Update on Life

I don't have internet and so I'm having to spend about $5 at Starbucks to use their internet. It doesn't actually cost anything but I feel like I need to buy something or they may kick me out. At any rate, it's pretty clear thanks partly to this I will not be able to save $880 to pay for my school apartment this summer. That and the fact work isn't giving me many hours. I will work four hours next week. When I was still in school my average was sixteen hours a week!
I bought my ticket to China and I leave at noon on August 21st. I get back and go to Atlanta on December 16th. That's five days away from being in China for four months. Ok, Mom bought the ticket. There's no way I had money with this work schedule. And my spontaneous spending. The experiment has failed- I can't work in retail and not spend money.
In other news I'm compensating for my income by walking my aunt's dogs. That helps a little bit.
Other than that nothing is really happening. I haven't seen my Chinese teacher in probably a month so my Chinese skills are low but I'm back to knitting! I'm knitting up a ton of stuff for myself and others. So far I'm knitting a hat for my sister that I promised her I'd give her for her birthday. This year I think but it's going to be a this Christmas gift. Eh, she at least this way she can wear it as soon as she gets it. She lives in Atlanta and her birthday is in March so it would really have been no use to her then.
Anyway, it is ridiculously cold in this Starbucks and I'm definitely dressed for a hot summer day so I think I'm going to fly.
Note to self: Look into VPNs and which are best for China.

Buddhist Temple

So for an assignment I had to write a reflective paper on a Buddhist service. I thought it might be appropriate to copy my paper here since it was for my "Chinese Religions" class.

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I arrived at the Fo Guang Shan temple just minutes before the ceremony started. I quickly found my side and the procession began.  We paid our respect to the monks by bowing as they past us to go to the temple; however, they remained with their backs towards us, facing the three buddhas. I was a bit surprised, having only attended Christian ceremonies but after some thought decided this was far more affirming. Why would you turn your back to the symbol of the one you revere? For some reason, this simple act made the procession even more spiritual and less like someone taking the stage.

                We continued by chanting in a sing-song way various prayers with a lot of bowing. I instantly thought of my mother who had knee surgery as we lowered ourselves to the stools before us and remained in the full bowing position for a couple seconds. I watched as the elders slowly made their way down and slowly made their way back up, wondering if they would be shunned if they only bowed halfway to save their knees. I didn’t see anyone not go all the way down. I noticed over time it became easier for them to go down as it did for me. My knees didn’t hurt at all and usually they do with some bending. I realized somehow the way we were going down that I was using muscles in my legs instead of my knees and decided this was a pretty decent work-out. Perhaps all of this bowing helps your knees in the sense that you build the muscles around them?

                Finally we sat down and began to read/sing from this book. It was 47 pages long and we said 45 of them non-stop. The lead monk would take random breaks and I honestly wondered why he didn’t have a water bottle to keep his mouth from getting too dry. I admit I started to doze. I didn’t actually say the words but followed along and tried to read some of the translations. That’s when I realized this was like a scripture and as far as I knew the entire scripture (it was 45 pages). I wondered why the Christian services I had gone to didn’t read more scripture and perform less. After all, the sermons are more or less opinions- interpretations of a text that can be interpreted by anyone who reads it.

                After what seemed like forever we stood up once more and chanted numerous prayers again, multiple times, and proceeded with more bowing. When I finally thought it was over, I was pulled into a corner where a female monk prepared to translate the sermon for us. She had a hard time coming up with the right words and one man interrupted her with ridiculous questions about the times of meditation classes, so I’m not sure I received the entire message. From what I understood, the message was not to obsess on the superficial but to go deeper because by categorizing things you are already limiting yourself. It seemed like a very good sermon and I was frustrated I didn’t get more of it.

                At the end the monk announced today was someone’s birthday, or rather multiple someones. Triplets came down from the children’s area for us to present them with a cake and sing “Happy Birthday” to them. I left seriously considering returning if not for the Buddhism teachings then for the exercise and exposure to Chinese.