“That was fun!” she exclaimed.

I followed after, and once we were all safe on solid ground we made our way toward the temple.

“This is pretty fancy,” I said.

“This one is nowhere near as opulent as the Grand Palace,” my mother said, “but still, it’s my favorite.”

“You’ve been here before?”

“I come up here every year.”

“How come I didn’t know about it?” I asked.

“You and your father would be out snorkeling or sailing and I’d come up here for a little quiet time. It’s the best place in the world for thoughtful contemplation.”

I wasn’t exactly sure what that meant.

“Come. I’ll show you around.”

There was a long staircase leading up to a large front door—more like a gate than a door, really. As we started up the steps, the smell of the incense became stronger. It wasn’t just that you could smell it, you could almost taste it. It made me feel hungry. The smell seemed to be dripping down the stairs to where we sat.

“Take off your shoes,” my mother said quietly.

Just outside the door were a dozen or more pairs of well-worn sandals. We left our flip-flops there, and my mother led us into the temple.

It was a large, open space with a soaring ceiling. At the front was a big wooden altar, where the sticks of incense were burning. Behind that were five huge statues of Buddha. Then, in front of the statues, I saw a half dozen people, all on their knees on little straw mats. They were bowing, touching their heads to the ground.

“Should we be here?” I whispered.

My mother nodded her head. “The monks like to have visitors.”

“Those people at the front…are they praying?”

“Possibly praying, probably meditating.”

“Meditating?”

“Contemplating life, trying to find peace and inner harmony,” she explained. “This is a place for quiet thought.”

It was quiet. Very quiet. Eerily quiet. It was as if even the whispered sounds of our voices were absorbed by the walls, which were lined with hundreds and hundreds of smaller statues.

As we talked, the people at the front repeatedly bowed low, touching their foreheads to the ground. Occasionally they would rise, bow, and return to their knees again. Two Buddhist monks, dressed in brilliant orange, glided across the room. I was used to seeing them along the streets. They always looked contented, happy—sort of Buddha-like. They, too, bowed to the statue, and then they proceeded to light more incense sticks.

I looked up at the biggest Buddha statue, the one above and behind the center of the altar. His hands were together in his lap, his eyes closed. On his face was the same expression that was on every statue of Buddha I’d ever seen—that smile. It reminded me of the smile on the face of the Mona Lisa. It was as if the Buddha had just made a wonderful discovery, learned something very satisfying, something that answered a long-held question.