Wat Sanamnai

Wat Sanamnai is a temple in Bang Kruai district, Nonthaburi, on the edge of Bangkok. It is known among practitioners for the method of Luang Por Teean Cittasubho, in which mindfulness is developed through awareness of movement, above all a sequence of slow hand movements.

According to Thai Wikipedia, nobody knows who built the temple or when. It had stood empty, without monks, for a long time, with only the remains of an old ordination hall and stupa, and most of its land taken over for farming. In the mid-1970s two supporters introduced it to Luang Por Teean, who was then staying at Wat Chonprathan Rangsarit and looking for a place to teach meditation without putting up buildings. He liked the site and restored it as a temple. Phra Paisal Visalo, who first went there in 1975 as a student, recalls it as a former abandoned temple that Luang Por Teean and his students had only just revived as a practice centre.

Thai Wikipedia describes grounds of 80 by 160 metres beside the railway, planted with large trees and natural ponds, and kept deliberately plain. There is a monks’ area at the back with walking paths cut like paddy fields, a front area for laymen and monks with a hall, an open-air practice hall and a library, and a separate area for women with a sand walking court under tall trees.

For a foreign visitor this is a Thai-language place. The temple’s site is in Thai, with a Chinese-language version that includes rules for practitioners and a list of meditation centres abroad. No English visitor guidance is published. The practice itself starts with the movements described on the Luang Por Teean page. If you plan to visit, check the temple’s site first.