Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Perfume Pagoda Part II

Chua Huong- Perfume pagoda

Our trip to the Perfume Pagoda involved spending another hour on the boat chatting, laughing and of course eating what we had earlier offered in the Trinh Temple. This meant we got the luck from god before we arrived at Perfume mountain and walked up to Thien Tru Temple( God's Kitchen) for another prayer. This is also the lookout where everyone takes photos because of it's beautiful and surrounded by hills and old trees. People also stop here and take a deep breath before climbing up the Perfume mountain to visit Huong Tich Cave.

Chua Huong- Perfume pagoda

We had lunch at this stop from what we offered at the God's Kitchen altar, which was quite a luxury lunch that included 3 chickens, lots of fruits, stickyrice, sausages, beer, energy drink and bread. If you look at the above picture, you can see the warning on the temple wall, which actually says you shouldn't eat in this holy place. I mentioned that to my friends but they said to me everyone sits here so why don't we? Good answer and we sat there. The sign doesn't mean anything like so many places in Vietnam, even though we were in the temple haha.

Chua Huong- Perfume pagoda

We made it up to the top and down to the Huong Tich Cave but not the normal way that I used to climb up the mountain which took over an hour and a half. We took a cable car this time and it took us only 5 minutes for only 60,000VND return and I could see the whole beautiful area around. I know you may think we are so lazy not to climb up the mountain but I wanted to try the new technology and I quite like it. We walked down into Huong Tich Cave and I couldn't believe my eyes; the small cave was so packed, it was hard to move around. Hundreds of people, Vietnamese, Japanese and western people who don't care about the heat tried to reach the altar inside the cave just to make a wish. I was sweating myself and finally I reached the place and got out again.

Chua Huong- Perfume pagoda

Most people spend hours inside trying to get some water and pray for their future life. Maybe I am the only Vietnamese who came here as a tourist but I did make a quick wish and it took me two minutes. I really don't believe in god but I do believe in myself and believe in what I see and what's reality. It's good to dream but only in bed :). On the way out, we stopped at Thanh Son Pagoda to take a fortune paper which told us what will happen this year. Luckily, there was a lady in our group who is more serious about praying and wishing for everyone and she is also a fortune teller who could explain the papers to everyone. Thank god that I'm going to have a great year this year haha

Chua Huong- Perfume pagoda

I had such a great day with my friends and my new friends. I also learned alot from this trip. It cost me only 225,000VND for the whole trip which is really cheap.

5 comments:

Mery Gunawan said...

Hi....your post on food is really interesting!

do you have any suggestions on good place to eat in HCM?

we will be in HCM at end April :)

thank you!

Van Cong Tu said...

Mery Gunawan, please check out my posts about Ho Chi Minh city and restaurants
Hope you have a good time

junebee said...

The cave is very interesting. And huge. That was quite a lot of people inside of it.

Crystal said...

My husband & I spent two whirlwind weeks in Thailand last month, and boy was the heat a killer! Plus, everywhere you go there are seemingly thousands of other people, and it gets pretty frustrating after a while. At least you got a chance to make a wish at the altar, I hope whatever you wish for will come true! ;-)

Anonymous said...

Ah….the sweet, smell of perfume! Today's market is flooded with hundreds and hundreds of different fragrances ranging from floral to woodsy. Most women love the smell of perfume, wearing it even when going to the grocery store. The problem is that perfume allergy for some women, is anything but nice.