We travelled by car from Sutton to Wimbledon to visit what we know as the “Buddhapadia Temple” – a Thai Temple financed by the King of Thailand. This caters for the UK’s relatively small Thai population (and the Theravada School of Early Buddhism they follow) – and for other Asian and non-Asian populations that follow all types of different people. The Thais are fairly tolerant. Due to the lack of Buddhist Temples in the UK – Chinese people tend to visit this Thai Temple – as do we. Richard Hunn stayed in this temple studying meditation during the 1970s, and I think he returned their in the 1980s to make a documentary about the famous murals (I am not sure about the exact dates).
We arrived to find the Thais were celebrating their version of a “Mid-Autumn Festival” and quietly entered the temple through a side-entrance. As I have spent months sat meditating in this temple in the past – I knew all the path-ways and short-cuts that by-passed the main areas were many other people congregate. Although we wanted to light incense at the Buddha statues – we did not want to intrude in the Thai rituals. I discovered that the Thai name of the temple is in fact “วัดพุทธปทีป” or “Wat Phutthapthip”. I think in Indian Pali this is written as “Buddhapadipa” which translates as “Buddha Lamp” or “Buddha Light”. The Thai term “วัด” (Wat) or “Temple” – is written as “寺”(Si) within the Chinese language (amongst other terms). We took a photograph with us of Richard – stored on my ipad.
