Buddhism…

I want to read more about Buddhism. It is such an admirable way of life. The little that I know about the philosophy behind Buddhism I truly respect, I like the discipline involved in living life as a buddhist. The ancient history of buddhism and the architecture found scattered all over China is breath taking. When I was in Chengdu, Shu took Mitch and I to an ancient temple called Wenshu Temple. The colours of Buddhism are so bright and glorious! The gold buddhas, the pink and green lotus candles and the huge red incense sticks burning, there is such an overwhelming sense of quiet and peace.

I lit a bunch of incense and made a wish with Shu, I felt a little awkward doing it because I’m not buddhist. I felt like a bit of a new-age hippy phoney. I really enjoyed being a fly on the wall and wandering around the temple watching people  bowing before the different buddhas for prosperity, intelligence and health and making their wishes.

Mitch and I also travelled out to Le Shan, which is a town about 2 hours away from Chengdu on a public bus. The town wasn’t much,but the mountain itself was so tranquil. There is a Giant Buddha carved into the cliff face, with a height of 71 metres. The fingernails of the Buddha were taller than me. The construction of the Buddha began 713 AD, it was the brainchild of a Chinese monk called Hai Tong. The cliff face in which the Buddha is carved hangs over a river, it was hoped that the monstrous carving would calm the rough waters that plagued the shipping vessels travelling down the river. This was not only an act of faith, but of practicality, the huge expended rocks that were carved from the the cliff were thrown in the river, which in turn changed the river’s currents and appeased the turbulent swells. The Giant Buddha was completed in 803 AD and still stands strongly to this day.

Also to be found scattered all over the sacred mountain throughout the sub tropical forest are scores of Buddhist statues, Chinese gardens, caves with exquisite buddhist carvings and temples. You could smell incense wafting through the air surrounding the temples, telling you that there was one just around the corner even before you saw it.

To get the best view, Mitch and I took a short boat trip down the river to look up at the Giant Buddha. This was such a laugh, everyone else on the boat were Chinese tourists who were not only lining up to take pictures of the Buddha but of Mitch and I! There were so many photos with Chinese people that day, it is quite an unusual yet amusing experience being the token white people!

It was such a lovely way to spend a day, wandering around the holy mountain. Yet one must remember that we are in China and a day doesn’t go by without some kind of minor or major complication!

We went to a restaurant to get some lunch after the boat trip and was everything but physically dragged into one of the restaurants near the river. We saw quite a few people in there so we thought we’d give it a go. Strangely, the menu didn’t have prices on it, a fact that didn’t bother us much when we were ordering it, we were too hungry to care. The meal was okay, we ordered a whole fish, supposedly caught fresh from the river (we were told this after wards and weren’t overly comforted by the information because like most Chinese rivers this one was not overly clean), a pork dish and some greens.

When the bill came out it was 550 yuan! That is about AUD$100, this was the BIGGEST rip off I have ever experienced. We would normally pay 50 yuan at the very most for a meal like that. They were charging about 480 yuan for the fish alone! For a some fish caught out of the muddy river, bloody hell! I have never seen Mitch look this scary! He is one of the most non-aggressive people I know, but watching him looming over the tiny waitress (he’s 6″4) and the owner, talking harshly in Chinese, was a little scary.

Well, we certainly learnt our lesson. We were fuming, lucky we had a calming, holy mountain to stroll through back to the bus stop to settle our tempers. I wonder if a true Buddhist would be angry in this circumstance?

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