First published: 11/04/19.

Zoë Sheng 0.5

Lumbini

Lumbini (Inscribed)

Lumbini by Zoë Sheng

This may be my last review seeing that I will receive all the wrath from Buddhists reading this and...but wait according to Alan Partridge the only religion allowed to be made fun of are Buddhists because "they don't fight back"... besides the comical quote and the fact that real Buddhists would indeed not show anger, plenty of them may not be happy to see I'm not writing something unholy about their sacred place. Would I rate the Church of Nativity equally low? Probably not, besides the fact that the church is not even the place where JC was supposed to be born but at least you a) see a church and b) have the mythology as well. Here, in Lumbini, you get a small house that isn't original, that is SUPPOSED to have been the birth place of Lord Buddha (with zero evidence that it is true), but it also has the mythology of millions of people following the story along. They all come to pray at the stone. I respect it but at the same time I find it ridiculous that they do. Yes you can tell I'm not religious and I find it almost shameful that UNESCO places something like this on the list along with the baptist site in Jordan. Also I then have to argue why this is acceptable for the main popular religions but there is nothing for the followers of e.g. Scientology or the Mormons...

The rest of the Lumbini area is NOT inscribed but unfortunately the only way to get here is by car and they will take you on a tour which means you get to see all the Buddhist temple styles around the world, basically China, Japan, Myanmar, Korea, Vietnam, etc. Very boring even if it's free. What made me more annoyed at this place was the crowds and the small path ways that are easily blocked off by a single tour group.

Pro-tip: Well, don't go to see it? Okay a real tip: the long line/queue to get into the building is actually for praying at the stone so if you don't want to do that you can just skip it, make sure they maybe know you are not skipping but just want to see the building and leave. Inside is lots of space to look down into the ruins.

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