Bodhgaya Shanti

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This is one of the places I've always wanted to visit, having read about it several times in different books.

This is the spot where 2500 ish years ago the Buddha attained enlightenment after fasting and meditating under the Bodhi tree for 40 days and nights.

I guess you could compare it with Bethlehem or Jerusalem for Christians, but this is a place of peace and tranquility even now in the 21st century.

Modern day Bodhgaya is a sleepy little town in Bihar, one of the poorest and most crime ridden parts of India. But it is peppered with monasteries of Buddhist monks from around Asia...Burmese, Thai, Japanese, Chinese, Tibetan, Bangladeshi, Nepali, Bhutanese etc. The local beggars here are on to a right winner, as you can imagine, with tourists and monks giving alms.

The Mahabodhi temple is one of thoses special places that exude peace and positive energy, especially around the area of the bodhi tree and the 'golden throne' where the Buddha is said to have meditated. The front part of the temple didn't feel that special, especially as you get hassled there by guides and charlatans trying to make a quick buck from this spiritual heritage.

But round the Bodhi tree side it is all people meditating, praying, and prostrating themselves is front of this abode of enlightenment.

Me and the smaller memeber of the bear clan sat down for awhile and ended up having a very deep conversation about the oneness of the universe and other stuuf like that. I dcefintitely felt that being here reconfirmed my appreciation of the fundamental message of the Buddhist philosophy.

Maybe this also had to do with the fact that I was reading a book by the Dalai Lama at the time too!

Anyway, I think I'll definitely be visiting Bodhgaya again in the future, and reckon it would be a good place to do a meditation course or something similar.

In the meantime I'm going to try and keep in mind that the individual ego is not the be all and end all of existence, and that, beleive it or not, we are all connected inextricably to one another, and the natuiral world.

Big up yaself Siddhartha...Booooooo!!!

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Photos

The Bodhi Tree and 'Golden Throne'
This is the spot where Buddha achieved a higher state of concioussness, enlightenemnet, whatever you want to call it.

How many Buddhas?
This is a set of statues inside the Mahabodhi complex.