Buddhist temple built out of one million beer bottles
A temple has been built by monks in northeast Thailand who used over a million recycled beer bottles to make the walls and roof.
Buddhist monks have recycled over one million used bottles to build their temple in Khun Han, Thailand near the Cambodian border Photo: BRONEK KAMINSKI/BARCROFT MEDIA
Wat Pa Maha Chedi Kaew, also known as Wat Lan Kuad or 'the Temple of a Million Bottles', is in Sisaket province near the Cambodian border, 400 miles from the capital Bangkok.
The Buddhist monks began collecting bottles in 1984 and they collected so many that they decided to use them as a building material.
They encouraged the local authorities to send them more and they have now created a complex of around 20 buildings using the beer bottles, comprising the main temple over a lake, crematorium, prayer rooms, a hall, water tower, tourist bathrooms and several small bungalows raised off the ground which serve as monks quarters.
The bottles do not lose their colour, provide good lighting and are easy to clean, the men say.
A concrete core is used to strengthen the building and the green bottles are Heineken and the brown ones are the Thai beer Chang.
The monks are so eco-friendly that the mosaics of Buddha are created with recycled beer bottle caps.
Altogether there are about 1.5 million recycled bottles in the temple, and the monks at the temple are intending to reuse even more.
Abbot San Kataboonyo said: "The more bottles we get, the more buildings we make."
The beer bottle temple is now on an approved list of eco-friendly sight-seeing tours in southeast Asia.
8 comments:
they question that begs to be asked.
did they drink all the beer required, in order to recycle, for construction purposes
;)
Not sure,but if they did I wonder how they remembered where they left their begging bowls. No wonder why they are always smiling.
Sounds like a pretty cool way to recycle irregardless of where they got the empties from!
20 buildings already, wow, and they plan on building more, impressive!
Yes skye but just think of all of those emptys that have been taken out of the market.
To these monks it's like home brewers just don't matter. Oh and when I think of a million bottles filled with home brewed Coopers beer, it just makes my heart weep.
Damn Monks never think of anyone but themselves.
hey silv and skye
I just wanted to share some good news
Yesterday, the switch flipped.
Since the accident over 8 weeks ago, I have had what I called foggy vision.
I didn't know how else to explain it.
Then it went clear, snap your fingers, fog to clear.
It was so weird, I was stunned.
I say to hubby "wait, wait, wait a minute just let me look around".
It was clear, the sky was bluer, things were brighter.
He says what is it like, what happened.
I think, and explain
It was like on an old 35 mm camera, when you manually focused the lens and everything came clear, sharp and bright.
Hubby says 'depth of field' Like you got your depth of field?
Yes and then when you go to wikepedia and see the pic they show.(shallow depth of field)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depth_of_field
That was how I saw for over 8 weeks.
Then it was clear.
so it is a step forward, right silver, it really is
Great news Pen, like I have told you things will get better but in healing the brain takes little baby steps.
It will take time to get back to full steam but it will happen, trust me on this.
Whoohoo Penny, I'm so happy for you!
thanks, I am pretty dam happy for me too.
I still have a way to go, I know, but, this was good.
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