Sao Chingcha

Sao Chingcha — the Giant Swing — is a pair of 21.15-metre red teak pillars standing in an open roundabout in front of Wat Suthat in Bangkok’s old Rattanakosin quarter. There’s no gate or ticket: it’s a public monument, free to view at any hour, day or night.

Rama I raised the swing in 1784 when he extended the new capital east from Thonburi and marked the city’s centre with a cluster of shrines and temples, the swing among them. It anchored the Brahmin Triyampavai-Tripavai ceremony, an annual rite drawn from Hindu epic tradition, in which teams swung out on long ropes trying to snatch a bag of gold coins tied to a bamboo pole high above the crowd. Falls were common and sometimes fatal, and by the 1930s the ceremony had been discontinued — the swing itself stayed as a landmark.

The structure standing today isn’t the original. Two centuries of monsoon rain had rotted the teak beyond safe repair, so the whole swing was taken down and rebuilt over three days in September 2007, using golden teak logs shipped in from Phrae province in the north. The design follows the old one closely: a pair of central pillars flanked by two sets of angled stilts, all round-lathed teak trunks painted red, joined at the top by a carved crossbeam. The base is a white exposed-aggregate lotus pedestal, with a stone tablet set into its arch recounting the swing’s history for passers-by.

Insider Tip: Shoot it early — before 8 AM, traffic on the roundabout is light and the low sun catches the red teak against the whitewashed pedestal. By mid-morning, tour buses and songthaews circle constantly.

Watch out: The swing sits in the middle of a live traffic roundabout with no pedestrian bridge. Use the marked crossings and wait for a gap — cars don’t always slow for the junction.

Pair the visit with Wat Suthat’s ordination hall next door, home to one of Thailand’s largest surviving Sukhothai-era Buddha images, or continue on to the shophouses along Bamrung Mueang Road, Bangkok’s traditional street for Buddha statues and monk’s alms bowls.