Membership Has Its Privileges

Obviously not the swimming pool in question.
I wanted a pool photograph, but have surprisingly few.
This is the Bali villa where I stayed a few years ago.


I love to swim. Anyone who knows me, knows that about me. People who barely know me, know that about me. If you are a time traveler and want to warn me about something that is going to happen in the future, whatever you do, don't use my love of swimming as a way to convince me that we will know each other. That would be like telling me I can breathe a mixture of mostly nitrogen and oxygen.

Special note to all you time travelers out there: You already know what to say to convince me because I will tell you later.

When I lived in Hong Kong, swimming pools were few and far between. My last apartment was a few blocks from a sports complex with a public pool. There was also a YMCA at the Cityview Hotel, but I have no idea if they had a pool. Farther south was Kowloon Park, which has an outdoor swimming pool. I always found that ironic since Chinese people hate the sun. Almost all swimming pools are indoors.

The problem with public pools in Hong Kong was never really the pools. It was the public. The first time you see a child standing at the edge of a pool, his mother holding his penis and pointing it directly into the pool so he can relieve himself, you think that is odd, and more than a little horrifying. The third time you see it, you wonder if this is some Chinese tradition for baptizing pools. Who needs a bottle of champagne when the urine of young boys is an infinite resource.

I try not to blame an entire culture whenever a single person does something insane. If we did that, where would it leave the United States? But I will definitely look for a different pool after I see it used as a piss bucket. When I saw a grown adult man use a swimming pool as a toilet, and not just for fluids, I vowed to never set foot anywhere near a Chinese swimming pool again. The only positive to any of these encounters was that I was not actually in the water at the time. I would still be in the shower if I had been.

My only safe haven for swimming in Hong Kong was the big house at Clear Water Bay. That was a private swimming pool at a private residence. The only people who ever used the pool were the owners, who probably never used it, and mostly me when we took our annual visits. The owner and his wife are an older couple who do not strike me as particularly active. For them, the pool is more likely a status symbol than a means of exercise. Having your own swimming pool at your house is something you can brag about in Hong Kong.

When I moved to Taiwan, I was wary of public pools. Taiwan is not in China, but the culture is more or less the same. Hongkongers say that Mainlanders act like wild animals, but Taiwanese say the same about both. I don't remember anyone in China saying much of anything about the Taiwanese. Unfortunately, we know no one in Taiwan who has their own private pool in the backyard. Or even a backyard.

There is a gym close to my apartment. The actual gym part is pretty half-assed, and they have yoga classes I have not taken yet, but I went to check out the swimming pool. The only way to swim without becoming a member is to pay a high visitor fee. I liked that because, in Taiwan, the people most likely to abuse the pool are least likely to pay the highest prices to get in. There are plenty of public pools around town that are far cheaper to use and require no membership. I paid too much to use the pool and immediately became a member.

The swimming pool has a dozen lap lanes, ranging from 1 meter deep to 5 meters. The weakest swimmers always stay away from the 5 meter lanes. No human alive today can touch the bottom of that one. There is a separate children's pool that does not come in contact with the lap pool, so I can easily ignore any shenanigans in the children's area. Next to the lap pool is a large hot tub area with two 10-person hot tubs, three 4-person hot tubs, and several individual hot tubs. So far, I have tested the larger hot tubs and a few of the singles. They all seem to have different temperatures and jet levels. There is also a shallow pool that is entirely too hot. Taiwan is a hot springs culture, and while none of the water here is from a natural spring, some of it is on the hotter than necessary side. Since all of the pools are indoors, in one large cavern of a room, even the coldest pools stay warm. The pool area is a bit of a steam room. Anyone not used to Taiwan's humidity might think the place is too humid, but I find it pretty mild. There are also literal steam rooms, segregated by gender.

Near the hot tubs are a wall of water massages. High pressure water drops down two meters. People sit or stand under them and let the water massage their heads and shoulders. I found the pressure too high and would never get my head anywhere near any of those jets, but older people love it. I have never seen anyone under 50 under those things.

Since this is Taiwan, there are more than a few rules. No shoes can be worn past the lobby. Between the lobby and the women's locker room, there is a smaller room where everyone can take off their shoes and put on their slippers. I assume the men's locker room has a similar setup. Not wearing shoes indoors is pretty common around here, and not wearing shoes in a swimming pool makes perfect sense.

Everyone has to wear bathing suits past the locker room. That seems reasonable. Taiwan is not exactly famous for its public nudity. But that also means parents who want to watch their children in the kiddie pool also have to wear bathing suits, even if they have no intention of touching the water. Everyone also has to wear swimming caps, which I could do without. That seems to be a nationwide rule. Taiwanese would be just as shocked to see a swimmer without a swimming cap as they would without a bathing suit.

Not only are no street clothes allowed in the pool area, which makes sense, but no towels are allowed past the locker rooms. I do not understand this one. When you get out of one pool or another, you have to go to your locker, dripping wet, before you can get your towel. This is probably one reason the locker room floor is always soaking wet. They have those rubber jigsaw pieces to keep everyone from falling down, but there is no dry floor anywhere near the lockers. This makes changing at your locker impossible, unless you want to get your clothes wet. Not that anyone in Taiwan would change in front of their locker. Everyone changes in private, and dry, changing cubicles. So to avoid any hint of nudity, we walk dripping wet to our lockers and get whatever we need, bring everything to a wet shower cubicle, bring everything to a dry changing cubicle, and then go back to the wet locker to put away whatever we want to leave at the gym.

The good news is that every member has their own dedicated locker. That means we do not have to bring a gym bag with us every time we go. Some people might keep a bag in their car, but since I walk to the gym, it is nice to have everything I need already there. No advanced planning is required.

The entire gym is open 24H, except during lunch. You can go there at 3 o'clock in the morning, but not at noon. I asked them when they clean the pools and was shown their maintenance schedule. The good news is that they clean the pool daily and completely empty it once a week. The bad news is that it is obviously not open 24H. Even the half-assed gym closes for cleaning. I don't have a problem with any of this. I think regular maintenance is a good thing. But maybe they should not advertise as being open 24H when, at most, they are open for 19.

The strangest part about the entire operation is that there is ample parking. That is rare in Kaohsiung. Unless, of course, I can walk to it. I don't need to park since I can walk from my apartment in ten minutes. This seems to be a theme in Kaohsiung. Overall, it is difficult to park in this city, outside of shopping malls and the main train station. But the places I can easily walk to always seem to have plenty of parking.

The Secret of Christmas

Vanessa Carlton, Hear the Bells




Ella Fitzgerald, The Secret of Christmas

Getting Ready For Christmas

Paul Simon, Getting Ready For Christmas Day




Sting & Mary Macmaster, Christmas At Sea

Two Holidays

Tori Amos, Christmastide




Lisa Loeb & Renee Stahl, Light

How To Be a Buddhist Monk in 489 Steps

Rather than live like a monk when I was at the monastery, I lived like someone who was there to study Buddhism. The monks had their schedule and I had mine. Different groups of monks had different schedules. It was almost like working in an office building. Everyone was there at the same time, but not all doing the same things. My schedule was designed for students, but as far as I know, there were no other students there at the time.

05:00 Daban
At the crack of dawn, someone banged on the 起板 (qiban), which they called 打板 (daban), telling everyone it was time to wake up. There are no satisfying English translations for daban, anban or qiban. They are wooden boards that monks tap on to signal a specific time or event. As with anytime anyone rang a bell, there was a specific pattern that matched whatever was being announced. It was essentially a monastic alarm clock. Though there were computers and smartphones all over the place, they still followed the tradition of keeping time through chimes. Everyone knew what each pattern meant, and I knew that most of them had nothing to do with me. Daban meant it was time to wake up. Of course, people could and did wake up earlier. I always did. But tapping on the wooden board was the signal to all that the day had officially begun.

05:30 – 07:30 Morning meditation
Every morning, most of the monks went into the large Amitabha Chanting Hall to chant jing for two hours. Unlike meditation, chanting was done while standing. For two hours. Monks, in general, are not known as the most athletic people in the world. They spend a lot of time reading and meditating. I never saw any of them on an elliptical trainer. But every single one of them could stand still without straining and suffering. Or at least without showing it.

I was not unwelcome to participate, but told rather bluntly that this was a more advanced practice that I was simply not ready to learn. I was gradually taught some of the jing, but never expected to know any of them as well as the monks. Without knowing the jing, I would have simply stood there for two hours, which would have been pointless.

Instead, my morning meditation was scheduled during the morning chants. That meant Laoshi had to miss his chanting to teach me how to meditate, but he was happy to do it and I was glad he was there. I have been taught how to meditate by a few different people, and all of them taught me something different. The only real similarities were clearing the mind, controlling the breathing, and going full lotus. Different teachers will have different ideas about how to meditate, but everyone agrees that the lotus position is the only proper way to sit. Half lotus is only acceptable if you are just starting out or have joint issues, and no one approves of sitting criss-cross applesauce. Full lotus makes the most sense. If you can get yourself into position, it has to be one of the sturdiest ways to sit. You can knock over someone in a half lotus with a feather, but someone sitting full lotus could fall asleep during an earthquake and never fall down.

Fo Guang Shan practices Chan meditation, which has its own rules and regulations. You could fill a book with all the rules. In fact, people have. I read one of them. The main point is mostly about breathing and trying not to think about all of life's daily bullshit. I was given a personalized mantra, but my takeaway was that any mantra will do since repeatedly chanting pretty much anything will automatically shift your focus. But you don't want to chant jing because most of them are too long and you would find yourself concentrating on the jing rather than the meditation.

My morning meditation was not coincidentally scheduled during the sunrise, just as my evening meditation was during the sunset. On the first day, I wondered why we were doing it outdoors rather than in the giant Meditation Hall. I assumed it was because I was just learning while the monks in the hall were there for serious business. Teaching me would have been a distraction. But then the sun went down and I understood why Laoshi chose a spot uphill, facing west. It was one of those magical moments where you are relaxed and generally content and suddenly feel the sun's warmth on your face. I thought it was beautiful. Until Laoshi pointed out that if I was truly meditating, I would not have noticed the sun setting at all. The following morning was the same, except we were facing east instead of west. I felt the sun rise on my face, which is kind of hard not to notice, which only pointed out how much I was failing.

08:00 – 08:30 Breakfast
Breakfast was served in the dining hall; a large, open rectangle of a room with at least fifty long rows of folding tables placed end to end. All of the utilitarian seats faced in one direction so that no one sat with anyone facing them. Everyone sat side by side, in rows, facing the backs of the rows ahead. The reason immediately became clear. Meals were for eating, not talking. The oldest monks sat first, followed by the younger monks, then the novices, students, and miscellaneous laity. I was close enough to the end of the line where it never mattered what order anyone was in. After all the monks, it was first come, first served. Though there is a hierarchy at the monastery, seating was not about obedience to any chain of command. It was purely out of respect. In any situation where groups had to wait in a line, the oldest were always at the front.

For most of the monks, breakfast was the only meal of the day. They are strong believers in fasting throughout the day, but also recognize that people need to eat. In English, breakfast literally means break fast. That is exactly how the monks use it. But in Chinese, 早餐 simply means early meal. Some of the monks ate dinner, which was called the medicinal meal because it was for those who might have medical issues with only one meal a day. As a student, I was never expected to fast all day, and I am currently trying to gain weight, so fasting would not be ideal. In addition to breakfast and dinner, I was always free to eat at any time in any of the restaurants on or near campus. The museum down the hill has an entire food court. But I would have to pay for any unscheduled meals, and I wanted this experience to be as authentic as possible. Getting snacks from the 7-Eleven down the hill does not strike me as particularly monastic.

Breakfast was always rice porridge. Every single day. Just like dinner, for those who participated, it was quick. Everyone sat down, the monks did a quick chant, everyone ate without any conversation, there was another chant at the end of the meal, and everyone left the room in an orderly fashion. At the monastery, the purpose of a meal was to eat. Anything else was a distraction. Everyone had too many things to do.

They handed out a lot of wisdom nuggets in the monastery. Sometimes too many. It must take years just to remember all the aphorisms. But one that really stuck with me was the idea that food is medicine. You should only take what you need. In the monastery, no one lives to eat.

08:45 – 10:45 Reading
After breakfast, my reading time was pure independent study. Most of my day was spent with at least one other person, guiding me or watching to make sure I did not break anything, but when it was time to read, I was on my own. They gave me books and told me I could sit anywhere, indoors or outdoors. Sometimes I would find a quiet nook in one hall or another, but most of the time I read outdoors. A few of the gardens were on the side of a hill and not the worst place in the world to read.

11:00 – 13:00 Lecture
The daily lecture was exactly how it sounds. One laoshi or another spoke for two hours on subjects ranging from meditation to jing to Dharma to the difference between Humanistic Buddhism and Mahayana Buddhism to the Buddha's life and a lot of what he said. The lesson plan was whatever that particular laoshi wanted to talk about on that particular day. I would have preferred to know what the lecture was going to be so I could read up on that subject beforehand, but that was not the way they wanted to do it. I was not arrogant enough to tell them that my way was better than what they had been doing for two thousand years. Even so, the lectures were highly educational and entirely too much to absorb in such a short period of time.

13:15 – 14:15 Gardening
Just after what would have been lunchtime, I worked in one of the gardens. I was there to study rather than work, but manual labor is a routine part of any monk's day. There are a few gardens throughout the monastery, mostly maintained by a combination of monks and civilian professionals. Somewhere on site was a vegetable garden that provided most of the food eaten in the monastery and the museum. I never saw that one, but I walked through several gardens and worked in an herb garden. I think they had me working with the herbs because they were easier and safer. Had I killed all the basil, meals would taste slightly different for a little while. Killing an entire crop of vegetables would be disastrous. I also doubt it was a coincidence that I was working around food at the same time my mind was supposed to be thinking about lunch. Buddhist monks are big fans of denying pleasure, and for a lot of people, eating is one of life's greatest joys. What the monks never knew was that I have no appetite and can easily go all day without eating.

14:30 – 15:45 Free time
The monks were encouraged to take a nap in the afternoon. The Meditation Hall had alcoves to sit and meditate or take a nap in between all that meditating. There was always someone in the Meditation Hall, and I'm pretty sure a few monks spent the entire day inside, napping in between meditating. There is a strong work ethic at the monastery. Everyone pulls their weight and everyone does some kind of labor that people in business suits would deem beneath them. But when you wake up at dawn and work all day, you need the occasional nap. The older monks generally stayed awake all day, doing all their monk business. At nap time, I could always find younger monks sleeping here and there.

I spent nap time jogging around the monastery, or last least the parts less frequented by the public. My exercise routine was neither encouraged nor discouraged. The monks believe in staying healthy, but prefer to do so through meditation. As long as my afternoon run did not get in anyone's way, no one had a problem with it. Nap time seemed like the perfect time since most of the monks were indoors for an hour or two. Afternoons are not the ideal time to exercise in the heat and humidity of Kaohsiung, but my mornings were pretty busy.

16:00 – 18:00 Evening meditation
Evening meditation was just like morning meditation, only facing west in an attempt to block out the sunset. It took a long time, but I could eventually reach the point where I never noticed the change of light and heat. I even had a time or two where everything around me just faded away. I think that is at least mildly impressive since I was surrounded by nature, which is often hard to ignore. Birds especially have a way of mocking your meditation. I could only get to that point with a teacher. Try as I might, it never happened on my own. I never learned how to levitate or do anything crazy, and I was nowhere near the on-ramp to the freeway that eventually leads to the neighborhood next to Nirvana. At best, I would say that what I experienced was piece of mind.

18:30 – 19:00 Medicinal meal
Dinner, the optional medicinal meal, was as organized as breakfast, but with a wider variety of food. There was a different dish each day, either at random or in a pattern that I never recognized. There was usually rice, but sometimes noodles, with vegetables and a variety of soy products. There was almost always soup. The evening tea was noticeably different from the morning tea, but no one told me what it was and I never bothered to ask. At this point in my life, tea is tea. As long as it has no caffeine.

19:30 – 21:30 Dharma lesson
The evening's Dharma lesson was just like a regular class. Rather than a private lesson, like my lecture time, it was a class full of monks taught by a senior shifu. Just like in school, we were all expected to take notes, and there were periodic tests. Oddly enough, it was the most informal time of the day. The monks were always serious when it came to meditating and chanting, but they smiled and laughed in the classroom, even though everyone was expected to learn every ounce of the lessons.

Afterward, I was free to do whatever I wanted for the rest of the night. Some of my favorite time at the monastery was walking around after dark. The tourist side closed at 17:00 and that was when the spirit of the place really came to life. After the sun went down, the grounds were lit up with lanterns and more than enough electric light. It is almost a shame that the monastery is not open at night, but the lack of tourists made it far more beautiful. Monasteries are not natural tourist attractions.

22:00 Anban
At ten o'clock on the dot, someone hit the anban, which was just like the daban, only a different pattern. All the monks knew what it meant, and I figured out the difference right away. Of course, it helped that one was in the morning and the other was at night. That made it a little obvious.

Once the day was officially over, the monastery fell silent. It was never a particularly loud place to begin with, but in the dead of night, even the crickets kept it down. I went for a few walks after anban, which were always interesting. If you want solitude in the city, early morning is always better than late at night. Taiwanese generally stay up late, and the only people out before dawn are going to work. It was the exact opposite in the monastery. While I always saw at least one other person out and about at night, the place was deserted compared to the mass of motion during the day.

This was a unique experience that I can always repeat, but probably never will. Getting the most out of it requires spending more time in the monastery. If I have the time, I am more likely to travel somewhere. Studying in the monastery is a great way to learn a great deal in a short amount of time, but it is far from a vacation. While my brain was flooded with all things Buddhist, I doubt I will retain most of it. Sooner or later, I will forget most of the jing. And as much as I think meditation is helpful, there are never enough hours in the day.

Seeing Buddha's Lightor At Least a Tiny Spark From a Great Distance

If you want to be generous, you could say that I am an expert on maybe one subject. At most. Buddhism is not it. If you want to learn about Buddhism, there are a few million people who can tell you more than I can. In fact, there are more than a few books on the subject, written by people who know what they are talking about. Some of them were written at Fo Guang Shan Monastery. They will happily give you a book or ten. Even the museum hands out free books. One of Fo Guang Shan's primary missions is to educate. They have founded and/or sponsored more than a few universities, high schools, and elementary schools. Something all schools have in common is books.

After a couple of weeks at Fo Guang Shan Monastery, I now know infinitely more about Buddhism than I did prior. Unfortunately, one of the things I inevitably learned was that I know almost nothing about Buddhism. The farther one travels, the less one knows. That is Tao, but the same concept.

Buddhist monasteries tend to be on top of mountains, when available. That is mostly for seclusion. 佛光山 (Fo Guang Shan) means Buddha's Light Mountain. It was built just off the Yushan mountain range, which cuts through south central Taiwan. While the unobstructed views are nice, it was built there to make it harder for most people to reach. But it was opened to the public over the years, with streets and ample bus access, and became a tourist attraction. More than a few monks told me that the large museum was built downhill to draw people away from the monastery while still providing a Buddhist day trip for civilians.

I know that there are different branches of Buddhism that believe different things, and more than a few disagreements within each branch. Mahayana Buddhism started in India and worked its way to China a couple thousand years ago, where it mixed with Taoism and got stirred around in a big pot until it was hard to tell where Buddhism began and Taoism ended. Fo Guang Shan practices Humanistic Buddhism, which comes from Chan, which is a school of Mahayana.

I know that Humanistic Buddhism is about living people. The temples, memorials, pagodas, and statues are for the living. The Buddha was a human who lived and died, as humans often do. Humanistic Buddhism tends to focus on improving the lives of people right now rather than killing in the name of gods and getting a trophy after death. Ironically, while the Buddha personally ordained the first female monks and Humanistic Buddhism advocates equality, education, and altruism, Fo Guang Shan's founder was a bit of an asshat and a lot of a misogynist. Fortunately, he is 90 something years old and retired. His successors are more enlightened and live in the 21st century. As with most religions, women were only subjugated in later years after some extra sensitive male egos took over. Today, just like 2500 years ago, women can be monks, be seen with the men, and even breathe without permission. That worked out better for me.

Unlike probably everyone at the monastery, I am not Buddhist and have no intention of ever becoming Buddhist. I have studied and/or am studying it for the cultural aspect rather than religious. I never mislead the monks or pretended to have any other motives. I told them upfront that since I am studying Chinese/Taiwanese culture, and specifically the differences between the two, I think I should be studying Buddhism as well. No one can ever understand China without at least a rudimentary grasp of Buddhism. That would be like studying the thousand years of war in Europe without knowing anything about Christianity.

One of the great things about Buddhism, as well as Taoism and Confucianism, is that everyone is welcome to learn as much as they want without any pressure to convert or sign a blood oath. Unlike the western religions, it is perfectly acceptable to mix and match in China. Most of the people who practice Confucianism are also Buddhist, Taoist or something else. Some insist that Confucianism is more of a philosophy than a religion, but all religions are philosophies, in one way or another. What I like is how different it all is from the Judeo-Christian philosophy of kill or be killed, us versus them. Chinese philosophy is more live and let live, we're all in this together.

The not very creatively named Main Shrine
Fo Guang Shan Monastery

Flower and Stone Garden
My favorite place to read

Tathagata Building, Jade Buddha Building

Golden Buddha Building
Golden Buddha Shrine

Dharma classroom

Main dining hall
Cloud Dwelling Building

Meditation Hall
Tathagata Building

Amitabha Chanting Hall
Jade Buddha Building

Dharma Square

Sutra Repository

Lots of Buddhas

Even more Buddhas
Overlooking the Gaoping River

Great Buddha Land
“The highest standing Buddha in southeast Asia”

Dharma Hall

A Brief History of the Buddha

The Buddha thanking his mother for giving birth to him

Fo Guang Shan Museum
Just a quick hike down the hill
Or an elevator ride for those in need

Great Path to Buddhahood
and the Eight Pagodas

Bodhi Wisdom Concourse
Home of the Eighteen Arhats

Sutra Repository Stupa
with one million Heart Sutras

Stupa of Vow

Stupa of Wisdom

Sutra Repository Stupa, Fo Guang Buddha, Stupa of Wisdom

Fo Guang Buddha
I had to pump up the contrast because I was facing the sun
But I think it worked out OK

Meditating On Buddha's Light Mountain

Main Shrine
Fo Guang Shan Monastery


I live about 30km from Fo Guang Shan Monastery, the leading center for Mahayana Buddhism in the country, according to them. I never asked around. The monastery is pretty big, though no self-respecting Buddhist would ever brag about size. Just down the hill is the Fo Guang Shan Buddha Museum, which is one of the most popular tourist sites in Kaohsiung, even though it is practically in Pingtung and at least 35km from downtown. The museum is pretty enormous. Someone told me it was the largest Buddhist museum in the world. I never checked. But it does house the tallest seated bronze Buddha statue in the world. That is easy enough to verify, but one should keep in mind that there are a million superlative Buddha statues. Most of the tallest or biggest will mention indoor, outdoor, standing, seated, reclining, bronze, wood, gold, left handed, right handed or facing east. But again, no self-respecting Buddhist would ever brag about size.

I spent some time at the Fo Guang Shan Monastery, but not as a tourist. You can certainly visit the monastery, but most people go to the much larger museum. I have been to the museum a time or two, but I went to the monastery for a completely different reason.

Fo Guang Shan has a program specifically for foreigners who want to play Buddhist for the weekend. The “volunteer group” lets people sleep in dorms, do a few arts and crafts, and mostly wash dishes and do laundry. It is probably beneficial for the monastery. They have people come in and do some chores, while the volunteers get a brief introduction to Buddhism. I did not want that.

It should be noted that both the monastery and museum have full time volunteers who are mostly walking information booths for visitors. They are all locals who work at Fo Guang Shan for years and wear civilian clothes with colored vests, depending on location and specialization. If you enter the Sutra Repository, you will be greeted by a monk in brown or gray robes who might not know much English beyond a few words and a volunteer in a red vest who might be able to explain the room in two or three languages. At the Great Buddha Land, you will be greeted by a volunteer or two in yellow or orange vests who may or may not speak any English. The museum has far more English and Japanese speaking volunteers than the monastery. These volunteers, though called volunteers, are nothing like the foreigners in the weekend volunteer group.

Like a lot of temples and monasteries, Fo Guang Shan Monastery has a temple retreat for foreigners. The difference from the volunteer group is that people pay to sleep in the dorms, wear gray pajamas, learn the basics of meditation and chanting, pretend to learn calligraphy, do some light chores, eat three meals a day, watch a tea ceremony, and always stay in their group of however many people are booked that weekend.

Before I went, I did a little research. Most of the information I found was on the volunteer group and the paid retreat, so I initially thought I might pay to stay the weekend. But the more I looked into it, the more it sounded like a waste of time. The volunteers spend little to no time with the monks. They are supervised by a public relations employee of the monastery who is not ordained. They eat in a separate room away from the main dining hall. Almost all socializing is with other volunteers. They sleep in shared dorm rooms, wear whatever clothes they brought with them, and live in their own volunteer bubble. There is no schedule, aside from meal times. Their only obligation is to do assigned chores, which is mostly cleaning things outdoors, washing things indoors, and doing laundry. The paid retreat is more educational than the volunteer group, but far too short and superficial. It is like reading only the first paragraph of a long book. And you have to pay to get in.

Eventually, I figured out that I could stay at the monastery as a student. Student is not really the correct word. In Chinese, I was 學習者 (xuexizhe) rather than 學生 (xuesheng). The easiest translation is learner vs student. Fo Guang Shan welcomes locals who want to learn as much about Humanistic Buddhism as they can cram into their brains. There is no time limit. Some people stay for years before eventually joining the monastery. We all knew I was never going to do that, but I could probably stick around for a week or two. I'm not technically a local, but since I moved here from China, they treated me as if I was Chinese. Being from China or Taiwan is not required, but only the tourist weekends are in English. If you want to study for any length of time, everything is in Chinese.

While I was Xuexizhe, my teachers were mostly 老師 (Laoshi) or 師父 (Shifu), and rarely 法師 (Fashi). While every shifu and fashi is also a laoshi, laoshi and fashi are only called shifu by people further down the ladder. I was at the bottom, so I could call everyone shifu or laoshi. Fashi, of course, is only reserved for specific laoshi. Or shifu. To every fashi and shifu, I was Xuexizhe, but the occasional laoshi called me Xuesheng. I think maybe five people on the entire campus knew my Chinese name, and I only told one laoshi my English name, because he asked and he enjoyed practicing his English with me.

All the monks had names, of course, but they also had Dharma names and courtesy names. This is pretty common in Chinese. Sun Yat Sen was born Sun Deming, called Sun Wen as a child, called Sun Yat Sen in Hong Kong, called Sun Zhongshan in Taiwan, and given the courtesy name Zaizhi. I still call him Sun Yat Sen, the rare time he comes up in conversation, but no one around here knows who I am talking about until I mention Zhongshan. Ironically, the National Sun Yat Sen Memorial Hall in Taipei is not called Sun Zhongshan Memorial Hall. Not that it matters since that is the English name. In Chinese, it is the National Father of the Country Memorial Hall. To avoid confusion, I was encouraged to address the monks by title rather than name. Pretty much everyone I met was either Laoshi, Fashi or Shifu.

I spent most of my days with one monk or another, usually Laoshi. I ate with monks and novices in the dining hall. I met plenty of other people at the monastery. It is almost impossible not to. But I did not see a single foreigner or another xuexizhe. All of the volunteers I met were full time locals who knew what they were talking about, and not part of the foreigner volunteer group. I don't know how often they host weekend retreats, but I doubt any were going on while I was there.

I slept in a tiny, private room, which was more decorated than I expected. It was all Buddhist decor, but I thought it would just be bare walls and a bed. It was more like a small hotel room with a larger than average bathroom, which is not much of a surprise since Fo Guang Shan often hosts monks, scholars, and dignitaries from all around the world. They gave me student robes to wear, which were a different color and style from what the monks or novices wore. The hierarchy of robes was fairly complicated and took a while to figure out. No one was ever going to mistake me for a monk, especially since I had hair, but the clothes announced to everyone exactly who I was, which was convenient. Since part of the monastery is open to the public, tourists sometimes wander into areas not intended for tourists. Had I been in civilian clothes, I would have spent too much time trying to explain why I was there. The robes were an all-access pass, or more like a low-access pass.

There was a schedule for practically every waking moment of every day. It was far from hectic, but I was expected to follow it religiously. I was free to leave at any time, of course, but as long as I was there, they wanted me to be fully there. Being in the moment is kind of a big thing to Buddhists. Best of all, I was not part of any group. I was in a group of one, getting individual attention, except when I was surrounded by monks. My schedule might not have been tailor made for me specifically, but I was the only person on it. Sharing the experience with a group of tourists would have diminished it.

Since Humanistic Buddhism is more about helping the living than mourning the dead, the monks at Fo Guang Shan are not cloistered in a cave somewhere. They operate a wide variety of social and educational programs around the country. They work in village clinics, volunteer in city hospitals, operate rehabilitation services in prisons, run orphanages and senior centers, and do all the usual monk jobs of feeding the hungry, clothing the poor, and officiating at weddings and funerals. They go to conferences around the country and other parts of the world. They publish articles, hold seminars, and write books. A lot of books. Every shifu wrote at least one book and the laoshi were handing me books left and right.

I never witnessed any of their outside activities. As a xuexizhe, I was not at all qualified to do anything even remotely close to monk work. From what I saw, even the novices mostly stayed on site. Unlike the monks, I was cloistered, but in a monastery too large and populated to feel claustrophobic. There are usually two to three hundred monks at the monastery, with ample room to hold a few thousand during conferences and major holiday festivals. There was an ordination ceremony while I was there. New monks from around the country came to Kaohsiung to get sworn in. It was wall to wall monks for a few days. I have no idea how many people came to the monastery, but it could have easily been in the thousands.

Something I saw all the time was how much they embraced modern technology. Fo Guang Shan is known for its use of modern technology. They have websites and apps, a couple of podcasts, a public relations and marketing department, and like a lot of other Buddhist groups in Taiwan, they have TV shows. Not shows about monks who go from town to town solving crimes, but single camera lectures where a monk talks to the audience. Sometimes they chant. It is not riveting television. There was no TV in my tiny room, but the entire monastery is a wifi hotspot. Not only was my phone not taken away, I was encouraged to bring a laptop to do online research. Seeing monks with smartphones and other i-devices is common in Taiwan, but for some reason, I did not expect it in the monastery. I had to remind myself that these people were Buddhist, not Amish.

Dharma Square

John Lennon

1940-1980

People say we got it made
Don't they know we're so afraid
Isolation
We're afraid to be alone
Everybody got to have a home
Isolation

Just a boy and a little girl
Trying to change the whole wide world
Isolation
The world is just a little town
Everybody trying to put us down
Isolation

I don't expect you to understand
After you caused so much pain
But then again you're not to blame
You're just a human, a victim of the insane

We're afraid of everyone
Afraid of the sun
Isolation
The sun will never disappear
But the world may not have many years
Isolation

Pearl Harbor

“Yesterday, December 7, 1941 – a date which will live in infamy – the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.

“The United States was at peace with that nation and, at the solicitation of Japan, was still in conversation with its government and its emperor looking toward the maintenance of peace in the Pacific. Indeed, one hour after Japanese air squadrons had commenced bombing in the American island of Oahu, the Japanese ambassador to the United States and his colleagues delivered to our Secretary of State a formal reply to a recent American message. While this reply stated that it seemed useless to continue the existing diplomatic negotiations, it contained no threat or hint of war or of armed attack.

“It will be recorded that the distance of Hawaii from Japan makes it obvious that the attack was deliberately planned many days or even weeks ago. During the intervening time, the Japanese government has deliberately sought to deceive the United States by false statements and expressions of hope for continued peace.

“The attack yesterday on the Hawaiian islands has caused severe damage to American naval and military forces. I regret to tell you that very many American lives have been lost. In addition, American ships have been reported torpedoed on the high seas between San Francisco and Honolulu.

“Yesterday, the Japanese government also launched an attack against Malaya. Last night, Japanese forces attacked Hong Kong. Last night, Japanese forces attacked Guam. Last night, Japanese forces attacked the Philippine islands. Last night, the Japanese attacked Wake Island. And this morning, the Japanese attacked Midway Island. Japan has, therefore, undertaken a surprise offensive extending throughout the Pacific area. The facts of yesterday and today speak for themselves. The people of the United States have already formed their opinions and well understand the implications to the very life and safety of our nation.

“As commander in chief of the army and navy, I have directed that all measures be taken for our defense. But always will our whole nation remember the character of the onslaught against us. No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.

“I believe that I interpret the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost, but will make it very certain that this form of treachery shall never again endanger us.

“Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory and our interests are in grave danger. With confidence in our armed forces, with the unbounding determination of our people, we will gain the inevitable triumph, so help us God.

“I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7, 1941, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire.”

--President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 12/8/1941

Pearl Harbor National Memorial

Never Trust Anyone Over Thirty

The boomers who used to tell you not to trust anyone over 30, over 50 years ago, are now senior citizens. But it was good advice. As they themselves have shown, the older you get, the easier it is to abandon your principles. Rather than save us from the establishment with peace and love, they became the establishment, as every generation does. Peace and love never pays as well as divide and conquer.

When I was young and idealistic, I was going to be a famous ballerina. That never happened, for a few reasons. Almost no ballerinas are famous. Debbie Allen told her students that fame was unlikely. Fittingly, she is the only one of them who is still famous. Dancing, like pretty much any art, is what you do because you have to do it. There is something inside that compels you to bust your butt and work as hard as you can for little reward. If you want to be rich, go into politics. Art is created for art's sake.

Unlike music or acting, dancing is for the young. Sure, Baryshnikov was on stage well into his 50s, but most of us are not Baryshnikov. Though I knew I would never have a career anything like his, I was doing all right into my late 20s. Thanks to some medical issues, I unofficially retired at 29. Like Baryshnikov, and a great many others before and since, I got into choreography. I miss being on stage in front of an audience, but working behind the scenes pays more and is much easier on the toes.

Most of the dancers I work with are younger than I am. That is perfectly normal for most choreographers, but I am used to working with people my own age or older. In my 20s, I was with the cool kids. At 30, I sit at the adult table. I accidentally went from a rebel to part of the establishment. I think that just happens spontaneously when you turn 30. That's why no one is supposed to trust us.

I also moved from one country to another. China was probably not the best choice for my career, but it provided opportunities to work in a variety of other countries. Taiwan is a better and steadier gig, but I have yet to work outside of the country. Of course, a large obstacle is that much of the world is highly contagious right now. When I lived in China, the air was cleaner wherever I went abroad. In Taiwan, I am infinitely safer. There were quite a few changes in my life when I turned 30. Technically, this all happened when I was 29, but 30 sounds better.

There are a great many people who will tell you that 30 is still young. And they are correct. I plan on living a long time, so middle age for me should be around 50. Some people say middle age is well into your 60s, but that sounds optimistic. If you get the senior citizen discount, you are closer to the end. Of course, any of us could die tomorrow, so those are all just useless labels.

According to the label people, I was born in the middle of the Millennial Generation. No one called us that when we were young. It was Generation Y, which I always thought was stupid. The generation before us is Generation X because no one could think of a name. After the Baby Boomers, every generation suddenly had to have a name. Hemingway and his gang were the Lost Generation, but no one called the Greatest Generation the greatest generation until they had one foot in the grave. Imagine what would happen if you called teenagers the Greatest Generation. They would not end up so great. With Generation X somehow sticking, all the geniuses in charge of naming came up with Generation Y, followed by, hold onto your hats, Generation Z. The irony is, the X was never about the 24th letter of the alphabet. It was X, as in unknown, alienated, blank. Now it is just another letter. If you have to name every generation, at least come up with a name. Call boomers Generation W and see how upset they get.

Then they started calling us millennials. Not because we were born at the end of an old millennium or the beginning of a new one. Those are Generation Z, who some people like to call “zoomers”, even though that is stupid. Someone chose “millennials” because we started becoming adults at the new millennium, even though that naming convention does not match other generations. Did boomers become adults when the baby boom started? That would be the Silent Generation. I guess we know why they were so silent.

According to the internet, boomers and millennials are natural enemies. Then again, on the internet, boomers think anyone born after they were is a millennial, even though whenever boomers complain about young people, it is usually something Generation Z does. Possibly because Generation Z was born around the new millennium and it would make far more sense to call them millennials. Not that millennials have to worry about it. We are on the winning side. Time has a way of making the older generations obsolete. Long after the last boomer is dead and buried, we will still be here, complaining about those young Generation AAs or Generation Alphas or whatever stupid name someone comes up with.