Snake temple

Many years ago there was a Chinese Buddhist monk named Chor Soo Kong who came to live in Penang. Like the Buddha he cared for all living creatures—even poisonous snakes. It is said that he gave shelter to snakes from the jungle.

A temple was built in his memory. It was finished about 1850. After it was completed vipers, poisonous snakes, came to stay in the temple. Vipers are still living in the temple today. Although their venom is deadly to humans, they have never been known to attack anyone. The correct name of the temple is Hock Kin Keong, sometimes it's also called the Temple of the Azure Cloud but most people call it the snake temple.


I visited the snake temple recently. There is a room in the temple where there are quite a few snakes. There are some big pythons. You can have your picture taken with them if you wish. There are also a few little guys like this.


Actually, when I got there these snakes were not moving at all. I thought they must be fakes. I asked someone and he said 'No, they like to rest in the daytime. They move around more at night.' Most of them were on a tall stand but this one was on a stand about one metre high. The man prodded it and it started to move. So I took a few photos.


The man explained that all the snakes on the high stand are venomous. They have poison that can kill a man. This one has had the venom removed. They put a red mark on its forehead so they know which one is safe.

I went out the back of the temple where there are some gardens. In trees in the gardens you can see more snakes sleeping.


When I came back inside I took this closeup shot of the snake without any venom.


Some of the others were moving around a little too. So I got on a chair and took this pic of one of them.

Sujata

Once upon a time there was a young, beautiful girl named Sujata who wanted a husband and a son. She was told to go to a banyan tree near the river and pray to the tree god.

Later she married a good man and they had a son. Sujata was very happy and always wanted to serve the tree god to show her appreciation.

Sujata had many cows that gave sweet milk. She used this milk to make sweet rice to give as an offering to the tree god.

One day, Sujata's servant went to clean the area under the tree but was surprised to see someone meditating there. The servant ran back to Sujata and said, 'The tree god is meditating under the tree. Now you will be able to give him rice in person.'

But it was not the tree god. It was Siddhartha Gautama meditating under the banyan tree. He was meditating so that he could become the Buddha.

Sujata took the bowl of rice to Siddhartha and bowed respectfully. She said, 'Please accept this rice from me. May you be as successful in obtaining your wishes as I have been.'

Siddhartha ate the rice. He continued to meditate under that tree and in time became enlightened. He achieved his wishes and became the Buddha.

The End

The sculpture of Siddhartha and Sujata was on the wall of a temple in Vientiane, Laos.

School for monks

These guys are monks at Wat Xam in Kompong Chhnang. This is a temple with a school for monks. There are over 100 monks who live at the temple. Most of them are there because their parents are very poor and can't afford to send them to school. So they become monks and go to live at the temple. Every morning they walk around the neighbourhood and people give them food. Sometimes they get a lot. Sometimes, not so much. Sometimes they get water in bottles too. Sometimes they don't get enough and they have to drink the water from under the ground. It isn't always clean but it's cleaner than the water from the river.

After the monks finish school here, many will go to Phnom Penh and study at the Buddhist University there. Most will stop being monks after they finish studying. Then they'll have to try to find a job.

I used to teach the monks at this school about four years ago. I visited last week to see if any of my old students were there but they weren't. They must have all moved to Phnom Penh or stopped being monks.

Free the birds

When we visited Wat Sala Loi in Korat there was a man who had these birds in a cage. They were for sale. When people buy them they don't take them home. These are not pet birds, they are wild birds. People buy them to set them free. They think that by setting the birds free they will make merit.

The next day the man will be back at the temple selling wild birds again. He has caught some more. Maybe they are even the same birds. I don't think there is any merit from buying these birds. If people stopped buying the birds the man would stop catching them and selling them. The birds would always be free. What do you think?

Very thin Buddha

Before the Buddha became the Buddha he was a prince. He had everything that money could buy. OK, he didn't have a Playstation or any other gaming equipment. They hadn't been invented in those days. But he was rich enough that he could have anything that had been invented.

His name was Siddhattha Gotama. Sometimes you'll see that spelt differently but it is probably still the same person. Anyway, he grew up with everything his parents, the king and queen, could buy him. When he grew up he fell in love and married and his wife had a son. But there were things about life he did not understand. He knew that no matter how much people had they still experienced suffering. He knew this but he didn't know why. So he left the palace and his family and became an ascetic. An ascetic is a person who lives life with almost nothing usually for religious reasons.

Siddhattha had some teachers who taught him all they knew but he still didn't have all the answers. At one point he didn't eat anything for a long, long time and became very thin. He almost died. And it didn't work either so he started eating again.



In Asia there are many beautiful statues of the Buddha but the ones I don't see very often are the ones of Siddhattha when he was very thin. When I was in Korat I was wandering around Wat Phayup. At the back, under a Bodhi Tree there was a statue of Siddhattha when he was very thin so I took this picture for you.

There is another picture like this here.

Cave temple

Once I went to a Buddhist temple that was inside a big cave, a real cave. In Korat there is one they call 'the cave in the city'. But it is not a real cave.

Phra Raj Wimonmelee, the head monk of Wat Phayup, once found some pieces of rock that had come from inside a cave. There had been an explosion, perhaps the cave was in a mine and it was blown up. When Phra Raj Wimonmelee found it many of the stalactites and stalagmites were there as well as other rocks from inside the cave. He bought them and had them sent back to his temple. There a cave was constructed inside a building. When you go into the building it is like you are inside a cave.

love from Grandpa

Temple dogs

Buddhist monks must never harm a living thing. Usually they will not even kill a mosquito. To kill anything, even a mosquito, is to make bad karma. If you go to a Buddhist temple it is OK to wear an insect repellent to keep the mosquitos away from you but you shouldn't kill them.

Lots of animals seem to know that they are safe in a Buddhist monastery and they make their way there. If there is a river next to the wat often the fish come to that spot and monks or other people feed them. There is even one temple in Thailand that is famous because of the tigers there. No one harms the tigers and the tigers don't harm anyone but they are still wild tigers.

In Thailand there are many stray dogs. People often feed stray dogs because that is a way of making merit. Often the dogs find their way to Buddhist temples and the monks look after them. It is usual to see lots of dogs as well as other animals in Buddhist temples in Thailand.

When I visited Wat Phayup with Nid we saw this dog. Its back legs seemed to be a little crippled. It could still walk but its legs didn't work properly. If it tried to scratch itself with its left hind leg, the leg wouldn't reach the itchy spot. The dog would keep trying but just kept going around in circles. We felt sorry for this dog but in the end he needed to scratch his right side and that worked. So then we were happy for it.

love from Grandpa

Making merit

Many Buddhists believe in karma. If you want good things to happen to you then you should do good things. If you do bad things, bad things will happen to you. Because of this, many Thai people like to do things to 'make merit' ('tam boon' in Thai language) so that good things will happen to them.

Buddhist monks don't usually buy food for themselves. They are usually only allowed to eat food that is given to them by others. Some monks live in areas where people are very poor so the monks don't get a lot to eat. Others are lucky and get more food than they can eat because lots of people like to make merit by feeding the monks.


At certain times of the year people are invited to make merit by coming to the temple and donating things to the monks, necessary things like clothes, soap, toothpaste, anything they might need on a regular basis.

I went to visit a temple near Mahasarakham with my friend. This temple in known as Wat Wangleung. In Thailand there are two types of monks, the regular ones and forest monks. Forest monks are more strict and follow more rules than the others. For example, they only eat one meal a day. Wat Wangleung is a temple for forest monks.

It was Sunday when I visited so many people had come along to make merit. There was a lot of food. First the food was offered to the monks who each took a little from each tray that was offered. After all the food was offered to the monks, what was left over was put on a table and all the people who had come along were able to share it.

Later there was a special ceremony. My friend's family had donated a sala to the temple. A sala is like a hall but it is open at the sides. People can gather there for ceremonies or to talk with the monks. This sala had just been built and a ceremony was held to hand it over to the monks.

After the ceremony I had a chat with the head monk. He invited me to come and stay at the temple next time I come back to Thailand. Maybe I will.

If you want to see more photos that I took during my visit to Wat Wangleung, just click here.

When you write Wat Wangleung in Thai it looks like this: วัดวังเลีง

love from Grandpa