Wu Wei Zheng Dao 66
On the road from the mountains forest around Wu Wei temple one can meet the "stacks on the legs" - going down back to the village old ladies, carrying on the backs collected pine needles, packed in a huge rectangular shaped stacks more than a meter high.
When asked why they were doing that, the old ladies answered with the
enthusiasm, but in their local dialect, which disciples of Wu Wei temple could not understand. And the answer remained a mystery until mandarin speaking local girl translated, that the fallen needles are used to make large incense sticks, which are then burn in temple.
Foreigners living at the Wu Wei temple were surprised, that huge incense sticks in a bright magenta color paper, which burning for many hours, local old ladies make from collected in the surrounding forest pine needles.
Residents of megapolises, especially from other countries, do not easily understand the ways of life of Chinese villagers, and some local traditions can lead foreigners to a slight shock.
Lara, a 23 years old girl from Novgorod, stayed few weeks at the Wu Wei temple, and witnessed the procedure, that consider simple and understandable by local, but greatly surprised Russian girl. Trip to China - the country of her childhood dream, was the gift from here parents. She had learned Chinese for a couple of years, which helped her a lot in the temple.
One morning, not going to training because of the slight pain in her stomach, Lara was secluded in the sun on a bench at the yard of the new part of the temple, and enjoyed loneliness. A monk that was staying at the guest room there, came outside, but her peace was not disturbed, monk never spoke to foreigners.
Lara heard that before coming to Wu Wei si, he trained in Shaolin temple, and his kung fu skills was very high, but he trains in the woods outside temple ground, and foreign guests only saw him during meals, and at prayers.
Silently passing Lara, he began to swept the yard, then removed the cobwebs from the tea bush, then hung a towel on the bush and sat down on a bench with a trash can in front of him.
- I secretly took a couple of shots on my phone, - Lara told the foreigners afterwards, - when the monk swept the tea bush with his outstretched arm at the height of his chest, holding a scoop in other hand. He looked like a semaphore - robot. It was funny, and I thought it is a cute photo for the collection of moments of life of the mountain temple.
When I noticed that the monk, slightly leaning over the plastic bucket standing at his feet, pierced his fingertip with some pen-type object, and pressing the finger, that blood shot into the bucket, I could not help to ask him “what are you doing?”
He said it was to get rid of stagnant blood. And that it should be done every 2-3 months to stay healthy. And that many people in China do so, especially if they get sick. For example, if a tooth hurts, he does so, and in the morning pain gone! Because there was a lot of fire in the tooth.
I said that in the West, too, this was done before. Many diseases were treated by bloodlettings. In the absence of other opportunities in the early stages of medicine, but I did not say this part, not knowing how to say it in Chinese.
But I knew how to talk about all kinds of other things, and grabbed the opportunity to communicate with this mysterious monk.
He is 44 years old, which was impossible to determine. Right?...
-Yep, we all wondered about their age, it is never easy to tell, - said guy from Israel.
- We talked about all kind of things, - continued Lara, - He spent six months in America, living near the Harvard University, teaching kung fu. In English he could say just "senkyu" and "noy", saying that he could not learn the language, because he was no longer a young man, and the language was not coming to him easy. But he mentioned that it was very easy to get a visa, in the embassy, as they saw that he is a monk, the visa was given without problems!
He is from the northeast, so his Chinese is clear, with a slight addition of "r" as the Beijiners do, and I understood him, unlike when talking to the locals, who speak not like our teacher in Novgorod! - smiled Lara and continued the story:
-He lived in Beijing for some time, where he ate a lot of "leb", referring to “hleb” (bread in Russian), and he liked this huge "leb," he showed it to me, spreading arms for half a meter. I doubted that the loaves were of this size, but he assured me, that in Beijing they are exactly that big, because “there are many Russians living there” he said.
Telling this he took turns to pierce his fingertips and shoot long bursts of blood into the bucket. Saying, that it is very useful and everybody from children to an old people are doing so.
I did not dare to take pictures of this process, but I asked if women do it too? The monk confidently said yes, everyone doing it! and squeezed his little finger, it was its turn for the blood fountain. Then he carefully put needle-pen in a nice little case, took out plastic bag from the bucket, and took it somewhere.
Lara sat in silence until lunchtime, rejoicing in such a multi-informative conversation on various unexpected topics, and that she was able to hold it in Chinese, for the first time talking to a monk in a Buddhist temple.
She was absolutly happy:
- Wu Wei temple is incredible place, and I am so glad that I learned Chinese! It is for such amazing conversations! I also remembered, that the monk said he plays the flute, - Lara turned to the guy from India, who came to the temple the day before, with a backpack full of a variety of flutes.