Beauty All Around

Haeinsa Temple, first gate Haeinsa Temple scene



This photo shows the Tripitaka Koreana, a world famous treasure. This is the most famous national treasure of the Haeinsa Temple. There exist in this building, which is an architectural wonder in itself, 81,340 blocks. All characters are carved out of specially treated wood. The blocks are in perfect condition even though they were made in a 16 year period around 1236 A.D. These blocks hold the words and teachings of Buddha.


This is one of the four beings that are inside the second gate at the Bulguk-sa Temple that I visited today.





Kindergarteners on a field trip Sr. Citizens preparing to
teach us how to make taffy

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I have been on the road for the past two days so I didn't have time to add to my blog yesterday.

Now I am excited to explain some of the things that I have learned about and seen. Once we left Seoul by bus we traveled for about 4 hours to the south of the penninsula. If you want to look up the following places on Google Earth or a map it will make lots more sense to you when I explain where I am! I am now in Gyeongju. This is a beautiful place with mountains and lush green trees and vegetation. There are streams that rush through the mountains and valleys, and the land that is used to grow rice is as green as emeralds. I am enjoying the fresh air, and the pleasant weather too.

We visited some very impressive and ancient sites. The first two pictures show scenes from the Haeinsa Temple and the building that houses the Tripitaka Koreana. This is a world treasure site and it is easy to understand why. The building that houses the 81, 000 + wooden plates has been built in such a way that there is no decay, rot or insects that have disturbed the plates since they were carved in 1200 A.D.

The Temple itself is beautiful, ancient, and alive with a feeling of peace and calm. Many people still go there to worship as they have for hundreds of years.

When you are in Korea you realize how very old this culture is. Temples that are so impressive are still standing after many hundreds of years. Worship was very important to the Korean people and they spent a great deal of time making their beautiful shrines and temples.

This morning I visited something much more modern, not as beautiful, but incredible and impressive. I was able to visit the huge ship building facility called Hyundai Heavy Industries. There I saw huge ships being built, all in various stages. The man who created Hyundai left North Korea after the war. He came to South Korea with nothing but a cow that he stole from his father. With his planning and dedication to work he actually built an industry that is now the largest ship builder in the world...and yes Hyundai is also the producer of the Korean cars that we drive in the US.

Many years later the man took 1001 cows back across the bridge to North Korea to pay back his debt and make it right with his family for stealing the first cow. Now that is an investment.

Can anyone reading this blog name the man that started Hyundai?

Today I also visited another temple and saw a beautiful grotto that houses a Buddha sculpture that is 1300 years old. This grotto is the Seokuram Grotto. It is said to have been built in 751 A.D.

Everywhere I go in Korea I see such beauty in the buildings, the landscape and the people.