Some Early Mosques and some bloody pigeons

We'd felt for some time that we hadn't done enough 'culture' or 'heritage' here in Penang since we arrived, actually nearly 2 years ago now.... doesn't time fly? So we planned to do some more and earlier this week we went on one of Michelle's Spiral Synergy tours which would include the 3 oldest mosques in Georgetown. Well attended and very interesting indeed. The tour guide, Teresa, was fun which made for a good time all round.

The mosques are all within a few hundred yards of one another but if you wander round and round in circles enough and stop for some interesting tea and cakes at a Jawi cafe, the time passes most agreeably without too many gaps where you wonder what else? What was interesting about each mosque is the demographic that attends them as all date back to the early 1800's, just after the British arrived, and were built on land which even then was in the middle of what was then downtown Georgetown. The city/town back then was essentially 6 blocks back from the water (Beach Street or Jalan Pantai today) and no more than a dozen streets going left to right in a grid pattern. So that means there used to be 72 (or so) blocks where all commerce and in general all life took place for there were no other settlements on the island back then.

The British set aside what they thought as the best bits for them of course but also for the Indians they'd brought with them (mostly Tamils from south India who turned out to be muslims in the main), the Chinese who rushed in as soon as they saw what was happening (mainly Hokkien people from Fujian province) and also the local Malays who came over from the mainland too.... except that in the main they were not Malays, rather Indonesians trying to get away from the protestant Dutch who were forever fighting a rebellion in Aceh, a town in Indonesia only a very short boat ride away (less than 1/2 hour by plane these days). So, multiple demographics with obviously multiple requirements for their holy houses. Even today, the demographic separation remains broadly intact so Indian muslims rarely go to an Indonesian mosque (and of course vice versa) and neither attend other than rarely the newer Malay mosques.

I'd always wondered about what the colour scheme of old Penang was for today so many buildings look dilapidated in the World Heritage part of Georgetown. Apparently there were 3 colours, sky blue (with the colour coming from a local tree's berries that grow everywhere), yellow like in the photo (derived from cow's urine mixed with the white wash that is also prevalent. Local cows eat local mangoes and the result is very yellow apparently) and green which is a combination of the other two. Must have been very colourful. Makes me happy coming from Bermuda where houses are all lovely different pastel colours to think that something similar was happening here too. All old photos are black and white so of course impossible to know how colourful or not things really were. I like the colourful thought.

The big mosque on what used to be called Pitt Street was where we had the big talk from a local learned man. A very lively and jovial Indian who said his name was Dong and that if we wanted to remember him, we could always think of a bell and go Ding.... I believe he could make a living selling ice to the eskimos.

Someone had told me the mosque had been named after a pre-Colonial era ships captain of great renown but Dong told us that 'Kapitan' simply means leader and 'Keling' means Indian people. Another myth squashed!

Dong (or was it Ding?) took us on a whirlwind trip around the big mosque describing the pre-service washing requirements, why you kneeled on lines of carpet (hurts the knees otherwise apparently!), how you prayed, when you prayed, what the calling on words actually meant (pretty much 'time for prayer, get out of bed' for the morning session, similar thereafter), the fact that the Imams were not religious people just normal people who had something to say... and a whole lot of other stuff. He gave out free pamphlets on topics like 'Science in Islam', 'The Truth about Jesus', 'The position of Women in Islam' and other topics too. So easy for me to be cynical and describe it all as being a sell of the religion, but I'd like to think it was someone reaching out trying to dispel some myths. The fact that he used to be a Christian and converted (apparently he and Teresa were long time friends so both laughed about it) came up and I immediately thought about Saul becoming St. Paul and how he basically created the Christian faith out of a mish mash of ideas, facts and fiction. Not so different really.

A question on terrorism and radical Islam came up (it may have even been Ding (or Dong) who raised it unasked, come to think of it). Also the different sects; sunni, shi-ite, wahabbi (sp?). He brushed across the top of it. 'If someone kills or harms another person, he is not a muslim. He is a killer.' As for the sects... 'there are no sects in the muslim faith. All those others aren't Islam.'

Lots to digest then as we continued our stroll across the street in fact to the next mosque, which was actually not a real mosque but a shrine, called the Nagore Shrine. It was in crossing the road that I was attacked.

I'd like to know who ever came up with the notion that being pooped upon by pigeons is good luck .... OK I know, my mum did. But who else? Total crackpots (Mum excluded of course), that's who. It is nasty, smelly and really downright unpleasant. Of course Google has a myriad of links to totally gormless websites that devote column inches to this topic. Here's one:

I’m sure we can all agree that we’ve had our fair share of annoyance with bird defecation – it leaves a nasty stain on our cars and clothing, and any time birds are around, we’re instantly aware of their presence and hope that they don’t decide to use our clothes (or skin) as a toilet. It’s simply become a random, everyday occurrence and constant annoyance. How could anyone ever like it?

If you agreed with any of the statements I’ve said above, then it’ll come as just as much of a surprise to you when I say bird poop is actually a symbol of good luck. Believe it or not, there’s an entire mythical world behind the existence of and the importance of when a bird sh*ts on your car. If you’re a bit skeptical, keep reading.

For centuries, birds have always been, to a degree, mythical creatures; the Phoenix is an example of this in many cultures. Imagine, an animal able to simply spread their wings and glide across the sky with no issue keeping in sync formation with the birds around them.

Unfortunately, the price of being an airborne member of the animal kingdom is never knowing or having the appropriate means of defecation. Where would their waste go if they have no time to reach the ground to release it? Good enough for birds though, they’ve figured out the answer to that question long before humanity could even form adequate societies: give the humans good karma if they ever had a direct encounter with their droppings.

The main reason why we get mad at seeing bird poop “fly-by’s” is because of its unexpectedness and the annoyance brought on by the thought of cleaning it up. That doesn’t stop the Karma Gods from working, which in turn will bring you good luck and good fortune. With that being said, the next time you see bird poop in someone’s (or your own) hair, clothing, or windshield, don’t get mad – take a sigh of relief!

Numbskulls! I really don't need any self help dummy to tell me in 5 repetitive paragraphs of inanity that being pooped on is nasty. Really. As for the Phoenix... who cares about the bloody phoenix? It's a mythical bird. Not real. Getting pooped on by a bloody pigeon though, that is real life mate.

So it was with a less generous demeanour that I crossed the street into the shrine. It is both old and a bit ragged to tell the truth. But it is what it appears to be. A living, working place of worship not a gilded palace. I instantly felt the people here would understand my pigeon issues.

Repentance and Compassion

It had to happen.  We had to turn south again and today was the day.  Most gloomy we were too as this has been a great trip.  Marvellous scenery and lovely people too.  So it was with regret we headed out of Eureka back along 101 – I think retracing steps is the gloomy part.  Things start becoming familiar instead of creating that squiggly feeling in your belly about the new things that you are about to experience.

We stopped briefly in Ferndale largely because we’d watched a Food TV programme called Diners, Drive Ins and Dives which had featured this small town.  Located 15 miles out of Eureka it is definitely off the beaten track but we found a healthy sprinkling of tourists like us with cameras at the ready. 

Annoyingly the reason we’d come was closed today!  This was a bakery making bacon and cheese scones that appealed to Viv so our stay was brief.  Cute town though with lots of Victorian style buildings.

Our trip to the next destination Ukiah (the county capital of Mendocino County incidentally with a county topping population of 36,000) took us through the Avenue of the Giants again, and this time we stopped and bimbled (see website here).

Fires cause this hollowing out effect in the tree trunks.  The tree remains in perfectly good health otherwise, this one being a monster.

The redwoods were just as large and lovely as elsewhere on the road trip and of course we had our daily hug again – this will be something we’ll miss when we leave California.  Simply walking through the trees and finding absolute silence is priceless.

Roosevelt Elk in the forest

We’d targeted Ukiah as I’d spotted in some brochure a comment about the City of Ten Thousand Buddhas being located there -- see website here.  It intrigued us for sure and having visited I still wonder why they located it there.  Perhaps when they started out in the 1970’s, the closure of the old county hospital gave them a start in infrastructure that they could readily use.

The man who started it all, Hsuan Hua, came originally from Manchuria via various parts of China.  There he met a 109 year old Buddhist patriarch who prophesied that the young man would be one of the most important leaders of the faith. In 1948 possibly co-terminous with the ending of the civil war in China, he left for Hong Kong which he left in the late 1960’s again possibly co-terminous with the Cultural Revolution on the mainland which threatened Hong Kong’s existence at the time.  Arriving in the US to spread the word he established the city as a place of teaching, reflection and worship.

The city is a regular school as well as everything else with children from all backgrounds studying there all with an overlay of the religious principles of Buddhism which appear to my superficial gaze to be the third way; namely neither materialistic/anarchist nor religious ascetic.  Just do the right thing and achieve an internal state of peace.  Very similar to the early precepts of Christianity really.

One thing I couldn’t answer was why or how the religion has been taken over by the Chinese for the original Buddha was an Indian prince born in 563 BC who gave up the material world at age 28 to teach inner peace and the third way as he traveled through that part of Asia.  He clearly did a great job as there are lots of Bhuddists globally today.  But when did the Chinese take over? 

Siddartha Guatama, the original 'awakened one' with his 5 companions that comprised the first 'Sangha' (from a painting in a Laotian temple) 

Not sure.  A question to answer to be sure.

We’d come to join in the ceremony of Repentance and Compassion, a daily ritual much like a mass in the Catholic church, held daily at 12.30 pm.  There weren’t many attendees, mainly monks and students by the look of them – the former wore sandals, the latter sneakers under their robes – who were on the right hand side of the hall.  We lay people were on the left hand side, women at the back, men at the front. 

Fortunately Viv and I were helped in our respective places by kind, patient and generous folk who pointed out in the book that accompanied the service where we are.  Viv thinks it was Mandarin, but the book was interesting in that it laid out the service first in English, next in characters and then finally in phonetic Chinese.  This was what they chanted in, very fast too so it was tough to read the English and follow the ritual despite my friend’s help.

The overall tone of the ritual was inner peace, seeking forgiveness for past transgressions and looking forward to a life of learning, compassion and repentance.  Again not much different from much of the Catholic and other Christian rituals.

This was a good experience.

The rest of the day was a madcap rush down the highway to San Francisco airport but as we’d chosen the no freeway option on our GPS much was over mountains again with more chicanes and windy bends than I could count and along the very high cliff top highway 1 – I had a death grip on the wheel of the car for much of it! 

But we got there in the end, staying at Pacifica just down the road from the airport and an early start tomorrow.

Thanks California and using the words of ex-Governor Arnold Schwarzeneggar, “We’ll be back!”