Bridge on the River Kwai

Ready to leave Bangkok, we got up this morning, picked up our laundry, and caught a bus west to Kanchanaburi. We arrived 2 hours later to weather a bit cooler. Kanchanaburi is a small town of about 60,000 and lies right on the Mae Nam Khwae Yai (River Kwai). We checked into a hotel, our room floating right on the cool, clear river itself, and had some lunch. We then hired some bicyles and rode to the Jeath War Museum. The museum is a replica of the bamboo 'attap' huts that housed Allied POWs by the Japanese during WWII. Most of the camps were work camps, and the POWs were forced to build a railway (the 'Dealth Railway') connecting Thanbyuzayat, Myanmar (Burma) to Nong Pladuk, Thailand. The Japanese had gained control of Rangoon, Myanmar and this railway would allow them to ship supplies for their further conquests of other Asian countries. 'Jeath' is an acronym for Japan, England, Australia/America, Thailand and Holland, the nationalities of those involved in the railway construction. There is a lot of Aussie press clippings about the camps survivors and especially Weary Dunlop.

Next we rode to the Allied War Cemetery where the remains of Allied POWs who died during captivity are buried (except for the 356 Americans; they're buried in the U.S.). This is a beautiful cemetery, very green with colourful flowers planted between each gravestone. The POWs were under constant abuse and torture by the Japanese army. They worked 12-18 hour shifts and had few rest days. Their only food was a small ration of rice per day. They were paid a little bit and managed to use the money to trade with local Thai people to supplement their diets with a few eggs or salt, as well as medicine when it was available. An estimated 16,000 POWs died while building the railway, and another 90,000-100,000 Asian labourers from various nearby contries. They died of cholera, dysentery, starvation, beri beri, malaria, and in construction accidents.

Outside of the cemetery, we were approached by a group of Thai (we think) girls wanting to take a photo with us. We felt like we were in China again as we posed with the girls while each one took a picture with their individual cameras. I found it so ironic as they were such cute girls, and I looked shocking, hot and sweaty with my hair stuffed into a baseball hat, yet they still wanted my photo. We then pedalled ourselves to the Saphan Mae Nam Khwae, the so-called infamous 'Bridge On the River Kwai.' We wandered around a WWII museum, a dodgy rip-off of the Jeath War Museum we had just been to (but a lot more obscure), then walked across the bridge just in time for a beautiful sunset. On the other side, we watched a family of elephants having a nice cool bath in the river. There was a small baby elephant having a swim. He kept diving down, his tail and back legs kicking up out of the surface, then surfacing again. He was having a blast. We headed back to our hotel for a cold shower, had a great Thai dinner, then went to bed on the River Kwai.