I finally made it to this high point of this half of the trip. I sat beneath the Bo Tree, contemplated the meaning of life and enlightenment, and marveled at the devotion shown by the monks, nuns, and lay pilgrims from many countries (mostly SE Asia, but including Tibet, Korea, and China), as they performed their ablutions, chanted, meditated, circled the Mahabodhi temple and the Bodhi tree. All around the temple, which was built about 250 years after Buddha discovered the true path, but forgotten and buried until the late 19th century, are other smaller structures, maybe graves, among which are multi-colored sleeping mats, tents, plank platforms for performing the kneeling to prostration and back up movement, where the followers, organized followers, not wanderers with dreadlocks and backpacks, are spending the nights. The various groups of pilgrims gather at various points around the temple and are led through mantra or sutra recitation exercises by monks, often with rhythm kept by a bell or wooden fish.
Note: I am lucky enough to be in a hotel with a mosque nearby, so I am hearing the call to prayer right now.
I sat on the sidelines (about 3 feet from the group of pilgrims chanting, with enough sidewalk for those circling the temple to pass). You cannot circle the temple without also circling the tree, there is no passage between the tree and the building. My feet were bare, and I was a bit embarrassed by my bed bug bite spotted feet and ankles, but the rhythm of the chanting led me into a state of quiet, forgetful comfort. After an hour, I went back outside the grounds and bought some prayer beads and began circling with the others.
Most monks are in maroon robes, but some are in orange or beige, and most with shaved heads. There were monks and lay pilgrims performing the kneeling to prostration exercise on the sides of the building, facing it, and others as they circled the building, counting one bead for each action. Some of these people were very old and their resolve (and ability) to perform that move at their age was astonishing.
After a long, cold, and cramped train ride (sleeper class (low)) from Varanasi, which dropped me here at about 1:30am, I could not get the name of my reserved hotel right, and my auto-rickshaw driver was not really helpful, so he dropped me at a place where he could get part of the action, a real dive. It only cost Rs500, about $4USD, and was worth no more. But the guy at the desk said, "My friend come in the morning, show you all the places." I was not sure I wanted another guided tour, but the kid who showed up at 9am, with a new motorcycle and very good English, took me on a great ride through the countryside, small villages, across a dry riverbed, to one of the Mahakala caves where Buddha is said to have spent six years in self-mortification, fasting and meditating. It is a popular pilgrim/tourist spot, so the ramp up is lined with people asking for something. My driver suggested the more challenging, rough steps which I took, and avoided most of the hungry eyes.
The cave/temple, surrounding prayer flag cornucopia, and view of the lower countryside made me grateful to have bumped into this guy. I would not have even known about this site, otherwise. The cave plaque on the outside (it is just a tiny, dark opening in the side of a mountain, about 9 feet deep, 5 feet wide, and 5 feet tall) called it Buddha's Rain Retreat. I suppose he took sun during the dry seasons, and hung out in the cave during monsoon.
As the story goes, for those six years that he occupied this mountain cave, he would eat only six grains of rice each day, and came close to dying. At the end of this period, a woman named Sujata met him under a banyan tree near her village and offered him some milk rice (pudding). He decided the milk rice was better than starvation and that extreme asceticism was not the way to find Nirvana.
We also visited the village where Sujata lived, and the temple there, devoted to her, and the banyan tree where she encountered him that day.
Since I came by rail and did not want to lug the suitcase, I just brought a light backpack and left my plastic bag of cables, converters, etc., in the hotel in Varanasi. I will upload some beautiful pictures and videos of this part of the trip tomorrow.
Note: I am lucky enough to be in a hotel with a mosque nearby, so I am hearing the call to prayer right now.
I sat on the sidelines (about 3 feet from the group of pilgrims chanting, with enough sidewalk for those circling the temple to pass). You cannot circle the temple without also circling the tree, there is no passage between the tree and the building. My feet were bare, and I was a bit embarrassed by my bed bug bite spotted feet and ankles, but the rhythm of the chanting led me into a state of quiet, forgetful comfort. After an hour, I went back outside the grounds and bought some prayer beads and began circling with the others.
Most monks are in maroon robes, but some are in orange or beige, and most with shaved heads. There were monks and lay pilgrims performing the kneeling to prostration exercise on the sides of the building, facing it, and others as they circled the building, counting one bead for each action. Some of these people were very old and their resolve (and ability) to perform that move at their age was astonishing.
After a long, cold, and cramped train ride (sleeper class (low)) from Varanasi, which dropped me here at about 1:30am, I could not get the name of my reserved hotel right, and my auto-rickshaw driver was not really helpful, so he dropped me at a place where he could get part of the action, a real dive. It only cost Rs500, about $4USD, and was worth no more. But the guy at the desk said, "My friend come in the morning, show you all the places." I was not sure I wanted another guided tour, but the kid who showed up at 9am, with a new motorcycle and very good English, took me on a great ride through the countryside, small villages, across a dry riverbed, to one of the Mahakala caves where Buddha is said to have spent six years in self-mortification, fasting and meditating. It is a popular pilgrim/tourist spot, so the ramp up is lined with people asking for something. My driver suggested the more challenging, rough steps which I took, and avoided most of the hungry eyes.
The cave/temple, surrounding prayer flag cornucopia, and view of the lower countryside made me grateful to have bumped into this guy. I would not have even known about this site, otherwise. The cave plaque on the outside (it is just a tiny, dark opening in the side of a mountain, about 9 feet deep, 5 feet wide, and 5 feet tall) called it Buddha's Rain Retreat. I suppose he took sun during the dry seasons, and hung out in the cave during monsoon.
As the story goes, for those six years that he occupied this mountain cave, he would eat only six grains of rice each day, and came close to dying. At the end of this period, a woman named Sujata met him under a banyan tree near her village and offered him some milk rice (pudding). He decided the milk rice was better than starvation and that extreme asceticism was not the way to find Nirvana.
We also visited the village where Sujata lived, and the temple there, devoted to her, and the banyan tree where she encountered him that day.
Since I came by rail and did not want to lug the suitcase, I just brought a light backpack and left my plastic bag of cables, converters, etc., in the hotel in Varanasi. I will upload some beautiful pictures and videos of this part of the trip tomorrow.
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| Looking up into the Bodhi tree |
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