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"Friends part reluctantly at the pavilion of separation, by the ancient road, there they think of the parting of their ways, shelter against the rain, protection from the dust, a need for man, day after day".
"On the mountain the birds greet the spring, while the monastery proclaims the dawn to all, the scent of incense on the breeze, the sound of the bell, a need for me, year after year.
This couplet has a double meaning, referring, in the first line, not only to the nunnery as a place for proclaiming the ancient way of the Buddha, a shelter from the impermanence and contamination of this world represented by rain and dust, but also to the nunnery's secular duty of sheltering men from physical rain and dust as they pass along the physical road in front of it. In the second line, the poem not only refers to worship in the nunnery at dawn on a spring morning, but to the nunnery's duties to bring enlightenment to all the people.
The History of the Cheung Shan Kwu Tsz
The bell of the nunnery is dated Chien Lung 54 (1789), and this is almost certainly the date of first foundation. The inscription on the bell makes it clear that it was donated by villagers from the various nearby villages," and it remains the unanimous belief of the local villagers that the nunnery was founded by the joint action of their ancestors.
The history of the nunnery is soon told. The original buildings became decrepit and were demolished and rebuilt in full in 1868.2 Local villagers believe that the nunnery was originally built a little further up the side of the mountain, and was only moved down to stand immediately adjacent to the road it served in 1868.
The reputation of the nunnery was at its highest in the late nineteenth century. Lee Pui-yuen (李沛源), of Sheung Wo Hang, a famous local teacher, had a great affection for the place, writing the couplet for the main door mentioned above. According to a fellow-villager, "when aged he retired" to Cheung Shan Kwu Tsz, and lived there until his death." In 1887, Lee Cheung-chun (李章駿), one of his pupils from Sheung Wo Hang, went to try his luck in the Sau Tsoi (秀才) examinations in Canton. After leaving his village, he spent the first night at the nunnery, to say farewell to his old teacher, and to pray for divine assistance. He