Buddhist Temple Visit

Saturday morning we went to the Buddhist Temple about 45 minutes away and fed the hungry ghosts. It was incredible, and knowing I'd been there before but not remembering is so surreal. I got up at 3:30, we left school at 4, and got there by 5. The monks did about an hour of chanting, both to the Buddha and then as part of the ceremony for ancestral spirits, and to call to any spirits that may have been reborn as hungry ghosts. Hungry Ghosts are these ghosts who are ugly and putrid and disgusting and they have huge bellies but tiny tiny mouths so they are always hungry, and they can only see things that are gross and dirty, so in order to feed them we had to throw sticky rice and fruit onto the ground. The whole purpose of the ceremony is to make merit for yourself and your family in terms of karma, as well as to honor your ancestors just in case they did something bad and were reborn as hungry ghosts. The temple was beautiful, and I had a really good time going.