Temple of the Sacred Tooth

Kandy Lake, and the Temple of the Tooth Relic (the pitched roof buildings at the back), Sri Lanka

I love festivals. Religious festivals or whatever. It gives me a reason to celebrate, and I don’t have to crack my mind for ideas on what to write about in the blog, hehe!

It’s Wesak Day! (OK, it WAS Wesak Day …when I started writing, ahem). Wesak (or Vesak) is a day commemorating the birth, enlightenment and death of Lord Buddha (…I wiki’ed it, OK?) In India, it’s called Buddha Purnima. I dunno what people do on Wesak Day, I just remember that every year in Malaysia, I’ll get a day off from school, (which is always good news for a student, …especially a lazy student, …like me). I guess devout Buddhists will pray at temples, and that’s about it.

And since it is (was) Wesak, here’re some pictures of a famous Buddhist temple in Sri Lanka, the Temple of the Tooth Relic. If you’re god, even your teeth are sacred.

And if I’m god, I’ll give my cracked tooth and half-decayed teeth to the followers I like least, and save the best teeth for my favourite disciples. And I’ll still have a whole load of other bodily parts and personal items to bestow! I’ll probably make a catalogue of my body parts and personal items, listing them according to how valuable I think they are, and who they’d be given to. I’d probably give 1MDB (and its bosses) a piece of my poo. It’d be called holy shit! …Maybe that’s why I’ll never be god.

Enough of that nonsense! Here’re photos of the temple.




Temple of the Tooth Relic, Kandy, Sri Lanka – the last time I visited in 2004, the place was teeming with soldiers carrying machine-guns!


Temple of the Tooth, first floor – lotus flowers placed outside the tooth relic chamber – that’s probably the closest you will get to seeing the actual holy tooth. I heard that it’s quite rare that people are allowed to see it, and… nope, I dunno when we can do that. Besides, it’ll probably look like any other tooth except that it’s really ancient, and holy, and placed in the nicest of containers, or whatever they use to keep a tooth




Views of the Tooth Relic Chamber – this holy temple lies in the compound of the royal palace of Kandy. (Yup, Sri Lanka used to have kings. Then the British came and did what they did best i.e. friggin conquered the country.) Another view can be seen in this post. Note: DO NOT TAKE A PHOTO OF THIS CHAMBER BY POSING IN FRONT OF IT, WITH YOUR BACKS FACING THE BUILDING, or …that’ll probably be the last you see of your camera or phone. I helped a local couple to take a photo of them in front of the building, and before I could walk off, the temple officials were already there, giving the locals what must have been the lecture of their life. I dunno what happened after that, I snuck away as fast as I could!


Temple of the Tooth Museum


Temple / Palace grounds, Kandy, Sri Lanka


The streets of Kandy, Sri Lanka