Afternoon tea at the governor's mansion

Their Majesties the King and Queen have taken lunch at the residence on three occasions.

Manote Tripathi

The Nation

Nong Khai

  After meticulous refurbishment, the 80-year-old Nong Khai governor's mansion has reopened as a museum to flaunt its French colonial-Vietnamese arches and hallways and the river of history that has run through them.

 The mansion was home to 37 governors, the first one walking through its doors in 1929, the last one locking up behind him on April 29, 2007. He handed the keys to present governor Jadet Musikawong who gave the place new life as a museum and a landmark of the French Indo-Chinese culture that drifted across the Mekong.

 Nong Khai boasts several French-colonial structures in its old quarters, but the governor's mansion is the grandest - Their Majesties the King and Queen took lunch here during their tours of the province on November 9, 1955, October 24, 1966 and December 16, 1969. The King spent his first visit inspecting the living conditions of his subjects, his second assessing the problem of flooding in the city and the last presiding over the switch-on of the electricity supply to Lao PDR. The front-right staircase that Their Majesties used on that occasion has been closed ever since.

 Set in a palm-shaded eight-rai plot in downtown Nong Khai not far from the Mekong River, the mansion was initially designed as a residence for high-ranking Thai officials as well as for French civil servants on their way to Laos. Its two storeys are a mix of French colonial and Vietnamese styles, characterised by a hipped roof and a distinctive front portico accessed by four archways.

 The mansion was built with a budget of Bt25,000 in 1926 on an area belonging to a former ruler of Nong Khai. On completion, it served as the residence for the first governor, Phra Pathumthewaphiban (Yiam Pathumthewaphiban), and a number of Nong Khai provincial commissioners.

 Entering, visitors discover an interior restored to the gleaming elegance of those early days. Authentic touches come from the antique furniture and ornate d?cor, while the walls display photos of Their Majesties' official activities.

   The ground floor is divided into a front veranda, reception area, dining room, two toilets, a kitchen, bedroom, a living room and a passageway. The second floor houses a prayer room, two bedrooms, the main hall, a storage room, two toilets and a dressing room.

 Now banded by traditional Thai stencilling, the walls of the living room once echoed to the chatter of formal parties and dances. It's easy to imagine afternoon tea being served from a tray on the antique dresser that stands by the doors to the garden. The natural light that floods through those doors and the large windows gives the room an airy feel, but the sombre glow of halogen lighting helps recreate the ambience of officialdom.

 A trip to the toilet is no less stately: a cavernous bathtub sits on gleaming-white floor-tiling downstairs while private moments on the second floor offer a view onto the lush garden ringing with birdsong.

 A roofed passageway paved with time-buckled clay tiles links the main building with a Thai-style kitchen house, whose smoke and smells couldn't disturb the governor at this distance.

 A feature to look out for are the double doors found mostly on the upper floor. Each has two panels: one, a wooden door topped with louvres, opens outwards while the other, with glass panelling and louvres for ventilation, opens in.

 Observant visitors should find the Vietnamese elements especially striking. Vietnamese carpenters left evidence of their subtle skills in the staircase, and the green and red mosaic tiles with elegant flower motifs at its foot are Vietnamese imports.

 The antique furniture adds to the picture. The ground floor houses glass-panelled wooden cabinets displaying sets of chinaware that once graced official banquets. Then there are the details: old-fashioned padlocks/doorlocks, dressing tables, desks and beds used by successive generations of governing families.

 If the governor decided to dine alfresco, he could step out onto the cool lawn and into the shade provided by its canopy of trees. These days, visitors can follow in his footsteps for a final taste of a green oasis that was a fitting setting for Nong Khai's most powerful figure.