Big Buddha Temple (NgongPing 360)

Ep. 16

“Do not overrate what you have received, nor envy others. He who envies others does not obtain peace of mind.” – Buddha.

September 9^th, 2011

I'm posing like Buddha.

Riani and I have promised to go to NgongPing 360, where the Big Buddha Temple took place. I called her in the morning to wake her up (around 9am), but unfortunately she was sick by that time. She said that she was so sorry that she couldn’t make it due to her exhaustion after her last flight (well, I have to admit, sometimes I also had the same afterflight-laziness syndrome). But I really want to go…then I checked everybody’s roster, checking who were in HK at that time. I crossed Helen’s name, and called her, asked her whether she wants to go or not, and (thanks God) she agreed! (we founded lately that during our high school time, my big brother is Helen’s basketball ass. coach and we’re actually had a basketball match back there during our basketball golden time).

Our feet on the crystal cable car floor

Me, Helen and our Tickets!

I picked Helen in her apartment around 10-11 am. And we go straight to Tung Chung, to ride a cable car to NgongPing 360. From HK Gold Coast, where we live, we took K51 bus to Tuen Mun Central (HKD 3.9), transferred to E33 (HKD 13), which heading to Airport. We were supposed to stop at Tung Chung station, but as we’re to excited chat one another, we arrived at the airport instead and we had to take another extra trip on S1 bus (HKD 4) to Tung Chung  (Citygate Outlet, a very nice place to shop, cheap and branded). We finally arrived at Tung Chung Cable Car Station around 12.30 pm. Hahaha… Actually, there were two ways to go to NgongPing 360: by normal bus and by cable car. We chose the second one. We queued on the ticket booth and bought the cable car ticket. There were two types of the cable car: Normal cable car and Crystal Cable car (all glass around the cable car (even the bottom). Wanna guess which one Helen and I rode? Of course the crystal one…(we’re craving for some experience). It costs us around 179 per person to ride on that cable car. As usual, click! Click ! click! One cable car could carry max. 6 persons and it took around 30 minutes to travel from Tung Chung Cable Car Station to NgongPing. There were 2 other couples in that cable car and both of us the only one that standing and jumping all around the cable car to take some picture (those couples might thought that we’re two little crazy girls that have no fear of death). 

NgongPing Village

Po Lin Monastery

We reached the summit at about 1 pm. We directly took pictures (repeat: LOTs of them) here and there (until in the end, we used up all the battery and even used all out mobile phone battery as well…tsk tsk!). We went to the Po Lin Monastery, a temple where the monks lived and took care of the ground. We met a tour group there, we (smartly) squeezed ourselves into the group and (smartly) hear all the history from the tour leader (about the incense means, why people use 3 incense sticksto pray and blab la bla), we were like “oh! That’s why…” (yeah free tour!). We went into the Po Lin Temple and saw the greatness of it and we moved on to another part of NgongPing 360, NgongPing Village. NgongPing Village is a beautiful place to spend your spare time, to shop some very “Hong Kong” souvernirs, to eat in some traditional building style Hong Kong and international restaurant. For me and Helen, we packed ourselves better, we won’t waste time to sit around in such a good place (we bought a bag of bread at the cable car station to feed ourselves).

Me and My Wish

In the village of NgongPing we took a lot of pictures (repeat: hundreds). There is a Bodhi tree, where we can buy a small hexagonal wooden board to write our wish and hang on the tree. We also can see some traditional architectural gate of China, of course not to leave without a picture or two. There are also some cable car models which have different national flags skin on it (another pictures). On our way to the Big Buddha, we can see 12 statuettes of Chinese zodiac warrior, which is believed to be the guardian of the temple itself. To our surprise, there are some cows that grassing freely around the area. Cow cow cow chase the cow! (stupid).

Dragon Warrior Statuette

Hello from up there!

We proceed our way to visit the Big Buddha. From far away, we could see that we should walk on some long series of stairs to reach the place where the Buddha sits. Now, when we’re just in the foot of the stairs, we got the common sense why does it called the BIG Buddha (it was HUGE Buddha…or may I say gargantuan?) and the *what I called previously as ‘long series of stairs’* stairs, it was like hundreds of tiny little stairs. Huft! Helen and I collect our energy and do some stretching (hyperbolism mode :ON..but we really do gather up some energy). We set our feet on the first step and go on and on and on and on…….. After approximately 20 minutes of walking (read: climbing) up the stairs, we finally reached the Big Buddha. As soon as we arrived, almost ran out of our breath, we open our picnic pack of bread and bottled water. We sat for a while and refuel ourselves. There were several statuettes of Goddesses, which I believe is the servants of the Buddha. The view from up there was really stunning (not to mention the wind was really blew my bangs away and mess up my hair). Inside the Buddha is sort of a museum which tells you the process of the making of the Bug Buddha itself. And some sacred things were kept there, so that we should keep our voice down there.

In the middle of exhaustion

Going down from the Big Buddha, our next destination is the Wisdom Path. It was actually my suggestion, I heard that Kay said it was a great place to take some picture due to its splendid panoramic view and Helen agreed to go there. We walk to the direction which the direction board pointing (it says: ßWisdom Path 15 minutes walk. But after around 10 minutes walk, we realized that we haven’t seen anyone (read: any person) walk from the opposite direction, well, to be honest there were only two of us in the middle of nowhere (coz we just walk and chat all the way). 

Bodhi Tree

Our path towards Wisdom Path

We walked a little bit further and what lies in front of our eyes is an abandon restaurant in the middle of woods. If we walk a little bit further, we will enter a forest and it was already 5.30 pm. and the sun is almost setting. There were two paths lies in front of us, on one of them a white dog is sitting in the middle of the path and on the other path, two black dogs are laying on both side of the path (I’m not lying). I was so determined to see the Wisdom Path, but the situation is kinda creepy now. Helen suggested to just go back coz it was very risky if we went on. I almost agree, but there were my stubbornness that made me said “let me walk a little bit, if I can’t see anything from the point I can’t see you at my back anymore, we’ll go back.” So be it. I walk to the path with two black dogs on the side of it (I don’t know why did I chose that one), until the very end where I almost can’t see Helen, I still can’t see anything, all I can see were just trees and woods. So I decided to go back to Helen and walk the track back. Inside of my heart? I was so curious and still wanna see the Wisdom Path. I actually grunted inside. But, I know at some points it was just to risky to walk into a forest where we still didn’t see any person walk from the other direction, right? Anyway, it supposed to be a tourist attraction, but how come there was no one on our way?

The View from the Wisdom Path

Wisdom Path

OK! I talked to myself may be God has another plan and didn’t let me see the Wisdom Path that day. I gave up. But, see how miracles always comes upon me, we finally met a lady, 40-50 years of age, and she speaks in Indonesian (seriously!) “ini jalan ke wisdom path bukan ya?*is this the way to Wisdom Path?*”. Helen and I replied, “Yes it is but it seems a little bit further inside the forest.” She talk to some of her friends behind of her to confirm that it was the right way to Wisdom Path and offered us whether we want to walk together with her and her friends or not. LUCKY! Thank you God, in the time I almost given up, you always hold my back. Helen and I walked pass the abandon restaurant again, and to the intersection with white and black dog and we took the black dog path again, we walked and walked and walked around 5 minutes further into the forest, we finally found a prairie. A flat surface of grass, a statue of Peacock and a gate. Beyond that gate up to the mountains, the view was really SPLENDID! There were stand the wooden spears, with some Chinese characters engraved onto it. It was said that the Chinese wording is the Wisdom that Buddha gave to the human being. It was truly an amazing view. I still could remember that I said “it took a great courage to reach this place, we almost gave up back there, but God sent us those Indonesian ladies. Lucky us!”

Drained all of our ammo (read: camera and mobile phone batteries), we head back to the cable car station. We finished our one day trip to NgongPing 360 and Big Buddha Temple also the Wisdom Path (the most memorable one) with lots of pictures ready to look through when we arrived safely and sound to our sweet apartment room. The experience I got there is none of a kind that I ever imagine.

Nice weather to take a picture!

“Replace your term of Fear into what we called Curiosity. It will bring you far.” –Me.