Road to Qinghai - Sanskrit Sound

The plane soared into the sky, leaving the rainy city of Chongqing at its feet. At an altitude of 30,000 feet, the sun was unobstructed. Two hours and 1,300 kilometers from Chongqing to Qinghai, it only takes a split second to make this decision. Sichuan-Tibet, Yunnan-Tibet, and then Qinghai, approaching Tibet step by step. The road to Qinghai, the journey to the Pure Land, this is a birthday gift to myself.

When the first ray of sunlight shines on the golden roof of the Great Golden Tile Hall, the monks of Kumbum Monastery have already started their morning classes. The melodious chanting of sutras lingered in the sky above the temple. After listening to it for a long time, I gradually developed an ethereal feeling.

Kumbum Monastery, a prestigious Gelug sect monastery, is the center of Tibetan Buddhism activities in the entire northwest region and enjoys a high status in China and Southeast Asia. Tens of thousands of believers and monks come here to worship every day. This is the birthplace of Lobsang Drakpa (1357-1419), the second Buddha in the world, Tsongkhapa. It is the most sacred place in the minds of Tibetan Buddhist disciples and believers. This master had two very famous disciples in his life---one named Panchen Lama and the other named Dalai Lama. Since the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, these two people have been reincarnated for more than ten lives.

In Tibetan areas, perhaps the most magnificent building is the local Buddhist temple. Compared with the temples in the mainland, the architectural specifications and layout of the temples in Tibet far exceed those of the temples in the mainland. Kumbum Monastery is the representative among them. Its talent, architectural ingenuity and grand layout are breathtaking. There are more than 1,000 courtyards and more than 4,500 temples and monks' houses, scattered at different heights and complementing each other, forming a well-proportioned building complex with rigorous layout, unique style and integrating Chinese and Tibetan technology. The large and small halls in the courtyard are all painted with gold and plastic powder, and are magnificent. The statues of gods and Buddhas are inlaid with various gemstones: clam, coral, agate, obsidian, turquoise, beeswax... and the gilded real bodies complement each other, making the temple full of gods and Buddhas more solemn. The murals all over the walls are still bright and eye-catching after hundreds of years. The pigments used to paint the murals are made using secret methods, adding a bit of mystery to the Kumbum Temple.

As the sun gradually moves, the shadow left by the Eight Treasures Ruyi Pagoda on the square on the ground becomes shorter and shorter, and the white tower body becomes more and more dazzling in the sunlight. The bells in the temple pierced the sky, and under the corridors of the temple, devout believers and monks prostrated themselves and worshiped. Did you know that one knock on this long head is worth one hundred thousand. From morning to night, from spring and summer to autumn and winter, from black hair to white hair. It takes more than 2-3 months for strong young people to complete, while it takes a year for the elderly! This does not require supervision by others, it is all self-supervision in one's own mind. The floor in the corridor has been used by believers like a mirror, a series of slow but rhythmic movements.

When the believers of Kumbum Monastery were worshiping the Buddha statues in the temple, a staggering and stooped Tibetan grandmother from the Qilian Mountains walked into the Arou Temple, turned the huge prayer tube, and started her own the path of faith. She devoutly prostrated herself on the ground, kowtowing step by step, and respectfully touched the monk's rosary beads and the cloth filled with scriptures with her forehead. In the tent temple, the old man began to follow the monks as they walked around the temple. I don't know whether she was praying for blessings or fulfilling a wish. Maybe at this time, in the old man's heart, everything in the world has disappeared, and only the Buddha is in his heart.

Color has been most legendaryly used in Tibetan monasteries. The gorgeous prayer flags fluttering in the wind at the Dharma Protector Temple of Arou Temple, the dazzlingly colorful murals all over the walls, and the magnificent palace itself do not feel frivolous, but grand. This is a temple that is free and open to the public. This is a temple without walls. This is a temple without merit boxes. From the beginning of a mobile tent, it has become the largest Gelug monastery in the lower Qilian region today. Here is a place very close to the sky. This green mountain, this blue sky, these colorful prayer flags, and the sound of wind chimes, freeze the eternal moment of Qilian Mountain.

I traveled thousands of miles and finally saw the long prayer tube at Kumbum Monastery and Arou Temple. The creaking sound of the prayer wheel is like a distant whisper, like the stillness of spring water overnight, it removes the dust from my heart and tells the story of the peaceful past. Turning around mountains and rivers, just for the thousand-year-old Sanskrit sound.

Let our hearts move on, there is a legend in the vast Qinghai Lake. The setting sun gradually fell into the lake and fell asleep. The cold wind blew across the lake and the Haixin Mountain in the center of the lake. When night fell, in the Lotus Nunnery on Haixin Mountain, the nuns began their evening classes under dim lights. In the sound of reciting sutras, everything in the world gradually fades away. In this secluded place far away from the world, the Lotus Nunnery, which consists of only a few shabby houses, hangs alone on the Haixin Mountain, accompanied by a 30-meter-high golden statue of Padmasambhava in front of the nunnery. But the bells in the morning and the drums in the evening still have the dignity of Dharma.

Local people told me that there are seven Juemu in the nunnery, the oldest is 53 years old and the youngest is 15 years old. I get up at six o'clock every morning, meditate, give lectures, and study with others. Every year, they only go out to sea when the lake is frozen, take a year's worth of food and live there, and never come back for the whole year. Life here is extremely poor. There is no incense money or a merit box. They rely on the nuns in the nunnery to raise their own funds and can only maintain the most basic living standards. However, the Juemu people do not feel that life is difficult. In their daily practice, their faith gives them incomparable courage and wisdom. Accompanied by the curling smoke of butter lamps and listening to the loud chanting, they are immersed in the Buddhist world. In the midst of supreme joy, both body and mind fall into infinite peace.

Tibetan people’s belief in Buddhism is unimaginable by mainlanders. In the face of this huge belief, we are not even qualified to evaluate it. This is faith that can be seen and firmness that can be felt!

(P.S. I didn’t take too many pictures of temples and believers. Sometimes I take pictures for commemoration, and sometimes I don’t take pictures out of respect. Haixin Mountain hangs alone in the center of Qinghai Lake and is not accessible to the outside world. Since it is open to the public, tourists cannot go to the island and can only rely on the narratives of local Tibetans to imagine the island.

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