Talents are best nurtured in solitude, but character is best formed in the stormy billows of the world. – German writer and philosopher Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)
Whoever is delighted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god. – British writer and philosopher Sir Francis Bacon, Sr. (1561-1626)
LESHAN CITY, Sichuan province, southwest China – No, no, no, I have not converted to the gentle religion of Buddhism just because I recently visited the world’s tallest Buddha statue (at 71 meters, it’s 34 times the height of NBA giant Yao Ming) carved here in the mountainside overlooking the river and other historic sites during my tour which were coincidentally Buddhist or Taoist sacred mountains or ancient temples. No, it’s not true I’m on a honeymoon or carousing in this extended Christmas vacation (originally two weeks but now six or eight weeks), because I’m really traveling alone (but not lonely!).
No, I’m not like the bosses of America’s Fortune 500 corporations or Asia’s taipans with huge cash surpluses to invest in this fast-growing economy. I just want to be alone and relax in an exotic land visiting emperors’ palaces, romantic poets’ haunts, ancient battlegrounds of great heroes, bicycling to quaint temples/ monasteries/scenic lakes (bike rental is only 10 yuan or P66 per day!), trekking up (not athletic climbing) lots of high and sometimes snow-capped mountains. Philippine STAR readers, like Tom Lynn of Boston and others, have been tracking my progress by e-mailing me questions on the various cities I’ve visited.
Although I might fly to Lhasa in Tibet or take a four-day Yangtze River cruise through the world’s largest Three Gorges Dam project, I really prefer traveling by myself at a leisurely pace, reading books or dozing off in China’s efficient (and cheap) trains. A young American lady tourist at the coffee shop of Sheraton Chengdu Lido Hotel told me that even the world’s richest superpower, the United States, doesn’t have a similar nationwide network of efficient and affordable trains.
One of my favorite novels is Cien Anos de Soledad or One Hundred Years of Solitude authored by Nobel Prize winner Gabriel Garcia Marquez of Colombia. In my vacation through the vast hinterland of east, central and western China, I would have wanted 100 days of solitude traveling non-stop, but I guess my office staff in my modest businesses back home would soon panic, believing their boss has gone bonkers or will forget to pay their salaries on time. They might even ask the Interpol to track me down for being BAWOL or "boss absent without leave!"
Almost everyone I met in various cities in China (and even friends abroad) asked me why I’m traveling alone here and why during the freezing cold winter. I wish to share a secret: the coldest time is also the low season for China’s booming tourism industry, so there are fewer foreign and local tourist crowds. I could get five-star hotel accommodations for only US$50 a night (and even less whenever I go to four-star hotels for bargain room rates). Airline tickets and tourist destination entrance fees are discounted now. The winter cold has a way of heightening the serenity of solitude. But most of all, I enjoy the tranquility of peace and quiet. Unlike isolation, which is negative, solitude is life-giving and rejuvenating.
Solitude has become a luxury more rare than the diamonds of South Africa or the jades of imperial China. We seemed to have forgotten that although we humans are essentially social beings, we often need to recharge our mind, body and spirit with the silence of solitude.
Solitude enhances our sense of focus, self-discipline, self-analysis and allows us priceless time for introspection. Maybe that’s the reason many of the world’s literary masterpieces like Henry David Thoreau’s Walden, Marco Polo’s travel book, the late eminent Indonesian novelist Pramoedya Ananda Toer, Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote and others were authored in the solitude of their prison cells. America’s Christian minister, the late Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., also wrote fiery missives from jail.
The healing, rejuvenating and spiritual powers of solitude are maybe among the reasons why the Taoist or Buddhist monks, yoga masters, martial arts experts and even devout Christians prioritize their mornings for meditation or contemplative prayers?
Confucius had wandered through China as a traveler, perhaps the journey had sharpened his mind, wizened him to become East Asia’s most revered philosopher. Jesus Christ as a young man had also found it infinitely beneficial to travel alone for some time (if I’m not mistaken, the KJ devil even tried to disrupt His wanderings through the wilderness, unsuccessfully tempting Him three times).
I’m not inclined to be a hermit or a recluse, but the writer and romantic in me just wishes to have occasional long periods of solitude. Yes, I’m sometimes amidst huge crowds in the bustling marketplaces, lively eateries or crowded trains of this vast country, but as a foreign-born ethnic Chinese whom the crowds do not recognize as a foreigner, I’m an outsider by myself like a fish is swimming along the gushing river or a panda clambering up a bamboo forest surrounded by other flora, fauna and wildlife.
There is also something about solitude that humbles our ego, calms our restless spirit and somehow brings us closer to God. The reason I could never fully appreciate people who shout or clap during public prayer gatherings is because I’ve always associated silence with prayers.
Although I’m a Protestant, I admire the Catholics, Buddhists and Taoists for their age-old monasteries in which their monks, clergy and nuns enjoy the overpowering experience of solitude. I envy them, but I don’t have the nearly superhuman discipline to endure years or a lifetime of monastic silence.
A fascinating group in the West similar to China’s ancient Taoist and Buddhist monastic orders is the Carthusian Order. It is a small international order of hermit monks and also nuns who live in perpetual silence and solitude. They were founded in the Chartreuse valley of the Dauphine Alps in southeastern France by St. Bruno of Cologne in 1084. They pray, study, eat and sleep alone daily in a cell with a garden but gather in church for morning mass, vespers, and the night office. They dine together on Sundays and major holidays and walk together once a week. They abstain from eating meat, and eat only bread and water on Fridays and fast days.
At their motherhouse, or Grande Chartreuse (today in Voiron, Isère), the monks distill the well-known aromatic French "Chartreuse" liquor, which bears the house’s name. All tourists to Lombardy, Italy should tour their 611-year-old former abbey "Certosa di Pavia," because it is an architectural monument of elegance and rich history. Amazingly, the Carthusians have endured and have never needed to be "modernized" to this day in the 21st century.
The Carthusians are the only monastic order in the long history of the Catholic Church to preserve faithfully the true monastic ideal in all its perfection, while other orders have given in to so-called modern reforms. Some observers have commented on this phenomenon in Latin: "Cartusia numquam reformata quia numquam deformata." This is translated as, "The Carthusians have never been reformed because they have never been deformed."
I’m not aspiring to be a saintly monk, but I hope my befuddled employees back at my office and my other surprised friends back home will understand why I’m making my modern-day long march (not Mao Zedong-style convoys but by modern conveyances) through colorful east, central and west China for a long quiet vacation.
Whether at home or geographically and culturally far away as I am, we can all seek our own level of solitude, which is good for our physical, intellectual, emotional and spiritual well-being. Solitude is not only for philosophers, mystics, poets, monks, revolutionaries or for the ancient rulers and wise generals of China contemplating their next history-changing maneuvers.
I believe deep thinking, replenishing our physical energies, creativity, dreaming (or daydreaming) and spirituality (not religiosity) are at their fullest during solitude. It’s nice once in a while to just slow down from the rat race and truly relax. I am reminded of the poet and warrior King David of Israel who wrote in Psalm 54:7 his own similar wish: "O that I had the wings of a dove, I would fly away and be at rest."