The pleasantly mouldering temples of Anuradhapura aren't just curiosities for tourists to visit and write ace blogs about. Even the more remote ones attract their fair share of interactive scenery (i.e. local people), and major ones like the Bodhi Tree Temple are extremely hard to take vacant photos of without some bloody humans getting into frame. Sometimes I can't tell if I'm a perfectionist or a misanthrope.
The Bodhi tree itself is reputed to date back to 288 BC, which is really, really old. Impressive, sure, but did this tree uproot itself and fly hundreds of miles to join its owner in exile, like the Tobiume plum tree at Dazaifu definitely actually did? Didn't think so - bad luck Bodhi, you get second place.
Road to Sri Maha Bodiya
The journey was better than the destination in this instance, as I had the chance to hang out with stray dogs and friendly langurs. That's 'friendly' in comparison to the garbage-fed macaques anyway, as these duskier monkeys won't rip your face all off.
Brazen palace of Lovamahapaya, where herons jealously guard their parking spaces
I didn't want to wake these guys.
I literally let sleeping dogs lie
The one on the right is so posing for my picture.
The one on the left seems ambivalent at best
Flashbacks of Scotland
(oh come on, I dump on England enough)
Monkey wrestling. What's not to like? I'd try to sell the rights to Challenge TV, if I wasn't certain they already had something similar in their schedule
Is this the Bodhi tree yet?
Sri Maha Bodiya
(Bodhi Tree Temple)
It's somewhere behind all those flags
You have to take your shoes off to enter all these temples.
I'll spare you the sight of my Flintstone feet
Sandy moonstone. A depiction of the Buddhist afterlife, though the two people who explained it to me had different ideas about the top or bottom being heaven or hell. All I know for certain is there's lots of elephants, swans and vines involved
Sri Sarananda Maha Piriwena
Big Buddha
Oh, there it is
You might be aware how much I love crap dioramas by now.
Without translations, these scenes from Buddhism made no more sense than the Chinese legends at Singapore's Haw Par Villa, but I'm pretty sure this guy with fangs preparing to eat or sacrifice an infant is a baddie
This is why I never take my shirt off
