Thai Buddha cards are similar to those Guanyin Maitreya pendants in Chinese temples, the difference is that Thai Buddha cards have a good effect, and some are even very obvious, unlike those Buddhist ornaments in China, most of which can only play a role in psychological comfort and decoration. The main raw material of the amulet is soil, because the Thai amulet believes that the land is the source of all things, and there is nothing without soil.

In Thailand, almost every temple makes amulet cards, the original role of amulets is to raise funds, about a few hundred years ago, Thai monks in the renovation of the old temple or old pagoda, first by the monks to make a lot of amulet cards, and then with mantras blessed (Chinese called Kaiguang, a meaning), and then let the believers please go home, with the temple to repair the pagoda. After repairing, those believers have sent the Buddha cards back to the tower, and the abbot will bless them for several days, months or even years or more than ten years, so that the magic power of the Buddha cards will increase again, and then the believers will take them home. Slowly, this became a fixture in Thai temples, and the habit of wearing amulets in Southeast Asia was developed. Until a few decades ago, after Thailand's political instability and local armed conflicts, in order to show force, it would first attack the local temples and pagodas, and a large number of old Buddhist cards could still be raised from them. This kind of Buddha card is also quite strong because it uses a complete ancient method, and what can be left to the present is a treasure.

The whole people in Thailand believe in Buddhism, and the popular one is Hinayana Buddhism, which is completely different from the Mahayana Buddhism cards in East Asia, and I hardly understand this aspect, so I just listened to Kaohsiung talk about it. This means that the mantras of Theravada Buddhism are more effective than those of Mahayana, so the Buddhist cards created are also very popular. In southern Thailand, it is customary to refer to the official monks as "Luang Po" and in the north as "Cuba", both of which are transliterations of Thai, and some people who are not monks but also like to practice magic are called "Azan", which means "teacher" in Thai. The Azan Pingdu that Kaohsiung took me to meet yesterday is one of them, Pingdu is his name, and the word Azan is added in front of it, which means the mage called Pingdu. The biggest difference between these Azan masters and monks such as Luang Po and Cuba is that most of their practices are not formal Buddhism, but foreign spells that have been handed down from Southeast Asia for hundreds of years, and there are many evil methods and even black methods.

I guess I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to digest it for a while, so Kaohsiung didn't continue to talk too deeply, but talked about the main raw materials for making Buddhist cards, and also talked about the necessary knowledge, such as the procedure for asking for a Buddhist card from the temple, the living habits of Thai monks, the taboo of wearing a Buddhist card, and the method of getting started. I hurriedly wrote it down in my notebook, but the more I remembered, the more frustrated I became, I put the pen down and said, "Boss Gao, I don't know anything about this thing, and I don't know if I can sell it, how much money I can make, is it useful to learn so much?"

"It's really useless, it's up to you!" Kaohsiung locked the safe, but the amulets were not installed.

I asked, "If you try to sell hard, people won't be able to see the real thing, and they won't know if they can believe me just by listening to me." ”

Kaohsiung was puzzled: "What do you mean? Aren't you going back to China to sell Buddhist cards?" I said where I could go, Huang Chengcheng seized my passport on the grounds of applying for a study visa for me, just because he was afraid that if I ran away, the 10,000 yuan would be wasted.

Unexpectedly, Kaohsiung was very angry after hearing this: "This old fox, he is really fucking calculating, I have to talk about him." "Immediately called Huang Chengcheng, on the phone, Kaohsiung said that Huang Chengcheng did this pointless, not everyone can sell Buddha cards, not to mention that this kid is still a newcomer, do not let him return to China in person to sell, how to sell Buddha cards, how to make money to pay off debts. He said a lot, Huang Chengcheng seemed to be convinced, agreed to return the passport and the visa that had not been completed to me first, and also helped me dredge the entry and exit department of Thailand, and changed the ticket originally booked by the travel agency yesterday afternoon to tomorrow afternoon.

I hurriedly thanked me and asked how long it would take to send it from Thailand to China and how much the postage would cost if someone bought it. Kaohsiung waved his hand: "It will take half a month, it's too troublesome, you bring all the Buddha cards back, how good is the domestic spot!"

"You're not afraid that I won't come back?" I was surprised.

Kaohsiung snorted: "These Buddha cards together don't have 8,000 baht, but no one has ever dared to shop for my goods." If you kid dare to do this, even if you escape to the North Pole, I'll still pull you back!" I laughed, saying that I couldn't. He told me to go to a small temple nearby to do some business, and then come back to him in the evening. I thought to myself that Kaohsiung was really interesting, taught me so much knowledge, gave me free credit, and invited me to dinner, and thanked me again and again. Kaohsiung wrote a few lines of Thai on the paper and marked them with Hanyu Pinyin, all of which are common words that can be used when going to the temple to ask for cards, such as "Hello, Master", "I want to ask for a Buddhist card", "The cheapest", "Please bless", "Thank you", "Goodbye" and so on.

After leaving Kaohsiung, I first found a newsstand near the BTS station, bought two maps of Bangkok, marked the location of nearby temples in red pen, and found a fruit shop owner who could speak simple Chinese and asked him to show me the way and tell me which small temples were nearby. Ride a motorbike to a small temple with trees nearby, and you can hardly see any tourists coming in or out. When I entered the temple gate, I saw two young monks in red robes walking by in the courtyard, so I stepped forward, folded my hands, and said the sentence "Hello master" in pinyin.

The monk smiled and folded his hands at me and said a few words of Thai. Of course I didn't understand, so I stumbled over the Thai phrase "I'm going to ask for a Buddha card", and the monk nodded and led me to a room in the temple where there were several Buddha statues. I bowed a few times, and another middle-aged monk took out a few Buddhist plaques from the tray in front of the Buddha statue to show me. I said "the cheapest" and the monk pointed to one of the pieces and gestured with two fingers. I counted out two hundred-baht bills, and the monk nodded and took the money.

Two hundred baht is equivalent to forty yuan, I thought it was cheap, before I copied the pinyin Thai phrase "please bless", the middle-aged monk had already put the Buddha card back on the tray, flat end in his hand, the other hand five fingers opened, pressed on the Buddha card, began to chant mantras. Of course, I didn't understand this mantra at all, but I always thought it sounded pretty good. After two minutes, the amulet is mine.

After thanking the monks, I took out my phone and took pictures of the Buddha plaque, the monks, the temple, and of course with a few monks. At that time, there were no smartphones, let alone selfie sticks, and if you wanted to take a selfie, you could only rely on the small square of electroplating on the back of the phone, called a selfie mirror. In order to take the full picture, I asked another monk to do it for me, and I grabbed the chain of the amulet and placed it between me and the monk to try to be as intimate as possible.