Buddhists and Bruges

When we set off (quite late in the day) yesterday I had vaguely wondered if there might be a buddhist temple nearby so that I could pay respects and offer merit for my uncle. I had been somewhat resolved to just having to wait until I got to Thailand. Well, there may not have been any temples, but just after we had lunch/breakfast (and I posted my last update) I saw four monks wandering nearby.

I sneakily went closer to see if they were Thai monks, and looking at the embroidered language on their bags and hearing their driver taking a photo of them in saying “1,2, 3” in Thai, I engaged them in conversation. At first I asked if they knew of a temple nearby and I found out there was one in another town, which I wouldn’t have time to go to since we were going to Bruges and then Belgium the next day. The next best thing was to ask if I could give them some form of offering in his name. Luckily, Svendlemouse and Star were with me, because I embarrassingly started crying in the middle of the street when I started to say that my uncle had died that morning, so they helped explain the situation.

It was lucky that their driver spoke French, English, Thai and German, and between the four monks there was Thai, English and French spoken. So in an interesting mix of languages, they agreed that it would be appropriate for me to buy them a coffee or an ice-cream if we could find an appropriate place to do the offering. Normally you could offer proper food, flowers, supplies etc to the temple, but they don’t eat full meals after midday, and they couldn’t really carry anything with them.

After a quick wander we found a nice little pub/cafe near a canal to do the ceremony. It was just below a bridge, so we had a bit of privacy, although the waiter and a few tourists had some amusement seeing us, and I think the tourists took pictures.

We ordered coffee and juice for the monks (also got one for the driver/guide), and then I was able to offer the drinks and some money. I wrote my uncles name on a bit of paper and the monks found it funny to see Luang Yat (uncle Yat) written in English, and said it was a common name so they wrote it in Thai for me too. The ceremony consisted of them chanting and they told me to send my good thoughts and merit to my Uncle. Then they burned the piece of paper and did further chanting while I sat teary-eyed with my hands together thinking good thoughts for my uncle.

After they had finished they wished us all well for our travels and told me before I went to bed to send my good thoughts and best wishes to my uncle.

The guide took a few photos and will email them to me and I got the website address for their Temple in France. They were the type of Buddhist monks, the same as those we get in the stokes valley temple in Wellington NZ, that travel to foreign temples. They had been in Ghent that day for a celebration for some buddhists in Ghent and told me there were a lot of Thais in Brussels, but they are actually based in France.

Here is their site: www.watthairoubaix.fr

Although I am still very sad about my uncle, I am amazed at the circumstances that led me to be able to pay respect for him the very day that he passed away, all the way far from home in Ghent, and that makes me pleased.

After we said goodbye to the monks it was off to Bruges. We didn’t have much time there, but it was still good to go and see the awesome buildings that look a little like gingerbread, wander around and look at the lacework in the souvenir shops. I bought a black lace butterfly to wear to remember my uncle. We thought of going to the fries and chocolate museums but they were both closing very soon after we got there. I couldn’t find the Tin Tin shop at all even though we looked around a lot for it. We had a good dinner and saw plenty of swans in the canal.

We got back in time to enjoy a bit more of the festival in Ghent, which I found impressive for a Monday night. It really is a 10 day festival!

I think we all really enjoyed Belgium and would have loved to spend more time there. But as I write this we are on a train bound for Berlin!