Magic Tattoos

Today's Independent has a feature on Cambodian 'magic' tattoos:

The Girl with the Magic Tattoo.
Even with Angelina Jolie's approval, Cambodia's mystical body artists are struggling to survive.

These tattoos often feature texts in Pāli, written in the Cambodian script (aka Khmer) which itself ultimately derives from the Indian Brahmī script.

This is the one Buddhist culture I know of which has a tradition of tattoo. Although the story suggests that the art is dying out in Cambodia, it is alive and well in the rest of the world - as an internet search will reveal - partly because of celebrities getting this kind of tattoo.

Unwise Tattoo?

Wisdom
Originally uploaded by Jaspreet Dhillon

Saw this on Flickr. The word for wisdom is prajñā - a feminine noun in -ā.

This person has: प्रज्ञाः prajñāḥ

Prajñāḥ is the nominative plural: wisdoms. Whoops.

Evil Tattoo

A friend posted this on his Facebook page and I thought it would make a good cautionary tale:

A Buddhist, who’s more faith than reason, into all things tantric, spots the paṁ syllable in a purification practice. He goes along to the local tattoo parlour and has it tattooed on his shoulder blade.

He's showing it off to a friend who reads the practice and says: 'It says here that paṁ is the seed syllable for all evil.'

'Oh, I’ve got the seed syllable for all evil tattooed on my shoulder blade.' Sad, but true.

My response was that he might reassure his friend by reminding him that paṃ is also the bīja for Paṇḍāravāsinī, plus I think evil would have to be pāṃ (from the first syllable of the Sanskrit word pāpa). This is one case where diacritics matter!

12/9 Noticed this Kelly Osbourne interview today:

"I hate my tattoos. I saw someone about getting a couple removed, especially the keyboard, because I don't even know how to play the piano and I was drunk when I got it. I was a spiteful brat who got tattoos to piss off my mum and now I think they are ugly. People define you by tattoos and I don't want to be defined by an anchor on my arm! Unfortunately, having them removed is going to be painful."

Tattoos

Every now and then I get a fun request for a tattoo and this mornings effort is a gem of the genre.

"I was wondering if you guys could translate the Seven Deadly sins and the Seven Holy Virtues into Buddhist Sanskrit for me. I want to tattoo it on my back."

Given that he won't be able to read the result - what would you write on his back? Must be in lots of seven!

I'll start the bidding with: बष्वुल्, डक्, डौपी, ग्रंपी, हप्पी, स्लीपी, स्नीसी

Dumb Tattoos

I sometimes cop some flak for saying that I think tattoos are dumb. I'm mainly referring to people who want tattoos of mantras/words/syllables they don't understand the significance of, in scripts they don't read, in languages they don't speak. Some of the consequences of this approach to body adornment can be seen on this blog: Hanzi Smatter - "dedicated", the subtitle reads, "to the misuse of Chinese characters in Western culture". Tattoos feature highly on this site. One man's tattoo doesn't mean "Dragon Soul" as he thinks, but simply "foreigner". A model for AussieBum underwear seems to have inadvertently tattooed himself with "determined to cut down something big", etc. Need I say more?