If you truly believe, then you will not be tempted by the coercions of satan.

Scary title eh!
The actual topic isn't very scary though. This weekend, Karly and I had the opportunity, along with 2 students from our Korean American Friendship Circle and my boss and his wife, to to a "temple stay" at Haeinsa. Interestingly enough we have gotten a little flack from some of our friends over here but I have to wonder why they are so animate against visiting a temple and learning about their customs. I'm not going to go into philosophical or religious discussion because those of you who are reading this likely already know how I stand, which is firm Lutheran no questions.
So on to the show. I can't even begin to relate the whole experience. It truly surrounded you for about 20 hours. First, we showed up for the stay, and they had us register and pay the fee. Many temples are like a hotel, you can spend the night anytime for about 20,000 won. The cost was a little higher for us because they were running a program so it was 30K (huge difference ;) ). We were then shuffled off to our respective bunkhouses, women in a nice big room with a refrigerator, a water cooler (with hot and cold water), and their own bathroom. The men were taken down a construction ramp, past a heating oil tank, over a bunch of pipes, and down a narrow corridor (on one side was a construction barricade) where we went all the way to the end of the building and into a 10 foot wide by 40 foot long corridor with lockers on one wall. This was to be our home. The restroom was the common pit latrine with an ice cold outdoor spring for the only water.
The weather was very chilly so left layers on and put our temple stay clothes (traditional Korean clothes). We then headed up to learn a little about what we were going to do, have an opening ceremony and then dinner.

The opening ceremony was the usual chanting with a couple of bows. We were asked to participate but not required. We all did learn how to bow though, I didn't think there was that much to it but indeed to do it right was difficult. I remember during the opening ceremony doing a glorious version of the Lords prayer in my head (as the stay went on I went through Kumbaya, The Nicene creed, some Haydn, and even a little Monty Python to name a few). After the opening, we were instructed to get some neatly wrapped bowls that were lined up on shelves to the rear of the hall. We sat in a semi-circle and learned how the most formal and traditional monks eat their meals. It's called four bowls (I can't remember the Han-gul). The package was entirely wrapped tightly with a gray cloth tied in a bow over the bowls and covered with a hand towel. Under the knot of the cloth were the chopsticks and spoon in a little pouch. The hard stainless of the utensils kept the outer wrapping tight. Under the four bowls was a tabel cloth. The process was simple, undo the package, lay out the cloth, put the four concentric bowls out (one in each corner) and place the utensils in the upper right bowl. Of course the catch was that this had to be done in silence. After the setting is out, then he meal is served.

So we practiced with our bowls a couple of times, and then it was time to go get the food. We went out with good order and dicipline in a straight line and headed to the kitchen. We carried all of our food back to the hall and set it out as directed. We sat down, heard the 3 claps of the bamboo stick, and started unfolding. After that, 3 servers started passing out the water to clean the bowls, then the rice, followed by the soup, and lastly we picked up our own sides and placed them into the upper left bowl. We were required to have at least one of the yellow radishes to clean the bowls with when complete. We were given about 5 minutes to stuff our faces, and then the three claps indicated we were to be finished (some didn't make the cut). Then came the rice water. This was the best part, after all the food was consumed, you had hot rice water poured into your rice bowl. You swirl it around to clean the leftovers out, and pour it into the side dish bowl and do the same, followed by the soup bowl. Once you've sufficiently cleaned the three bowls you drink the water (tastes interesting). Then you use some of the original water to clean out the bowls again, this time with the radish, followed by eating the radish and pouring out the waste water from the original cleaning. then you dry the dishes with your towel, and restack to return to the shelves. I didn't find this too sanitary so I'm not planning on becomming a monk for this as my first of many reasons.

As we were finishing, we heard the loud sound of the evening drum ceremony. We finished up and watched the end and were scurried off to the evening prayer ceremony. At this one I made found the Monty Python monk chant worked perfect. We then headed to the head followed by tea time in the ladies room. We sat and introduced ourselves and had a wonderful question and answer session with the monk who was our guide for the tour. I'm not going to try and offend anyone here but the answers basically showed me that the religion is all about me. It's very self-centered. We posed the question based on Biblical scriptures of giving love as Jesus loved us as well as faith and works, and we got the answer "through meditation we have a great influence on the world". HUH??? I just can't take the leap to a bunch of people sitting in a circle staring at the floor in front of them while having their feet go to sleep because of the position their sitting in and keeping completely silent for hours on end, can cause major change in the world.

Anyway, after a nice refreshing fruit plate (I was still hungry), we headed off to bed for lights out at 9. Of course we didn't get to leave until 10 till so there was barely enough time to brush teeth and hit the jon prior to lights out. Then in our bunkhouse which was a heated floor (hard), where we were stacked in like sardines, there were three 10year old boys. That was not fun as we were trying to get to sleep for a 3AM wakeup and had three boys snickering and making fake snoring sounds. Of course dad wasn't saying anything and I can't chew out some Korean kids cause they's look at me like a deer in headlights. So I just prayed and attempted to sleep. Emphasis on attempt.

3AM
Good morning neverland!! Reason 2 not to become a Buddhist monk!
315 start the moring drums (really cool show).
330 moring ceremony. We got there a little early so we'd have seats right behind the monks. Unfortunately they seem to like uncomfortable sitting positions and my ankles were killing me before the thing even started. The head monk started chanting and everyone was bowing here and there, and then the wave of halitosis hit. Apparently brushing teeth before the morning service doesn't happen for monks. It was terrible, I wanted to breath into the mat but i'm not sure that would have been better as people step on the mats all the time, so I was stuck.

We were shuffled off yet again to the same room we ate dinner in the night before. We were going to do the baek-pal (108) bow's ceremony. 108 is symbolic of the number of afflictions we will have in our lifetime. Again, I'm not sure how they came up with that number. In anycase, I spent most of this PT session thinking about how stupid it was to wear zip off pants under my temple garb. My knees were killing me. I also made the bowing into more like push ups. So it was kind of a hit your knees, do a push up, rock back up and stand while of course keeping your balance and making it smooth. All in the name of learning right? So sore and tired, we headed to the ladies giant crib again for a little meditation.

This is where I learned about the meditation position and its propensity to shut off blood supply to your left leg. I meditated hard on praying that Mom would go to church more and live a healthier lifestyle, that the grandmas were healthy, that our little peanut was growing a good little brain and heart, among other things. Apparently, we're supposed to think about some "secret code" or ha-du. But since I was never told the secret code I had a hard time thinking about it. A half hour later I was in serious pain and praying that my tendons would bounce back to normal.

Finally, breakfast. We actually ate at the table (in complete silence of course). Korean breakfast is the same as lunch and by this time I wanted meat but the temple food didn't seem to have any (imagine that). Then it was time for showers and shave. I of course had only one blade left and it was dull so I nicked myself a coupl of times and had some nasty razor burn on my chin. To the fortune of Koreans, they don't grow a lot of facial hair so shaving every day isn't a necessity, but for my hairy chin I needed a better blade.

Then the tour of the temple. This is what I had been really waiting for. A guided tour of Haeinsa where I could finally get to see the Tripitaka Koreana one of the first (if not the) sets of woodblock printing blocks in the world. It is also the most complete collection of Buddhist sutra and considered to be a world treasure. The blocks are over 900 years old and still kept in the same building as they were originally placed in. There are over 80,000 wood blocks about 1ft x 2.5 ft each. The blocks and their preservation are truly a marvel especially for us bibliophiles.

After the tour, we were pretty much done for the day. We went back to our rooms changed back into normal clothes, and cleaned up a bit then did an evaluation and headed off for a group picture. I almost forgot Karly intentionally killed a bee somewhere in there too (ooooh). We had a small but good lunch checked out the souvenir shop and headed for the Haeinsa museum and then home to shower and catch up on sleep.