Temple Stay

To start, I posted another post that is before Latanya's hair post called Orientation. If you did not see it check it out yo.
So let's get started telling the wonderful story of our Temple Stay experience. I know many of you have been waiting for this one. To start off Tania, Latanya's and my friend, who we met at the orientation and who Latanya got her hair done with, invited us to go on a Temple Stay. The Temple Stay was organized by a foreigner travel company called Adventure Korea. The trip was for two days and one night, so a weekend basically. The Temple refers to a Buddhist temple, and the Stay is actually the act of staying over night, obvious right? We were really excited leading up the trip. Basically you get to spend your weekend living just like a Buddhist monk. Awesome, yeah!
We had to get up really early on Saturday to make the charter bus in Seoul. We woke up around six or so. It was earlier than a typical week day. So much for sleeping in. There were about 40 foreigners and one Korean on the tour. Of those forty or so, only six were men. The ratio was a little favored one way. I did not know whether to be happy about spending a weekend with that many women or sad. Oh yeah there was also a little boy on the trip with his mom. He was about 10 years old.
The bus ride took about three hours. It was not too bad. We stopped at a rest stop and were able to stretch our legs and get a bite to eat. We were originally supposed to go river trekking prior to our arrival, but unfortunately it was raining and the rocks were too slippery. So instead we went on a short walk/hike near the river. We soon arrived at the temple and were happy to be there. We met the head tour guide who only spoke Korean. Luckily he had a translator who assisted him.
As soon as we got up to the main hall we had to change into official Buddhist wardrobes. They were extremely large but very comfortable. It honestly could fit two and half of me. At this point we changed, put all our stuff in lockers and had a little free time to roam around the premises. Keep in mind that it was still raining. Actually at this point it began to pour. Boo! We grabbed a couple of ponchos and walked around. The grounds were spread out on a very very very steep mountain. Not hill, but mountain. We took a hike not a walk up the mountain to see the oldest temple they had there. It was beautiful. The hike on the other hand was not. It was not just the rain that made it miserable but the fact that it was sooooo humid, just sucked.
After our dreadful hike we made our way back for our welcome orientation. We were given our strict itinerary and instruction on how to do the proper bow. This bow was not your ordinary bow. It was intricate and difficult to perform. And every time you enter the building with the head monk you must do three bows before you sit down.
Here's the breakdown of how to do a proper Buddhist bow, at least at this temple anyways. First you must bow 45 degrees standing up when you first enter the room. And then once you get to your floor mat you must begin three actual bows. You must have your hands together in the typical praying position. From the standing up point you must drop to your knees, still with your hands together. After that you put your palms on the mat, shoulder width apart, followed by your elbows and forehead. At this point you have five body parts touching the mat and the ground, your head, hands, elbows, knees and feet. Once there you must cross your feet, one on top of the other, and then rotate your hands 180 degrees and lift them up to your ears and back down. After that you must extend up to the kneeling position with your hands in the praying position again. From there you must spring yourself up from the kneel to standing while keeping you hands together. After all that you must repeat it two more times just to sit down.
Wow, what a long explanation. It was really a task let me tell you. And in the orientation after our many practice we were told were going to have to do 108 bows in a row later that night. What!?!?!?! Yeah 108 bows. No way? Yes way. More on that later.
After orientation we were taken on a meditation walk. Keep in mind, yes it is still pouring. Usually the walk is performed bare foot. But they let us wear our shoes. I actually would have preferred no shoes, because they became extremely soaked during the walk. We were told to walk very slowly and try to feel with our feet and relax the mind. It was really awesome actually. It is amazing how much your mind thinks just walking. We had to control our thoughts and concentrate just on our feet. It was relaxing and a good way to release stress I think.
Once the meditation walk was done we had dinner, all veggies of course. We had to eat everything we had on our plates. They do not believe in wasting food or anything for that matter. We also had to wash our own dishes. I was laughing because Latanya will never wash a dish at home, but she had to here. To be honest, I was shocked to see it. The food was alright. Their Kimchi was almost like sauerkraut and did not taste very good, but whatever, it was to be expected.
We headed up to the bowing temple after dinner. It was like a death march. Sorry for the historical insensitivity, but it really was. We had all our belongings and were caring them up a giant mountain in the pouring rain, just to make it to the top where we knew what we were going to have to do. That's right, 108 bows.
We got into the temple and did our three warm ups. The head monk came in and we started it off. Every time he slaped his stick once we had to either go down for the bow or come up from it. He was leading the way and we were at his mercy. About five bows into it I stopped counting. If I were to count I would have been more frustrated. The 108 bows signify the 108 sufferings of mankind. And boy were we suffering alright. We made little dream pouches earlier in the day that we used for concentration. In the small dream pouch we wrote one main dream of ours for this year. It was actually really helpful for concentration. The way they were teaching us Buddhism was very broad, yet it was something we could take back to our normal everyday lives. For example, I am the center of the universe, I make my own choices and am responsible for everything that may or may not happen to me, the whole Karma thing you know. Also if you focus on your dreams and put effort into them as well as have good Karma, they will come true.
Anyways, while we were in deep with the 108 that's what I was focusing on. I was so proud of Latanya because she was right there with the majority of us bowing away. Side note (she hates to sweat). After we finished we were done for. We were so exhausted and ready for bed. It felt great to finish all 108 and keep up with the monk who had not even a bead of sweat on his body. I for one was drenched.
We then walked over to the sleeping quarters. All the ladies were piled into two rooms and the men shared one with so much space. We all had to sleep on the ground. We had blankets and pillows and were set to go. After everyone showered and everything it was about a little after 11pm or so. I fell almost right to sleep. I tossed and turned a little but over all slept well. I guess I was happy to have some space finally.
We were woken up at 4am. It was still dark obviously. Yeah 4 AM. It was not too bad waking up that early, but it definitely was not pleasant. After getting ready and brushing our teeth we headed over to the bowing temple where we did a 30 minute meditation with our legs crossed and backs straight. We watched the day begin. It was really beautiful hearing the birds chirp. It had stopped raining but it was still over cast, and yes extremely humid. It's like, I already sweat in a dry heat, but here I sweat profusely all the time, very uncomfortable, let me tell you.
After the morning meditation we had a traditional breakfast with the monk in the main hall on the ground. It was really nice. The food, were veggies again of coarse, but they were so delicious. There is a whole story about how you properly eat and place everything as well as clean, that is too long to explain now. I am trying not to make it too long of a post. I know I know too late, right?
After the wonderful breakfast, we had to march back up to the bowing temple again. It was there where we made a beaded necklace and/or bracelet. Guess how many beads there were?.......That's right 108. For every bead we had to do a bow. AGAIN!!! We did it and we did it strong. Our bodies were hurting so much from the night before, but we dug through and finished strong. Since this was during the day this time we were sweating even more than the night before. At least this time we did it at our own pace. I had a huge sweat mark where my head hit the mat. Gross right? Well it was. When we finished our beads, we got to put them on and the monk said we did a great job. We hung our dream pouch on the wall and made our way back down the hill. After lunch we changed back into civilian clothes and made our way back home.
Other little stories omitted and could be brought up for discussion another time were: the bell ringing, tea with the monk and story time, bugs in the sleeping quarters, wetness of everything especially socks and shoes, beautiful surrounding mountains, breakfast with the head monk, making Lotus Lanterns (which mine looked beautiful and LT's was, well not as beautiful, hehe) and last of course, Latanya's perspective, it is more than likely completely different than mine.
Over all I got a lot out of the weekend. It made me more positive and happy in general. I felt like I was able to dig deep inside myself and push myself physically through mental concentration. I recommend it at least once in your life. We had an experience and it was one hell of a way to spend a weekend.