Bathing Buddha

A couple of Sundays ago John and I went to the Chinatown to stock up on all the imports us Americans can't live without, ie soy sauce, sriracha sauce, hot sauce, etc.  To our surprise, they were having a Buddha party in the street. 

I decided I wanted to join in on the Buddha festival, and went to watch what was happening.  After reading through the Vow of Buddha I thought it'd be a great thing to do!

Below is a rough translation of the Vow of Buddha:

To take the Vow of Bathing Buddha

1. In bathing the right shoulder, I wish to speak well.  In bathing his left shoulder, I wish to do good deeds,  In bathing the bathe back I wish to have a positive mind

2. In bathing the right shoulder, I wish to have a healthy body.  In bathing the left shoulder I desire to rid of all the accumulated karmas.  In bathing the back I desire to increase my wisdom.

3. In bathing the right shoulder, I wish to be more compassionate.  In bathing the left shoulder I wish to have more patience.  In bathing the back I wish to serve the good of society.

4. In bathing the right shoulder, I wish to have a thriving business.  In bathing the left shoulder I wish to have a united family. In bathing the back I wish to have a harmonious society

5. In bathing the right shoulder, I  wish to increase my wisdom.  In bathing his left shoulder, I wish to have successful studies.  By bathing the back I wish to have good affinity with everyone else.

So, as you might have guessed, what was set up was a spot to bathe Buddah.  I asked for help from some of the men working the bath area and he explained to me what to do.  First, I was to bow to Buddah to show respect.  Then, I was to bathe his right side, followed by his left side, followed by his back.  A lot of people were out for the event, it was pretty cool!

This is how you do it...

First the right side...





Then the left side...





Then the back...



Then the bow!

This dude loved bathing Buddah!

Feliz Cumple!

For John, I feel bad. 

He unfortunately has the role of boyfriend to a rather needy girl come every May 5th.  You see, May 5th is my birthday.  For as long as I can remember my birthday has been the most important day of the year.  In fact, I recall telling my mom once that my favorite holiday was my birthday (mind you she had asked expecting an answer like Fourth of July, Christmas, etc.) But really, why wouldn't someone love their birthday the most?  It's a day (I'd like to think it's a week rather than a day, really) that's yours-you don’t have to share it with anyone, and everyone is supposed to be nice to you.  Chances are, you get a free dessert at a restaurant... and you get gifts... it's the best.

So, for John, I feel bad.

I believe he agonized over my birthday this year-what to do, what to say, how to spend it, etc.  In the end, he executed it just perfectly!  He knew that we would be traveling over my birthday so he decided to cut to the chase and have a celebration before we left. 

He chatted me at work one random day and said "don’t go home tonight, I have a surprise for you."  Then, he signed off! I had no idea what to expect or what was up his sleeve.  I thought maybe he wanted to surprise me randomly with something cool.  The longer I thought on it though, the more I realized it was probably birthday related-which was obviously very exciting! 

We met at a subway stop and he took me downtown.  We hurriedly walked through the shops and rows of stores and stopped in front of one in particular.  He told me he had done extensive research on leather jackets and had one picked out for me but wanted me to try it on first.  We went into the store, and unfortunately, it wasn’t really what I was looking for (although at that time I didn’t know what that would be).  We shopped around some more that night, but didn’t find just what we were looking for.  We'll try again another day. 

As we were heading home he says well that's just part one, part two is at home.  When we got home he had gone to a place nearby that we've both wanted to go that has lots of great spreads, cheeses, meats, breads, etc.  He had bought a little bit of everything and a bottle of wine! 

John, I'm singing your praise!