Chapter 92: The Arrogance of Silence

After listening to me talk for nearly an hour, Author Oh Hee-kyung suddenly told me to try bowing, and I couldn’t hide my confusion.

She paid no mind to my puzzled face, which was probably full of question marks, and gently pushed me along to somewhere.

She assigned me a small single room used for temple stay, and handed me a set of deep gray beopseok identical to what she herself was wearing.

The room I was to stay in was an old-fashioned ondol room, like those I had only seen in TV dramas as a kid. Judging from how warm the floor was, someone must have been stoking a fire somewhere below.

Half-dazed, I changed into the beopseok, put on a thick vest, and stepped outside.

Of course, it wasn’t because I’d accepted her command to bow—as if it were some kind of divine revelation.

“This way. The restroom is over here.”

She marched off with her hands behind her back, headed toward the outhouse.

Author Oh Hee-kyung had won a literary award, while I, stuck in a slump, hadn’t been able to write a single word.

I was being dragged along, honestly, for the pettiest of reasons, with a “let’s just see what happens” attitude.

Well, wouldn’t even a breath of fresh air in a place like this be better than nothing for clearing my head?

“Ugh.”

But that innocent hope was shattered almost immediately.

The restroom that Author Oh guided me to was a pit latrine.

When I opened the door made of wooden planks and stepped inside, heaps of waste piled under the hole in the floor greeted me with open arms.

“Here’s a handkerchief. We don’t use toilet paper here. Please use this and wash it afterward.”

She pressed into my hand a handkerchief she had used earlier to wipe tea cups.

“With this? For the toilet? No way.”

“Well, shall we go to bed? Wake-up time tomorrow is 3:50 a.m. The Buddhist service at Daeungjeon starts at 4.”

“Four? No way.”

“Let’s sleep. Good night. Ah, right.”

Author Oh held out her palm to me.

“Give me your phone. It helps to cut off from the secular world while you’re here.”

“Oh.”

“If you need to make a call, do it now, then bring it to my room.”

She smiled a serene, monk-like smile and drifted away.

I felt like I’d been well and truly duped.

At first, she’d made it sound like all I needed to do was bow, and now here I was, facing a pit latrine and having my phone confiscated.

I made up my mind right then to quietly change back into my own clothes and slip away.

Yeah.

Who am I to try training at a temple?

If I went home, took a hot bath, scrubbed my feet, and slept, maybe I’d wake up the next day and find my slump gone, words pouring out.

So, back in my room, I took off the beopseok, folded it neatly, and was changing when a call came in from CEO Hong Joo-hee.

-Author-nim. I heard you’re in a slump. Are you alright?

“Yes. For now, I guess so.”

-Jo Min-sung told you to meet Author Oh Jeong-hee or some nonsense like that, right? Don’t listen to him, meet me right now. I’ll introduce you to a famous psychiatrist. Where are you?

“I’m at a temple called Geumgang Jeongsa on Mount Gureum in Munju.”

-Munju? I can’t get there right now.

“No, no. I’m actually about to head back down. I think I’ll be fine if I just go home and sleep.”

-No, Author-nim. You’ve never had a real slump before, so you don’t understand. I’ve seen dozens of writers disappear into history after falling into a slump. So please, get a grip.

“No, seriously, I’m fine, I just want to go ho—”

-This is when you have to do something you’ve never tried before. Living the same way won’t change anything. I’ll be there first thing tomorrow morning. So tonight, don’t think about anything, just sleep well at the temple.

“No, really, I don’t want to sleep he—”

-Stay!

At the booming command echoing from the receiver, I had no choice but to close my mouth.

-Trust me. I’ll get you out of this slump, no matter what.

So I quietly changed back into the beopseok, handed my phone over to Author Oh Hee-kyung, and briefly told her that CEO Hong Joo-hee would be coming.

She laughed her serene laugh, saying, “I hope she brings some tasty food as an offering,” and I returned to my room, lay down on the warm floor, and let my back soak in the heat.

After the hike and all the physical chores, I fell into a deep sleep almost instantly.

---

Tap, tap, tap, ta-ak—

“Ma ha ban ya ba ra mil da shim gyeong gwa an se eum bo sal haeng shim ban ya ba ra mil da shim jeuk seol ju wal.”

Inside the Daeungjeon Hall, the chief monk’s low, resonant chanting filled the air—it was time for the morning Buddhist service.

I sat in the farthest corner, so mesmerized by this extraordinary scene that I couldn’t even doze off.

From four in the morning, I wondered who would bother coming to such a remote mountain temple at this hour, but my jaw dropped at the sight of the hall packed full. There must have been at least fifty people.

Most were older than me, or had some physical difficulties.

For the hour-long service, they sat perfectly still, chanting along with the monk.

After the prayers ended, everyone picked up their prayer beads and began bowing.

Before entering the hall, Author Oh had given me a set of prayer beads, and I followed the person beside me in bowing.

Having never done this before, I tensed up like at a funeral and bowed awkwardly.

I managed to keep up for about ten times.

But after thirty bows, my knees were creaking and cold sweat was pouring down.

It felt like doing burpees in a personal training session at the gym.

With my whole body tense and moving in unfamiliar ways, it was a workout that put normal calisthenics to shame.

Past fifty bows, I couldn’t tell whether I was bowing or my legs were just giving out.

“Haah, haah.”

Panting, I looked around.

Most of the people—women in their 60s and 70s—were bowing as if it were second nature.

There were even people with one leg disabled, or someone coughing incessantly as if they had lung disease, but they didn’t stop bowing.

The fact that I, who run every morning and regularly do PT, had so little stamina compared to them made me feel a strange sense of shame, and I stubbornly forced myself to keep bowing.

After one round of the prayer beads, I’d reached 108 bows.

But the people beside me didn’t stop; they turned their beads and started again.

“Uuuugh.”

After a second round, starting a third, my entire body was drenched in sweat.

Now I was a zombie, my legs trembling as I collapsed onto my cushion, barely making it to 300 bows.

Actually, I’d only done two and a half rounds, but figured I could fudge the remaining sixteen or so, so I finished along with those beside me.

“Oh my, such a young man and already so weak, tsk tsk.”

“Let’s go eat.”

The elders, who finished their 300 bows and even completed a round of meditation, looked after me—panting and sprawled on the floor—on the way to the dining hall.

I felt like a criminal being led away in handcuffs after a beating.

The dining hall was even more miserable.

I barely had the strength to lift my spoon, and there was nothing but vegetables, vegetable roots, and soup made from boiled roots.

Still, after two hours of struggle since 4 a.m., I had to eat something, so I took a bite.

Surprisingly, it was delicious.

The elder ladies laughed heartily at the way I was shoveling food into my mouth.

“Tasty, isn’t it?”

“Our dining hall ladies are the best cooks around.”

“Eat slowly, or you’ll get indigestion.”

I nodded and stuffed everything on my plate into my mouth.

“No need for a formal meal offering today, I guess.”

“No, no. You have to use the pickled radish to wipe up even the chili powder left on your plate.”

The white-haired, bespectacled lady placed a slice of pickled radish on my plate.

“In Buddhism, you can’t leave even a single grain of chili powder behind. Otherwise, you’ll be reborn as a hungry ghost and pay for your sins by eating the food you wasted in your past life.”

Isn’t eating it now or later the same thing? That thought briefly crossed my mind, but there’s no good in disobeying elders, so I dutifully wiped the chili powder off my plate with the radish and ate it.

It definitely wasn’t because I felt outclassed by their spiritual power.

How could these elders, who ate barely a handful of rice and finished 300 bows plus meditation with ease, be so extraordinary?

It was truly remarkable.

The next part was a meditation session with the monk.

Most people left after eating, but a few special individuals stayed behind for this session.

About a dozen people gathered in a circle in the Gwaneumjeon Hall.

Tak, ta-ak—

“Hkkk.”

I, nodding off, was struck with a bamboo clapper.

The monk walked around with a bamboo stick, correcting people’s postures by tapping their shoulders or backs.

After that intense cardio and a heavy meal, how could I not be sleepy?

But the monk, indifferent to the woes of us mere mortals, kept whacking me with the clapper, relentlessly chastising a foolish disciple.

“Please… spare me.”

I whimpered as I staggered out of Gwaneumjeon.

What time could it possibly be now? I was frustrated not being able to check the time.

Judging by the sun being just past mid-sky, I thought of CEO Hong Joo-hee.

She definitely said she’d come at first light today.

No matter how slowly she drove from Seoul, it should be about time for her to arrive.

Whatever I needed, I’d just get in her car and go straight back to Seoul.

“Mr. Lee, do you need anything?”

Almost as if she’d read my mind or walked on air, Author Oh Hee-kyung appeared before me.

“Um, Author-nim, I think this is as far as I can go. I need to go back down the mountain.”

“Hm. I see. Then, before you go, won’t you have a cup of tea? When your companion arrives, you can go back together.”

“What time is it now?”

“It’s not even ten yet.”

Not even ten? I could’ve sworn it was well past two.

Now that I looked, the sun was still making its way toward the center of the sky.

Following her offer to let me go, I decided to have a cup of tea.

There was no point in being suspicious anymore—besides, I had nowhere else to go, and

It was better than being chased around by a monk with a bamboo stick.

“So, who would like to share first today?”

The same group who had meditated together now sat in a circle for a tea discussion with Author Oh.

But it wasn’t just an ordinary tea gathering.

As they drank tea, people began to share their stories one by one.

From a grandmother visiting the temple because of a grandchild taking exams, to a wife with a gambling-addicted husband—there were many stories.

The three elder ladies who had taken me to the dining hall also spoke in turn.

First, the white-haired, bespectacled lady talked about how she’d married three times, and was worried about her son who had divorced again—she warned that if he brought home another grandchild, she’d break his legs.

Next, the lady with the short, cropped hair talked about how she’d undergone breast cancer surgery last year, cut her hair, and now, since her prognosis wasn’t good, she’d have to have surgery again.

Lastly, the lady with thickly tattooed eyebrows wiped her tears as she shared that her husband still hit her whenever he drank.

Finally, it was my turn.

“Mr. Lee Jung-hyuk, do you have anything you’d like to share? What’s said here never leaves this room. No one judges anyone.”

“……”

“Would you like to talk about what’s inside?”

I felt everyone’s eyes on me.

They were each carrying their own burdens, clearly ready to listen to and share others’ troubles as well.

Gambling, violence, divorce, cancer surgery. Yes, those are all serious matters.

But for some reason, nothing came to mind for me.

To be honest, is it really that big of a deal? Is it something you have to gather and talk about for comfort? That’s what I thought.

There’s a saying people often use, but I can never relate to it.

“Happiness doubles when shared, and sorrow is halved.”

No. When you share sorrow, you just end up with two people who are sad.

Nothing is solved just because someone listens to your sadness.

When my parents suddenly passed away, when I found out my father had a massive debt, when I had nowhere to sleep and my relatives ignored me, when I discovered the woman I loved approached me for other reasons, when I learned my only daughter wasn’t really mine—

To me, the people gathered here seemed like they were making a big fuss over a paper cut.

Coming to the temple at dawn to pray desperately,

It all just seemed a little excessive, a bit noisy.

“No. I have nothing.”

So tea time came to an end.

People began to rise from their seats and leave the room one by one.

I too tried to get up, but Author Oh Hee-kyung stopped me.

“Why didn’t you share?”

“There’s no reason to tell my story to strangers.”

“But you told me.”

“That’s because I thought you could give me an answer to my problems.”

“And not them?”

I answered, expressionless and flat.

“Yes, that’s right.”