Open Collections

Courtyard and Performance Stage of the Niao Shi Temple (鳥石寺) (ศาลเจ้า โอวเจียะ หยี่อาเนี้ยเก็ง) (Sanchao O Jia Yi Ania Keng)

From the Ground Up: Buddhism & East Asian Religions (FROGBEAR Project)

The Niao Shi Temple (鳥石寺) (ศาลเจ้า โอวเจียะ หยี่อาเนี้ยเก็ง) (Sanchao O Jia Yi Ania Keng) is a Guanyin (觀音) temple in a quiet neighborhood in Bangkok, Thailand. According to the temple caretaker, the temple was established 200 years ago by Teochew Chinese (唐人) (ชาวเถิง) people. The temple is run by a committee whose membership is passed hereditarily, but at the time fieldwork participants visited in May 2023, there was only one surviving committee member, whom the temple caretaker deemed "too old to walk." The temple is known in the neighborhood for effecting miracles. The caretaker told participants stories of how people who wish to sell their land bring signs reading "SOLD" and leave it in the temple, and then their property is sold, after which the templegoers come back and burn the sales certificate. Some other templegoers claimed that they put the names of ill family members under Guanyin altar, and their family members miraculously recovered. It was said that the CEO of a large grocery store chain called Makro came to pray at this temple when he was a taxi driver, and as he regularly prayed, he became more and more wealthy. He now returns to the temple once a month to donate and help the caretaker renovate certain spaces. There are two regular chanting groups of roughly 60-70 people who frequent the temple. The groups are made up of both older men and women who wear white and speak Chinese. Each of these groups comes around only once a month. The temple is open from 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. everyday. The following set of images show the courtyard and performance stage of the Niao Shi Temple (鳥石寺). Image 01 shows a view of the front of the temple and temple patio. On top of the roof there are two mirrored golden dragons, appearing to be depicted in water. On the left of the photo there is a large pillar with dragon motif snaking up towards the top. There are lanterns like the ones placed at the front entranceway. For a reference to these lanterns, see "Right Patio Area of the Niao Shi Temple (鳥石寺) (ศาลเจ้า โอวเจียะ หยี่อาเนี้ยเก็ง) (Sanchao O Jia Yi Ania Keng)." Image 02 shows the right side of the courtyard, taken from the perspective of the middle. Image 03 shows the back of the right entranceway, featuring the inscription 出入平安 "May you come and go in peace." Image 04 shows the performance stage within the courtyard, featuring the temple caretaker's son on a tricycle. There are various motorcycles parked in this section, as well as toys. The stage as lanterns with 福 written on them, and pillars with golden dragon and cloud motifs. Having performance stages is very common across the Guanyin temples that fieldwork participants visited. Often, these performance stages served the purpose of entertaining Guanyin, and many of the temple caretakers said that there were performance troupes who came once a year to different temples in the area to give performances. The temple caretaker specified that at this temple, there are performances/operas for Guanyin once every four months, or the times a year. They specify that they regularly show her movies, but specifically on each of her three birthdays, which include the birthday of Guanyin according to the lunar calendar, the day that Guanyin was enlightened, and the day that she was sent to heaven. The caretaker claimed that Guanyin likes "old Chinese movies that have swords and are in color," and that her favorite types of movies were fighting or action movies. Metadata created and compiled by: Kira Johansen

Bangkok (Thailand); 13.719533; 100.482269

chi; tha

Cluster 3.4: Typologies of Text-Image Relations

Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library

10.14288/1.0441488

Non UBC

Faculty; Graduate; Undergraduate

DSpace