This is a monk on his morning alms walk

Michael Cargal‎Everything good in the world

This is a monk on his morning alms walk, which takes him right by one of our favorite breakfast restaurants, Pirates Terrace, on the beach road in Thung Wua Laen, Thailand. That's an umbrella in his left hand. This was taken in the rain season. You can tell the photo was taken late in the lunar month, because his head is fuzzy. They shave their heads every full moon.

Monks are not allowed to handle money (though many do), so they are fed by the villagers. Pretty much every restaurant and store that is open at this time of the morning gives him something and then kneels down for a blessing. Sometimes they have a kid, a toddler even, kneel to receive the blessing. The parent guides the toddler's hands into a wai position.

Monks are not allowed to eat after noon, because when Buddha was alive, he was surrounded by poor people who didn't have much food, and he thought it wrong that he should eat better than them, and the tradition continues.

Maybe it's the people I hang out with in Thailand and in the US, but it seems to me that at least Thai Buddhists are more devout than American Christians. For that matter, I found the same thing working in the middle east. The average Muslim citizen in, say, Dubai is more devout than the average Christian citizen in the US.