Buddha Tooth Relic Temple and Museum

Despite Michelle having worked in Chinatown, Singapore for nearly a year now, the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple and Museum is only the second of many tourist sites there that we have visited (the first being the Sri Mariamman Temple which we covered back in April). You can guess by its name that the main attraction is of course the Tooth itself; unfortunately we didn't get to see it on our visit as (1) while the temple is open from 7:00am to 7:00pm daily, the Sacred Buddha Tooth Relic Chamber that houses it is only open from 9:00am to 6:00pm daily, and we got there at 6:30pm (2) photo-taking of the Tooth is forbidden, so we wouldn't get any images of it anyway. Nevertheless the temple itself, inside and out, is a sight to behold and is worth making the trip downtown. (Plus, it's free!)

The interior of the temple is huge and wondrously decorated. It doesn't show up too well in this picture, but there's a gorgeous display stage of a couple Buddhist gods/goddesses with a lovely canvas backdrop in the background!

Founded in 2002 by Venerable Shi Fa Zao, the temple is dedicated to the Maitreya Buddha, which means "The Compassionate One" and is also called "The Future Buddha". As a place of worship, incense is readily available at the entrance for those who want to make an offering, and temple robes are provided should you be "inappropriately dressed" - sleeveless, low-back tops, mini-skirts/shorts and strangely, hats, are not permitted within the site. The temple is five stories high including the rooftop, and even has a couple of basement levels for visitors to park their cars in.  Large, intricately carved and decorated statues of gods and goddesses are located in almost every corner of every room, and nearly every wall is lined from floor to ceiling with hundreds upon hundreds of miniature deities.

They're watching you. Every single one of them.

Seeing as we only had thirty minutes to explore the entirety of the temple before it closed, we pretty much breezed past most of the exhibits of deities after fully admiring the main hall, heading up to the rooftop where the Vairocana Buddha Prayer Wheel and the Pagoda of 1,000 Buddhas resided. The sight that greets you directly after exiting the lift is something right out of a meditation guidebook:

The Orchid Garden on the rooftop is very, very well maintained and absolutely beautiful, the greenery framing the Vairocana Buddha Prayer Wheel in the center. Someone had spun it recently when we reached the top, making it sound loudly every few seconds.

The rim of the Wheel is "embossed with Vairocana Mantra, [and] every turn of the wheel represents a single recital of the scripture and mantra."

We didn't need to look far to find the 1,000 Buddhas either, it was the same pagoda that housed the Wheel! (And I thought the hundreds of deity statues on the first floor was impressive!) These Buddha statues are about two inches in height and covered every inch of the walls, extending all the way to the walls outside the Wheel; they even have little numbers on them telling you exactly which number Buddha you are looking at!

ALL OF THEM. WATCHING YOU.

Unfortunately, as it was already 7:00pm by then, we had to leave shortly after visiting the rooftop, although we managed to squeeze in one more visit to the Museum part of the Temple before the guards chased us out (well, to be more accurate we got lost trying to exit the temple and wound up there. It was really more of a souvenir shop though, so we still left right after either way). There's really only so much we could cover in half an hour, but I'd definitely like to come back again some time in the future to fully enjoy the various floors of exhibits and of course, catch a glimpse of that famous Tooth myself.

More information and images of the Temple can be found here. Say hi to this guy for me if you go!