The Monk in Walking Meditation by Guting Station

Shashwat
Oct 23
3 min read

Updated: Oct 26

Outside gate number 5 of Guting MRT station, I see a monk dressed in gray robes with a bowl in her folded palms tucked close to her belly. I notice her in passing. I am always in a hurry to be somewhere else. She is never in a hurry. She is where she is, gently treading the ground beneath her feet, eyes gazing vaguely in the distance, and her mind turned inwards.

If there are landmarks and places that anchor our ships, floating on the vast cosmic ocean without a lighthouse in sight, that could be the sign of land or the night sky full of stars pointing north, that monk is the landmark par excellence. Without ever saying a word, without impinging herself on the world, she paces slowly up, one small step at a time, and down, some more small steps in the hundred meters distance by the Youbike stand, the Café!n and the long queues outside the Oolong Tea Project.

Very soon, I move close to Guting station, on the twelfth floor of an apartment with a room of my own, with eye-level windows peering into the city, its night lights streaming in the shadows of my castle. The distance between my place and school becomes shorter, but I still run late.

Yet she never seems late, and looking at her, I wonder where I am. I could take a long exposure of the sidewalks and streets, and most of us will vanish in a blur, cars turn into streaks of light, where I am one moment, I surely will not be the very next. A fidgetiness laces our bloodstream.

I also wonder where she is, and before I subvocalize the question, its stupidity makes me laugh. She is right here, and no matter how long the exposure, she is still here, where I melt away like a crowd. We have mastered the art of expression. Find any other species that loves to talk so much and cannot listen at all. She says nothing, and I can feel her listening to us all.

Soft waters rub away the rocky mountains,

floodplains of the Yellow river silt the course of history,

supple overcomes the brute chasing strength

diminishing in spirit,

jostling tenderness, ah, such deep loss

and stillness is time regained.

Roosevelt Road intersects Heping Dong Lu at Guting. A temple sits in the corner across from the monk. Every incense that burns before the deities is a question in some mind, a mild pain or some deep anguish unspoken, perhaps unformulated to oneself.

Leave the busy roads and take an alley inward, and a many-branched tree embraces you in its shade, open and unlocked without a thumbprint, day and night through the spiral of seasons. It could be a tree in Taipei, Shanghai, San Francisco, or some village in India. In a rush, we are blind to the sacred geography of a place, build metal thorns that dig into tired bones or tin shades that glow metal red in the summer and shrivel the skin.

With time, I learn to stand still with the monk, taking over the reins of Guting at night when she has disappeared into some hermitage. From the red glow of Mai Dang Lao (麥當勞), I watch across at the sleepily swaying bodies waiting for the bus. Calmer now, they have run enough for the day, gone too many wherevers, they are ready to surrender themselves to the driver who must sit awake a little longer. In his care, they may rest, half awake and listening for the sound of their stop and a careful reminder to pay attention while getting off – 請注意下車.

Waiting for the Last Bus on Roosevelt Road

The late open restaurants and cafes are winding down for the day, too. A last whiff of the day's feast rises from the rinsed dishes, and the tables are wiped clean of the chilli oil, adding another layer of sheen, before they are stacked on top of each other. Traffic lights turn green, but no cars go; they turn red, and there is no one to stop.

It is time to set up my tripod and long expose the film just as the monk exposes her eyes to the walkers who pass her by, would you like to see cars vanish in a streak of light?