Imagery
Thailand, Part 3: Ao Phang-Nga
When we arrived at the cave, we were surprised to find ourselves in Hell—that is, in a life-sized recreation of the Buddhist concept of Hell. Although it may be hard to see in the picture, the poor souls in the background are being tortured in a wide variety of ways: being boiled in oil, being stabbed with spears or chopped with axes, having their intestines wrung out, being devoured by beasts, being hammered with mallets, being forced to climb a thorny tree, and my personal favorite (which I unfortunately did not capture in this shot), being put through a giant wringer and coming out looking like Gumby. The figure in the foreground is being dragged to judgment before the King of Hell. It looks humorous, but actually walking alone among the figures is kind of creepy.
Heaven, incidentally, was the cave itself, which was certainly nothing to shout about.