Wat Bang Phra

On my recent trip to Bangkok one of the main objectives was to visit Wat Bang Phra and get a Sak Yant tattoo, also known as a sacred tattoo. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending how how you look at it, we arrived at Wat Bang Phra just 2 days before the huge tattoo festival was to take place. This meant that the normally quiet Wat had a few hundred people in attendance on the day which would be a lead up to the some 40,000 people that would be attending the tattoo festival on the weekend.

Wat Bang Phra is renowned as the place to get Sak Yant or sacred tattoos and they are given daily by the monks at the Wat. On this day and the week preceding the Tattoo festival many people come to have tattoos done as well as have previous tattoos re-blessed or recharged. To Thai people these tattoos don’t just represent traditional Buddhist images but they believe them to hold power and protection over the wearer. Once the Sak Yant is given the monk then blows a blessing into the tattoo bringing it to life and giving it power.

Most Sak Yant wearers return to Wat Bang Phra or other temples yearly to have their tattoos re-blessed by the monks. For a more detailed look at the Sak Yant including video please look at Sak Yant Thai Tattoo.

Well, as I said this was a very busy week for Wat Bang Phra and it didn’t look like getting my Sak Yant would be in the cards this trip but we spent an amazing morning walking around the Wat and through the throngs of the faithful taking a lot of pictures. I need to  thank Catherine, my gracious host,  from Women Learning Thai and her driver Khun Pissout for taking me to the Wat and for a wonderful day of sight seeing.

My next trip to Bangkok will hopefully find me again at Wat Bang Phra and getting a sacred Buddhist tattoo but until then you can enjoy the photos below and over 200 pictures of this trip in the Wat Bang Phra Gallery.

Wat Bang Phra Photos

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Jimmy Wong’s second annual tattoo festival will play host to over 200 tattoo artists from around the world. The festival begins May 16th and will go through May 18th.

Traditional Thai tattoo known as Khone Drama will be at the forefront of the exhibit due to it’s renewed interest in the past few years by foreigners as well as traditional Japanese and Tribal.

The festival will kick off on May 16th with a seminar at the Manita hotel in Pattaya at 1pm featuring
Gippy Rondinella from Italy, Johnny Twothumb family from Singapore, and the Jimmy Wong family from Bangkok.

There will be many things to see and do over the 3 day festival including tattoo contests:

• Best of creation.
• Best tribal tattoo.
• Best of Thai traditional tattoo.
• Best Japanese style tattoo.
• Best Color .
• Best body suit.
• Best lady tattoo (Miss Tattoo).
• Best shadow work.
• Best male tattoo ( Mister Tattoo).
• Best dragon tattoo.
• Best old school tattoo.
• The regent tattoo artist of the year.

For a full Itinerary of events and more information regarding the festival and tattoo artists involved you can head over to Jimmy Wong’s site 2cnd world Tattoo Arts Festival

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In my trips I’ve been in quite a few tattoo shops in Bangkok and Pattaya and I can tell you for a fact it is very safe to get a tattoo in Thailand. Some of the shops aren’t any bigger than a small room and some are very large but they all put the customers health and safety first. New needles are always used and opened in front of the customer, they all have working autoclaves, and work areas are sterilized constantly. The tattoo shops I’ve been in all used American inks as well. When asked why the answer was “it’s the best”. So, don’t listen to anyone telling you old needles are used or the tattoo shops aren’t safe. If you should be in a shop anywhere in the world and they won’t open the new needle in front of you or it doesn’t seem clean…walk.

There are many tattoo shops in Thailand, in Pattaya alone there must be 500, some as small as a telephone booth. Not only are there many shops but equally as many talented artists doing the work. I did a lot of research before I got work done and originally narrowed it down to 3 shops but finally settled on 13 Crowns on walking street in Pattaya. My brother got his work done first, a very colorful dragon, and I was impressed with their work and everyone in the shop was great. I settled on a dragon myself but all black with a red eye.

If you plan on getting ink done while in Thailand do some research of the shops in the areas you’ll be and I’m sure you’ll be pleased with the end results. If you’re in Pattaya head to walking street and look for a bicycle chopper outside a small narrow shop with a sign that says 13 Crowns…you won’t be disappointed.

My brother ended up getting a second tattoo of a dragon and my girl got a small back tat too…you can see the tattoo’s in the Gallery section or you can click here Getting Ink Done.

Thailand Tattoo

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