Ganesh

I had been admiring this shrine for a while, right outside a huge mall called Central World,

where people had been stopping to worship all day, in the midst of big city craziness!

 I met a couple of Thais who explained that this was a god named "Pík Khanet," otherwise known as "Ganesh," from India (khanet>ganet>ganesh)...

and that he was, among many other things, the god of artists!  Performers in Thailand apparently pay respects to him before performing. 

They said I must have found my destination, and taught me how to pay respects, with 9 incense sticks, one candle (free at the site)...

and flowers (which they graciously gave me)...

and then kneeling down and praying.  They told me to pray for money, success, artistic accomplishments, and "all things better."

here's our incense in the bowl, 

and our flowers went on the heads of these elephants (later when I walked by there were mountains of flowers on top of ours):

There was something truly transportive about this gorgeously glittering shrine, despite, or maybe because of, its busy, super loud location.

It had been a long time since I kneeled, prayed, or had any kind of induced spiritual experience, but this was definitely one.  To remember.  Thank you Pík Khanét.

P.S. While I was gathering the incense a man came up to me and asked "do you believe?"  Now I'm not one to lie to the Buddhist police, so I just replied "Pom ben silapín" ("I'm an artist"), and that satisfied him to allow me pay respects to this god of art!