We're lucky to get Korean National Holidays off work, in addition to our vacation days in Korea, and all of us teacher here were excited to see that this year's Children's Day and Buddha's Birthday holidays, landed on Monday-Tuesday (5th-6th) May, giving us a 4 day weekend.
Naturally I searched for flights to Taiwan or Japan but there weren't any good deals at all, so a group of us decided that we should 'tick a few boxes' from the things we can do in Korea. One of them, which we seem to have never got round to, is a Temple Stay. Our good friends Nina and Paudi had booked a overnight stay in Haeinsa, so we decided to tag along!
Haeinsa (해인사) is one of the Three Jewel Temples of Korea, and represents Dharma or the Buddha's teachings. It was founded in 802 and the name is derived from "truly enlightened world of Buddha and our naturally undefiled mind." Haeinsa is located close to Daegu in the Gaya Mountains, South Gyeongsang Province. On the Saturday we headed to Seo-bu bus terminal and caught the bus directly to Haeinsa, costing about 7,000 won each.
The bus takes you up the windy mountain road and to a terminal. Arriving there in the sun, we got some water and walked up the steps and hill to the temple. We immediately discovered how big and beautiful the temple was. It was also well decorated in colourful lanterns for Buddha's upcoming Birthday. We found the place to register for the Temple Stay and were given some oversized, padded brown pyjamas to put on.
We were ushered to a room where we met other people partaking in the stay. An Italian guy (with great Korean), a Chinese girl, a Vietnamese girl and a Korean guy (with good English) came to talk to us and this formed our group. We were led into a room where we were given instruction on Buddhist/Temple etiquette and told the itinerary. This was quickly followed by a dinner in the temple's cafeteria. Without being disrespectful to the monks and cooks, the nicest thing I can say about the meal was that I would rather have eaten Vladimir Putin's sock. Thankfully I happened to have some Cheetos in my bag that I'd not managed to eat on the bus journey. ^^
Next, we were taken to a temple where we bowed a few times and listened to monks sing and light candles. This was a great experience. By now it had got dark and it was peaceful and serene in the wooded mountain. The only noise that could be heard was the monks' song and the tapping of the instrument.
We then had tea with 'our' monk. This was the best part of the stay. He served us some tea and we sat in a circle in the temple and talked about many things. We were very surprised to hear the monk talk about his pre-monk life. He used to like to smoking, eating BBQ, drinking, partying and girls. He asked us if we knew Pasha nightclub in Daegu. When we said we did, he mentioned they used to have 'Touch Parties', whereby Koreans could put stickers on their bodies and you were allowed to touch them there... he then mentioned he liked boobs. To be fair to him... who doesn't!? This was very enlightening for us!
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| At one with the world |
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| The monks were quite cool people! |
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| The four of us inside |
After sleep, we were woken up at 3am to get ready for prayer. We watched some monks bang the drums which could be heard across the mountains, then went back to the temple to bow and listen to the monks sing again. We were then led to another building where we embarked on a workout that would have Jillian Michaels in a panic. We were to do 108 'prostrations', which is a special way of bowing to buddha and standing back up again. This was followed by 30 minutes of silent meditation with your legs crossed and squeezed up your thigh which made me feel like Dhalsim from Street Fighter. |
| Buddhist Prostraition (x108!!!) |
After this punishment... I mean... experience, we were 'treated' to breakfast, which was (marginally) better than the dinner, then made to do communal work'. Paudi and I had imagined having to clean the temples with a toothbrush or something, but all we had to do was clean the dorms in which we'd slept. We were then given a tour and an insight into the temple's history and an overview of Buddhism by a wonderful guide. We were taken to the Tripitaka Koreana, individually crafted blocks of the teachings of Buddha, in Chinese. Sadly, mid-way through our tour, tour guide received a call to say his relative had passed away, yet he continued to show us around. I was very impressed with him, and he was a great guy.
After eating (real food), we caught the bus to Jinju, and from there bought tickets to Tongyeong. The journeys were pleasant, despite me almost losing my bag. We took a taxi to our hotel which was really nice. Looked like a classy Love-Motel but was spotless and had everything we needed (www.motelo2.com ). We chilled out, had great BBQ and bought some beers to have in the hotel and watched TV.
The next day, we decided to take a ferry from Tongyeong to one of the many islands off the coast. We chose Bijindo (비진도) as our friend Victoria was camping there and we were curious to see what it was like. This turned out to be a wonderful ride and a beautiful island, one of the best places I've been in South Korea. We walked on the beach and could have been fooled to believe we were in Vietnam. The beach wasn't so clean, but it was beautiful. We found a giant light bulb of all things!! We had a couple of beers, hiked the mountain to get an areal view of Bijindo before catching the ferry back and having a Pizza.
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| Beers on the beach with friends |
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| Winnie had a great idea (look how beautiful) |
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| Returning from the hike |
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| Paudi and the girls |
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| Ferry ride was short and fun. |
The next day was Buddha's Birthday. We walked to the harbour and looked around the Turtle Ship replicas, made famous by Yi Sun Shin (이순신). Then we went for a walk into the streets of Dongpirang, a poor area of Tongyeong brought to life by colourful street-art. We walked to the top of the mountain and took pictures by the pagoda. We'd had a wonderful time in Tongyeong and would love to go back. We took a taxi to the bus terminal and bought tickets back to Daegu. We had to wait a while as there was a massive line of people returning for the holidays. We managed to get a seat on an overly packed bus, so we were happy ^^
We had hoped to squeeze in a ride on the cable car up Mt. Mireuksan, but I'd read many blogs that said during holidays, the wait for the cable cars can be 3-4 hours. Next time!
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| Standing at the back of the Turtle Ship |
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| Looking over Tongyeong Harbour, beaut! |
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| Ran into some 500 year old noblemen :) |
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| Street art |
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| 'cosy' ride home |
