Thailand: Laughing Buddha, Wat Tham Seua, Krabi Town, Krabi Province, Southern Thailand

Wat Tham Seua, the 'Temple of the Tiger Cave' is built into a cave set in a limestone cliff.<br/><br/> Surrounded by individual monk's residences, this is one of southern Thailand's best-known forest temples.<br/><br/> The main viharn or assembly hall extends into a long, shallow limestone cave displaying various grim reminders of mortality as a counterbalance to worldly desires. At the back of the cave a flight of marble stairs lead up to the 'tiger cave' itself. Within there is a venerated Buddha footprint on a gilded platform and a life-size figure of Ajaan Jamnien, the temple's enigmatic abbot.<br/><br/> The sprawling temple grounds are partly landscaped, and there are two separate stairways leading to a large Guan Yin image (the Mahayana Buddhist version of the Indian sage Avalokitesvara, known generally as 'the Chinese Goddess of Mercy'), and to another Buddha footprint.