From Knowing and Seeing Pa-Auk Forest Monastery video In 2005 I made a video called, “Knowing and Seeing Pa-Auk Forest Monastery.” This is about the Pa-Auk Main Branch in Mawlamyine. Sayadawgyi was young back then and used to climb the stairs to his mountain kuti twice per day. I will miss that. The title was meant to play with the name of Sayadawgyi’s famous book called, “Knowing and Seeing.” The book is referring to knowing and seeing the detailed Dhammas which were once thought impossible to know and literally “see”. He has since proved that all of this is possible. His original detailed 5 volume book set was rejected for printing locally by the national monk committee. To get around this, the book was printed in Taiwan and shipped to Myanmar as any other imported book. Like any banned book, or the Streisand Effect, it made the material and author more popular due to curiosity.

Pa-Auk Main Gate (cc-by-sa) Pa-Auk Forest Monastery and Pa-Auk Sayadaw share the same names. Why is that? Some people might question why Pa-Auk Forest Monastery and Venerable Pa-Auk Sayadaw have the same names. Did the Pa-Auk Sayadaw name his monastery after himself to immortalize his name? Is this an ego trip? What is the who, what, were, when, why, and how of this story? Who? Venerable Pa-Auk Sayadawgyi (cc-by-sa) Venerable Pa-Auk Sayadaw’s real name is Sayadaw U Āciṇṇa. It means “habitual kamma” in the Pāḷi Language. If you ever meet him and know how he acts, you will see that he lives up to his name. He is very predictable because he does everything systematically according to the dhamma on a habitual basis. It is not polite to call a sayadaw by his Pāḷi name if he is given such a title. Likewise, when speaking to him, you would just simply address him as Sayadawgyi (big sayadaw). In my days, we just called him “Sayadaw.” However, after some time, many teachers became of age and also became “sayadaws” too. That was when he became known as “Sayadawagyi.”

(Republished from June, 2015) Having Fun At The Pa-Auk Dentist Clinic (Repost/refurbish from June, 2015*) Because dentists are very expensive in America and the Pa-Auk dental clinic has pretty good sanitary conditions (for Myanmar), I went for a checkup before my trip to Hawai’i. Usually in Asia, you only go to a dentist when there is pain but I had some sensitivity I wanted to get checked and I waited for the Saturday dentist who is known on the street as “the old retired dentist who takes his time and does a good job.” He is a volunteer like the other two dentists and two medical doctors who visit our in-house monastery clinic.

500+ monks at paauk main. Some slippers go missing so people mark them with different patterns as a passive way to prevent loss. However, the slippers in the center were not as passive. (Reposted and fixed lost picture from 2013) Look at the writing on the slippers “No for Your” (Not for you).

I recently found this video in my Google Drive. I had a layperson (probably UKZ) follow me around in the line to show what it was like for a monk to go through the alms food line at Pa-Auk Main Center, Mawlamyine, Myanmar. It is not easy to manage so many donors with big hearts to give. Most of the time, I am giving hand signals to get less food. You might want to play this at double speed. However, you can get a real time feel of what it is like, once one enters the food line. There are often 400+ monks waiting in line to get to this point too.