MONKEY!!!

If, like me, some of your earliest verifiable childhood memories concern a rather crazy, inexplicable, badly dubbed Japanese TV series called MONKEY [also sometimes called Monkey Magic] (the other ones, for me, being the last few episodes of Blake's 7 - click HERE for more info - in fact this TV series is where my parents got my name from...), then this is of special interest. (Although the Chinese seem to hate the TV series, since it's less than serious and not entirely faithful to the original book, which is a very famous part of classical Chinese literature. The real-life monk actually set out, in the year 629, on his perilous 17 year solo journey to India and back again to collect various Buddhist scriptures (thousands of miles across mountains, deserts, etc. etc. etc.). I believe this is the temple he returned to, not the one where he started out; but I'm probably getting my facts mixed up a bit. I thought this was in Luoyang, but actually Wikipedia says it's in Xi'an (the two places are not that far from each other - from memory, I went on a train from Xi'an to Luoyang which took about five or six hours). Anyway, this real journey inspired the classical Chinese fiction Journey to the West, in which the monk Tripitaka (although apparently also called Xuanzang and various other names) is aided by The Monkey King and several monsters.

Statue of the real-life monk Tripitaka at his temple in Xi'an or Luoyang, China

Apparently, this "Japanese style" of building originated in China, but was adopted later by the Japanese.

If you look carefully, you can see the monks playing basketball.

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