Songkran in Chiang Mai I’ve had many friends over the years rave about how good Songkran is, so naturally I had to find out for myself. I have already attended one incredible festival in Chiang Mai, the Yi Peng Lantern Festival, which I didn’t think could be topped. I would have to say that Songkran […]
The temples of Bagan – Myanmar
After visiting the incredible Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon I was wondering if anything could top that in Myanmar? It didn’t take long to find out, with my next stop at Bagan. [Temples on the Bagan Plain] Ancient Bagan Bagan is the site of a ruined city in central Myanmar that was a powerful capital nearly […]
Shwedagon Pagoda – The cure for temple fatigue
[Shwedagon Pagoda (Paya), Yangon – Myanmar] Visitors to Europe would be familiar with the phenomenon of being cathedralled out. This is when you visit lots of cathedrals in a short space of time, to the point that you tire of even the grandest of cathedrals. The same happens with the temples of Asia. To be […]
The joy of Yi Peng, 10000 Lantern Release Festival – Chiang Mai
Sometimes words and pictures just can’t describe events. The Yi Peng Festival was such an event for me. I have many friends in Chiang Mai who have been to Yi Peng before and told me it is one of the highlights of the year. With such an endorsement I had to see this for myself. […]
Seeking Nirvana in Bodhgaya – where the Buddha attained enlightenment
India has three of the four most important Buddhist pilgrimage sites in the world, with the fourth being in Nepal. That is an impressive heritage for a country that counts less than one percent of its population as Buddhist (though ask any entrepreneur and most would take 1% of billion). Out of those four sites, […]
The Bangkok 9 Wats in One Day Challenge
Bangkok’s reputation as a traffic clogged megalopolis overshadows the fact that Bangkok has more temples than any capital in Southeast Asia. Bangkok is the seat of Thai Buddhism, and the grandest wats in Thailand are in the capital. A popular way to visit the wats is to visit 9 temples in one day. In Thai […]
Borobudur: The biggest Buddhist temple in the world
Borobudur Temple Borobudur Temple is the biggest Buddhist temple in the world, which is impressive considering that it’s not in a Buddhist country but in Central Java, Indonesia. [Borobudur Temple] It’s a temple that ranks with Cambodia’s Angkor Wat and Myanmar’s Bagan as one of the great religious monuments of Southeast Asia. What is more […]