By: Bin Peng
Translated by: Huali  Yuan

March 26, 2017 is the Cherishing Youth Day in Gold Sage Monastery. CYD is supposed to be easy since we held this event every year. It is not true: the activities to server two or three hundred people has never been an easy thing. It was my honor to participate in the preparation of programs, and I found this is not an easy task.

One of the favorite program for children is the vegetarian food. This day, different countries, different flavors of dozens of vegetarian food were displayed in different booths for anyone to taste. The food just lasts a few seconds in our mouth, but the preparations have to start a few weeks ago. Desserts, homemade drinks, main course, sushi, marshmallow, popcorn and so on. The popular menu from previous years are preserved this year. These are still relatively easier. Every year, Dhamar Masters also need prepare some new recipes which takes more time. These need to be tested before they can be determined. Dozens of volunteers took more than one week to prepare all choosed recipes so as to be able to offer all guests a rich vegetarian day.

Every year there is no rain during Cherishing Youth Day and Respecting Elder Day. This CYD is a little earlier than the past, and the rainy season of California this year is a little late. There was still raining on Saturday morning. I had been worried how to do if raining: play games in the corridor? What about the outdoor activities? Fortunately, there was no rain from Saturday morning, and it started raining on Sunday night when the event finished already. I don’t know whether someone supports this quickly. Anyway, this event has not been affected by the weather this year.

This year's programs were changed back and forth several times. We were still changing the schedule the night before this event. Every year, we will prepare a drama as the main program. At the beginning, we’d like play the drama "humiliation fairy". Because Teacher Peter got hurt in his feet, we have to replace it with a simpler drama. But, that was canceled due to the time. At end, the drama was replaced by in interactive storytelling. It was a simple story. But, it becomes very attractive to children when Teacher Peter told it. This storytelling should be one of the most popular program!

The girl students from GSM Sunday school played guzheng, pipa and other musical instruments. The girl students and boy students, who cannot speak Chinese, recited The heart sutra, sung the song "I am lucky to study Buddhism" and chanted the "repaying parents matra". The students from Gold Mountain Monastery performed two verse recitations and nursery rhymes, but also sung "Amitabha song". The students from CDR performed "Song of Buddhist young man" and "You raise me up". All these caused the applause of guests. The girl students from GSM also danced fan dancing and ribbon dance. These students wear traditional clothes, dancing, causing a lot of cheers.

The group game is two people walking with three feet and carrying Easter eggs. This was very popular. Originally, we want to have three teams with 6 kids in each team, but each team was joined with 11 kids and parents. After the game started, each team still growed. The kids of the winner team have a small puppet as prize. The group game is followed by 10 booth games. In one hour, each child completed 10 games and then they can receive a beautiful gift. The 10 booths are: 3 art & crafts, reciting Buddha name, meditation, marbles, lotus in water, mirror writing, magic lift and CD knocking. The Sunday school’s teachers had done a lot of work to prepare the three art & crafts. Each booth need to prepare hundreds of materials. Without their hard work, CYD would not succeed as this.

Thank all children and their parents for the participation. You provided a great chance for us to server you. Thanks to the GSM Dharma Masters.  Without their support and hard work, there is no way to held this event. Thanks to all the volunteers: who working in the kitchen, who serving in the office, who preparing the site, who working in the game booth, who organizing the activities, who working in the parking lot, etc. Without your hard work, there is no success of the evnet. Thank Mr. Fang for his wonderful work. Without his humor and hard work, the event would not be so successful. Thanks to Ver Master Hua. Without VM’s great vow, there is no CYD.