At the Pagoda of the Golden Tortoise
Annie Eagleton
Tom Howard/John H. Reid Short Story Contest 2009 (view all the winners)
Highly Commended
Under cover of darkness I arrived at "Tu Kim Quy", the "Pagoda of the Golden Tortoise". The night was gravid with frogs. Their strange calls announced our approach, and later in my room I drifted into sleep, listening to their curious amphibian talk.
Sometime in this preternatural night rain woke me, coming in sideways through the open window, soaking the bed, the floor, my bags. As I scrambled to close the shutters, lightning illuminated the sky, followed by a deafening crash of thunder, loud enough to crack open the heavens! I lay awake a long time, feeling both humbled and exhilarated by the power of the elements in this mysterious rural backwater.
After six months of teaching English in Danang City, on the central coast, I was about to discover a more traditional Vietnam. A flight of less than an hour had brought me to the capital, Hanoi, where I was met by the Monk, Thay Nhan (a friend of a friend) and his translator, Tuan (who introduced himself as Thay Nhan's "disciple". I believed (due to the wonders of miscommunication) that I would be staying at a pagoda in Hanoi. But I was whisked off in a taxi 70 kilometres to their village in Ha Tay Province.
The Monk, round-faced and corpulent in dark brown robes, was a very jovial character, who giggled a lot and seemed biologically attached to his mobile phone (which he was on almost the entire journey.) Driving into the unknown, overwhelmed by the hospitality of strangers, the incessantly honking horn and the blasts of cold air from the air-conditioner, I had become irritated.
My purpose for coming to Hanoi was to get a Japanese visa and I needed to be back there early the next morning for an appointment at the Embassy. As the distance from Hanoi grew, so did my anxiety. "Don't you worry about that" Tuan reassured me, "Thay Nhan* will take you." I should have just trusted the process, trusted my friends. Masters of hospitality, they arranged everything and transformed what could have been a stressful adventure across an unfamiliar city, into an excursion, and an excuse for a gathering.
* The honorific "thay" is used for both male teachers and monks. Both are always and only addressed with this honorific, as a form of respect. "Nhan" I was told, means "patience" or "endurance" (a quality I would have done well to cultivate.)
After a quite special, though brief introduction to the pagoda*, and a breakfast of noodles, we left for Hanoi on two motorbikes (Thay leading on one, and me on the back of Tuan's). It was my first sight of where I was. Leaving the walled pagoda grounds through the village, I drew stares from the locals, as we zipped around a labyrinth of narrow alleys, honking before every corner, passing houses, vegetable gardens and ponds. We rode over a river on a rickety wooden "floating bridge", where Tuan paid a small toll on the far bank.
*A pagoda (in Vietnamese "tu" or "chua") is a Buddhist place of worship, with an upward curving roof, decorated with dragons, in classical Chinese style. Inside, the focal point is a statue (or several) of the Buddha.
On the two hour journey, there were constantly changing vistas: dogs outside village homes, horses and carts, water buffalo, hundreds of white ducks in riparian duck farms (one of the villages is famous for duck soup). Solitary peasants, stooped over in conical hats, worked in a sea of green rice paddies.
As we left these rural scenes behind and dove deeper into the suburbs of Hanoi, motorized traffic increased exponentially. It was my first visit to the capital and I was stunned by the number of motorbikes (motos) on the move. (Now I understood why Vietnamese called Danang a quiet city!) We flowed along in the swarm, a constant drone, a tiger's purr, frequently drowned out by the murderous blasts of bus and truck horns. On this first excursion, I was all eyes and trying hard not to be ears!
Motorbikes and bicycles alike were loaded with all manner of sacks, bundles, crates, boxes and packages or potted trees, minimally tied down (if at all!) and often dwarfing the rider. Planks of wood, poles of bamboo or sugar cane or metal pipes, extended metres beyond the length of the bike. Other motos carried cages stuffed with live animals: I spotted a large cageful of rats (Tuan told me these are bred or caught in the fields for consumption) and a motorbike-load of a hundred or so live ducks, some in cages and many hanging upside-down from the handlebars. I was horrified by the cruelty of this, but sadly, this is the "normal" way to transport fowl in Vietnam.
I saw riders picking their nose or smoking or talking on mobile phones. In fact there is nothing unusual in this. Everyone is well-practised at riding one-handed. For men, it seems almost obligatory to light up as they set off.
We passed a lone traffic policeman, striking in peach-coloured uniform, on a raised platform, under a large parasol, in the mayhem of a busy intersection. The regular police are vibrant in fern green with red trim.
My visa application was done swiftly and it was time to "an com" ("eat rice")—one of the Monk's favourite expressions, and rituals, I was to learn. He took us to Hanoi's most famous vegetarian restaurant, tucked away down a shady alley. (Vietnamese monks are wholly vegetarian, whereas lay Buddhists abstain from meat twice a month, at new moon and full moon.) We were joined by five of his young friends. I was treated to a veritable feast of mock-meat delicacies and genial company.
Thay had business to attend to, so at my request Tuan took me to the Women's Museum. Sadly, most of it was closed for refurbishment, but viewing the one floor was a moving experience nevertheless. The courage and ingenuity of Vietnamese women in defending their country from the American war machine was awe-inspiring.
Later, over coffee, Tuan and I got to know each other better. With his mop of thick black hair, cut in a "basin-cut", he looked like an Amazon Indian, and I told him so. This was a new concept to him, which however impressed him enough to create an email account after that name. He is a diminutive, gentle man of about thirty, with a sweet smile and a soft voice, and enunciates English almost perfectly (rare for Vietnamese English teachers.) Tuan had taught English for seven years in a secondary school (though I was the first "foreigner" he had ever spoken to). I was appalled to hear how little he earned: 450,000 dong per month for a 40 hour week (less than $30—a sum I earned in less than 2 hours in a western-run English Language centre). Even after so long in the Vietnamese school system, he had no hope of promotion or a raise, because of the time he graduated. I did not entirely understand this, but he said that other "official" teachers earned up to 3 million and above. (Because of this dire situation, he decided some months later, to migrate to Australia, where he could earn much more as a farm worker.)
In spite of the discrepancy in our salaries, he insisted, as my host, on paying for the museum entrance fees, coffee and even internet, all small amounts, but it did not sit comfortably with me. Then we headed back through rush hour traffic, back into verdant rice paddy country, along the Red River wall, passing through villages, each famous for a different craft: soft noodles, conical hats, wood carving and bamboo, back to the sanctuary of the pagoda.
We sat cross-legged on mats on the floor of the anteroom, the place where Thay received visitors, beneath an imposing Buddha altar and two smaller ancestor shrines. Thay's room and the guest room were at opposite ends of the anteroom. Pairs of heavy double doors opened onto a tiled veranda, shaded by a huge longan tree. A hot evening meal was served by Thay's devoted cook, Dong ("East")—a colourful array of vegetable dishes, tofu and condiments and a large pot of steaming rice. This was a scene that repeated itself many times that week. Thay would serve me a generous scoop of rice (which he insisted on replenishing), and with chopsticks we filled our bowls from these dishes. It is a lovely way to share food. Throughout the meal, Thay would pick up some of the tastier morsels with his chopsticks and place them in my bowl.
We were soon joined by a group of elderly women, who had been praying in the pagoda (a nightly ritual, it transpired). I was an object of curiosity, as a rare foreigner in their village, and the news that I was Buddhist, provoked both gasps of surprise and murmurs of approval. They sat in rapt attention to our conversation (no secrets here) sipping on green tea, while wrapping and chewing betel nut ("trau"),* which they also offered to me. It has a bitterness, which turns to sweetness in the mouth and arouses a subtle feeling of well-being.
*A leaf from the betel nut vine is smeared with a dab of white lime from a special little pot, then wrapped around a piece of the nut from the areca palm. The origin of this combination of ingredients coming together is told in a popular folktale—a tragic triad of love. It is a mild stimulant, bringing a feeling of well-being. Indeed, as the saying goes: "a quid of betel nut gets the ball rolling!"
Two beautiful boys appeared, and shyly sat across the room, staring at me, unabashed. Tuan (whom Thay always called Mr. Tuan) told me they had never seen a foreigner before. Radiant smiles lit up their faces, every time I glanced at them. Every so often, they crept a little closer, until they were sitting next to me. Through Tuan I learnt their names and ages—Manh ("Strength") was fourteen, and Diep ("Butterfly") was twelve. Only later did I find out that Diep is the cook's son. They were temporarily in the Monk's care. It seemed a mutually beneficial arrangement. The Monk treated them very kindly and they showed him great deference.
In the week I stayed at Kim Quy pagoda, there were frequent visitors and gatherings. Those children and others, would often sit around the circle of adults, wide-eyed, quiet as mice, listening attentively, and eagerly springing up to fetch and carry, at the slightest signal from Thay or another adult. Elders still reign supreme, and children continue to obey parental authority into adulthood, indeed for their whole life. A strict hierarchy and codes of behaviour, inherited from the Confucianism* of the Chinese (during one thousand years of domination) is evident throughout Vietnam, and particularly here.
*In its most basic form, Confucianism deals with human relationships, which must all be approached with virtue, which comes from having "li" (decorum and etiquette) and "jen" (humanity and love).
On my second morning I rose before four, to join the Monk in meditation in the pagoda, as the cadence of the gong cut the pre-dawn air. The soft yellow light and archaic appearance of several tiers of solemn statues created a mystical kind of ambience, tempered by the fat "Laughing Buddha" in central place. The air was already thick with incense. Thay gave me nine incense sticks to offer to the three Buddhas of Past, Present and Future, the protector deity and the other sages of Chinese antiquity. I sat cross-legged behind him, kneeling below the tiers of Buddhas, while he rhythmically struck the "mo" (wooden knocker) and "chuong" (bronze "singing" bowl) and chanted prayers. Then we meditated together in silence for another half hour.
It was still dark when we returned to our rooms to rest, hearing the last songs of the crickets, as the birds began to wake. While I lay dreamily, sacred Buddhist chants soared from the Monk's open window to bless the community. Suddenly the numinous mood was shattered by a revolutionary song, blaring out through a crackly village loudspeaker! Music and talk continued for the next forty minutes, effectively drowning out the chants. A "collision" of very different, yet co-existent worlds.
Sleep now impossible, I got up to do some yoga, then stepped outside to explore my surroundings. I still had little sense of where I was. Stone steps led up to a flat roof, from where I had a panoramic view of the pagoda grounds: Entering the grounds through an ornately decorated gate, one crossed a vast courtyard, empty but for a tall, alabaster statue of Quan Am (better known in the West by her Chinese name Quan Yin, the Goddess of Compassion). There was also a pond and many trees and plants.
The pagoda's earthen yellow and pink stucco stood out among the blackened moss-covered stone of the village houses and walls. Lush vegetation, palm trees and banana plants reared up from almost every garden, and in-between. Stone water tanks, the size of swimming pools, grew fish and water spinach. Mist was rising, mingled with wood smoke from household chimneys. The air was alive with the sounds of the natural world: insects, wild birds, an occasional cock crow, grunts of pigs, an occasional dog bark. Everything was green, soft and diaphanous, as night became day, yin turned into yang.
I watched as the immediate neighbourhood slowly came to life: a solitary woman riding silently by on a bicycle, blue shirt against redbrick wall; some minutes later, a few chickens emerge, stretch their wings and begin scratching about; then a sleepy dog...then another; then another woman on a bicycle, her long black pigtail starkly soft against her apricot shirt.
After breakfast with the Monk, there was sudden activity in the courtyard. A man had climbed barefoot up the longan tree outside the house and was gaily hacking away at a large branch with a machete. Having been a tree surgeon in a former life, I could see what was going to happen— the heavy branch, when it was cut through enough to fall, would rip the bark down the trunk. Somehow, using body language and a drawing, I conveyed to the Monk that the man needed to do an undercut. He gave instruction and the branch was neatly removed.
The place was not as quiet as it had appeared by night—in fact it was a hive of activity. There was chopping and sweeping going on in the yard, people, young and old, coming and going all day, to see the Monk, to pray, to bring offerings of fruit or cakes, which Thay shared with subsequent visitors, after a spell on the altar. Much green tea was drunk. As a guest and a foreign visitor, I was treated with great warmth and respect by all. It is a strange thing to be some kind of celebrity, solely by virtue of being a foreigner! (The Vietnamese expression for foreigner, incidentally is "nguoi nuoc ngoai" which literally translates as "person country outside", but we are sometimes referred to as "mui lo"—"long nose".)
My "conversations" with the Monk were extraordinarily deep, considering we had only a smattering of each other's language. Lengthy talks were possible through Tuan, who came daily to visit and translate for an hour or two. But otherwise, with the aid of a dictionary and drawings, we managed to communicate very well on our own. I had to frequently use my reading glasses to decipher and copy the "diacritics" of the Vietnamese words* and Thay began borrowing them, which gave him a wicked kind of pleasure!
*Vietnamese, like Chinese, is a tonal language. Five different tones are indicated by "diacritics" or accents on the vowels, to denote rising or falling tones, a crack, etc. Each word has five or six possible pronunciations, all with quite different meanings. It is monosyllabic and very "musical", but for a Westerner, the tones are very hard to "hear" and reproduce, so it is an extremely difficult language to learn.
Inspired by my presence, and making an effort to communicate better, he began looking up and copying lists of English words. And so we passed several studious mornings together in this pleasant manner, sitting cross-legged, opposite each other at a low table.
Thay hailed from Saigon and had been summoned to this northern village pagoda only a few years before. An orphan, he had become a monk at the age of eight (thirty-two years ago). He was well educated, and read Chinese, the language in which many Buddhist texts are written here. Monks hold a high status in Vietnamese society and they play a variety of roles. Thay is an astrologer (in the Sino-Vietnamese tradition), and is often consulted to divine the most auspicious time for weddings and the opening of businesses. He is also a practitioner of "feng shui" ("phong thuy" in Vietnamese, meaning "wind and water") for the correct placement of things in building projects, and the knowledge of how to "cure" bad energy. Thay is also a chiromancer.
These were all topics in which we shared an interest. He was impressed by my knowledge of Chinese cosmology (from my Chinese Medicine background), the concepts of yin and yang ("am duong" in Vietnamese), the Five Elements and the Twelve Year Animal Cycle. Born in January 1955, I had long known I was in the Horse Year, rather than the Ram, but I was surprised to hear that my Element was Metal and not Wood, because the lunar calendar falls about one month behind the western calendar. And he got out his almanac and charts to calculate and explain this, with Tuan's help.
However, I being a relatively new Buddhist (in the Tibetan tradition), it was about Buddhism that I quizzed him the most. Vietnamese Buddhism is very much like "a Chinese kind of Buddhism, which is a bit of this, that, and the other—ancestor worship, a belief in ghosts, bad fate, all the frightful things" as described by Amy Tan in her novel "Saving Fish From Drowning". I learnt many Vietnamese words for Buddhist terminology, with Thay's help, a dictionary and Tuan's assistance, again discovering that lay Buddhists are not so familiar with concepts, I had been privileged to learn from lamas.
One of the visitors to the pagoda was a young photographer named Tai, who spoke no English, but took a great interest in me, addressing all his questions to me directly, in Vietnamese, rather than through Tuan. I told him that I had taken many photos in the past, but now, as I no longer owned a camera, "I photograph things 'in my mind', to write about them later." Tai said he would bring his camera and take photos of whatever I wanted. I said "Then you must see with my eyes" at which Tuan quipped: "You mean 'Eye Service'?" and we both laughed in a wonderful moment of linguistic rapport. ("Eye Service" was an expression I had just learnt online from Wordsmith, with Tuan looking over my shoulder. It actually means "work that is done only when the boss is there to see".)
Next day, Tai showed up with a large digital camera and organized a few posed shots in front of the house and Quan Am, but this was not what I had in mind. I rang dear Tuan to ask if he could come over to translate. He came immediately. I said I would love some "natural shots" of the beautiful faces of the two boys. It became clear Tai did not know how to do that. It turned out he was a Studio Photographer. He would line the boys up, tell them to smile, and shoot, but they looked stiff and uncomfortable. The remarkable thing was, the moment after he clicked the shutter, they relaxed and their faces broke into the genuine smiles I wanted to capture!
While that was going on, a funeral party arrived: twenty or thirty matriarchs in sombre dark brown "ao dai" (traditional long dresses) and "non la" (conical palm-leaf hats), were processing across the courtyard, into the pagoda's front entrance. Through my eyes, a sepia tone scene from another place and time, but to Tai, nothing out-of-the-ordinary. Suddenly the Monk appeared at the side door of the pagoda in his ceremonial saffron robe, framed, from where I stood, not only between the stone door jambs, but also perfectly between two papaya tree trunks. Another missed photo opportunity.
Some time later, their prayers over, the ladies marched out of that side door and filed towards the house, where I was standing on the veranda. Each one acknowledged me with the traditional Buddhist greeting of palms pressed together, and a big smile flashing betel-stained teeth. They stepped up on to the veranda, and regimentally, one after another removed their conical hats and slotted one inside the other in one neat stack. Then the women stripped off their formal "ao dai", to relax in the simple shirts and black silk trousers they wore underneath. I happened to be wearing a similar shirt and black trousers, and several women tugged at my clothes and indicated their approval!
A special meal had been prepared and laid out on the floor for this ceremony, in memoriam of two deceased elders. I was invited to eat lunch with a circle of seven or eight grandmothers. Each of the women graced my bowl repeatedly with morsels of vegetarian "meat". The meal was followed by eugenia tea and the ritual chewing of "betel nut".
There are many different ways to wrap and shape the package, according to occasion. A great mound of areca nuts is a necessary offering at wedding ceremonies and to guests at Tet (Vietnamese New Year), to ensure affable conversation. Chewing betel instantly turns the saliva to crimson. Nowadays it is mainly enjoyed by elderly village women, whose lips and teeth are stained a deep red. It is said to have health-giving properties, particularly strengthening the teeth and gums. Indeed, all the reddened mouths of the matriarchs I met had a mouthful of their own teeth!
A few of the older women had black teeth, which is a remnant of an ancient custom, when young women, in order to attract a good husband, would blacken their teeth with a special plant dye, so that they were "as black (and shiny) as watermelon seeds," so the saying goes. This was actually a national trait of Vietnamese women, particularly in the north, to distinguish them from Chinese women. There was an old adage that "only animals have white teeth" (a covert way of referring to their oppressors, the Chinese.)
It was almost dusk. The two boys ran across the roof, releasing their kites, one red, one green. Each kite was attached to a seemingly endless length of twine, wrapped tightly around a bottle, and was skillfully reeled out. They lifted and soared like twin celestial stingrays, tugging and luffing, long tails trailing. Suspended, far, far up in the clear cobalt sky, "eight miles high". Another translucent green kite hung jellyfish-like. There were many kites over the village, but ours flew closest to heaven. Below them, charcoal clouds gathered mass, against pink patches of sky.
This twilight time again, when day meets night, yang becomes yin...The last swallows of the day swoop and dive, as the first bats of the night begin to flit through the darkening sky. The first star glimmers through blackening clouds. Sudden flashes of lightning flood the firmament. Thunder growls in the distance. Cattle low. A dog barks.
Meanwhile, I had become increasingly fond of this place and my magnanimous host, this generous, gregarious Monk. With his repertoire of facial expressions, silly voices, hoots, chuckles and titters, he is Laughing Buddha incarnate. A little fat, yet powerful, he rolls up his sleeves to muck in with everyone at physical tasks, clean-up and cooking (and he is an excellent cook).
It is a special privilege to join Thay every morning in his pre-dawn ritual. To watch him reverently light all the candles and spiral incense before each deity, then strike the gong to announce our presence, our offering. And to listen to his chants with the "pap, pap, pap" of the striker hitting the wooden "mo", and intermittent chime of the bronze "chuong". The bowl "sings" for a long time after being struck, and as I feel its resonance throughout my body, it seems to tune my spirit. I am sitting very close, so I feel everything with some intensity, and also the air when it stops; the lingering resonance fading into stillness, but not silence, for then the sound of the falling rain and the song of the crickets fill the air. Sitting like a mountain, enveloped by the warmth of my blanket, I feel solid and connected, in spite of the pain in my knees. I feel part of something ancient, beyond time...
We share a contemplative breakfast of fried sticky rice, noodles and greens, followed by a pomelo, an enormous fruit similar to a grapefruit, with a very thick skin. Thay carefully, lovingly cuts and peels to remove the skin in one, in the beautiful shape of a lotus—and then promptly turns it upside-down on his head like a cap! We both erupt into laughter, but slowly I begin to feel sad. Appreciating the quiet beauty of this place, the morning light through the open doors, rain falling softly, "Ten Loves" (of the Buddhas) drifting from his room. My mind flits through all the love and smiles and peace and inspiration I experience here, and tears well up at the thought of leaving.
After breakfast, I sat on the steps leading into the pond and just watched. There were many ripples on the surface, but it took me a while to see they were caused by hundreds of tiny fish (and some bigger ones occasionally), and that the pond was absolutely teeming with life. I happened to look down at the step and noticed a little crab clinging to the stone. As I watched, it eased itself almost imperceptibly out of the water, just enough for one eye on a stalk to break the surface. I fancied it wanted to take a look at me. So we eyeballed each other for a long minute before it vanished with a plop into the murky depths.
Having been cloistered, as it were, within the walls of the pagoda, I asked Thay if I could borrow a bicycle to explore the village. Ever the perfect host, within half an hour he had organised a bicycle and arranged for Dong to take me around. She does not speak any English, but has the most disarming smile and beautiful manner, as does her son, Diep. We had become close in those few days. She gave me a tour around the patchwork of streets, fields and ponds and the local market. Some places flew the red Vietnamese flag with its central yellow star. Everywhere people were quietly engaged, tending plants or harvesting or transporting or selling or building. In this village-commune, apart from the now ubiquitous mobile phone and a few motor bikes, there is still little evidence of encroaching westernization.
When we stopped to buy fruit, a woman who prays at Kim Quy invited us in for tea. An enormous cobra was pickling in a jar of wine. Some Vietnamese are quite partial to snake, gecko and scorpion wine for "medicinal" or aphrodisiac purposes. Apparently the most potent are those that have had a live animal dropped into them, expending their life force into the brew.
I needed the bathroom and was taken out back—into the pigsty! One sty was full of curious piglets, while the other housed a rather thin sow. I said hello, and she eyed me with one piggy eye, which looked remarkably human—and fearful.
Dong and I returned to the pagoda as it began to rain. Dusk fell. The rain stopped. From the roof I gazed up at a herringbone sky. Myriad insects buzzed, crawled or hopped about: mosquitoes, moths, ants, crickets and one bright green grasshopper. Frogs started to call, one sounding like a cough, another like the bark of a dog. Inside the anteroom a small lone frog was jumping up at the altar (a monk in its last life perhaps?)
My days were full, whether spent alone writing, reading or brushing up on my Vietnamese or socializing with the numerous visitors. Most precious were the times when groups of elderly women and schoolchildren came there to volunteer their labour, preparing the grounds for the construction of a large ancestor house. I was feeling some discomfort at being the pampered guest in the face of their zeal and energy. Thay was trying to get me to take a hot bath, but instead I started dragging brush and got involved in the "hacking" process. I felt quite in my element, though it was the first time I had used a "dao rua" (a cleaver-machete hybrid, which is used to cut just about everything in Vietnam.) I did not quite master the stroke, but I was happy to be heaving to with the gang. They seemed variously amused and impressed by my participation, and when we were done, the matriarchs invited me into their circle to, of course, chew betel nut.
But it was shifting bricks that I found most poignant—a group were busy moving them from piles into neat stacks. I joined the chain and found it remarkably satisfying—an easy swing of the body from left to right to left, receiving and passing 2 bricks, 2 bricks, 2 bricks...It was a meditation and it was a connecting link to these Buddhists. I was one of them, there to serve my pagoda.
At this place in rural Vietnam, I had been transported back to another time, where codes of chivalry, service, hospitality and respect are still honoured; where both young and old are eager to be servers and bearers, giving, sharing and offering mutual support. Somehow this unlikely melange of Buddhism, Ancestor Worship, Confucianism and Communism has spawned true community.
