Today we went to a Buddhist Temple near our school. There were a lot of monks and other visitors there, and one monk gave us a tour of the different halls for praying.
I asked the monk if people pray just out of respect or if they actually pray for certain things, and he gave me a very Chinese answer. He said that they don't actually believe that Buddha or the statues will do anything, they just thank him for his teachings and pray that they can receive his teachings. But then he said they also ask him for wisdom in decisions like finding work, or buying a house.
There's also plates of apples in front of the Buddhas and if you're having troubles or if someone is sick, you can take an apple for them to eat as a kind of blessing.
There were a lot of people cow-towing (if that's what its called), they would bow and turn their hands palm-up to receive his teachings.
It was very beautiful there, everything was so intricately done.
After a while, they also let us eat with them in a cafeteria room. They put out bowls for everyone, and then the monks chanted for a while. I took a video but I can't seem to upload videos on here. It was pretty cool. Then we ate. You have to eat everything you're given, cause they don't believe in wasting food. And they also don't eat meat. The food they gave us was really good though. We had white rice, cucumber, a type of thin green vegetable/herb, and eggplant. It was pretty good.
Then we left.
Today was the first day of sun in a week, everyday this week it rained non-stop, so it was a really nice day for visiting the temple.
I tried to take close-up pictures of the temple's details, it was really beautiful.
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