Chapter 646 Donating Silver
The young novice's senior brother, Monk Guangji, was in his twenties, had a big face and big ears, and a simple and honest appearance. He was very funny. When he saw them, he smiled, put his palms together, and recited the Buddha's name, "Amitabha, several donors have come from afar. Come, little monk, be polite.”
He lowered his head slightly, and the six ring scars burned by incense candles on his head were shining brightly.
Xia Zihan and others hurriedly put their hands together and returned the salute.
Monk Guangji led them to the guest room.
The house specially used to receive overnight guests is divided into two courtyards, the east and west courtyards. The east courtyard is specially used to receive male guests. The west courtyard adjacent to the inside is specially used to receive female guests. In front of the two courtyards is the temple hall, where worshipers are worshipped. The place of Buddha.
Chu Jingqi and Shengdi Ma Bao were arranged in two guest rooms near the west courtyard. Chu Cong and Xia Zihan were arranged in the innermost side of the west courtyard. Monk Guangji arranged two rooms for them, and they only wanted one room.
After arranging the house, Monk Guangji clasped his hands and said, "Dear donors, according to the rules of our temple, we only eat two meals a day. After noon, we have fasted. However, our temple will prepare fasting meals for pilgrims staying overnight. We just have to wait for an hour, please be patient for a while.”
"It doesn't matter." Xia Zihan said with a smile.
Monk Guangji resigned.
After a while, a dozen or so little novices walked over carrying several buckets of hot water. The little novices were all about seventy, eighty or nine years old. The two of them carried a bucket, and their little faces were flushed with effort. flushed.
When he came out of Shengchi and saw him, he walked over, took the bucket from the hands of the four youngest novice monks, carried a bucket in each hand, and easily carried it into the west courtyard and placed it at the door of Xia Zihan's house. "Princess, Chu Cong, the hot water has been delivered."
"I know, let's leave it at the door first." Chu Cang responded in the room.
He placed the raw material at the door and went to pick up the buckets from the hands of other novice monks.
The young novice who had greeted them before gasped and blushed with embarrassment, "Thank you so much for your help, donor."
"It's us who have caused you trouble." Shengdi said politely.
He was embarrassed to have a group of seven or eight-year-old children waiting on him.
Several people had washed up, and the vegetarian meal was prepared. It was brought by the novice novices. The dishes were very simple. Chu Jingqi's side had three dishes and one soup, pepper potato slices, pumpkin puree, spicy radish strips, and a winter melon and shiitake mushroom. Soup, three bowls of rice, and three big steamed buns.
Xia Zihan's side only had two dishes and one soup, no spicy radish strips, two bowls of rice, and two big steamed buns. It was a very simple dish. It was obvious that the life of the temple monks was not good.
"Princess, there is also a box of snacks bought for lunch in the bag." Chu Cong saw that Xia Zihan didn't eat much. The vegetables were fried too lightly and had almost no salt, so she put down the bowl and chopsticks and dug out the bag. A box of snacks.
Open it and place it in front of Xia Zihan.
"Princess, my servant will serve you a bowl of hot soup. Drink some hot soup and eat some snacks, so as not to dry out your throat."
"We'll just keep a few pieces, and send the rest to Aqi and the others."
Xia Zihan picked out a few pieces of her favorite sweet-scented osmanthus cake, and picked out her favorite crystal cake for Chu Cong. Then she closed the box and asked Chu Cong to deliver it to the east courtyard.
Chu Cong responded, took the box and went out. After a while, she came back with a strange look on her face.
"Princess." She whispered, "The prince is in the house, while Shengdi and Ma Bao went to the woods.
It was the woods they passed by when they came here.
"Going hunting?" Xia Zihan guessed.
Seeing Chu Cong nodded, Xia Zihan curled her lips, broke off half a piece of sweet-scented osmanthus cake and chewed it in her mouth. After swallowing it, she said, "I knew that Aqi would not wrong herself. That's all." It’s strange that he can eat it.”
I will definitely let Shengchi Ma Bao go hunting and secretly get some game back to eat.
Half an hour later, when Xia Zihan and Chu Cong were about to go to bed to rest, there was a knock on the door, "Open the door."
It was Chu Jingqi's voice.
Chu Xang was startled and hurriedly opened the door.
Then she saw Chu Jingqi coming in with a roasted and fragrant pheasant in her hand, handed it to Chu Cong, and said, "Serve the princess and eat it."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
Chu Cong took the roast chicken, which weighed at least three kilograms, and looked back at Xia Zihan. A bowl of soup." She and Chu Cong ate each of the other two dishes with chopsticks, without eating any rice.
When the young novice monk came to clean up the dishes, he saw that the food was not much touched. He seemed to be satisfied with it and said nothing.
Chu Jingqi snorted coldly, with a somewhat displeased look on her face, "Shengchi went to the backyard to look for the kitchen, looking for a salt shaker, and adding some salt to the vegetables, just to make a fool of herself. Who knew, but he overheard something."
"What's going on?" actually makes A Qi angry?
Chu Jingqi's face exuded a cold air, and she said coldly, "He heard several young novice monks talking together. The meaning behind their words was that when entertaining guests, they would deliberately cook light meals. It has no taste, so the guests won’t eat it, and they can eat the rest in the morning.”
"Why? Is it because the temple is so poor that they can't even afford food?" Otherwise, how could a group of children eat the leftovers left by the guests? Xia Zihan thought of the group of seven or eight-year-old novice monks. They were all quite thin. I thought that their bodies were relatively thin. But now it seems that they are hungry?
Chu Jingqi snorted coldly, "That's not what you should do. If you don't want to give food to the guests, we won't blame them if you don't do it."
"Then you want us to donate more sesame oil money." Chu Cong said.
This is called taking people with short hands and eating people with soft mouths. Even if you don't eat it, but someone brings it, you can't not donate a penny of sesame oil.
The corners of Xia Zihan's mouth twitched.
No wonder Aqi would be angry. The practices in this temple are really unacceptable.
"Okay, don't think about it. Eat quickly and rest early. We will leave here early tomorrow morning." Chu Jingqi reached out and rubbed Xia Zihan's hair.
Xia Zihan hummed.
He handed the roast chicken to him and said, "We are both full. Let's save this roast chicken for breakfast tomorrow."
"That's fine. If you eat too much at night, your stomach will feel uncomfortable." Chu Jingqi took the roast chicken and talked for a while before leaving reluctantly.
Early the next morning, the sound of bell ringing came from the temple, and then the sound of chanting sutras. After Xia Zihan washed up, he went to the temple hall with Chu Cong.
The main hall was full of kneeling monks, more than twenty monks of various sizes.
There are only six big monks, one of whom is an old monk, who should be the abbot of the temple, and the rest are all young monks in their teens, as many as seventeen or eighteen.
Can such a small temple support so many half-grown children?
Xia Zihan remembered what Chu Jingqi said last night.
Perhaps, it was so difficult that the monks in the temple had no choice but to come up with that solution?
Xia Zihan didn't think much about it. After the monk finished reciting the sutra, she and Chu Cong entered the main hall, worshiped the Buddha and Bodhisattva, and donated money for sesame oil.
Thinking that there were many young monks in the temple and life was difficult, Xia Zihan thought for a while, then took out a five hundred tael silver note from his purse and placed it at the foot of the Buddha statue.
Even if it's just... let's repay the favor of staying overnight.
After Xia Zihan paid homage to the Buddha, under the guidance of Monk Guangji, he met with the abbot and then said goodbye.
"Amitabha, donor, breakfast has been prepared. You can eat your breakfast before leaving." After reciting the Buddha's name, Master Abbot sincerely wanted to keep them for breakfast.
Xia Zihan thought about the taste of the food and rice served last night, so she firmly refused.
After Xia Zihan and Chu Cong left, a young monk picked up the two silver notes donated by Xia Zihan and handed them to the abbot.
The abbot took it and looked at it, and was shocked.
One was a two-hundred-tael silver note, and the other was a five-hundred-tael silver note. A total of seven hundred taels was enough for the monks in their temple to eat and drink for twenty years.
The abbot looked excited, clasped his hands together, bowed to Xia Zihan's leaving figure, and said, "Amitabha, good intentions will definitely bear good results, and good people will have good rewards. The female donor is a female Bodhisattva in this world. It’s so good.”
After Chu Jingqi and others packed their luggage, they said goodbye to Monk Guangji, the abbot and others who came out to see them off.
Monk Guangji was carrying a food box in his hand, which contained ten hot boiled eggs, five large steamed buns, two plates of pickles, and a plate of fried peanuts.
Monk Guangji handed the food box to Shengdi, scratched the back of his head with an embarrassed look, and explained in a low voice, "We don't have much food in the temple. We only have enough food for five or six days. This year's food hasn't arrived yet, so what?" The vegetables...are all given by the nearby villagers, and there is a vegetable field in the temple, but there are too many children to grow enough to eat, so... I hope the donors will forgive me, we will not do it next time."
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With the sesame oil money donated by these donors, their life in the temple will be easier, and they don't have to do anything to the hosts just to keep the children fed.
Chu Jingqi hummed and ordered Shengdi to take the food box, so as not to blame them.
After a group of people left, in the backyard, several young novices in charge of cooking poured the few bowls of rice that Xia Zihan and others had left last night into a large pot, added half a pot of water, and cooked it into gruel.
He heated up a few more dishes, added half a spoonful of salt to each dish, and heated up twenty-five large steamed buns. The breakfast in the temple was ready.
It was a very simple meal, but a group of young novice monks ate it happily, as if they were not eating porridge leftovers, but the most delicious thing in the world.
And before they were taken in by the temple, they were all little beggars with no father or mother, no relatives, and never even a full meal.
For them, having a delicious porridge and a big steamed bun with some side dishes every day is already the most delicious food in the world.
(End of chapter)