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Templehunting
Datong, Shanxi province, 10th of August 1991
The Shanhua Monastery. This gets into a real problem. I had tried to
find that place the whole afternoon yesterday in southern Datong,
where my otherwise trusty guidebook had placed it, but all the people
that I asked pointed to the north. Southern Datong is a conglomerate
of industrial complexes and warehouses. All of Datong is not exactly
a beauty but the south end is definitely the ugly heart of a busy
industrial town.
Today in the morning I asked one of the staff in the hotel and he
sketched a crude map: It shows the monastery to the north of the
hotel, at the southern part of the OLD town of Datong.
Since it looks like walking distance I stay clear of the crowded
buses and walk north along Da Nan Jie. The cinema to the left shows
a more-or-less biographical movie about Mao. The poster depicts a
young Mao with his trademark on the chin heroically looking into a
seemingly bright future. Something is burning in the background.
Now the modern street with two lanes for the cars and two seperate
lanes for bycicles ends abruptly and is replaced by the small road
that represents the main thoroughfare of old Datong.
Datong is one of the few big cities in China which still has an
intact old town. Most roads are mere paths, only a few feet wide and
a foot higher than the entrances to the houses due to the amassed
dirt of a millennia. Most of the houses look very old. They are
traditional family-houses with a front gate and the rooms placed
around an open yard. There's grass growing on the curved roofs and
most of the grey tiles are cracked.
My guess is that the monastery is somewhere on my left, but none
of the narrow lanes looks too promising and it's impossible to see
the roofs of the temple above the houses that line the street.
I turn left on the next path and follow it for a while. Even while
I'm not looking for the temple I still have to be on a constant
lookout because of the bikers who hurl themselve down the path with
the blaring noise of their bells, missing people by tenths of an
inch. There's an old man sitting on the front porch enjoying the sun
and he's definitely startled as I approach him and ask with the
finest pronounciation I can muster 'Shan hua si zai na li?'
His reaction is the standard bafflement. After that there's three
typical follow-ups if they are not used to foreigners:
One - they start talking like a waterfall because they think you've
mastered their language, which makes it usually a fairly onesided
conversation. Two - they answer the question in an understandable
way, which happens, alas, very seldom. Three - they simply just
don't believe that you know a single word of Chinese and whatever
you say, it has to be a funny coincidence that it sounds
like Chinese...
He is of the first type, but after listening to it for a minute
I slowly get it that the monastery is due south of us. I thank him
and turn back to the main road, but the old man is suddenly in
front of me, laughing, talking and visibly enyoying his new role as
tour guide. He leads me south and we enter another small alley near
the entrance to the old town where the old city wall is still
visible as a mound of earth. My new guide points at a sign at the
entrance to the alley and I recognize the characters for the temple
on it. He is a good walker for his age and after only a minute we're
at the front gate of the monastery. My guide is still talking and I
thank him again. I buy my ticket - or better two of them, because
foreigners have to pay double for everything, and as I walk through
the entrance hall with its beautifully carved guardians I look back
and there is the old man, smiling...
This travelogue is (c) by Thomas Sturm.
The author allows non-commercial publication of this text in electronic form,
as long as this paragraph is added to the end of the text.
For publication in any other form, please
write to: t_sturm@pacbell.net
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