This is Chris Bricker, and I’m thrilled to introduce you to Bill Porter – or Red Pine – one of the world’s finest translators of Chinese Poetry and religious texts. For those of you who already know him, and those of you who will get to know him, he prefers to just being your neighbor Bill Porter. Each week, Bill will bring you a series of enticing installments that we’re calling A Journey Along the Silk Road. So sit back and enjoy the journey, every Tuesday at approximately 5:20 and Friday at approximately 12:15. And lose yourself in the mystery of the Silk Road!
(Airdate: August 6, 2024) We’ve been visiting one of China’s greatest repositories of Buddhist art, on a mountain called Maijishan. We returned to Tianshii, too late to find a room in town. But it was just as well, none of the hotels in town had hot water anyway, and we wanted a bath….
(Airdate: July 30, 2024) We’re at the Buddhist caves of Maijishan, or “Wheatstack Mountain.” It’s not really a mountain. It’s a big monolith of red rock sticking out sticking out of the hills of the Qinling Mountains. But the calves are real, all 194 of them….
(Airdate: July 23, 2024 ) We’re in Gansu Province, about 60 kilometers southesst of Tianshui, and our minivan has dropped us off at the foot a peculiar looking mountain. It’s sheer on three sides, and from one angle, it looks like a stack of wheat….
(Airdate: July 16, 2024) As we pulled out of the Baoji station heading west, we passed a couple of hobos in the train yard waiting for a freight train to do the same. Like hobos around the world, they were probably looking for work and couldn’t afford the bus fair to the next job….
(Airdate: July 9, 2024) We’re at the Baoji train station, waiting for the next train heading west. As usual, the only tickets for sale were for standing room. But here’s a surprise, the station has a no smoking, no spitting allowed waiting room. The train arrived half-full, so we stretched out on the seats….
(Airdate: July 2, 2024) From the terrace in front of Zhang’s former home, we looked across the river to the north and the Sa-kuan Pass to the south, which reminded us of two stories from China’s distant past….
(Airdate: June 25, 2024) We’re in the town of Baoji and visiting the town’s Jintai Temple, on the hillside overlooking the train station. Before the temple was built in the 14th Century, it’s site was the residence of a most peculiar Taoist master, Zhang Sangfeng, the patriarch of Chinese Kung Fu….
(Airdate: June 18, 2024) We’re in Shaanxi Province and in need of a place to spend our first night from leaving Xi’an. Finally, about sunset our bus lurched into the town of Baoji. At the edge of town the police stopped the bus to check tickets. Whoops! The police dragged fifteen people off the bus….
(Airdate: June 11, 2024) We just finished paying our respects to the Buddha’s finger bone at Ramen Temple. The finger bone, we noticed, was pointing west and we followed as it far as the next town of Xianyang, where we hired a three-wheeler to take us to the shrine of the Duke of Zhou….
(Airdate: June 4, 2024) We’re 150 kilometers, or three hours west of Xi’an, just north of the town of Fufeng, and we have arrived at Famen Temple, the home of the Buddha’s finger bone, supposedly brought to China via the Silk Road over 2300 years ago at the behest of India’s King Ashoka…
