Monday, March 07, 2011

Haw Par Villa

roaawwwrrrrr

During February we had some friends drop by on their way through to the UK from a cruising holiday with their parents around the region (...). Benji wanted to see the "quirky" side of Singapore so I took them down to Haw Par Villa, the compound built by the brothers who established Tiger Balm.

The villa is filled with plaster concoctions of all sorts of weird and wonderful people and creatures from Chinese mythology, with the highlight of course being the pavilion of the 10 (or 18, depending on who you are) Levels of Hell (Diyu). From pits of lava for prostitutes, to being crushed by giant stones, to being ground up by a spiky pestle in a stone mortar, the punishments are detailed with meticulous accuracy. Apparantly legions of local kids have been scared by their parents into (temporary) good behaviour by this place.

Head over to flickr to seem some bad iphone+flash pics of the various floggings, crushings, cuttings, boilings and burnings. Good Fun!

No comments: