Home of the Four Trans

Justin’s Auntie Tran, Uncle Ken, and cousin Amber were heading to the Hsi Lai Temple, today in Hacienda Heights, and invited us to come along. Although we had an appointment with Justin’s infant stim teacher, Mei, today, I called to reschedule as this was an opportunity I wanted the boys to experience. It would be unlikely that I’d drive them out there by myself on a weekday as it is about 1 hour away from where we live.

I’ve only visited the Temple once before today. This would be the boys’ first visit.

The winding road leading up to the majestic Temple on a hill were lined with round lanterns in celebration of the Chinese Lunar New Year. The kids finally took there hypnotized eyes off of the TV to admire the inviting red and gold colors. This was only a taste of what was to come.

We rode the elevator to the second floor where the main courtyard was. This was where all our senses were enticed by so much of the Chinese culture. I loved it! I had never seen the temple decorated for Chinese New Year before.

 

The display represents the year of the Ox bringing prosperity to the New Year. (R-L: Nathan, Uncle Ken, Cousin Amber)My favorite feature of the New Year decor is the “Make-a-Wish Tree”.

The “foilage” of this tree was entirely composed of red ribbons of wishes.

After burning incense and praying for a prosperous New Year, we offered monetary donations for the Temple in exchange for red ribbons of wishes. There were 7 wishes we could choose from. The most popular, “For everything to go perfectly for you,” was sold out. We chose some others pertaining to health, wisdom, and good fortune for myself, Auntie Tran, Uncle Ken, and the three kids–it was 2 for $5. What a deal right?
There was no textual nor verbal explanation on how or why wishing on the “Make-a-Wish Tree” will bring us good fortune. Whether your wish will come true or not is dependent on your faith as you release your inner most desires to the universe to hear. Like in literature such as “The Secret” describes, this act of wishing is condoning the idea that if you let positive energy into the universe, you will receive positive energy back. In essence, you have a way of willing something to life.I’m a born and raised, practicing Catholic. While burning incense and wishing may seem contrary to my beliefs, it is not. I burn incense and pray out of respect for our Chinese ancestors, but still believe there is only one God. I wish, but still have faith in my Lord to execute all that he has planned for us. I wish just like I pray–to my Lord, in hopes that he’ll hear and answer my prayers.

It is Faith that I base my actions on. It is Faith that has given me the ability to move on when my world seems to be crashing down.

It is in those moments that I am most vulnerable that I appear most strong because I have Faith that carries me.

The Make-a-Wish Tree was as beautiful as it is inspiring. Now, I don’t feel so bad for playing hooky ;).

Here are some other images of our visit to the Temple:

Walking down the corridor to the Wishing Pond.

Nathan at the Wishing Pond after having thrown 3 coins into it.

Justin and Mommy in front of the Main Shrine (this is the best picture we got).

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 8th, 2009 at 3:11 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.