THAILAND

Friendly and fun loving, exotic and tropical, cultured and historic, Thailand radiates a golden hue from its glittering temples and tropical beaches through to the ever comforting Thai smile. The celestial world is a close confidant in this Buddhist nation, and religious devotion is both colourful and ubiquitous. Gleaming temples and golden Buddhist statues frame the rural and modern landscape. Ancient banyan trees are ceremoniously wrapped in sacred cloth to honour the resident spirits; fortune bringing shrines decorate humble homes as well as monumental malls, while garland festooned dashboards ward off traffic accidents. Thailand is encounters between history and culture, the new and the old, at just about every turn.