"Originally there is nothing..." Venerable Hsin Pao

After close to 30 hours of travel I have made it! Taiwan is a beautiful country, filled with lush greenery EVERYWHERE. I may just stay here until the Californian drought is over haha. Anyway, the experience is pretty much what I expected although the monastery is completely different then anything I could have imagined. It is HUGE. There is two of the most giant Buddha statues I have ever seen, as well as a shrine (the Main Shrine) housing nearly 10,000 images of the Buddha. It is also much more developed then I had pictured with many tourists and pilgrims around everyday. The Monks and Nuns are all very nice though quiet and I think they get a kick out of us kids trying our best to imitate them. I landed in Taipei near 6 a.m. and as soon as I stepped outside I was wet and sticky. Man the humidity here is tough but luckily much of the time spent at the monastery is inside in nicely air conditioned rooms. My first culture shock was walking into a 7/11. Man the smells! It was more like a street food market then a 7/11 with bubbling cauldrons of oil (and who knows what else) containing corn, meat, rice balls, fish, desserts and many other suspect (though delicious looking) objects. The high speed rail was cool after a nice girl helped me get into the station LOL. One of the trains was Adventure Time themed (it was a giant Jake the Dog) and another was Cartoon Network themed although I got the snicklefritz train which was plain. Riding the rail was awesome! I traveled from Taipei in the north to Kaohsiung in the south so got to see much of the island. I also sat by a nice Taiwanese guy living in California who taught me a lot about Taiwan and Taiwanese culture. Most of the island seems to be vegetable farms with cities dotting the landscape. There seemed to be a major lack of roads. I've met a lot of \people so far, and everyone in the program seems to be really nice and for the most part cool. Yesterday (first day of retreat) consisted mostly of orientation and the rules for both the program and monastic etiquette. We did do some walking meditation as well as chanting which was a great experience and made me feel really, really good. Can't wait until we start some serious meditation. We were also blessed have an opening ceremony conducted by the Abbot of the monastery Venerable Hsin Pao. First time I have met someone who I could feel their presence in the room. What an experience! We learned how to eat in the monastic way which is actually pretty tough. It is conducted in complete silence other than chanting before and after the meal. The difficulty comes from communicating with the servers what you do or don't want. To make it easy I accept whatever they give me and don't ask for seconds. The food is good though all this white rice is starting to bog me down if you know what I mean. It is also tough because monastics are expected to eat everything which includes the leftover juices and tiny flecks of food which is pretty difficult to do with chopsticks while maintaining manners. The monastics also eat pretty fast so it is a little nerve wracking to try to keep up. I am enjoying each meal more and more now that I am getting the hang of things and learning how to eat with chopsticks. It is cool because they treat eating (in fact they treat everything) as meditation. It is much different then the way we eat in America. Today we started with a short sitting meditation at a beautiful spot of the monastery and then had classes mostly on the Buddha and his life. We will be following this format for about 12 more days but we do have a one day break which will be much needed. I am really looking forward to the 1 week silent meditation retreat. The schedule here is pretty strict and we don't get a lot of time to ourselves. In fact I am writing this in one of our few breaks that last longer then 15 minutes. Apparently they don't have computers for us to use, (like I was told) but luckily the homie and my room mate Sam is letting me use his computer. I wrote this in haste (though mindfully of course) so please forgive any mistakes or confusions. It is 11:53 here and I have to be lined up ready for class (and meditating) at 12:15. I miss all my friends and family and really wish they could be here to experience this with me. I also miss my main man/dog Roo! And Wilson, I could never forget about you. I hope everyone is doing well, you are all in my thoughts! I must go and continue the path to becoming and ascended master. I will try to post more soon. Peace!