Assumption Cathedral

This guide to Assumption Cathedral in Bangkok traces the city's oldest Catholic site from Father Pascal's 1809 land purchase through a reconstruction funded, decades later, by a Thai-Chinese merchant family. It follows a Thai priest, Nicholas Bunkerd Kitbamrung, arrested under suspicion during the Second World War, and a young king who walked through these doors soon after the war ended. You'll hear how French Gothic Romanesque towers, Italian marble, and a Thai-Chinese family's devotion ended up sharing this one bend of the river. Stand in the nave and look up at the vaulted frescoes.