The Monk Who Would Not Ride On An Elephant

I've had just enough time to...   want to ride on an elephant

Taken in a Hindu temple that we stumbled on by accident in Termeloh, Pahang, Malaysia

To ride on an elephant 

A sultan not a mahout 

High above my subjects 

A subject of envy 

Feeling like a king 

High above all 

Till I met a monk wearing 

A smile 

Walking on bare feet 

He did not want 

To be on the beast 

I can tell 

For some reasons 

That infuriated me 

What pleasure can there be 

To ride on an elephant 

If others are not envious of me? 

So I try to steal his smile 

By fraying his skin 

Though he cried in pain 

As the lashes flew 

His spirit could not be broken 

As I could his bone 

What pleasure can there be 

If I cannot submit 

Every one to my will? 

I rode the elephant back 

To the palace 

And the rain 

Falls on me 

The elephant 

And the monk that I killed

The Monk & The Flame of Life

I've had just enough time to...   watch the flame dances.

Taken of the monk watching the flame of Life in the Temple of Shaolin

The monk stares at the flickering flame

Admiring its sensual dance of life

With the waltzing wind

As the pace picked up

The flame sparkles and frolics

Spin, sashay and gambol

Glitters, glistens and quivers

With rising passion

Consuming itself in its brilliance

And the monk wonders

Should he live Life as an untamed flame

Or an unlighted candle

The Monk & The Little Devil - Part II

I've had just enough time to...   give the little devil a whack with my not so mighty staff.

Taken at night in place where there was no one about.

There was a pious monk proud of his reputation. And he felt he needed to protect and enhanced it. All the better to serve his God, you see. If the people believe in him, they will believe in the God he served. The praises he heard got into his head and he sucked them in like a smoker sucking smoke through his smoking pipe. The smoke that he blew out intoxicated him and clouded his view.

The more religious relics he has, the more religious he believed he will appear to be and he set on the task of accumulating them. They should not be in the hands of the less devoted, he argued but in those of the more deserving hands like his. He plotted and schemed to make them all his lest they be tainted by hands unclean.

And should anyone stood in his way, he just arranged for them to be conveniently removed as if ridding the world of evil. For anyone standing in his quest for spiritual perfection is evil, aren’t they? Why should he feel remorse for the uncouth that could not understand the purity of his quest? 

“Do you think it is easy to have someone “removed”? How many prayers I had to make to regain my lost sense of peace? Who understands such agony in my breast and these sacrifices that I make?”

Then something strange happened. The more treasures he accumulated, the tighter he held on to them, the more he seemed to shrink in stature. Till one morning, the disciples went to the master’s bedroom and saw only a tiny ghoul with sharp teeth. The frightened disciples engaged a traveling monk who got rid of the little devil with one whack of his mighty staff and that is the end of him.

Part I - The Monk & The Scriptures.

I've had just enough time to...   talk to the Monk about the scriptures.

Taken of the Monk & his books one night alone in Hangzhou, China.

“All the knowledge is in the scriptures”, the monk said.

“Studied it well and you will know all there is to know.”

The disciple took it to heart and studied it day and night.

And when he has memorized and could repeat every single word.

He went back to the monk with all he had learned.

“You have learned nothing”, the monk said.

“Except for the words you have read”

“The wisdom is not in the words”

“Go back and read some more!”

And the disciple burned the scriptures

And become a rich trader.

And the monk took another disciple

Who is asked to read more and more

And then some more…

The Cheerful Boatman of West Lake.

I've has just enough time to...   take a boat ride on West Lake.

Taken of my cheerful boatman of West Lake

It was my fortune to hire this cheerful boatman to take me on a tour of the romantic West Lake. She effortlessly pushed the heavy oar and gently swayed with the rocking of the boat wearing a perpetual smile on her face. And in a sing-song voice, she narrated the romance of The Scholar and The White Snake.

One of the lovely view of the lake.

Through her words, I imagined the scholar walking under the weeping willow meeting Lady White Snake and falling in love with her. How the strict monk seeking to uphold the Law of Heaven forbade the union of man and spirit and drove them apart. And when he could not severe their love for each other, imprisoned her under the Pagoda for eternity. A tragic but beautiful love story. So if you go to the West Lake of Hangzhou, hired one of the boatman for this is the best way to view the lake and hopefully, you will get a boatman as pretty and as cheerful as the boatman who showed me West Lake.

_______

This animation film by Yun Tin Ruan, a famous comic artist in China give a slightly different take. It tells of White Snake practising for 1000 years to be a perfect woman. She falls in love with a man by Hangzhou's West Lake but the man's distrust eventually kills their love. The tale is used as a metaphor for the relationship between man and woman in a male dominated society. Watch it - the animation is fantastic!