Title: May 25th - 16:16
Medium: Super-8 film
Aspect Ratio: 4:3
Resolution: 2880 x 2160
File Type: H.264 Codec / MP4.
Comments: We met with a friend from online named, Rain. She is a tattoo artist. We spent the day going to see art shows and stumbled upon a Buddhist festival. Turns out it was Buddha's birthday! We took our shoes off and went inside the temple to observe the celebration and pray with the locals. After meditating and listening to the mantras for 30 minutes by the monks we quietly and slowly walked outside. I saw large yellow candles and was inspired to light a candle up for my mother to celebrate Buddha's birthday. My mom taught me to appreciate all religions and people at a young age. I bought a second candle for Rain and asked her to light it up for the portrait and stand with Buddha and make a wish or prayer. She closed her eyes for a moment. Then looked up at me, the wind started howling. You can hear whistle and paper shuffling. The small flame was extinguished. So I lit it up for her again. We bowed to our smiling stoney friend and walked under the colorful paper lanterns to the street sidewalk. I look across the way and saw two tea shops. We went into the first on the right side, but the staff was too busy to help us. We quickly left and went to the other shop. The woman behind the tea table smiled and welcomed us in for a glass of tea. She was an academic and expert in the art of drinking tea. She served us many variations; one notable blend that felt euphoric and psychedelic. After 3 hours of tea drinking we decided we would love to buy a brick of black Puer tea. There was a Hagi tea set that was gleaming at me. So, I asked if I may buy this tea set. She boiled the tea and set the Hagi down for us to try. She busted out her rarest black tea from 1969. We drank and stayed for another 2 hours. Rain was translating the whole time, but the storekeeper quickly became our tea master.