After my excursion to Macau, I spent my last two days in Hong Kong visiting the last of the touristy sites in the city. Friday was a day downtown while Saturday I went to the northern area of Hong Kong's city limits.
Friday I visited Victoria Peak, Hong Kong Zoo, and the Walled City Garden. Vitoria Peak is one of the most notable tourist destinations in Hong Kong boasting some of the best views of the city. On the top of the peak, there are a few shopping centers (it is Hong Kong after all, shopping opportunities around every corner) along with multimillion dollar homes. After a few photos, I had lunch in the shopping center overlooking the city before taking the famous tram down to the city.
Hong Kong Zoo is a fusion of gardens and animal pens. In addition, half of the zoo is on one side of a main street right downtown with an underground tunnel connecting it to the other half on the opposite side. I liked how the zoo didn't feel like a mass of cages on concrete, it had more of a park like feeling similar to the St Louis zoo. For it being right downtown a couple minutes from the bay, it had a nice calm atmosphere.
The next day I went to the Temple of 10,000 Buddhas on the northern city limits of the city with Mike. He hadn't visited this very peculiar temple, so it was something new for the both of us. This particular temple was built in 1974. It consists of over 10,000 different images of the Buddha in different artistic styles from different cultures. It is the second largest Buddhist temple in land mass in the Western Hemisphere consisting of several places of worship as well as a monastery. As you make your way up to the temple, the sides of the path are lined with several thousand Buddhas each displaying a different emotion that you must discard in order to reach enlightenment. I must say there were some pretty interesting Buddhas on that path! I'm not sure exactly what some of them were trying to let go in terms of emotions, but there were a few like the extremely angry Buddha or the glamorous Buddha that were pretty obvious.
The complex was pretty interesting, it had a very different layout compared to Korean Buddhist temples. The architecture was a lot more flamboyant and extreme compared the the subtle style of Korean temples. While I found that this temple had unique qualities, I don't think it represents the philosophy of Buddha in the same way Korean temples do. Buddha never wanted to be considered a deity, and while every Buddhist deifies him, I felt like this temple took it to a commercial extreme. Buddha was focused on letting go of earthly things and finding peace, I think the more subtle introverted approach is more fitting of the philosophy. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed visiting this temple, it displayed something to me in a new light: every individual religion has diversity in itself. I think we Christians like to focus on the differences we share, but we don't tend to look at other main religions and how they have argued for centuries over doctrine. I find this fascinating not only the variety of different religions, but the diversity of ideas within a religion.
After visiting this temple, we went to see the Lutheran Church of Hong Kong Synod's seminary. It is located a few kilometers from the temple. Oh my gravy.....this seminary is the most beautiful place of study I have ever seen! It was built in the 1970's as the seminary for the Hong Kong Synod. The Hong Kong Synod became the sole Lutheran church in China after the Communist Revolution. Christians were forced out of the mainland so many Lutherans from China moved to Hong Kong in hopes that China would open its doors again. The seminary is built in traditional Asian architecture, gardens included!
This place was one of the most beautiful places I have visited here in Asia. I loved seeing the way Christianity mixes with cultural aspects in order to display the diversity we share as the Body of Christ, yet there is unification in the message. I think it is beautiful to see a Christian church that embraces the splendor of a culture it is located in while resonating that universal message. It was nice to walk around this campus, seeing Bible verses written in Chinese next to a pagoda with beautiful greens and blues displaying a cross on the roof. I hope in the future Christians in Asia will build their churches in a similar fashion. God created us with diversity so I think it is wonderful to see different expressions of churches.
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