A quick tour of Henan's ancient wonders

It is a life goal of mine to explore every province in China, so when I had the opportunity to visit Henan, I swiftly packed my bags, bought a train ticket, and left a veritable trail of smoke as I raced to see two icons of Chinese culture, the Longmen Grottoes and the Shaolin Temple.

After arriving in the charming city of Xinxiang and enjoying some of their delectable, local lamb-based hotpot, hongmen yangrou, it was time for me to set off. With the help of my incredible driver, Mr Jiao, I was going to try and do both in one day! After a few hours driving out of the city, I soon arrived at the Longmen Grottoes.

Built from 386-1130, the Longmen Grottoes in Luoyang are carved into the sides of two limestone cliffs, which are bisected by the Yihe River. The Grottoes house nearly 100,000 Buddhist statues, ranging in size from 25 millimeters to 17 meters in height. Walking among these ancient, magnificent statues, it is easy to feel small, not only physically, but existentially. As the giant, wizened faces of the many statues stare down at you, their features weathered by the centuries, it is a truly humbling experience; one that allows oneself to look past the walls of their ego and earnestly, inwardly reflect.

While exploring the many grottoes, something else that became obvious was how many statues were damaged or missing. While damage occurring to ancient statues, particularly ones outside, is nothing out of the ordinary, some of the places where heads or entire statues were missing looked like they had been removed with tools. Looking into this, I learned that many statues over the years had been stolen by outsiders, a large portion of them taken by the Japanese during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1931-45). Many of these statues are still in museums in Japan to this day, and I truly hope that they can, one day, be returned to their rightful place. Until then, the statues still stand, near innumerable and resolute, their missing comrades highlighting the tenacity of Chinese culture.

After a brief roadside lunch of noodles and roujiamo, a Chinese-style meat burger, with Mr Jiao, we were off to the Shaolin Temple. We drove up a winding road through the Songshan Mountain, where Mr Jiao had to use his masterful skills as a seasoned driver to avoid a few overzealous tour buses. Eventually, however, I was standing at the entrance of the legendary Shaolin temple, the home of Shaolin kung fu and regarded as one of the greatest martial arts academies in the world. The sun was setting, and I had to run to catch the last performance of the Shaolin monks. I arrived just in time and squeezed my way through the crowd, and waited for the show to begin. Soon drums were sounding and a group of young teenagers took the stage. I thought it was nice of them to have an array of ages and assumed that they would start with their younger, inexperienced martial artists. When they started doing flips, breaking iron bars over their heads, and bending sharp spears with their bare chests, I realized these were the Shaolin monks and that these teenagers were experts. I couldn't help but reflect on what seemed like my now misspent youth, these young martial artists had trained to a point of near physical perfection and could throw a sewing needle with enough velocity and precision to pierce cleanly through a sheet of glass. When I was their age, I was really good at playing Super Mario — one of these is much more impressive than the other.

After the show, I had the distinct pleasure of getting to meet a few of the martial artists and their mastery was matched by their humility and kindness. It was intriguing to see the powerful and stoic warriors I had just witnessed performing near superhuman feats mere minutes ago, joke around and act like a group of goofy teenagers. It filled my heart with joy to know that regardless of their discipline, their youthful spirits remained undisturbed.

As the sun set behind the peaks of the Songshan Mountain, I wandered through the Shaolin Temple, reflecting on my incredible day and the lessons that these two ancient sites had taught me. I was overwhelmed with gratitude for the opportunity to have witnessed such breathtaking sights, and of course, to have Mr Jiao by my side.