choose life

This afternoon, Joanna and I went to the annual Tea Party at Samye Ling. It was tipping it down with rain, which we thought might put people off driving out miles into the Dumfriesshire countryside to a Tibetan monastery on a Sunday, but how wrong we were. Arriving at 2pm, as it opened, we found an almost-full carpark. A monk with high vis over his robes directed us into one of the last available spaces, we donned our waterproofs and headed up the path between the prayer flags, towards the main temple buildings where we found ourselves at the end of a queue to get in.

About twenty five minutes later, we were in the main hall, having taken off our shoes. We were in the queue for sandwiches, fruit and tea. I took an orange and Joanna a sandwich, but we didn't really want to sit down, we wanted to look around, so we put our shoes on again, went past all the people still queuing to get in , and crossed the courtyard to enter the temple. Inside here it was wonderfully quiet and peaceful, and such a beautiful space, full of light and colour. We sat for a while, enjoying the silence.

A quick visit to the shop followed, where I bought some fresh flags for our pole to replace the old ones which have all but disintegrated. Then we decided that we would explore the grounds, despite the rain. We walked down through the Memorial Garden across a lake with beautiful flowers, to the River Esk, and then through the kitchen Gardens to the enormous golden statue of Tara, finishing with a visit to the Prayer Wheel House. I enjoyed this part of our visit. 

It was very difficult to choose just one photo for my blip. This one shows the biggest cake I have ever seen, presumably as a follow up to the sandwiches. I've no idea how it was made!