Kanchanaburi – Floating market, Bridge over River Kwai and…a sugar factory.
Sunday, December 3rd, 2006I realise this is not a spelling bee, but how do you spell excitement? I’ll tell you.
s.u.g.a.r.f.a.c.t.o.r.y
Our anticipation on the bus journey to this monumental human creation (a rival to the seven wonders of late antiquity indeed) was ferverous and palpable. Ruth’s bladder almost succumbed to the suspense.
A factory producing sugar.
Sugar!
Factory!!
Sightseeing!!!
A strange combination involving connections my less imaginative brain would never have made.
Actually sugar can be quite interesting. Sydney Mintz, in his seminal text, ‘Sweetness and Power’ articulates the remarkable history of sugar – a tale intimately tied into slavery, colonialism and globalization, the confluence of which mutually constituted tyhe entities of Europe, Asia, and Africa and played no insignificant role in the industrialisation of Great Britain and the development of capitalism.
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andrewlegon