Day 94 - We have passed this temple many times. In fact, whenever we walked to the old market area we were near. Today, though, we walked inside.
The grounds were well-kept and we enjoyed the 3D murals of important events in the Buddha's life which encircled one area of the temple. Unfortunately, the writings were only in Cambodian, but Jay knows the stories. The most important part of the site was the 500+ year-old statue of a reclining Buddha. There's a sign on the site with this story:
THE VIRTUE OF PREAH ANG CHONG HAN HOY
In 1900 BE or in 1500 AD, a colossal statue of reclining Buddha was built and placed inside the main temple of Wat Preah Prohm Rath. What caused our then Buddhists to build the statue was that there was a story that in the year 1500 AD, there was a Buddhist monk who always traveled by boat to ask for food at Long Vek, the ancient capital of Cambodia, which is situated near the capital city of Phnom Penh. It is a long way from here to the ancient capital. But whenever he returned to this place from Long Vek, the rice in his pot was still fresh and so people nicknamed him Preah Ang Chong Han Hoy, which means “monk with freshly cooked rice in his pot.”
One day, while he was traveling in his boat, some sharks attacked the boat and the boat broke into two pieces. Instead of sinking into the lake, one piece of the boat floated to Wat Boribo in Kompong Chnang Province’s Boribo district. The Buddhists there built a standing statue. The other piece, the prow part, brought him back here safely. It was going with great speed that the water could not flow into it. Because of this wonderful event, our Buddhists decided to build a statue of reclining Buddha made of the wooden piece of the boat which has been kept in the Preah Vihear building. It has been subsiding deeper and deeper because the ground is growing thicker. Besides, the statue has been kept in the Preah Vihear building for over half a millennium.
