Au revoir, Dunhuang!

Today is the last day for me to read Dunhuang manuscripts in Paris. As I walked out the BnF à Richelieu, I felt quite special. From Nov.19, 2012 to today (Jan. 25, 2013), I have been to this reading room (Manuscrits des orientaux) many times, reading through 33 medical manuscripts from the Pelliot collection. When it is time to say goodbye, I somewhat felt melancholic, as if departing from an old friend. After the routine of summarizing today's reading at a nice café, I took a random promenade in the 2ème Arr, and walked into a very nice market street (Marché Montorgueil). Looking at many beautiful bakeries and chocolate shops, with the familiar melody of Kitaro's "Mirage," my mind went back to the days I spent at BnF with my old friends (yes, they are very very old)...

After I finished my research in London, I came to Paris in early November to continue working on Dunhuang manuscripts. I didn't expect too much at the beginning, given my experience in London. I only read five manuscripts there. Perhaps I could read a bit more here in Paris, I thought at the time. And the goal is different. Because all manuscripts here have been digitalized with good quality images, I don't have any justifications to consult any manuscript because the textual information is lacking or of low-quality. They are all there online. Therefore I switched my focus from the content to the format, that is, to study the ex-textual features of these manuscripts. For example, the quality of paper, the size and collation of leaflets, the basic form of the manuscript, the red marks, the grid, the handwriting, the recto/verso information, among others. I am not an expert on manuscript culture, but I was eager to give a shot.

The experience is quite fulfilling. The most important, thanks to the generosity of Madame Monnet, the librarian at the manuscript department, I was able to consult many more manuscripts here in Paris, altogether 33. In London, since that was the first time for me to read Dunhuang manuscripts, it was a "wooooo" kind of jaw-dropping experience. And I certainly focused more on the content rather than the format of those five manuscripts. Here in Paris, the initial excitement receded, replaced by a more mature sensitivity to examine these manuscripts more professionally. The room is perfect: it is small and cozy. The reference books are just nearby. Madame Monnet is quite present. And sometimes I met interesting people in the room. It made the whole reading experience very enjoyable.

So what is my routine of reading these manuscripts. I usually consulted 2 to 3 manuscripts each day, and 5 to 6 manuscripts each week. I tried to arrive there at 10am, the time it opened, and stay until 6pm, the time it closed. Before entering the library, I always listened to Kitaro's "Mirage." Maybe it is too sentimental, but for me it was a ritual that helped settle my mind to the right mood. And I was never tired of listening to it, because it made me imagine a bright future. Then I entered the room, and usually read some books to get the basic information about the manuscript I was about to read (typically Despeux's, MJX's, and the French catalogue). After that, I came out to wash my hands, re-entered the room, and started reading the manuscript. Each one took me about 2 hours or a bit more. For lunch, a sandwich from "Au 140" near where I live is perfect - quick and convenient, since I didn't want to waste time on this. But a café inside the building was necessary; it warmed me up, bringing energy to me. Then, the same process again for the afternoon reading. After the work, I would meander to a café nearly, summarizing all my discoveries for the day. After that, if it is a Wednesday or Friday, I would walk to the Luvre, which is not very far, and enjoyed a nocturnal section there. From the medieval Chinese manuscripts to the gorgeous Western arts, that transformation excited my soul!

To be honest, I don't know how much of my work here on Dunhuang manuscripts will be eventually incorporated into my thèse. Maybe not too much, my intuition tells me. But this experience is surely one of the most unique in my life. I don't just mean the reading experience of these precious scrolls and cahiers, which is an essential part. I also mean the ambient parts - the nice library, the kind Madame Monnet, the diligent Sakamoto san who works on paper in Dunhuang, the nice neighborhood around BnF, the walk along the seine and inside the Luvre. All of these, together with the core experience of reading the manuscripts, are perfectly integrated and become one memory, the memory that I will cherish for the rest of my life. It is also a motivating force for me to continue walking on the pathway, assuredly and steadily, that I chose some time ago and never regret.

Au revoir, Dunhuang. I hope that I will see you again, perhaps not in the near future. But you are always with me, in my heart, driving me to move forward...  

 

The Great Saint Bernard (II): History

The Great Saint Bernard is located at a strategic pass that is on the highest point of a route that offers the shortest passage across the Alps, hence connecting the Northern and Southern parts of Europe. The passage is the shortest, but not easiest, since the travelers need to climb up to 2500 meters , and often against inclement weather, to make the pass. My friends and I only hiked five kilometers, and that is already an odyssey for us. Think about the people in the past who travelled all way along without any modern devices. To use a Chinese term, this is the pass of demonic gate (鬼门关).

It appears that from the time of antiquity, if not earlier, people at the region already used the passage to cross the Alps. Among them are Celtic people who left artifacts along the route. Particularly they threw offerings, especially coins, into a pond near the site of the monastery to pray to the God Poeninus to bless their travel. This tradition continued in the Roman period. With its military and economic power, the Romans constructed a road on the passage, which we can still see the trace of it during the summer. Based on the account of Raphael, a cheerful monk in the monastery, in the Roman time, the area had a warmer climate and the tree lines were higher than what we have today. This probably gave the Romans an easier time to build the road, though still an amazing achievement given the technology they had at the time. Moreover, the Romans also built a temple dedicated to the God Jupiter at a place not far from the monastery (in Italian territory), and two "mansiones" that rendered shelters for travelers and animals respectively. These structures are lost long time ago, but archeologists found many artifacts including the tiles, the coins, and the various offerings around the site. Just early today, Ed found a small piece of tile that is presumably produced in the time of Romans. How cool is that!

After the fall of the Romans in the fifth century, the temple fell into disuse, and eventually was destroyed. We don't know much about the history of this place in the Haut Moyen Age (fifth to the tenth century). Then came the figure Saint Bernard, who in the early 11th century came to the place not far from the Roman temple and began to build a hut to help the travelers to cross the Alps. He survived the first winter in the hut. Today we can still see the trace of the hut built by him a thousand years ago. This is the start of the construction of the monastery. In the following centuries, more rooms were added to expand the monastery, the last of which was done in the late 19th century. Today the Great Saint Bernard monastery has become a multi-structure place including the church, the hostel, the hotel, the animal room, the museum, and a room to preserve corpses (closed). In the summer time, this is an attractive tourist site, since people can easily come here by car and go hiking in the nearby mountains. 

But we should not forget that the primary function of the monastery, as conceived by Saint Bernard, is to help people to cross the Alps. Spending some time here in winter is quite helpful to understand that goal. We already had the first-hand experience how difficult to walk a few kilometers in snow, against wind even with modern facilities. In the old days, the difficulty is unfathomable. We saw a video made in 1936 showing how the monks in the monastery rescued travelers from the avalanche, with the help of a special kind of guide/rescue dogs who are big and strong. They were given the name of Barry. There is a story in the 19th century that tells a heroic dog, Barry I, who rescued a boy who was abandoned by his companions as they crossed the Alps. The exhausted boy fell into sleep in the snow. The dog found him and kept licking his face to try to wake him up. The boy was hence saved, and he wrote an appreciation letter to the monastery that is still kept in its archive.

The humanitarian function of the monastery diminished in the second half of the 20th century when a tunnel was built connecting Switzerland and Italy. People don't need to climb up to the pass of Grand Saint Bernard to cross the border. But the monastery continues to operate, in the word of the monk Raphael, not to satiate the physical hunger, but to satiate the spiritual hunger. Indeed, the rapid moderation and globalization in the 20th century have fundamentally changed the way of living. The life becomes faster, more efficient and comfortable, but at the same time more stressful and materialistic. A place like the Grand St Bernard, hidden in the mountains and faraway from the mundane world of anxiety and haste, becomes a rarity, and increasingly attracts people from all over the world. My friend Ed. found this place when he was on an archeological trip organized by Stanford to research on the Roman remains left at the pass of the Grand St. Bernard. He immediately fell into love with this place, and came back many times. Two and a half years ago my friends Ed and Margo got married here. And now they brought me here to experience its unique natural beauty and warm hospitality. I, too, become very attached to the place.

The Great Saint Bernard (I): An Incredible Hike

December 20, 2012. A memorable day in my life.

On this day, I, together with three friends, hiked up to the Grand Saint Bernard, a monastery at the border of Switzerland and Italy. 

I have done many hikes before, not without difficult ones. Just a few days before, I did a day-hike with my friends in the Black Forest in Germany. But this one is probably the hardest in my life. Precisely this very hardness makes the day memorable.

I was in the Alps during the summer, studying French in Grenoble. That is one of my most pleasant summers, with plenty of enjoyable hikes, good food, and very nice weather.

But the Alps in winter are quite different. Particularly for this winter, there are so much snow in the mountains that transformed the whole landscape. When we got off the bus at the beginning of the trail, the hostility of the mountains felt imminent. The whole world is white. Underneath our feet are six meters of snow. The mountains only expose themselves at the top, the rest completely covered by snow. It was not snowing, but the strong wind powerfully threw the snow up to the air, darkening the sky above us. We couldn't see the sun.

This harsh weather doubled, perhaps even tripled the difficulty of this five kilometer hike. We were on snowshoes (called rackets in French), and moving very slowly against the wind. A few minutes after the start of the hike, I already felt tired. I knew that this was a bad sign. This is my first time to take the trail, and obviously there are no signs telling you how far you have walked (even there are such signs, they are probably buried in the snow). Ed told me that it takes only a couple of hours to reach the monastery. Yet after walking about an hour, and I still felt I was nowhere, I started to realize that the hike was much more difficult than I originally fathomed. That was not a very pleasant feeling.

And I was not very prepared. I didn't try my ratchets the day before, so they felt like a new machine under my shoes (they are certainly essential for the hike). I didn't eat much before the hike, confidant of taking care of a two-hour hike with an empty stomach. Most seriously, I didn't adjust my backpack very well, so all the weight landed on my shoulders. Oh, my poor shoulders! How unfairly I treated you, and what an excellent job you have done! Even worse, among other unnecessary things, I carried four books in my backpack, a typical bookworm behavior. Well, the legend goes that Henry Widner died from the Titanic shipwreck because of his foolish act of trying to save some of his books on the ship. I hope that my fate will not be like that.

The thought that I could not make it never occurred to me. I was confident that I was able to finish the hike, just with more time and difficulty. There are some comforting factors: Among the four of us, the only four hiking on that morning, Ed is a very experienced one who took this hike many times. Likewise Margo is also familiar with the environment. For her mom Tania though,  this is her first time, to take the hike, but she was determined to make it. Well, if she can make it, why cannot I?

Perseverance is the key. I am not a very sportive person, so my physical body has not been challenged quite often. This time it was quite an extreme. One step after another, slowly but steadily, I was moving toward the destination. There were not too many thoughts in my head during the hike. Perhaps the physical challenge really cleared up my mind, with a concentrated goal to finish the hike. Most of the time I was thinking about the strategies to execute the hike. Should I count the number from one to one hundred as a unit of hike? That didn't work out. Should I inhale the air from the nose and exhale it from the mouth? That didn't work out either because I soon ran out of breath after I did that a few times. The experience resembled that of my running a 1500-meter track: towards  the end of the run, my leg became so heavy and my breath was so out of control that I had to drag myself with great effort and mental strength to finish the run. But when was the last time I did that? Perhaps in college, which means more than a decade ago?

The hike also reminded me of another one I did almost thirteen years ago, with my family. We went to hike up to the top of the Long-White Mountain, a dead volcano in Northern China. It was also during the winter, perhaps in January. We hiked against the strong wind (yes, the wind is ubiquitous) and eventually reached the top. A different time, a different place, but a similar experience.

It is a hard experience. I cannot help comparing this to a pilgrim's experience. After all, we were heading to a monastery. For a pilgrim, physical difficulty, or even suffering, is a means to achieve spiritual elevation. That is why we see Tibetan monks prostrate their bodies every three steps on their way to a sacred site. It is interesting to think of the relation between the body and the mind in this case. My own experience during the hike clearly revealed that an intense bodily experience has purifying effect on the mind. On the other hand, practices such as meditation certainly have beneficial effects on our bodies. Well, this mind/body discussion almost becomes hackneyed, isn't it?

Back to the hike. It was hard, but this doesn't mean it was utterly miserable. Even under such a harsh condition, nature revealed her beauty to us. The mountains are truly magnificent, with their peaks piercing into the sky. The wind constantly blew off the snow at the peaks of these majestic mountains, creating a beautiful halo on them. At one moment, we even discerned the sun, hidden behind the heavy mist created by the wind. In this utterly white world, even a hazy and distant sun gave us a sense of warmth, and hope.

Finally, after three hours hike, we reached a hub where we took a rest. The hub seemed to be a haven for me. I filled my stomach crazily; the food never tasted better. I adjusted my backpack, making it less of a burden. It was cold in the hub, and without moving, our bodies became cold quickly. So we continued the hike soon after this much-needed rest. The remainder of the hike was significantly easier. Soon after the start of the second half, we saw the monastery from afar, which was certainly an inspiration. With a clear visual cue, the hike became easier. Even for the last part, which has this ominous name of the "Valle de mort," I did not experience much of a challenge. At around three in the afternoon, we reached the monastery, finishing a five-hour hike with five kilometers covered. One kilometer per hour, that sounds quite slow. But my dear readers, try yourselves and you know what I am talking about. For me, it is truly an once-in-a-life experience. 

As proposed by Ed, we did a group hug together to celebrate our incredible achievement. From now on, we will stay in the Grand Saint Bernard monastery for a week and spend the Christmas here (yes it is here because right now I am sitting in the salon of the monastery to write this piece). It is time to explore this very interesting place. 

And history rolls in.