Achieving Nirvana

This weekend was very painful. And cultural. But mostly painful. Such is the life of a Buddhist monk. I did a temple stay at Beomeosa Temple this past weekend. It was a great experience, but definitely painful. The point of a temple stay is to experience a little more of Korean culture and learn about the life of a Buddhist monk. My friends and I got to Beomeosa at 1pm on Saturday and began monkification. First up was the training suit. It was the most comfortable set of clothes I've ever worn. I had no qualms about wearing it for the whole weekend.

After we were changed a monk came in to tell us about temple manners. There is a special way to walk in and out of a shrine as to never turn your back to Buddha. We also learned how to do the dreaded bows. These aren't normal "bow at the waist" bows. These are 5 points on the floor bows. We had to get down on our hands and knees with our elbows touching the floor, rest our left foot on our right foot, forehead on the floor, and palms upturned as to hold the feet of Buddha. A normal bowing requires 3 bows. No big deal right? Sometimes. I'll get to that later.

The temple tour was pretty cool. I had no idea just how big a temple compound could be. There were at least 5 halls that you could worship in. Following the tour came dinner. A traditional 4 bowl vegan meal. We had to assemble our bowls, napkins, and such in a specifc way and put only specific foods in each bowl. I wish they explained the reasoning behind this. To wash the bowls we poured a little water in and scrubbed the bowl with a yellow radish. Once all the bowls were clean, we had to drink the water and eat the radish. Not one grain of rice was to be wasted at this meal.

The 4 percussions came next. Beomeosa has a HUGE drum hanging in a pavillion that they beat twice a day. There's also a temple bell, a wooden fish bell, and anoter smaller bell. We saw a cool 10 minute performance before evening service. The service wasn't so bad if you don't think about all the kneeling. We had to kneel as flat as we could with our butts resting on our heels. It was brutal. When service was over we went back to the sleeping hall for some bowing. Not 3 bows, but 108. 108 bows. One hundred-eight forehead to the ground on your elbows and knees bows. It was torture. While we were on the floor in bow position we strung a bead on a string. When we were done we had our very own set of prayer beads. It was cool to make them while bowing because they have more meaning to us.

The significance of 108 is interesting. The Buddhists see that you sense things through your eyes, ears, mouth, nose, mind, and body. I forget the next step but its something like each sense affects another sense....so somehow you have the number 36. Then you can sin in your past life, present life, and future lives. So now you have 108, which is why you bow 108 times.

By the time we were done bowing it was bedtime at 9pm. Makes sense when wake up was at 3. Ugh. We got up for another percussion performance and morning service at 3:30. Following sercvice was a lesson on how to meditate and then breakfast. After breakfast we had tea with the head monk. He was a really insightful person. Every question we asked he answered with a really good metaphor. Next came a nature hike and community work. Then home. Then sleep. Lots of sleep.

I got a lot out of the temple stay but I wish it went a little more in depth into what Buddhism was all about. Yeah the program covered a little, but it focused more on the life of a monk and not the fundamentals of the Buddhist philosophy. Regardless, it was a great experience and I absolutely recommend it to anyone who has the opportunity.