After seeing the baby on the bus, we couldn't help but talk about Pokemon. Haha! :-)
Finally we got to 범어사 Beomeosa and it is gorgeous! Talk about finding peace and beauty in nature. We have a great view from the place we're staying in tonight. The green mountains are my favorite here. It's so different from what's in Utah. Just walking around brought me peace and it was so easy to marvel what was around us. In Buddhism, they don't believe in two genders really. All of us had to wear these monk training robes that made us look like fat prison innmates. The main monk and one of his assistants talked to us about what was going to happen and a little bit about Buddhism and gave us green tea. Problem: we don't drink green tea. Solution we took: right when they left we hurriedly dumped the tea in a water bottle. It got everywhere which was a big problem. We tried to clean it up quickly but I think the assistant saw us. They taught us that every moment is meditating. Even when you walk, you're meditating. They told us to walk with our hands in front of us and to be quiet/meditate.
In Buddhism, they don't believe in eating animal products and so we got to have a vegetarian dinner. Eating vegetarian is totally fine. Except the food wasn't really that good. You know bad cafeteria food? Yeah that was dinner tonight haha. I'm not a picky eater at all but the food wasn't appetizing tonight. The 밥 rice (bahb/pahp) was really sticky. The 김치 kimchi was super sour. The 시금치 spinach (sigeumchi/shigeumchi) was okay. Haha all of us looked at each other and one of us whispered, "Orange restaurant after this temple stay/" Haha lol. You have to be quiet even when you eat. Even when you eat, you must meditate.
After dinner, we went to the gongs where the monks banged on the drums (which was awesome)! After, we were taken back to the temple where we would pracitce meditation. Monks meditate hours a day. I couldn't do it for more than 10 minutes. Sitting Indian crossed and meditating is harder than you think. My back hurt and I couldn't sit properly that long. I thought something that was really cool was what Dr. Peterson told us. He mentioned that many religions here are very different than Christianity. He mentioned a quote from I believe Joseph F. Smith about missionary work. "We're not supposed to tell people they're wrong. In fact, we're supposed to tell them that they're right. But that we have more." It's amazing how my outlook has been on religions and beliefs when I have found similarities between them. Even though Buddhism is so different from Christianity, we could still find some similarities. Dr. Peterson told us that when we meditate to think of the similarities between our church and Buddhism. I couldn't do it because I couldn't concentrate but many of the other students were able to do it and had a great experience.
We had to go to bed at 9 because tomorrow we're waking up at 3 a.m.! We're watching the sunrise and doing more meditation and we'll get to participate in the chanting and readings tomorrow! Exciting but 3 in the morning? The sunrise will be beautiful no doubt. I mean those mountains are gorgeous! Haha but do 5 girls go to bed on time when their beds are set up like slumber parties? Absolutely not! Hahaha and guess what we talked about? This isn't rocket science. You got it. Boys. We talked about boys until midnight. See you 3 in the morning!
In Buddhism, they don't believe in eating animal products and so we got to have a vegetarian dinner. Eating vegetarian is totally fine. Except the food wasn't really that good. You know bad cafeteria food? Yeah that was dinner tonight haha. I'm not a picky eater at all but the food wasn't appetizing tonight. The 밥 rice (bahb/pahp) was really sticky. The 김치 kimchi was super sour. The 시금치 spinach (sigeumchi/shigeumchi) was okay. Haha all of us looked at each other and one of us whispered, "Orange restaurant after this temple stay/" Haha lol. You have to be quiet even when you eat. Even when you eat, you must meditate.
After dinner, we went to the gongs where the monks banged on the drums (which was awesome)! After, we were taken back to the temple where we would pracitce meditation. Monks meditate hours a day. I couldn't do it for more than 10 minutes. Sitting Indian crossed and meditating is harder than you think. My back hurt and I couldn't sit properly that long. I thought something that was really cool was what Dr. Peterson told us. He mentioned that many religions here are very different than Christianity. He mentioned a quote from I believe Joseph F. Smith about missionary work. "We're not supposed to tell people they're wrong. In fact, we're supposed to tell them that they're right. But that we have more." It's amazing how my outlook has been on religions and beliefs when I have found similarities between them. Even though Buddhism is so different from Christianity, we could still find some similarities. Dr. Peterson told us that when we meditate to think of the similarities between our church and Buddhism. I couldn't do it because I couldn't concentrate but many of the other students were able to do it and had a great experience.
We had to go to bed at 9 because tomorrow we're waking up at 3 a.m.! We're watching the sunrise and doing more meditation and we'll get to participate in the chanting and readings tomorrow! Exciting but 3 in the morning? The sunrise will be beautiful no doubt. I mean those mountains are gorgeous! Haha but do 5 girls go to bed on time when their beds are set up like slumber parties? Absolutely not! Hahaha and guess what we talked about? This isn't rocket science. You got it. Boys. We talked about boys until midnight. See you 3 in the morning!
Temple house
Our. Amazing. View.
We could look out every moment to this and we woke up to this.
Laundry
5 Buddhist monks in training.
Meditation
Banging on the drums. They had a couple guys doing it and it lasted for over 15 minutes. You have to be so strong to bang on those. Also, it's all improvization! They had the coolest rhythms!
