“Visiting Shaolin Like a Victim: From Fever to Slides”

"... When every staircase becomes a trap!"... "When a childhood dream leads to snow and a fever!!!!!!!!!"... This journey started with excitement and ended with a fever 🤒But every moment is an unforgettable experience!... Shaolin... A dream destination that I didn't think would be this cold!🥶 Since childhood, I liked to watch Chinese Kung Fu movies. I grew up with scenes of Shaolin monks teaching their disciples to kick and punch in the middle of the temple courtyard. The word "Shaolin Temple" has always been like a sacred place in my heart. When I had the opportunity to visit China for the first time, I didn't think that one of the places I would go to was Shaolin Temple in Henan Province.❄️But what we never knew before, and no one warned me, was... Shaolin has snow!!! Yes, snow! And the problem is that my boyfriend and I have never been to Shaolin before. Plus, we've never seen snow because we have lived in Thailand all our life. So I wasn't prepared to encounter the truly extreme cold weather. I dressed casually while traveling in China, but I ended up encountering tons of snow. Because I thought, "Oh, China in winter is probably just normally cold," I chose to wear only thin long-sleeved shirts and normal pants. I thought it should be okay!!! I was wrong… When I got to Shaolin! The ground was covered in white snow. The air was so cold that my breath turned into vapor. We were like… “What the heck!? How did Shaolin have snow!?” But since we were already there, we wanted to try playing in the snow and this was the second disaster… playing in the snow without any thought until we got a fever at Shaolin Temple! It was so great for the first time when I encountered snow! It was like a Thai kid who has never seen snow before and is so excited when he gets it. We picked it up to look at it, tried making snowballs, and made crunching sounds when we stepped on it. We were so energetic. We had so much fun that we forgot we were wearing thin clothes. The result was… our bodies started to shake, our teeth chattered, our face went numb, and finally… we got a fever!!! What we planned to have fun on our trip turned into us having to drag our bodies all over Shaolin Temple, shaking in the heat and cold. At that moment, I wanted to wrap myself up like a steamed bun, but there was no blanket! The worst… my battery ran out! We reached our dream destination but didn’t have any pictures to bring back. If just getting a fever wasn’t enough to ruin the trip… Another event that was just as intense was when my phone battery ran out!!! Yes, I arrived at the Shaolin Temple that I had always dreamed of, but in the end, I didn’t take a single photo! I thought I would get beautiful photos to show my mom, but I had to rely solely on my memories and my own descriptions for my mom to hear. Even though it was a disaster, it was still incredibly impressive. Even though this trip was unexpectedly “brutal, exciting, and hilarious,” it turned out to be an incredibly valuable experience. Not only did I get to see the real Shaolin Temple, but I also learned that… 1. Shaolin Temple has snow! (For anyone who’s going, prepare a warm jacket.) 2. Don’t be careless with the cold weather, or you might get a fever playing in the snow like me. 3. Always carry a power bank because reaching your destination without any photos is the saddest thing ever. Even though I don’t have any photos to share, every moment that happened made me remember this trip in an unforgettable way! Shaolin… A temple that made me both “wow” and “faint” at the same time. I thought this trip would be an elegant follow-up on Kung Fu, but it turned out to be an unexpected “ice survival” trip! From being so cold that I got a fever… To involuntary skating After playing in the snow until we got a fever (from the previous article), we thought that the bad luck of this trip would end there...but no! The climax continues!!! What we didn't know before was that the snow and ice at Shaolin was not just freshly fallen snow that was still fluffy, but old ice that had been piled up for many days and had turned into a smooth, slippery skating rink-like sheet disguised as stairs! And let me warn you, Shaolin Temple has a lot of stairs!!! Stairs or natural slides!? Normally, walking up a lot of stairs is difficult enough, but these were "ice stairs" that were rock hard and slippery like glass! At first, we tried to walk mindfully, stepping carefully, but it turned out...as soon as our feet touched the first step, we slipped!!!! Yes, sliding down without brakes! It felt like riding a slide for free without wanting to, from the first step to the last! But what hurt was that we didn't slide down empty-handed. My boyfriend tried to help hold me, and in the end, we slipped too!! The image I saw... the two of us rolling down together like jackfruits rolling down a tree. My whole body hurt, but I couldn't stop laughing. Others walking up the stairs widened their eyes like “What the!?” As for us, we held our heads and thought… “Did we come to Shaolin to learn kung fu or to practice slipping and sliding!?” After one round of the Shaolin Stairs survival mission, we now know that walking up and down the Shaolin Stairs in winter is not just about walking up and down. It is a test of survival! • If you step wrong = slip down for nothing • If you step too hard = the ice cracks and makes it even more slippery • If you stand too straight = you won’t be able to keep your balance. In the end, we used the “penguin walk” tactic, shuffling our feet briefly to keep from losing our balance. But there were still some moments when we unknowingly slid forward, like being forced to go on a ride for which we didn’t buy a ticket! An unforgettable lesson from the Shaolin trip. Instead of intending to learn the philosophy of Shaolin Kung Fu, we ended up learning many more life lessons. 1. Shaolin Temple is not only a sacred place, but also a training ground for advanced balance skills. 2. The snow here isn’t as cute as in the movies. It’s ice that is ready to test everyone’s mental state. 3. Walking up the ice stairs Think of it as playing an extreme sport. 4. A good partner doesn't just hold hands and walk together. They must also be ready to slide together even if they get hurt quite a bit. But this trip was an experience that we will never forget (because the bruises are still there until now!) #Traveling in China #Shaolin Temple #Henan