Wat Chedi (Ai Khai)

The temple holds brick ruins and an old chedi believed to be over 1,000 years old, which gave it its name, though no firm founding date is known. Long abandoned, it was seriously restored around 1957, when monks came to live there again.

A 2022 Walailak University study by Sasipim Itsarawatthana and Suchita Manajit, comparing aerial photos from 1975 to 2019, divides the temple's development (Ban Pho Sadet, 103 Moo 7) into three phases: 1957–1974 as a monks' residence and once-abandoned temple; 1974–1999 after being raised from a monks' residence to a temple; and 1999–2020 under abbot Phra Athikan Aphichit Phutthasaro ("Achan Waen"). The grounds grew from about 9 rai at first to about 40 rai in 2015 and about 200 rai today, roughly 22-fold, and about 20 rai were levelled for parking in 2017 (Thai PBS puts the original area at about 6 rai).

The Ai Khai legend has several versions. The best known says the revered monk Luang Pu Thuat stopped at the deserted temple with a disciple aged about 9–10 and left the boy to guard its treasures. Another says the boy was following Luang Pu Thuat from Songkhla to Ayutthaya, was told to stay behind, drowned in the temple pond, and his spirit still guards the temple. A third says he was a village child who drowned. Media date the legend from about 250 years ago (National Geographic) to about 300 (Bangkokbiznews). Villagers first asked Ai Khai to help find lost cattle, later turning to luck and trade.

The wooden figure comes from Thiang Mueang-in, known as "Thuat Thiang Hak Lek". Thai PBS reports he dreamed of a boy of about 10 asking to be carved, and made the first figure from coral-tree wood around 1937; it has since decayed. The current figure was carved from twin takhian logs in 1982, and the abbot of the time, Pho Than Thoem, gave it the name "Ai Khai". Thiang died aged over 90 with a new carving only roughed out, and Thipwimon Kliangkham (Kawi Lenkhom) took over the work.

In 1983, while communist insurgents were still active in the area, a company of rangers camped at the temple and reported being disturbed all night. Villagers told them to say Ai Khai's name before meals, after which they slept normally. That year Luang Pho Thoem made the first Ai Khai medallions, now worth hundreds of thousands of baht.

Faith in Ai Khai grew in Nakhon Si Thammarat, a centre of the amulet trade. The Jatukham Rammathep craze began around 1997 and peaked in 2007, when the Fiscal Policy Office estimated about 22 billion baht changed hands, lifting national GDP by 0.1–0.2%. On 10 July 2008 the temple registered the copyright of the "Ai Khai Wat Chedi worship figure" with the Department of Intellectual Property, plus 10 more items.

The Ai Khai boom peaked in 2020 after Thailand's COVID-19 lockdown. National Geographic reported 70,000–80,000 visitors over a long holiday in September 2020, about 8,000 on an average weekday, and parking for up to 6,000 cars. Thai PBS reported flights to Nakhon Si Thammarat rising from about 12 to over 50, restaurants tripling, and the temple growing from about 6 rai to over 200 rai of land. A survey of 100 visitors found 60 came for lottery numbers and 20 for work.

Dailynews reported on 29 September 2020 that the first offering shops opened in 2011 and grew to about 200 along the road to the temple. Daily thanksgiving visitors rose from about 500–600 to about 10,000 from late 2019. Record offerings included 8 million firecrackers from Thais working in Hong Kong, 3,000 boiled eggs, twenty 3.5 m rooster statues and 3–5 tonnes of durian from Chumphon at a time, with at least 20 million baht a month changing hands. In June–July 2020 Nakhon Si Thammarat airport handled about 50 flights a day (normally at most 24) and over 170,000 passengers, its highest in 22 years; its roughly 10,300 hotel rooms ran above 70% occupancy, and about 200,000 people visited the province in September 2020, generating about 870 million baht. The effect spilled into Surat Thani's Mueang, Kanchanadit and Don Sak districts.

Thank-offerings define the temple's look. People once brought live chickens, which were inconvenient for the monks, so rooster statues took their place, priced from a few hundred baht to 1.5 million baht; one about 11 m tall stands before the ordination hall. Thousands of small figures are moved to a "chicken graveyard" of about 30 rai. Firecracker offerings range from 1,000 bangs for 100 baht to 100,000 for 1,000 baht and go off all day; on Tuesdays and Saturdays long-drum troupes dance in thanks, and visitors flock near the 1st and 16th of each month, the lottery draw days.

Ai Khai's fame has spread: figures have been installed at temples in Nonthaburi, Pathum Thani, Ratchaburi and Ang Thong without agreement from Wat Chedi, and highway signs point to "Wat Chedi (Ai Khai)". Some call him "Phi Khai" or "Ta Khai", and he has been dubbed a "god of the common people". Anthropologists see the craze as reflecting hard times and a need for spiritual refuge; it may fade, but the need will remain. In 2020 Bangkokbiznews named the abbot as Phra Khru Phutthachetiyaphimon ("Achan Waen"), named in the Walailak study as Phra Athikan Aphichit Phutthasaro, and National Geographic said the temple had about 10 resident monks.

The Ai Khai phenomenon has become an academic subject. Sitthiphong Boonthong's 2018 Prince of Songkla University thesis studied "Wat Chedi Ai Khai: constructing a sacred space amid the crisis of modernity", and the 2022 Walailak University paper examined how belief reshaped the temple's cultural landscape, citing earlier work by Thawanrat Phromwiset (2019) and Phra Ekkalak Achito et al. (2020), and finding that faith-based tourism has benefited the local economy.

The temple is open daily, about 07:00–19:00, with no entry fee. Sichon district also has beaches and Hin Ngam bay nearby. Belief in Ai Khai is personal; visitors should use their own judgement and respect the site.