You Min Temple

Mommy and Sarah before we headed out for the morning. The following is the "Brief Introduction of You Min Temple" that was given to us.
"You Min Temple was built during Tianjian years in Liang Dynasty, originally named Da Fo Temple. Mazhu of Tang Dynasty cultivated bushes here, extensively passing on Buddhist theory, thus forming "Hongzhou Buddhist" headed by Mazhu. It was at the peak of the time a copper column was cast one zhang and six chi high, weighing 36,000 jin to meet the Buddhist. The proverb, "Jianhxi is rather poor while there is 36,000 jin copper" has been handed down until today. Unfortunately, the column was spoiled during the Great Culture Revolution. In 1995, it was reconstructed and now it has become the most prosperous, holy place for Buddhist touring and visiting."





The yellow building is where the monks live.

See the dragon on the ceiling? This Buddah is about 15 meters tall. (45 feet) It is made of copper (not solid). The Buddah is holding a lotus flower in his hand and the dragon has some kind of ball near his mouth. It was spectacular!
This is one of two 250 year old cinnamon trees inside the Temple area. They were on either side of the path.
I liked this statue of the lion because it has a baby lion on it. These types of statues are all over the place here.



This was called something like "three levels of life". I don't remember the exact name. Basically we live in the middle level. If we do good things in life we will be deity(? - I'm not sure that is the right word) If we do bad things in life we become ghosts. This wall depicted that. It was amazing - all the figures were different from each other. And this is only a small portion of the huge wall.





I liked this sign - no spitting.

Sarah has on a little pouch - you can see the string around her neck. They have a paper inside that wishes a long and prosperous life. We picked one up - as I put it on her I told her she would have a cross when she gets home.

It is hard to see but this is the sign we saw as we were leaving the Temple. It says no photos.
Park across the street from the You Min Temple







It was about 95-98 degrees today with humidity that made it feel like 117! It was so hot! After walking through the Temple and into the park we were ready to go back to the hotel but we stopped at the porcelian store first. Jiangxi is most known for its porcelian. There were some amazing pieces! But, I think all of us were glad to get back to the coolness of the hotel. Sarah took a 2 hour nap!

We'll post more tomorrow evening (our time). Brent is doing a sight-seeing tour by himself while I stay back with Sarah. It is just too hot for her to be outside. A few days and we go to Guangzhou. I can't wait because it means we are closer to coming home. I am so ready.

Brandon and Hannah- we miss you so much! I loved the hamster and fairy you made with Gram and Bubba! I can't wait to see them when we get home. I hope you are having fun. We love you!