Kristine

It’s just a story because I really want a portrait.  My name is Kristine Peterson.  So this past summer I went to Japan and I lived in a really rural area and I decided to go for a walk one day and I was walking with my host mother and we came across a Buddhist temple randomly in the woods and she wasn’t normally aloud to enter but because she was with me it was okay because I’m an American and anyway the priests wife was there – but because she wasn’t apart of that church but because she was teaching me something cultural it was ok normally she wouldn’t be able to go in there cause she’s not a member she’s just a normal Japanese person so we went in the priests wife invited us in and she showed us around and told us what the different altars were for – the altar area, the chair, where the priest would pray, they had a zen rock garden because it was of the zen sect… um… anyway we ended up having tea with the priests wife which was really random and she was telling us why the zen monks when they meditate why they have to hit themselves with that stick and she had one in the corner and it helps them to keep them thinking about nothing and when their mind goes to something the priest who’s looking over them in their meditation can tell immediately but they’re suppose to have enough discipline to hit themselves it was a very strange experience but she had had an exchange student ten years ago from Australia so she showed us the pictures of that and invited me to come sing with them but I didn’t because I was supposed to climb Mt. Fugi that weekend but I didn’t happen. Anyway that’s my story about going to the Buddhist temple in the middle of the woods.