lanterns and drums

I wanted to put some pictures up with this post but I'm a bit too tired and lazy to deal with the uploading process at the moment. But Rachel and I got some good shots of the temple last night and this morning.

We went up to Songwansa yesterday afternoon because we heard that there would be some kind of candle lighting ceremony. There didn't end up being much of a ceremony, but there were lots of beautiful lanterns strung up around the temple and over a pond near the temple entrance. It was nice being out there at night, it was very peaceful. We inquired after our monk friend, the one who accompanied us on our hike between Songwansa and Seonamsa, but were told that he was no longer staying at Songwansa. After soaking up the tranquility we walked back down to the little area of restaurants and shops below to get some dinner. I was a little disappointed that there hadn't been much of an event. They didn't even perform the drumming ceremony that they do every day at dusk. I guess maybe the monks were too busy with other holiday-related things to do the nightly drumming. I was glad we got a chance to see all the colored paper lanterns at night, though.

We had a late dinner of bindaettuk (a sort of pancake made with bean) and pa jeon (another kind of pancake made with leeks and octopus) and some dong dong ju (a type of fermented wine), then made our way to the bus. When we arrived at Songwansa we'd asked the bus driver what time the last bus came. He'd told us 10:10. We arrived at the bus stop around 9:30. Shortly after we arrived, a woman came up to us and told us that the last bus had already come around 9 pm. Like all temples, Songwansa is up on a mountain, and getting to Songwansa involved taking a city bus for over an hour through countryside. According to the helpful woman, our choices were spending 15,000 won on a minbak (a type of modest lodging) 20,000 on a yeogwan (type of hotel) or 30,000 on a cab ride. We decided to go for the minbak, reluctantly, but we suspected that even if we did the cab ride, it would probably end up being more than 30,000 (about 30 dollars) because it was night time and we'd have to call a taxi since none were around. Unfortunately we ended up spending 30,000 on the minbak, since the cheaper rooms were occupied. But ultimately I was really glad we spent the night.

Because it turned out Sunday morning was the big time to visit the temple. We'd thought about visiting the temple again in the morning, but when we got up were leaning towards just going home until we saw all the carloads and bus loads of people arriving in the parking lot. Followed the stream of people back up the hill to find that the temple entrance fee had been waived for the day and that paper lanterns had been strung all through the main compound. In the entry way we were given gifts of tea and bead bracelets. A helped ushered us over to a table where we wrote our names, Chinese zodiac and addresses on a special piece of paper that was then attached to one of the paper lanterns around. It turned out that this cost money, but then the helper (who it turned out taught Ethics at a high school in a different province) felt bad for sort of inadvertantly tricking us into it and so he got us extra bracelets and later gave me a golden card of his own that depicted a buddha statue from the temple.

There were many people at the temple, many people actually worshipping, something which I'd never seen on that scale in Suncheon. I did see lots of worshippers when my mother and I visited a temple in Busan at sundown, with a professor from Busan National University (mom gave a talk there). I attributed that to the fact it was an urban temple in a large city. There was a drumming ceremony this morning too, and apparently a free lunch, though we didn't stay for that. The governor of Jeollanam province was also there, making me think we'd picked the right temple to visit that day. We also checked out the temple museum which had some beautiful prints for sale. They seemed to be done with a sort of gold ink on multicolored silk. A monk tried to strike up a conversation with us in Korean. We asked him about our monk friend and got the same sort of mysterious response of "He doesn't stay here anymore." I wonder where he went, and why?

We successfully got a bus back to Suncheon around 11, a sort of rollercoaster ride through the fields that I'm sure took much less time than our busride up had. I ate lunch with my host family while Rachel napped a little (the hot ondol floors of the minbak hadn't been the most restful) and then Rachel and I rented a Korean movie called "The Way Home." Rachel got on a bus to Gwangju a little while ago. It was really nice to see her, since it had been many weeks since we'd really hung out. And like I think I've said before, we always seem to have unexpected adventures when it comes to temples. I'll put some pictures up soon.