Log4: A Trip, a new CAC, and some Reflections

 Haeinsa Temple, Gaya Mountain

  This past weekend, we visited Haeinsa Temple on Gaya Mountain and had a relaxing break from the chaos of orientation.  Even our hotel had nice views.

 

The views from the 3rd floor of the hotel.  

Meredith, me, Olenka, Michelle and Jing; Meredith and I know Megan from Gunn H.S.  We all have been discovering just how ridiculously small this world is; another person I never met before knew my dad, and another one is really close to an old orchestra friend of mine.  Small, small small world.

Nida: she's quinta-lingual, if there is such a thing: English, Spanish, Japanese, Thai, Korean (she's Thai). Ridiculous. She said she doesn't count Korean as one, but I do because she was placed in the advanced class with all the other Korean Americans who grew up with that.  Filthy language skills.  Just filthy. 

Mafia in our hotel room. Clint (the African-American) is clearly not amused.  Josh (white shirt, laying on stomach on pillow in the foreground) is playing this adamantly; Pitzer 2010 graduate.  There are 4 other Pitzer students here; of the other 5C's, I am the only one.

Neil. He's by the chamber of woodblock prints.  They don't allow cameras there.  A note about people: I of course have only known these people for a few weeks, but it's really been interesting how generally amiable and good all these people are: fun, funny, genuine, kind and thoughtful.  What more could you ask for?  But maybe things will change in a few weeks...

Friday we visited the temple.  Saturday most of us went again because the Friday visit was a bit rushed.

Please.  This is a holy site.  Don't mess with it, or the angry turtle will hurt you.

Temple entrance.  I have to work on this smiling thing.

The central court and main sacred space.

I am thrilled.

Saturday.  This structure housed the central sacred space.

 

Jesse and Lara; two of the nicest people in orientation...though I don't know them that well.

 

View of the central court from the top the stairs.

One of the coolest aspects of the visit was the scenery.  Already tucked away in the depths of some thickly-lush mountains, the temple was couched in an immovable dense fog that rolled in and out at will.  The scene really was something out of a movie (which really doesn't make sense since movies are derived from the real stuff of life anyway).

To actually get to the temple though,we had to hike into the woods for about 15 minutes.  This was what one of the creeks we passed looked like on Friday without rain.

This is what the creek looked like on Saturday after an evening of rain.

Man of the hour.  Couldn't take pictures inside the sacred space, but the many doors were left open.  The statues proved extremely modest compared to what I had imagined for one of the nation's most famous temples.  About a third of the Korean population is Buddhist.  Another third is Christian, non-Catholic.

On Saturday we arrived at the temple just in time to witness some real monks chanting together.  The chanting moved me deeply (on a side note, I was told not to take pictures as soon as I took this; woops...snuck one in I guess).

To the right of the central sacred space were these two smaller "shacks" which also housed Buddhas.  There are Buddhas for different aspects of life and mind, and I assume each of them stood for one of these aspects.

On Saturday, this monk (you can see the sticks in motion) displayed a drumming tour-de-force as part of a weekly ritual.  This temple always wins friendly drumming competitions.

While the monk drummed, swarms of people (Saturday = weekend = more people come to the temple) walked through a maze.  I walked through it and it took maybe...3 minutes.  But before I entered, the person at the entrance said to us, "Enter with both your hands clasped, and please forget about everything."

The maze (Friday, when there was no one).

So what do I have to say about the trip?  A lot of it has been said in the new CAC (week 3), but it was first and foremost a nice relaxing break from the chaos and a great time to just reflect and bond with some of the other ETAs.  There are 73 of us, and in a gender-segregated dorm (strictly enforced by security cameras) with a really busy schedule and an absence of a decent common space, it's hard to get to know each other really well so it was a nice chance to just spend some time with people.

Other than that, it was a wonderful experience that recalled deeply my roots and my childhood.  I remember going to the temple as a kid in Korea not often, but enough for the memories to stick.  I remember the reverent ambiance that always seemed to reverberate throughout the temple halls, but I could not express what it was.  Not to say that I have the answer now, but I do believe that as with any religious or spiritual practice, much of the "enlightenment" or "divine understanding" comes from the ritualistic practices of complete devotion and commitment themselves, and never from the consequences of them.  

A simplified example is the bowing done at these temples (at least the Korean ones).  It is done grandly and with the entire body prone toward the great Buddha with a kind of religiosity that is not unlike other religious practices, and done many times (monks chant and bow 108 times together; witnessing was moving, but doing it I'm sure is a whole different issue).  And as I did numerous ones myself, I realized that it was during my routinized actions and whispering-to-self-of-old-chants-I-knew-by-heart from which I derived a sense of renewal, energy, and clarity.  It is thus the process, I believe, that seems so integral to all things we like to call ritual, because to stray from this process of introspection and mindfulness is too easy in such a highly extroverted and material world.

Okay enough of that though.  I'm going to post another post, but check out my CAC for more in-depth thoughts about the visit. 

I hope you're all well!