S2E3 - Journey to India: Bodhgaya- Under the Bodhi Tree

A final pilgrimage pulled us back to Bodh Gaya, and the road there told its own story—dusty tracks, crowded buses bending past safe capacity, cows and monkeys on the move, and a raw look at poverty that stripped away any romantic filter. We came for the Bodhi Tree and found a city surging with pilgrims, merchants, and quiet moments of grace. Somewhere between spotting Richard Gere by a street performance and dodging pickpockets, we learned new rules for safety, humility, and how not to order sugarcane juice from a car engine.

At the Mahabodhi Temple Complex, the night glowed with butter lamps and the kind of silence that makes a thousand people sound like a single breath. That peace was tested by a string of low-intensity explosions nearby—jarring to us, routine to locals who have learned to keep faith beside risk. The ceremonies continued, and we leaned into the Kalachakra teachings, the “wheel of time” that maps outer, inner, and alternate dimensions of experience. Think of it as a bridge between cosmology and practice, inviting you to sit with mystery rather than solve it on command.

A private audience with the Karmapa revealed a different truth about spiritual leadership: he’s not a celebrity, and wisdom isn’t a photo op. We talk about asking better questions—about suffering, meditation, and what a life of meaning actually looks like when fear of death won’t leave the room. The journey closed with visits to Nalanda’s ruins and Vulture’s Peak, and a realization that the search itself can be an act of compassion. If you’ve ever chased purpose across borders or wondered why calm sometimes lives beside chaos, this story will meet you there.

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Transcript

Returning For A Final Pilgrimage

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Yo, what's up, everyone? Welcome back to Asian Uncle. I'm your host, Uncle Wong. Now, I know I said before in the last episode that I never wanted to go back. It wasn't a nice trip. I didn't find it fairly amusing, and I was just there to see the Dalai Lama. And again, I returned because I didn't think my trip would be complete until I made this last pilgrimage. And so, like our Muslim brothers who traveled to Mecca once in their lifetime, for us Buddhists, we also wish to travel to where Buddha found enlightenment once in our lifetime. Like I said before, what I do regret not doing was uh any research before I got there. Because little did I know I was heading out to the poorest part of India. And also to get an up-close personal glimpse of what the slums look like. And so this time we flew into Mumbai instead of New Delhi. It's a very bustling city too, crowded. Uh we didn't we only stayed there really quick overnight, and then next day we flew out. At this time we we went there a little earlier. Um it was a bit cold at night, especially um during in the north part of India, it was a bit cold at night. So it was around March time. And so we took another nasty spice jet airline to Gaya Airport. Another small airport in the middle of nowhere. Our destination was the Sacred Temple located in Bhut Gaya, in the state of Bihar. Like I said before, it is one of the poorest states in all of India. And so immediately leaving the airport, you already you can already feel the poverty. It's not just how poor people were, it was just the condition of everything. Animals can be seen all over the dirt roads. You know, school bus pets passed by carrying just way too many kids to be safe. It looked like they were carrying stock and not children. Right? Like a bus like those yellow buses we sit at school, you know, that seat can sit like two people, maybe fit three, if you were small. They had like six, seven people in that, all cramped together, heads leaning out the window. You know, I thought these were only just out of pictures to mock them, but it's it's it's true. You know, they lack the resources that most developed countries have due to their population, um, everything. There's a lot of factors combined. And again, there was no cement roads after leaving the airport. Air was dusty, couldn't really drive fast. And so this was just completely different from my first trip. Because when I left the airport, I knew I was in India. And so all of a sudden, before I even knew it, it was hilarious. My driver just nudged into a cow in the middle of the road. It didn't hurt it, it moved and it walked away. And so cows are considered holy in Hindu culture, and so they're literally everywhere. They just roam around and shit everywhere. And again, the damn monkeys, they're everywhere. Along with, I even saw boars, I saw lamb, um, of course, domesticated animals like chickens and stuff, they're they're very common. But what's interesting is the monkey, right? You don't see that every day, no matter where you are. Um, before this episode, I did do some research. I wanted to sound smart and tell you what species of monkeys were there. And then I found out there were too many. Because I saw a bunch of different types of monkeys too. It wasn't just one or two breeds or species, there were like 15. It was ridiculous. It looked like a zoo. And the scene along that route is everything I had imagined in my back of my head. The further we drove away from the airport, it seemed like the worse everything got, the more poor everything became. People went from wearing shoes to slippers, and then to just barefoot. You know, I looked over and I saw a whole field of just shacks. And what I mean by shacks is not just wood plates or metal plates that built into a house. What I mean by shacks is just bare minimum, maybe cloth and some wood shafts or sticks. It looked it looked like kids camping in the backyard. Except it was much dirtier. It's essentially what it was made of. And I could not believe that someone could actually live in one of those until I saw this lady come out, wet soapy hair. Apparently she was washing her hair. I didn't know where. But someone did live in there. And of course we drove slow enough so I got a good look. And I was really curious too. So I decided I was talking to my friend next to me. He had a really nice camera on him, like, hey, let's maybe find a chance to come back so we can take some pictures. And then we finally arrived in our hostel. Again, it was dirty and nasty, even worse than the first time. Because now remember we're in real India. And then just, of course, the same routine: wipe everything down, um, get your clean water. And um, well, when I opened up the water, it wasn't as yellow as it was in Dharmashala, but it was definitely not drinkable. Right? Don't even use it to brush your teeth, like I said, don't even use it to rinse your mouth. Okay, you will get E. coli. Buddhaya at that time of the year was just bustling with people because there were um important Buddhist ceremonies that took place at the time. And the two people who led the ceremonies were very famous. One was the Dalai Lama, and the second was the Karmahapa. We'll go into that a little bit later. But this attracted tens of thousands of people all around the world. It was just ridiculous to experience all that people cramped into that small space where so many things could have gone wrong. One fire, one panic, right, one accident was all it took. But nothing ever went really wrong. So I walked around uh with my buddy after I dropped off our things at the hotel. Uh, my wife was, of course, frantically wiping down everything again. And so I saw some commotion on one side of the street, and I walked over and I saw a small girl, maybe seven or eight years old, I guess. She was doing a balancing act and be there with uh on a tightrope. And then I noticed uh somewhat familiar. It was Richard Gere. The dude was standing there watching that little girl with me. And he was looking at his wallet, trying to take out some cash to tip her. And he also a devout Buddhist. I see him a lot. I saw him in Japan before. Um, yeah, I saw him like three times already. And he visits the Dalai Lama quite often. It was pretty cool when you um when you see like I guess a celebrity in these places. But I knew he did not live in one of the nasty places that we lived in, right? And so as we kept going, just the merchants swamped the streets. Okay, once a year, that's their chance to rip off the tourists. There were pickpockets everywhere, we had to be very safe. You weren't and you weren't you wouldn't you shouldn't be directly harmed. We weren't worried about that. We were worried about getting our passport stolen. I didn't even care about the money. I didn't want my ID passport stolen, I'd be stuck there for longer than I have to. That that would not be good. And then I remember what I had to do. I told my buddy, my hey, dude, let's go back to the slums that we passed along the way and take some pictures. And because the site where we were at, it was just too many people, it was kind of too packed for comfort. So me and my buddy decided to, hey, let's take a walk or uh find that taxi and go a little bit further, back down to the slums where we came from, which was maybe around a 15-20-minute car ride. It was scary to think back now because one, we didn't speak the language, they understand the culture, and we did not even question our safety one bit. Of course, we were like two, three dudes. But I don't know. I I I guess we were just a little reckless. We didn't think that we would um get ourselves in trouble. All right, but definitely if you do visit, um, be safe. Research where you go before you go, and definitely don't try to visit places that are in deep poverty. It doesn't it probably won't end it too well. You know, it's just no point in putting yourself in harm's way. But I have to say I was wrong this time. And when we entered the, I don't even know what you call it, the village, the the complex, my my friend was quite rude. He just strolled up and just started taking pictures of everything. Small little details, giving no thought of their privacy at all. And they didn't mind at all. Many of them smiled back at us with missing teeth. And in front of my eyes, there was not a spot of anything clean in sight. Or anything white. And then while we're walking, I remember we we passed by this barber shop. And we took a picture, and we went back to the hotel, I looked at to find what was clean. The only thing that was sort of clean was the guy's watch. Like they slept on wood panels, straws, and I wasn't about to stay there long enough to find out what they ate. It was it was just horrible to see people living that way. And finally we reached some um food vendors, street vendors, where most of the people from I guess the complex come and eat. And needless to say, how dirty that was. There were flies everywhere, and it's just like nobody gave a shit. So I didn't want to walk forward, obviously. So we backtracked and we took the other route to try to take some more pictures. But then we realized there was not many places to go. It was getting late. Maybe thought we should turn back. But I was telling him, like, hey, maybe before we go, let's let's try to get something to eat or drink, right? Or take a picture of it. He's like, all right. So we're looking around, I was getting a bit thirsty. I was like, maybe that's safe, right? To drink something. I'm sure they don't just dig up the water on the ground from here. I like I don't know. And so I saw my favorite drink, um, sugarcane juice. It's just basically you grind down the sugar cane, just mush it, and you mix it with a bit of water. And so I gave the fellow on the street a couple of rupees. He took a sugar cane and he ran it through a fucking car motor, dude. Like I don't know what part of a car it was, but it was a car motor.

unknown 12:57

Right?

Peace At The Mahabodhi Temple

Explosions, Security, And Local Calm

The Kalachakra And Its Meaning

Mortality, Doubt, And Seeking Answers

Meeting The Karmapa, Asking Better Questions

Long Days, Historic Sites, And Closing

SPEAKER_00 12:58

Because when I got the drink, I could see a nice film of grease oil on top. And I'm sure sugar canes don't come oily. And so I put a course I paid him, it was like I think it was like 10 cents or something, US dollar, um, a couple of rubies, and I walked down the block and I just threw it out. It was uh horrifying. Of course, I took a picture of it first. And so we went back to the hotel uh to pick up our wives, meet up with everybody, and we continue to just roam the streets, I guess, walk around, see what the town had to offer. And it was hilarious because my wife, she's just so, I guess, picky about everything, especially cleansiness, right? And she did not like she knew well enough to not eat anything on the street, right? We were just looking, strolling around. But then she saw her favorite food too, just like I saw the sugarcane juice, and it was a sesame cake. Right? It looked like a legitimate bakery, too. And so as we walked up, I just saw the sheer horror in my wife's eyes. Right. She looked at me and said, It's not a sesame cake. The sesame flew away. I was like, what? And I was like, oh no, I got the joke. There were flies. Oh Jesus, like just the flies just dispersed when we walked up. I I wasn't looking. I was looking at her. And then she never looked at a piece of food on the streets ever again. Ever. You know, traumatized for life. And she only ate at the hotel, and even then she made sure it was clean and she didn't eat much. She would rather eat instant than eat anything that was not at the hotel. So despite having so many people, but Gaia, the temple is an interesting place. It felt very peaceful. The Bodhi trees there. So that's the tree where Buddha sat under when he when he found Enlightenment. And the temple, the actual name is called the uh Mahabodhi, the Mahabodhi Temple Complex. It's also World Heritage Site. It's huge. It's not just a small temple. And it dates back some 1,500 years ago to the Gupta period. And most of the temple was um outdoors. Only the main structure where held um the main Buddha was indoors. Everything else was outdoors. And like I said, despite so many people being there, it felt comforting. You could see the lights, the candles that the butter candles that were lit everywhere, and it kind of made the entire structure glow. Mesmerizing. And so for every night, the next ten days, twelve days I was there, um, I meditated there. It was too long of a trip to be honest. But one night something happened. When I was meditating and doing some prayers, I could clearly remember, I think, three or four loud explosions going off in the back. And it was quite loud. Later I found out someone set off like homemade clay bombs. This class of cultures where you had this type of radical behavior is just ridiculous. And I wasn't yet alarmed because it happened quite far from me. But I could see people running around um outside the fence of the temple. And that's when the security guards came in and told everyone to to leave. And once we left, um we just headed back. And the security guards, the monks, the locals, they seem so nonchalant, as if this happens all the time. And later I found out indeed it does. It's quite scary if you're a tourist, right, wouldn't you say? Because in in records in 2013, an Islamic terrorist group, they claimed responsibility for a series of sort of low-intensity bombs, the same ones that went off, probably a little bit bigger, right? Near the temple. It injured five people. And this time on the news, it was five explosions that went off again. Except this time nobody was injured. Thank God. And I heard from the security guards of uh the Dalai Lama that this happens quite often, almost every year. So it never makes the news. 2013 made the news. The year I was there made the news, and that's about it. And the ceremonies went as planned. There's some hundred thousand people came. Packed. Of course, I didn't know the real numbers, but it definitely felt like it. And yet, everyone was oddly organized. We were out in a giant field, and we had some patio covers over us. Uh, they gave us some hot tea and some bread to chew on while we sat there pretty much the entire day. And Dai Lama, he was so far, and it just looked like a concert, and I got the cheapest ticket. I could barely see the man. And there were big projectors, screens. Um, he had a microphone on him, so it was okay. We didn't feel any pressure sitting there. So this ceremony was different. Um, we didn't take part in it like we did when we visited Domashala at Dalai Lama's residence. So for this ceremony, we pretty much just sat there, watched, and listened. For the whole day until it starts at like 7, 8 in the morning, ends around 2 or 3. And we didn't really understand what was going on. The ceremony is special because only the Dalai Lama passes it on. It's such a difficult concept to preach and for followers to understand. The ceremony was the 10-day ceremony was called the uh the Kala chakra. And it means the wheel of time. So essentially it encompasses the external, the internal, and the alternate aspects of what we perceive as time. Yeah, I don't want to go into too much detail because it's such an abstract topic. But just think of it as Buddhist quantum physics. Only worded a little bit differently from our college textbooks. And being here to make it simple, not only did I I'm almost sure that most of the people that were there did not understand the physics behind it. But what they did understand was that being there was very important. Especially for the the Tibetans. Because they believed that if you attended the ceremony, you could also reach nirvana or become Buddha within seven lifetimes. That's not a bad deal, right? There's too much mystique in Tibet culture and Buddhism. And the more you understand, the more questions you have. And yet for some reason, they always seem to have an answer for everything. I think being there, um maybe I was trying to find something for for myself. Because at that point in my life, I already have everything. I had money, I have a great career, a great life. You know, but something felt empty. Maybe it was the start of midlife crisis, I don't know. Yeah, I was still scared of death. And perhaps that's what drove me to Tibet so many times. And India. And to Buddhism. Because for some reason I never thought things just happened by chance. And I certainly don't think that death is just like blowing out a candle. I thought like this even as a kid. It's kind of creepy. It was hard for me to read the Bible. Because it left me with too many uncertainties. Because it left me with too many uncertainties and blanks. Like for me, it didn't make logical sense. If you don't follow these ten rules, then the creator will condemn you to hell and burn for eternity. But he loves you. That quote is from the late great comedian, George Collin. You know, he has a special talking about the BS of religion. It's hilarious. And this man's not only a comedian, but he's also a great philosopher. And if you don't know who he is, definitely YouTube it, you won't regret it. And I had that one connected friend who's always in everybody's business. It was also him who wanted to have lunch with the exiled prime minister. And so he drags us to him aside one day. He was excited. He's like, hey guys, I got us a private meeting with the Karmaapa. So most have heard of the Dalai Lama or even the Pension Lama, but not many heard of the Karmahapa. The Karmaapa and the Dai Lama, um, to make it simple, they're just two different reincarnation lineages from different Tibetan schools of Buddhism. And the reason why the Dalai Lama seems to be higher or the highest leader, like the Pope, um, because his school, the Gulag school, is traditionally the ones that held power back during the imperial times of China. Make sense? So it's kind of like the Roman Catholic Church versus all the other uh denominations. There was no overlap except um the dialama has two jobs instead of one. He's not only the spiritual leader, but also uh a political figure. So when we walked in the room, the Karmapa was sitting on the sofa. He was young, a little chubby. He spoke very softly. But the meeting was a little awkward because I could see that he was clearly uh uncomfortable. Everyone just wanted to take pictures with him and ask him for his autograph. Because you have to understand, yeah, uh these guys are not rock stars or k-pop stars. Okay, they're spiritual leaders, they're spiritual mentors and teachers. Okay, they're supposed to be teaching you how to live. You're supposed to be learning. You need to be asking questions related to that. How do I suffer less? You know, what is the meaning of meditation? Things of that nature, right? Not take pictures and ask for some sort of blessing and ask for autographs. But I still took some pictures and I still got some autographs. It's very petty. But back then when I visited, I didn't have any knowledge. Okay, I knew whatever a question I was gonna ask was gonna be stupid. So I might as well just keep my mouth shut. And it seems as though I always ask my mentor stupid questions. I think I once asked him, like, what's the meaning of life? You know, he looked at me, he's like, Are you serious? You know, it's just the interaction with me and him is very different because we're just so close in age. And and I met him when he was so young, too. And so we have that kind of buddy-buddy relation while he's more strict with his other um disciples or students, I guess. Anyways, the uh the days were pretty long. We woke up around six, got breakfast, and like I said before, the ceremony ended early afternoon, giving us some time to uh do some touring. And then once we were well rested, uh we decided to go out of our way and to these two very important sites. One was the Great Temple of the Landa, or the ruins of Nalanda, and Vulture's Peak. So that's all the time we have for this episode. Please join us next time. Thank you for tuning in again. Peace out, guys.