CHENXIANGGE MONASTERY

This monastery of nuns located just steps away from the Yu gardens is very little visited and it is really a pity! The temple houses the largest monastery of Shanghai nuns, and is easily identifiable with its strong smell of wood that gave it its name. Legend tells that the smell comes from the statue of Guanyin, carved in a block of eagle wood (also known as the aloe wood). Brought back from Thailand under the Sui Dynasty (581-618) by an imperial envoy, the statue would have sunk during a storm on the Huai River. She was reportedly found a thousand years later in Jiangsu Province by Pan Yunduan, the father of the Yu Gardens.

Pan Yunduan then sent the statue to Shanghai, to install it in the temple he was building along the gardens. The original statue disappeared completely during the Cultural Revolution: and probably destroyed by red guards who attack any religious symbol. The statue currently found in the temple dates from 1990: The main abbess of the monastery visited Thailand to find a block of eagle's wood similar to the original, in which a new Guanyin was as faithful as possible to his ancestor. The temple itself is a haven of calm in the middle of the Old Town Bazaar. The courses are beautifully flowering, and the hall with the statue of Guanyin (take the staircase on the left side of the second court) offers, in addition, a nice view over the surrounding roofs. A beautiful place that deserves a little visit.