Anyone been to this Buddha Museum? Is it good and is there really a Starbucks inside?
I thought the area was mostly off the beaten path for non-Buddha-interested people.
佛光山佛陀紀念館 Fo Guang Shan Buddha Museum
84049, Kaohsiung City, Dashu District, 統嶺里統嶺路1號
https://goo.gl/maps/GUcvebWoikk
yes, there is really a starbucks inside. since the new visitor center opened a few years ago, it’s become very touristy, with souvenir shops,large (though still vegetarian) restaurants and exhibtion halls. i guess, there’s still the old monastery if you’re looking for something more spiritual but i don’t know if they grant access to everyone who wishes to visit that.
One enters the complex through what looks like a glorified shopping mall. I didn’t notice the Starbucks, but it would not be the worst example of rampant commercialism there.
The Foguangshan campus is huge, although a lot of it consists of offices, classrooms, monk’s quarters, and such which you wouldn’t be visiting. The main Buddha Halls are in the back (in two areas). The pyramid-looking thing is the new one; I remember liking the old one better. There are large buildings housing the ashes of devotees in what look like bank deposit boxes. My colleague has interned her father’s ashes there, and reports that the annual fees have become quite high.
On Dharmawheel.net there was some discussion about bona fides, so to speak, of the relic (a supposed tooth of the Buddha) enshrined within one of the halls.
https://dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?t=13867
Apparently it had been given to Ven. Xingyun, the Foguangshan founder, by…some Tibetan monk that nobody seems to know. Anyway, you can venerate it at Foguangshan, provided you are willing to endure a 20-minute (?) ritual during which it is unveiled. I spent my 20 minutes plotting ways to break in and steal the damn thing, so no doubt I can expect to be reborn as a cockroach.
Wow. Sounds like a Buddhist cult.
I’ll go and venerate the god of caffeine.
It’s long been a major local tourist attraction down there, so not surprising.
There is huge money flowing into any Buddist establishments from temples to well known monks or whatever they’re called. I’ve sat next to monks from Taiwan in first class on the plane and seen first hand Buddhist establishments charter private charter jets. Wouldn’t surprise me to see things like starbucks in a buddha museum.
Yes, more like tourist place. I will have check if Starbucks there has no meat.
It doesn’t, I wanted a ham sandwich but all non meat products only.
I visited Fo Guang Shan Museum for the first time last August. It’s impressive and commercial at the same time. And yeah, the Starbucks is billed as “the world’s first vegetarian-only Starbucks.”
Went to Fo Guang Shan a few days ago, incredibly beautiful place. Stopped at Starbucks to get a coffee (my annual visit to Starbucks I guess 
), but I recommend the vegetarian burgers that you can find at the other side of the place, very good and only 70 NTD. Amazing place overall, highly recommended.