Temple Crawl

Today was my day to see what local temples had to offer for lions. I woke up way earlier than I expected, even with a little spell of morning reluctance I got up at 8 and was out the door at 9. What a difference a few hours makes! Mong Kok was significantly less insane, still insane but not "Oh God what the hell?!" insane. I first went to Chi-Lin nunnery, a beautiful old Buddhist monastery that's completely pieced together without any nails. I got there in about 20 mins, so for a while I had the place pretty much to myself. It was lovely, monks chanting (turns out it was a cd, but still) the smell of burning incense and old wood, a babbling lotus garden. Beautiful and peaceful, but sadly lacking in lions. On a whim, since it tool less time to get there than I thought, I visited the Nan Lin garden across the street (and attached by a stone bridge). A little over manicured, but still very nice and more importantly, peaceful.I didn't know HK could have such quite pockets in Kowloon. Aside from being a nice distraction, I had a little success, LIONS! On a little bridge heading toward the "Pavilion of Absolute Perfection." It might be a bit of a hyperbole, but at least I've gotten something out of trekking there (aside of the enlightenment through osmosis).


Next I took the MTA one stop over to Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin (yikes). It was wholesale enlightenment, hundreds of people praying in mass, burning incense, donating coins, fruit, chicken and, for one family, an entire roast boar. You choke on the clouds on incense, everyone is running around with burning sticks in their hands. People stop and go as they please. At first I was worried it would be rude to take photos, but I saw right away people would stop, burn, pray and take photos, so I guess its part religion, part tour. actually once I got past the foreignness of it, it was an awful lot like the Vatican. Some people were genuinely praying, but everyone's aware you're there to see some of the spectacle. Plus the temple is supposed to be an all in one shot, Buddhist, Taoist and Confusian, so anyone who goes there shouldn't be too worried about offending the gods, at least those worried about singular devotion. In the visitor center a man was holding a little baby and came nearby, so of course I started making faces. Aside from the usual baby-themed talked, the dad said "He's never seen before, golden hair." Yay, I'm somebody's first white person. I asked "are you surprised?" to the baby and he just looked at me with with this fixed little stare. Very cute. The dad laughed.

SSYWTS has an entire mall style building of fortune telling, but at that point I was sick from the smoke and a pretty fed up with superstition. Its weird, i don't particularly like religion for all the goo-gahs it attaches to basic human desires, but to see it laid bare as a practice of luck and ancestor worship, I think I kind of prefer the goo-gahs.

Last stop was Tin Hau temple in Yau Ma Tei. This was a little north of Tsim Tsa Tsui, so basically its back in the bedlam. Beautiful old temple, very small but the intimacy helped. Spiral coils of incense hung from the ceiling and open atrium. I got there just as the sun peaked though at an angle, absolutely beautiful. Plus I found some nice old lions out front, good example of mid-19th century stuff. Popped by the recommended Broadway Cinematheque, nice little slice of urban modernity, made me think of home. I might go back for a movie next week.

Not sure what I'll do tonight, but at least I'm not as tired as I was yesterday.