The Buddha on Mecca’s Verandah

Cover

Download PDF (138.3 KB)
 

Series Page, Title Page, Copyright, Dedication

Download PDF (55.6 KB)
 

Contents

Download PDF (30.6 KB)
 

Preface

Download PDF (70.8 KB)
pp. ix-xviii

the Buddha on Mecca’s Verandah is about encounters. It is as much an ethnographic account of a marginal community as it is a story about powerful cultural institutions, cartographies...

Acknowledgments

Download PDF (47.7 KB)
pp. xix-xx

This book would not have been possible without the kind assistance of many people. Of these, foremost are the Thai villagers of Kelantan and Terengganu who permitted...

Orthography and Terminology

Download PDF (52.7 KB)
pp. xxi-xxiii

Unless otherwise stated, all Thai words in this book are in the Tumpat Tak Bai dialect of southern Thai as spoken by most Kelantanese Thais in the state. I have...

Map

Download PDF (58.4 KB)
 

Introduction

Download PDF (242.1 KB)
pp. 3-23

Kelantan is a marginal place. Geographically, the state is located at the peripheries of the Malay Peninsula. Flanked by the South China Sea along its eastern seaboard,...

1. Places

Download PDF (871.7 KB)
pp. 24-50

Kae Chi (Grandm other Nun) looked up at me as we soaped the plates and blue-and-white China bowls with lemon-scented detergent. One of the villagers had tried manufacturing...

2. Gaps

Download PDF (248.8 KB)
pp. 51-84

Khun Di was thirty-four years old when I met him in 2001. He had been a monk at Wat Nai for some nine years and was now the elderly abbot’s personal secretary and next in line for abbotship. That evening I found Khun Di sitting comfortably...

3. Forms

Download PDF (480.8 KB)
pp. 85-118

Every evening, Express Timuran (the Eastern Express) leaves Singapore’s one and only train station for the thirteen-hour journey north to Bandar Tumpat. The sleepy Malaysian town is served by two other train lines. The daily Express Wau and the weekend...

4. Circuits

Download PDF (284.5 KB)
pp. 119-147

One knew of Sultan Ismail Petra Yahya Petra’s upc oming visit to Bandar Tumpat from observing the road in front of Wat Nai. Miraculously the plastic bags, soda cans, drinking straws, bits of paper, and cigarette butts that littered Kelantan’s thoroughfares...

5. Dreams

Download PDF (224.2 KB)
pp. 148-172

The spread of a national Thai ethno-cultural consciousness via an officially standardized Buddhism purged of its local variations is nothing new in the modern history of the Thai polity. Writing about northern Thailand’s Yuan and Shan sects of Theravadism...

Conclusion

Download PDF (66.0 KB)
pp. 173-180

Much has changed in Ban Bor On. Many of the actors whose lives we encountered and shared in this book have moved on. Some have gotten married and now have children of their own...

Notes

Download PDF (106.2 KB)
pp. 181-196

Bibliography

Download PDF (115.7 KB)
pp. 197-214

INDEX

Download PDF (72.8 KB)
pp. 215-223