Explore Bangka: Laughing Buddha in Buddhist Temple "Puri Tri Agung"

The Laughing Buddha outside the temple

If Bali has the iconic Uluwatu Temple at the southernmost tip of the island, Bangka has a Buddhist temple standing at the hilltop facing the sea as one of its main tourism destinations.  It is called Vihara Puri Tri Agung, and is located in Pantai Tikus, Bangka Regency.

We went there during the Vesak Day and it was easy to access, basically. It was 40 minutes from Pangkalpinang—the biggest city in the island—by car or motorbike. Along the way to get there we could see large area of swamp, palm and rubber plantation. Not to mention, we went there in the afternoon thus it was windy but warm.

Once I got there I was amazed of how great this temple looked. It stood at the 30-meters-above-the sea-level hilltop and faced the South China Sea. Just like any other Buddhist temple with Asian influence, red and gold color dominated the building. We could find Kwan Im Goddess and Laughing Buddha statue outside the temple. Once I stepped into the inner side, I found this temple is…fancy in its kind.  What I really liked about this temple was its rounded shape and how it was located. And the ceiling!

We decided to get down the beach to seize some moment. It was white sand beach with big rocks “just like scattered” by the coast and it was beautiful. I saw some people enjoying the sand, playing with water and having some selfie with friends. I just walked by and found out a fisherman with his big-size catch!

There’s a story why this area was called as Pantai Tikus (Tikus Beach). People said that there’re lots of “jalan tikus” (shortcuts) used to smuggle the tin out of the island. The smuggler said that the area was haunted—to make people scared to come to this area and thus make their smuggling activity smoothly run.  Just so you know that Bangka—along with Belitung/Billiton—is rich of tin though the mining activities are nowadays very restricted for environment sustainability purpose.

Maybe we could not see the sunset as the hill barred the horizon behind the beach, but we still could see the big rocks turned gold under the afternoon shine. And trust me, it was relieving.