Kyaiktiyo Pagoda

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Kyaiktiyo Pagoda at sunset.

Kyaiktiyo Pagoda (Burmese: ; MLCTS: kyuik hti: yu:; IPA: [tʃaiʔtʰíjóʊ]; also known as Golden Rock) is a famous Buddhist pilgrimage site in Mon State, Burma. A small pagoda (5.5 m (18 ft)) sits on top of a golden rock, a rock covered with gold leaves pasted on by devotees. The rock itself is precariously perched and seems to defy gravity as it perpetually appears to be on the verge of rolling down the hill. The rock and pagoda are at the top of Mt. Kyaiktiyo, It is the third most important Buddhist pilgrimage site in Burma after the Shwedagon Pagoda and the Mahamuni Pagoda.^{[citation needed]}

According to the legend associated with the pagoda, the Buddha, on one of his many visits to earth, gave a strand of his hair to Taik Tha, a hermit. The hermit, in turn, gave the strand to his adopted son King Tissa, an 11th Century Burmese king, with the dying wish that the hair be enshrined in a boulder shaped like the hermit's head. Tissa, with the help of the Thagymin, the king of the Nats found the perfect place for the pagoda at Kyaiktiyo where the strand was enshrined. It is this strand of hair that, according to the legend, prevents the rock from tumbling down the hill.

The village of Kinpun (16 km (10 mi)) at the base of Mt. Kyaiktiyo is the closest village to the pagoda. There are numerous other granite boulders on the mountain, some rocking and some not.

Kyaiktiyo has become a popular tourist attraction place of Pagodas in Burma.