The White Temple: Wat Rong Khun

The White Temple

Alor Setar, Malaysia, September 2013

I had seen a photo of this temple before, Mrs. Tao our lovely host in Mengla in the province of Yunnan, China, had shown it to me when she knew that we were heading to Thailand. Her iphone picture was outstanding, a white temple with an architecture I had not seen before, it was like a mix of Chinese and Thai styles. At least that is what I could make up of this white temple of dragons and mirrors. I was looking forward to seeing it, but I was not sure if we would have the chance to. I could only hope it was on our route to Bangkok.

Nice Details

So there we were two months after in front of this surrealistic structure of the Wat Rong Khun temple. The temple was even more imposing live. The first thing that caught my attention was a sculpture on ground level of the alien from the movie *Alien, yes the same one that Sigourney Weaver tries to kill many times and in many sequels. I then knew there was much more to this temple than just its radiant whiteness.

Alienation

Buda

Inside the Wat Rong Khun 

“Take your shoes off” read a sign just before entering a small bridge that guided me to the main shrine. Below the bridge were many sculptured hands that I related to the ones that were described in one of the levels of hell by none other than Dante Alighieri. I felt sorrow for these nonexistent people; so strong was the power of the sculptures. The temple was all decorated from the outside by skulls, dragons, celestial creatures and Bodhisattva´s that I had seen in the murals of many of the Buddhist temples. This mix of the old and the new resulted in a one of kind experience inside a temple.

However the best of the temple was yet to come. Once I got inside the main shrine two larger than life murals faced each other in a sort of symbolic confrontation. Good vs. Evil, it was very easy to interpret. Facing me was a mural of the enlightened Buddha radiating light form the sun with his emblematic everlasting smile of peace. Facing him was the mural of a demon being assisted by many of the heroes that I had once admired as a kid to attack with evil fire the peace of the Buda. “No, not you, Luke Skywalker” I said to myself. Apparently Luke as well as Superman, Batman and even Shrek had finally succumbed to the evil forces of the dark side.

Like all the great pieces of art, this apparent heresy of pop culture had a well established reason to be. According to the master mind of this uncompleted temple, the famous Thai artist Chalermchai Kositpipat , all of these figures act as distractions to the real message of Buddha. They are basically the reason why we procrastinate our spiritual growth and that is why he used them in the mural of the “evil”. In fact that is why he surrounds the temple with these kinds of icons, to show us that it is only when we find our Buddhahood deep inside ourselves by setting aside all distractions we are able to reach enlightenment. The basis of Buddhism. The temple itself represents his life’s purpose, to create a space where people can learn from the teachings of Buddha and accomplish immortality.

The Golden Toilets

Inside

In addition to the shrines and sculptures he built, there are the coolest bathrooms I have ever set foot on. Clean, spacey and decorated with more gold than I had ever seen invested in a bathroom.

The temple itself is far from finished, it will require more time and investment, but as Chalermchai says,“Only death can stop my dream but cannot stop my project”. The Wat is planned to house nine buildings including a pagoda, a crematorium, a monastery hall, a preaching hall, a museum, a pavilion, as well as more golden rest room facilities which will be built on an area of 3 acres.

Before I left the premise I turned back towards the white temple and wished with all my heart that the temple would be completed soon. I then thought to myself, “White does suites this golden country”.

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*“fe de erratas” that the sculpture is Predator the one that Arnold Schwarzenegger fights against in the movie by the same name.