama V, the first Thai King who visited Europe. This Gothic-style Buddhist temple on a small island served as a royal temple when the King and his family spent their summer in the nearby Bang Pa-in Palace. Here, I have found many Treasures. The first Treasure found is stained-glass windows decorated to tell the story of Buddha instead of Jesus. 

The second Treasure is a huge golden Buddha under a Bodhi tree, however, there are two horse statues. I am curious why there are two horse statues? Ms. Joy mentioned the earlier transport in Ayutthaya is horse. Again, curious helps me to learn. The third Treasure is main chapel where its church-like exterior makes it stand out. Its interior is also decorated with church-like wall but with a number of small golden Buddha statues, marble floor, ceiling hanging with chandeliers and colourful stained-glass windows. A number of golden Buddha statues at placed the far end of the chapel. 

It is the same idea of Tuk-tuk. I reaffirm that creativity is combining 2 ideas together. Here, this is called Church Temple. This architectural site has attracted numerous tourists to Ayutthaya. This is the last stop and it is the ultimate learning that one has to travel to learn or we called it experiential learning.

I am blessed to find 6 Treasures in Ayutthaya. Here, I will only reveal 3 of them.

THE 3 TREASURES THAT I FOUND IN AYUTTHAYA:

Treasure 1: I learn that…

Learning is best when we are learning subconsciously. Don’t you agree? I realize the power of character-based gamification is that you are who you are - you do not need to consciously become someone else or an archetype of a grade A learner. We are who we are, we do what we do, and we learnt what we learnt subconsciously. 

Treasure 2: I learn that…

As an Investigator Communicator, my trigger of motivation to learn is curiosity. I am curious to know if the heads of headless Buddha statues are made of gold. Everyone is unique. Everyone's motivation to learn is different.

Treasure 3: I learn that…

The head of Buddha statues does not make of gold. The cause of the last war in Ayutthaya is not or just greed, but jealously (I might be wrong. Don't believe what I said. Go and find out yourself). I did not get to know from the books that we have borrowed and information online. It is my key insight into the history of Ayutthaya. This also pointed out the importance to learn on site - learning through experiential learning.



PS: What Treasures have you found in your recent trip? Play a character-based gamification - Treasure Mission.