We continued on to the Mahabodhi temple, the temple built around the Bodhi tree where the Buddha gained enlightenment. It had a very excited air about it, you could feel that many people had travelled from far and wide to come to this place, it was as if a world Buddhist convention was just about to begin. The form of the temple was very beautiful, and different to any I had seen before. It rose up tall and almost Aztec looking, I could imagine it growing, slowly emerging from the ground, shaking the earth and startling the birds. The main uddharupa of the temple sits inside, high up in a glass case. It was dark after being outside in the sun and we filled the small space along with other people who had come to pay their respects. Moving through to the part of the temple where the Buddha’s Bodhi tree stands, a perfect spot appeared under the tree next to a big group of Tibetan monks and lay people. It was very striking to see the variety of people, dress, languages, and faces that had all come to do the same thing at the same place. There was a strength to this, that the path the Buddha had come to fully realise under the tree in front of us went beyond any culture, religion or geographical place. Beings could see that it was good and wanted to follow it. ‘I am definitely a Buddhist’ I thought, ‘there is no going back now’.