A rare sight was caught by Angela Jordison, a social media user on X and an acclaimed poker pro, who posted a video of a Buddhist monk playing a slot machine in a Las Vegas casino that was not specified.
The post was wittily captioned as “after a long day of selling bracelets and blessings, even a monk needs to unwind – one ma bet at a time.” Jordison was referring to the fact that the Buddhist monk was unlikely to be a real practitioner, but rather a salesman who assumed an identity to help boost his sales.
The video quickly caught thousands of views, as it was fun watching the jarring contrast between the putative Buddhist monk’s ascetic lifestyle and his decision to gamble at the slots in Las Vegas.
Of course, netizens were quick to catch up to the fact that the person was not a real monk, as Jordison had already suggested in the caption.
However, to some people, realizing that the whole thing was a schtick, the realization hit them hard. Social media users vowed to never give these monks another penny, realizing that the whole thing was just a salesman tactic and not monks working to earn a living.
At the time of writing, the video has been seen more than 92,000 times, and although not the biggest sensation, it has been an interesting experiment to gauge whether casino-goers are aware of who the real monks are.