cremation of a monk in Chiang Mai, Thailand

January of 2010, we witness the cremation of a famous monk in Chiang Mai, Thailand.
He died a year ago. In that time his body was drying and his disciples were building this cremation ark.

The more famous the monk, in general, the larger the ark. Several things can make a monk famous or popular: wisdom, age, sometimes psychic powers, loving kindness and having many loving students. This monk was very famous by the age of 91 years and had lots of disciples.

His ark cost about one million, one hundred thousand baths to build about 33 thousand dollars. It cost about 300,000 baht to burn, about 9,000 dollars.

Many people came to Wat (temple) Chedi Luang to see it. The pictures are of morning before the burning, evening, evening during the burning and the day after.

There is a picture of a monk in a stand by himself. That is a wax replica of the famous monk. His boy is in the rectangle box in the ark.

This doesn’t happen very often. My friend Jamlong said that the last time he saw something like this was 20 years ago.

Best wishes
Lawrence