Shanghai is quickly accessible by the bullet train. I was up early and in Shanghai by 9 am. This was one of the best train rides ever, so smooth. I remember riding the Santa Fe train between Dallas and Ponca City, Oklahoma as a child with my cousin Mary, my grandpa and grandma. Back then the porters were African-American, this time Chinese stewardesses in purple outfits with cocked hats were our porters. My new traveling friend Daisy made all the arrangements with her Shanghai friends showing us around. What a delightful treat.
The view from the train was dank in color, mostly white, gray, beige and brick red. Many factories with smoking chimneys dotted the landscape. When there wasn’t a factory, I could see farmland in checkered squares of green. All the land was in use, with apartment high rises filling in the gaps.
First stop the French Quarter, here the architecture was similar to the Louisiana French Quarter with a Chinese flair. Then on to the art market, in a sectioned off alley way. This was were I found my red bean in the “Love of my Life” blog. (If you haven’t read it, go read it! It is short and terribly funny!) I also saw some nice art prints, mass produced acrylics and lots of fun cheap trinkets. The alleys in the rain were more fun to photograph than shopping. I took some artsy pictures.
Another taxi and to the Buddhist Jade Temple. By now the rain is coming down in buckets so we eat in the vegetarian restruant located upstairs in the temple. Daisy and Hazel, my Chinese friends had never eaten vegetarian mock meats so this was something new for them. After dinner we walked through the temple eying all the Buddhas jade, gold and human. I told the girls the story of the “Happy Buddha.” The origin of my happy Buddha story is from being awakened in January 2010 by a ghost visit from Andy, my son who the previous October died from cancer. He was in a long black rain coat, which I thought was odd but when you are asleep anything happens. I got up and went to the kitchen to write this story down. He told me in heaven there are many rooms and the one he was most excited about visiting was the “Room of Happy Thoughts.” In this room he said all our happy thoughts are collected. When we die we can visit this room and see all our happy memories from our life. He said my room and his were full of happy thoughts. He told me to make a happy thought and it would appear right before him. At 2 am I had no happy thoughts. He kept persuading me to think. Sitting at the kitchen table, I looked toward the lazy Susan where the salt and pepper shakers are sitting. Next to them was a tiny happy Buddha figurine I had bought at the Crow Asian Museum in Dallas. I held it in my hand and said “Andy, look a happy Buddha, that’s a happy thought!” Then without realizing it I visualized it to eight feet tall in my head. Then I heard Andy, yell in my head, “You just scared the shit out of me!” There is a happy thought –giving Andy a fright. I think I am still laughing about this. My room of happy thoughts is full of happy Buddhas!
As we walked up a flight of stairs to see the Jade Buddha, which I wasn’t allowed to photograph, we came to a wooden Buddha relic. It was full of coins. The idea is to insert a coin somewhere in the relic without it falling out and you will be prosperous. The three of us did this and my coin is next to a “Happy Buddha.”
The Jade Buddha was in a lavish room and roped off. As I stood there looking at it, I noticed two women ask the guard for a bottle of yellow colored oil and then payed for it. They held the twelve ounce bottle between their hands in prayer fashion and said a silent prayer. When they were finished the guard came and took the oil, walked to the alter, opened the bottle and poured it into a bowl with a burning flame. The prayer was now in the oil and would be carried up to the flame and away in the smoke to the great Buddhas in the ethers. It was a lovely way to pray.
Next we went to the Bund which is a walkway along the river. I couldn’t believe how beautiful the lights decorated the buildings. (Images that could be oil painted by G. Harvey) We walked with our umbrellas up to a shopping mall that resembles old Chinese architecture. Rain soaked we taxied back to the hotel and tumbled in bed. Tomorrow the world expo.
FIELD TRIP….. I took my senior IB students to the Yuejiang Tower or Lions Gate Temple for an art outing. We had a lovely afternoon. The focus was on photographing patterns, architecture, people, light and shadows. Mike, Anna and Ophelia accompanied me along with the economics teacher, Michael. When we got to the steps to climb the hill to the pagoda Michael took a leave (something about nap-time) and it was just me and the students. The temple was part of a Buddhist monestary built in 400AD. Much was destroyed, rebuilt and opened to the public in 2001. Being new, there are no Buddhist monks to be seen. More of a tourist attraction, it still represents the Ming Dynasty when Zheng He sailed to the Atlantic. It includes complex architecture lines in traditional Chinese style. Housed inside is information such as ship building, scientific sailing, how to conquer the ocean, peaceful diplomacy, good-neighborly relationships, transmission of civilization, equal trading and culture exchanges as well as local customs and practices in western countries. (This last sentence I copied from a tourist guide!) Since I can’t read the Chinese characters I enjoy the museum visually.
