The great thing I find about blogs is that you can publish information that other people can find extremely useful. I say this because I struggled to find information about Zen retreats in China. It seems to be far easier to find this information for retreats in Japan, Korea and Western countries. In Japan and Korea for example there is a better setup for tourists to experience life in a temple due to the fact these countries experience a far greater volume of western tourism, where China is only experiencing the growth in tourism now.

I visited the Bailin Temple around 250 or so kilometers outside Beijing, I spent 4 nights there and had a great experience. The monks went out of there way to make me feel welcome and made my stay great. Not many of them spoke good English but one or two helped me communicate and understand how things worked. Many ordinary Chinese people stayed in the temple to work and study, these people were welcomed openly and would either pay to stay or agree to work in return for their food and board. Two Chinese students were asked by one of the monks to show me around and help me anyway they could, they considered it there duty.

In all I highly recommend visiting the Temple just to get away from the rat race or to practice your beliefs, its a calming place and you won’t regret the visit.

Now to help anybody else that would like to visit the temple here is some essential information.

Starting from Beijing you first need to get to Shi Jiazhung. You can get her via the bullet train that leaves Beijing West Station. This train is 86 RMB for second class or 400 RMB for 1st class. Second class is very comfortable. You can get the information on trains running from this site.

http://www.chinahighlights.com/china-trains/

The prices mentioned above are the bullet trains which take two hours and all there train numbers start with D, known as D Trains.

When you get to Shi Jaizhung you have to get to the city’s south bus station, you have two options for this bus or taxi. I highly recommend a taxi, the bus is only 1 RMB but not as comfortable as the taxi which will cost you no more than 20 RMB, maybe 1.50 euro.

It will take maybe 10 mins to get to the bus station, when here you get a bus ticket to ZhaoXian, this ticket cost 9 RMB and is a small bus which is basic but comfortable. This journey takes 1 hour and the last stop is the temple, you’ll see it on your left so you can just shout to the driver to get off.

Once there just go inside and you can use the numbers below to contact the office to let them know you are there. The price per night is 20 RMB which includes 3 meals a day and your accommodation is a same sex dorm room shared with usually locals with an onsuite.

Bailin Temple Office: 00 86 (0) 31184942447

I have numbers for individual monks who speak good english, I can provide them on request, just email me at paul@weeno.ie.

The schedule involves 2 classes and sitting meditation, I will warn you the first class is at 5am followed by breakfast with the monks. Lunch is at 11.15am, the second class of the day is at 4.30pm followed by dinner and then sitting meditation is from 7pm till 8pm. The rest of the time is yours to do what you please.

If you need anymore information please contact me.

Note: I will add the Chinese symbols for all important words above soon, I just have to source digital copies of them.

I am currently in Shanghai and have been traveling around China for the last month. I have been getting a first hand view of what censorship for this country is like. Just from my sources from home, I can compare the difference in information been provided to the people here. The censorship is seen in everything as well, from the recent Tibet issue to a film I watched again just this evening. Whole chunks of information are removed or changed to suit the powers that be.

The country is growing at ever increasing speed and more and more opportunities are becoming available but I feel that huge sacrifices have to be made to be involved in these opportunities. For me I don’t think I could sacrifice my free access to information.