Today, are you incense? Today, temples are one of the must-see destinations on your travel list. According to Ctrip's data, since February 2023, the number of ticket orders for temple-related scenic spots has increased by 310% year-on-year. Topics such as "young people crowding the temple", "Lingyin Temple eighteen seeds hand string purchase limit", "Yonghe Palace legal objects invitation" and other topics have successively appeared on the hot search.
On weekends, visitors can arrange "temple day trips"; Once you encounter a small long holiday, the popular temple scenic spots such as Lingyin Temple, Putuo Mountain, and Hanshan Temple become overcrowded "fragrant dumplings". We not only burn incense, worship Buddha, invite hand skewers, but also eat vegetarian fasting and Zen, which seems to have become a new way of travel. After all, someone has calculated that if you check in a Buddhist temple a day, how long can you worship all the Buddhas and bodhisattvas in the country? The answer is 90 years. It sounds like a very large list of works.
We want to know, how hot is temple tourism? Why did it rise and what are the problems?
"Crazy Week Temple", tourists crowd the temple
Chu Chuhui was a little puzzled, why are there so many people in the Yonghe Palace? She is a graduate student in Beijing, and her mother has come to see her these two days, and the two of them are planning to come to the Lama Temple to ask for a "healthy" bracelet. Unexpectedly, as soon as I got out of the subway station, I saw the surging flow of people, "there is no need to navigate at all, everyone goes in one direction."
It's just that this is not a big battle, and when he saw the long line outside the "Law Logistics Office", Chu Chuhui understood that he underestimated the fiery degree of the Lama Palace. The security guard at the gate allows 15 people every 15 minutes, and according to this speed and the number of people at the door, "Please ask for a hand string first, and then go to the light, at least four or five hours in line." ”
It was cloudy, and it rained later, but no one wanted to leave, whether it was the circulation office or the light room, and they all stayed where they were.
A popular temple scenic spot loved by tourists, the source of the Mafengwo
Nowadays, tourists are crowding the temple area. The 2023 "Travel Bee Target" released by Mafengwo on March 23 shows that within a week, the average popularity of "temples" in various places increased by as much as 138%, and at the hottest time, the average daily passenger flow of the Lama Temple basically remained at about 40,000, and the same is true for other popular scenic spots. Nanjing Jiming Temple even specially set up a "repentance gate" to allow tourists who can't stand the queue to have a chance to turn back.
A large number of tourists from all over the country rush to the temple scenic spot to burn incense and worship Buddha, as well as for the cultural and creative products and tourism services supporting the temple cultural tourism.
The most attractive are cultural and creative products, such as the incense ash bracelet of the Lama Temple. According to the Internet legend, the bracelet is made of incense ash in front of the Buddha and fired with porcelain or glass, which can protect Nafu. Similarly, there are eighteen-seeded Duo Bao Buddha beads from Hangzhou Lingyin Temple, and lotus blossom bracelets from Faxi Temple.
The blessing bracelet of the Lama Temple
Some cultural and creative products can not only pray for blessings, but also conform to the new habit of "check-in" tourism. In the past two years, many temples and scenic spots have sold "Internet celebrity coffee", such as Hangzhou Yongfu Temple, Shanghai Jade Buddha Temple and Taizhou Longxing Temple. Their names are very Zen, the American name is "Di Fu", the mocha is called "Huanxi", and the matcha latte is called "Listen to the mountain language".
On the basis of cultural and creative products, a series of Dharma-related tourism activities have also been carried out, such as going to Putuo Mountain in Zhejiang Province to listen to sutras, coming to Beijing Guangji Temple to bathe Buddha, or going to Lushan Donglin Temple Gatuo Monastery to eat vegetarian fast.
Many even attend temple-sponsored "meditation camps" – visitors experience temple life for three or five days or more, where they can attend classes, fast, work and chant. It looks like an alternative "study camp".
This tourist, himself is a "special forces type tourism", go to the temple scenic spot, but also let the "bodhisattva work overtime".
"If you are not decided, first complete metaphysics"
All travel, there must be a guide, go to temple scenic spots, there are also a lot of experience stickers, such as "seek career to go to Lama Temple", "seek marriage to go to Hongluo Temple", "seek wealth to Hangzhou Lingshun Temple", "seek study to go to Wutai Mountain"... Even the blessing bracelets of the Lama Temple are also distinguished by popularity, and the most popular ones are "Duojin Ruyi", "Perfect", "Health", "Career" and "Marriage".
Temple scenic spots, different from ordinary natural and cultural scenic spots, tourists often go here to ask for something.
Temple cultural tourism is popular, many people will ridicule, is everyone's concept has changed. Now it is undecided, first rectify metaphysics. But it's not so much that more and more people are beginning to believe in metaphysics, but that everyone needs a window and a sustenance to fight anxiety.
Zhao Jing has become a frequent visitor to the temple since she visited the Potala Palace in Tibet, and in the early years, when she went out to travel, she said that she would go to the temple, and most of the people who accompanied her objected. But now, "they are very willing to go together, and they will compete to buy incense, buy souvenirs, and make strategies." ”
There are more and more people visiting the temple around her, and most of the people who are still in school are wearing green Lama Palace incense ash bracelet, "this is for study", and they have to pay their respects for official and graduate school entrance examinations, and they have to return their wishes afterwards. The most people who have already gone to work are "seeking transfer", "seeking career" and "seeking wealth", in contrast, those who "seek marriage" are already a minority.
Indeed, in the past two years, "internal involution" and "internal consumption" have become the keywords of the year, and further education, employment, and marriage are all objective pressures, and many people need some inward grasp and comfort while striving outward.
Under the many needs, temple cultural tourism is also actively catering and changing, providing emotional value for tourists.
Under the processing of the temple cultural tourism, a cup of coffee is no longer an ordinary drink, but a coffee bathed in the Dharma and morning bells and evening drums with the blessings of the monks. A bracelet is no longer a decoration, but a "magic weapon" with aura and luck. Some bracelets will have many taboos, such as not being touched by others, not being wet, not sleeping with them, etc., which may seem "troublesome" at first glance, but this is exactly the sense of sacred ritual that many people need.
Temple coffee
As for those tourist activities such as listening to sutras, bathing in Buddha and fasting, it is also the most popular healing trip for tourists to "cleanse the soul" and "gain peace" by planting grass, experiencing and checking in.
Relying on the "blessing economy" of temple cultural tourism, where is the way out?
It's just that the temple cultural tourism is running wildly, hiding a lot of problems.
The common feature of cultural tourism is that when there are many people, there are troubles. Open the temple scenic area guide, the most common keywords are "queue" and "many people". The man holding incense in the main hall surrounded the incense barrel on the inner and outer three floors; The scene of tourists making loud calls and picking on strings of hands crowded in the "French Logistics Gate" has the same visual sense as the picture of many people waiting for the call in the milk tea shop. Sometimes, because of the long queues, many quarrels and disputes break out.
In addition to the difficulty of queuing, the invitation of legal objects is also a unique phenomenon in temple cultural tourism. Da Zhong is a native of Beijing, and after losing his job, he went to the Lama Temple to pray for blessings, and after posting it on social platforms, many people asked him to ask for legal objects on his behalf. For each generation, he would add 30 to 50 yuan to the official price, "which is the average price in the industry", and when he was busiest, he had to enter and exit the light room more than 20 times a day.
The temple legal affairs please live broadcast
There are many people who do things on their behalf. Some people have become full-time daigou, and some people will specialize in live streaming on the platform. If there are celebrities wearing temples to pray, it may even evolve into a certain style of out-of-stock, such as a fan living in Hangzhou, who once asked for more than 40 strings of 18 seeds of multi-treasure Buddha beads for his fellow bearers as a "blessing of the same style".
Temple cultural tourism, part of the alienation into the temple cultural and creative business, such as the Lama Temple once stopped selling incense ash bracelet, because the temple incense ash is not enough.
Relying on prayers, cultural creativity, and tourism services in temple cultural tourism, which direction should we go in the future? Some mature examples that can be used as references. For example, Kiyomizu-dera Temple in Kyoto, Japan, where all the wishes that can be involved in life are made into prayer items, and the process is full of rituals, and the whole prayer process is a journey of inner healing.
Kiyomizu-dera Temple, Kyoto, Japan, the source of the measurement city
At the same time, Kiyomizuji Mountain, Yamashi, temples, and businesses have built a complex temple business district, and the commercial street has gathered a variety of commercial formats, such as the sale of porcelain, incense, Kyoto sweets and restaurant tea rooms, etc., it can be said that the entire cultural tourism supporting services are available.
Temple cultural tourism should not only sell cultural creativity and engage in peripheral services, which deviates from the original intention and significance of the existence of temples, and also wastes the rich temple tourism resources in China.
Source: Sohu Travel Editor: Zhou Quan