Uploaded on 2017-08-09 by Mike Scheer

While I spent time in Krabi, Thailand recently, I snapped this photo of a temple at the base of Tiger Cave Temple near Krabi, Thailand. The Temple depicted is clearly getting an addition. The addition appears to employ steel-reinforced concrete to build up the floors. Temples like this one are incredibly common across Southeast Asia, but I saw very few that were being built or added onto. Steel is produced very sparingly in Thailand, as shown in the maps of steel producing countries in the video lectures for this chapter. So, this reinforced concrete is representative of a globalized economy. The developers likely imported the steel used here from China or even the United States. Floor one of this Temple has a unique design but looks somewhat similar to most of the Temples in the region, with gold ornamentation, meticulous decoration and painting, and spires reaching up towards the heavens. To see, at the top of the image, the bare additional structure being constructed with concrete and steel is a bit odd. It looks out of place and disconnected. I'm sure that at the conclusion of the project it will look more succinct, but the building materials used these days for Temples across the region probably source too much non-local products like concrete and steel in this manner. Mike Scheer