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REBIRTH

Burial

People lie down into ornate coffins in order to end their old life....

...and begin a new one.

Wat Prommanee, a Buddhist temple, 66 miles northeast of Bangkok, offers believers the chance to lay in a coffin for a few moments, then rise up and feel reborn…

At Wat Prommanee people actually wait in line and pay a fee for a chance to get a new life. It’s one of the strangest ceremonies in the world, but one that has been rising in popularity ever since the temple started practicing it, over six years ago. Nine colorful coffins dominate the main hall of Wat Prommanee Temple, and hundreds of people lie down in them every day, playing dead for about a minute and a half, listening to religious chants, and then rise up at command, feeling cleansed and relaxed.

Wat Prommanee basically offers a daily resurrection service that many Thais believe washes away bad luck and helps prolong their life. The ceremony apparently relaxes them and gives them positive thoughts, so many people come back to Wat Prommanee Temple for the chance to be reborn several times over a few years. All they have to do is pay a small fee of 180 baht each, a little more than $5. 100 baht of it goes to buy real coffins for poor families who can't afford coffins and burials for their loved ones.

Next in line

Preparing to die

As recent economic hardship brings uncertainty and people try seeking a bailout on life. In growing numbers, they come here from around Thailand to join what has become an assembly line of resurrection.

"When the economy is down, we latch our hopes onto some supernatural power," said Ekachai Uekrongtham, the writer-director whose movie "The Coffin" is in Thai cinemas with a plot that revolves around such funerals for the living.

Chanting last rites

The monk chants over the dying person.

Buddhism in Thailand can take strange forms, embracing animist superstition, magical practices - and the entrepreneurial spirit of many senior monks. Many Thais say that the true spirit of Buddhism is being lost.

Many temples have become centers of enterprise that parallel Thailand's economic growth over the past few decades, selling good-luck amulets, holding boisterous fairs and telling fortunes.

Wat Prommanee, located 106 kilometers (66 miles) northeast of Bangkok, has offered its unusual daily resurrection service for more than three years, and its clientele keeps growing.

On weekends as many as 700 people a day pay the 180 baht each for the ceremony, and much more for amulets that are auctioned off by temple acolytes, screaming:

"We have only 50 of these, a limited edition, the price is up to you!" they cry. "Twenty baht, 50 baht, did I hear 300 baht? Someone has run into luck."
As the number of visitors has grown, their dip into the supernatural has become more perfunctory; now a monk with a bullhorn herds worshipers through the row of coffins, nine at a time.

Out with the old life and in with the new.

"When I went in I felt warm, and when I came out I felt released," said Nual Chaichamni, 52, a masseuse who visited recently and who said she liked the feeling so much that she had done it six times.

"As I lay there and listened to the chanting of the monks, I felt relaxed," she said. "When I got up, I was thinking of good things, thinking of the Buddha image in the hall. I felt good."

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To learn more about the rebirth ritual, take a look at the following web sites:

New York Times On Line
BuddhistChannel.tv
Oddity Central