My Life At Shaolin Temple

whoa how do we get here well that's a long story sit back relax this is my life at Shaolin Temple after I graduated from high school I started an apprenticeship at a German bank because I knew I'd earn good money and who wouldn't want to have a stable job I had a very high GPA so I had the freedom to do anything but I didn't want to go to university right away because I was sick of studying I wanted to make some money first unfortunately the bank sent me to an office pretty far from home and I didn't and still don't have a driver's license so I had to make a one and a half hour train trip back and forth to work every day which didn't help my motivation so I requested to be relocated to a more central branch they did and things became even clearer this was not what I wanted to do with my life so I quit and now I was lost I still didn't want to go to college but I also can't just do nothing so I went to China for half a year to spend time with my family and improve my Chinese I always love China but after that time it became my second home to this day Beijing is one of my favorite cities in the world and I have nothing but great memories of that place [Music] six months passed and I went back home even though I had a great time I fell right back into my old way of thinking when I returned I was lost again this was around May 2013 I learned so much in China yet I was still not ready to get back into my old life in Germany this depressed me after wasting my time for three more months wondering what I should do something came to my mind since I was about 13 years old I've always had this thought of living in a monastery maybe you could call it a dream it was never anything really concrete though just a distant idea but now things were different I had to do something and I knew I didn't want to stay here my options were limited is there even a monastery where I can find some peace and quiet and at the same time keep fit and of course there was only one possibility the ancient and mystical Shaolin Temple I wrestled with that thought for a while I thought it was outrageous like many of you I've heard stories about Shaolin monks and watched some YouTube documentaries how will I be able to survive there would they even take me in I'm sure there are tons of people who would like to join them but at that point I was obsessed I had to know for sure and there was only one way of doing that I had to give it a try and so began my three-year long adventure at Shaolin Temple getting there was no cakewalk first I flew to Beijing then I took the fast train to Gyeongju the capital of Honan then took a long-distance bus to dong Fong then take another small bus to the Shaolin scenic area and then get picked up by one of the Shaolin monks which my dad had gotten in touch with before through his contacts [Music] what was my first impression it was midsummer it was at least 40 degrees Celsius and extremely humid I wish somebody had told me at this point that my Western sophisticated standards are not gonna matter to anybody here and why should they I was a spoiled unsuspecting nineteen year old guy from Germany who thought he could just join the Shaolin monks and that would be the end of it obviously things went very differently my first day was a nightmare I was trained by one of the lead warrior monks together with a Chinese teenager who would come to Shaolin Temple every year during summer holiday it was just the two of us I had no friends I was in the middle of nowhere I was alone it sucked but during these rare and quiet moments when I was able to take in the scenery and think about the history of this place it was magical almost overwhelming [Music] [Applause] the shaolin temple lies in a valley of the holy song shan mountains if you walk 10 to 15 minutes up a street in front of the temple you'll arrive in a small village called von Drago this is a tiny place that is filled with people mostly children and teenagers by my estimation maybe around 1,500 people in total what do they do they're trained kung-fu all day every day nothing but kungfu from 4:30 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. this is their life they are divided into more than a dozen schools with their masters being former or even current Shaolin monks maybe I should better go to one of these was my thought and as I was walking through the Pacbell streets of andhra go it didn't take long to see the first western faces and that was like a gift from God a Western face meant home I quickly approached them and was brought to a school exclusively for foreigners and that's why I decided to stay for now this was supposed to be my transition period getting used to the life there while being able to spend time with people that I could relate to more easily I stayed here for one month and I met some wonderful people still every morning when we warmed up for training I saw the actual Shaolin Temple staring at me from a distance I knew that that is where I needed to go I wasn't here just to learn kung fu I wanted to learn about Buddhist and Shaolin culture so eventually I came in touch with the I guess spokesperson of the Shaolin Temple who's in charge of foreigners I'm sorry I'm still not quite sure of his actual job description he wasn't a monk he was a businessman which confused me a little but it shouldn't have come as a surprise since the Shaolin Temple is unesco world heritage and has become a million dollar industry over the past years attracting hundreds of thousands of tourists every month just among Chinese people alone it was by far not the place that I had originally pictured when I left Germany but I had come so far to see this legendary place I wasn't about to give up now so I made a deal with this man which brought me a lot closer to my goal I was still going to live in wrong jugo but I could train Eid and pray inside the Shaolin Temple this was huge for me ultimately my goal was training side-by-side with the monks but those guys have been doing kung fu since then little six-year-old kids in some cases even earlier how was I ever going to catch up it seemed impossible I did some judo when I was 12 but that's about it I left the school for foreigners and started training in Shaolin Temple under guidance of a senior Shaolin warrior monk and I stuck to it every day train about 6 to 7 hours daily it was exhausting I was still training together with foreigners and most of the time I was the only person who could speak Chinese so I also acted as a translator which would help me a lot along the way but it wasn't only an issue of language the Shaolin Temple is and probably always has been a turbulent place over the past years it's grown vastly in popularity Fame but also criticism now this video isn't going to address those because they're mostly uttered by people who are neither familiar with Chinese culture nor have they ever stepped foot into Shaolin Temple as anything other than a tourist Shaolin Temple has become very careful and wary of who they allow to get close to them I guess this is a normal and natural way of thinking when you got so many eyes on you constantly why do I mention this because I was lucky I was lucky that I look Chinese that I had a Chinese family who visited me several times and that I could speak Chinese it was a lot easier for them to relate to me and see me as one of them even during my first two years of training I had the honor and the privilege to train among the warrior amongst many times in Western countries we always expect regulations clarity and bureaucracy people often struggle to understand how my daily routine was I was monk every day was different I got up in the morning and didn't know what to expect sometimes training was cancelled due to a buddhist ceremony that i had to take part in sometimes i was called on short notice to run down to the temple quickly because the german ambassador from beijing was here and i should introduce myself and perform there was a lot of drinking tea cleaning up talking and being young that I was here indefinitely and it was hard for people to understand that [Music] two years passed and I had made many friends sometimes my master wouldn't even show up on training call me up and tell me that I should fill in for him this happened fairly frequently and even I was getting sick of teaching basics to foreign newcomers who would go home again after three weeks anyways I felt that it was finally time to take the next step so one morning I walked up to my master I looked him in the eye I was sweating like crazy and I asked can I join the warrior monks looking back I don't know why I was that nervous he knew that I spent a lot of time with him already training performing and going to the city together he didn't even hesitate he said yes sure but don't mess it up he trusted in me and he believed in me now that felt amazing like a new beginning which it was my last year was by far the most fun and the most painful before I got beaten by my master only on rare occasions if I really messed something up now it was almost a daily occurrence and ten times harder because I was a familiar face by now I think most of the time I got preferential treatment I wasn't hit as hard as the others because I was still a half foreigner they know that in the West were not big fans of using violence to teach but my god there were some masters who just didn't care which I loved it made me feel even more integrated although while you're getting hit with a stick it's still not that great it was a learning experience and I went through a lot of ups and downs the living conditions would drastically change at times going a week without running water or electricity turns out to be quite the challenge but winter is where things got really tough having to go into splits early in the morning at minus 20 degrees Celsius makes you rethink your life choices but of course it wasn't all bad on the contrary we also had a lot of fun goofing around and since I was shifted around different warrior monk training groups I got to meet some of the best martial artists in the world these monks had no interest in fame it's hard to see into the heart of the myth through the fog of mystery what Shaolin really is but I'm sure of it some of these monks carried the true legendary skill and ancient wisdom of a Shaolin warrior [Music] and their teaching methods were insane but undoubtedly effective some days would have to train until at least somebody throws up and thank God I never did we learned in two weeks what people in the West learn in two years because it was literally beaten into us [Music] I was instructed in several traditional and modern fist forms swords whips chain whips double chain whip and of course the most iconic weapon the staff it was important to be ready to perform in front of a large audience at a moment's notice which happened plenty of times [Music] of course Shaolin is not merely the name of the monastic order but it's also a culture a culture that is often reduced to the sport but it's much more than that I don't want to get into a zat arras ISM and Chen doctrine but I will never forget what one of the meditating monks once told me spirituality that is expressed is not spirituality [Music] this really made me think but I want to conclude this on a different note in my experience behind Shaolin lies a very contradictory philosophy you can ask the same question to two masters and you'll get two completely different answers this frustrates me to this very day but I'm still young so maybe I'm not supposed to understand it yet it wouldn't feel right to make this video without at least mentioning one of my best friends that I made a child in and that's Bruce I don't know gave him that name but he was the kindest and most loving dog I've ever met in my life he'd even join us on training and by joining I mean napping in the shadows while we were training under the scalding hot Sun sometimes he'd even run up the mountain with me Bruce was the best but because he didn't have a real owner and was sort of a half wild dog who would also hunt on his own one day he disappeared that kind of broke my heart I really loved him I have the suspicion that he was hit by a car since he loved going out after dark I just hope that it was a painless and quick death rest in peace boos I know it's important to be humble but if I may just say what I'm most proud of it's not the Kong food that I learned it's about the inside look that I was granted into the lives of my close friends at Shaolin Temple the friendships that I have made and the togetherness that I have experienced together through blood sweat and tears literally I don't regret a second of it finally having a better understanding of Chinese mentality and the Chinese way of thinking I want to thank all my masters for their endless patience with me I am forever in your debt you open my eyes to so many things it's almost impossible to put this into words everything you guys have done for me without you I'd still feel lost to this very day it was probably the greatest adventure of my life and I'm honored to be a part of Shaolin Temple thanks for listening [Music]

Channel: Ranton

Views: 7,615,891

Rating: 4.9437509 out of 5

Keywords: Happy, Fun, Ranton, Shaolin Temple, My Life At Shaolin Temple, Shaolin Kung Fu, Shaolin, What is Shaolin, Shaolin Temple documentary, Shaolin Monks, China

Id: XZuKUPMpcwA

Length: 13min 36sec (816 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 05 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/dogslayeggs]

I loved the quote "spirituality that is expressed, is not spirituality"

[u/markodus]

Maybe he can tell us what was that noise...

[u/superbaal]

great video, just sharing his experience.

wish he could've gone into more detail; it's very much a summary of his personal efforts and experiences and not much more.

his accent is also really trippy, it bounces between german-english and chinese-english accents but only if you're paying close attention.

[u/Brudus]

Real Shaolin like most traditional Chinese cultural died with the cultural revolution. All the remaining temples are allowed to exists under the eyes of the communist party because they are good for promotion and tourism.

[u/weaponode]

Bruce transcended. I am certain of that.

[u/bearCatBird]

I'm always amazed at what the human body and mind can achieve under specific conditions. Given my current situation, I'd consider myself the Shaolin Monk of laziness.

[u/CodyByTheSea]

lol just watched his vid reviewing the Shaolin/kung fu moves in the game For Honor. Pretty fun.

[u/Mansyn]

Seems like he has a pretty nice life, The choice to do whatever he wants without regard to finances. I'm jealous.

[u/Stealthy_Bird]

It’s so weird how so many videos randomly pop up on my YouTube recommendations and then it also gets posted on Reddit