Constructed at a cost of $1.5 million, the wat rests on a Dakota County hilltop just outside Hampton, a town of 434 people and is 30 miles south of Minneapolis amid lush farmland.
So far, the reaction from the locals has been wonderfully tolerant and curious. July 5-8th is the main consecration ceremony, which is immensely important to many of the local Buddhists, because it's not often that a wat is completed, and within the tradition, this is a moment of great and auspicious significance.
It's not quite completed- they're still finishing the painting when we went, but hopefully these pictures demonstrate that it will all be quite impressive and a fine treasure for the community for generations to come.
2 comments:
Wow, that’s beautiful, I’d assume that there’s a large Buddhist community in that area, thanks for sharing the photos.
We'll have to add it to the list of our American Buddhist pilgrimage places :-)
Very beautiful indeed. There are some pictures on flickr.com too.
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