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Arriving in Dublin on the morning of St. Patrick’s Day is like experiencing the calm before the storm. The cobblestone streets of Temple Bar are quiet and nearly empty, and bicyclists can cycle through the narrow streets with ease. This is the time to have breakfast while devising a plan: Do you want to find a place near the parade route? Should you claim a table at a pub? We filled up on eggs and coffee at Elephant and Castle in Temple Bar, and then saw the end of the parade. By noon, streets were clogged with people from all over the world -- singing in the streets, painting shamrocks on strangers’ faces -- and pubs rang out with traditional Irish songs. Don’t be shy if you don’t know the lyrics, since there’s a good chance you’ll hear the songs again. Have a Guinness (or two) and join in!

Located at the southern end of Hussain Sagar Lake, the Birla Mandir is a magnificent white-marble Hindu temple. The 200 tons of marble were imported from Rajasthan and the complex is open to everyone, regardless of religion or caste. The temple does not have traditional bells, instead cultivating a quiet environment that is conducive to meditation, and the main shrine is dedicated to Lord Venkateswara (Vishnu). There is also a temple dedicated to the Buddha, with fresco paintings depicting his life and work. Though divine in any light, try to visit Birla Mandir in the evenings, when the temple is illuminated with colored lights. The complex also comes alive every June/July for the Bonalu Festival—a spectacle not to be missed.

Hangzhou is an easy day trip from Shanghai, just 45 minutes by bullet train from Hongqiao Station. Hangzhou is the home of China’s prized Longjing green tea, which you can taste at the China National Tea Museum. The city is also known for its temples and for beautiful West Lake, captured in countless photos and classical Chinese paintings. Lingyin Temple is one of China’s largest Buddhist temples, which dates back to the 4th century (although most of the buildings that visitors see today are contemporary reconstructions of Qing Dynasty structures). In front of the temple is the Feilai Feng grotto, with more than 300 rock reliefs of Buddha, some dating from the 10th century.

The temples in Bali, Indonesia are famous for their multi-tiered thatch roofs. This was taken at Pura Taman Ayun in the village of Mengwi. Visitors are not allowed to enter the temples - we could only view from outside the walls. Thankfully the walls aren’t very tall :)

After New Year’s, tomatoes become the king of vegetables and flood the markets with no end in sight (until March). Many of the shirt-soakers hail from a dusty country town near the coast called Limache. These tomatoes hold a place in most Santiaguinos’ hearts and nearly every restaurant, joint, and household will be making copious amounts of “Ensalada Chilena” (Chilean tomato salad) at this time of year. The ingredients are simple: perfectly ripe tomatoes cut into slices or wedges (no skin), tempered onions, chopped cilantro or basil, a drizzle of olive oil and a pinch of sea salt. Heaven.

If you only see one temple in Bangkok, make it Wat Pho: home of the largest reclining Buddha in Thailand. The 141-foot-long statue is an artistic masterpiece plated in gold leaf and inlaid with mother of pearl. You could easily spend all day wandering the grounds, looking at reliquaries, visiting the massage school, and admiring the 400 statues of Buddha in the outer cloister—each posed and sculpted slightly differently. Before you leave, drop some money in one of the 108 begging bowls (one bowl for each of the characters of Buddha). The money goes to maintaining the Wat and the gift will bring you good luck. That seems like a fair trade.

This complex of Taoist religious buildings was constructed in the early 15th century under the Yongle Emperor, who also commissioned the Forbidden City, just to the north. The temple’s central building is the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests, a 38-meter-high (125-foot), three-tiered structure atop a three-tiered marble base. The wooden hall was built entirely without nails. Inside, the beautifully painted walls and ceiling make it a riot of color. On spring and summer mornings and on sunny winter afternoons, locals gather here to sing, dance, play games such as mah-jongg, and sip tea while catching up on neighborhood gossip.

This sprawling museum is located in four buildings near Battlefields Park—the most recent of them, the Pierre Lassonde pavilion, opened in 2016 and was designed by starchitect Rem Koolhaas’s OMA. The 25,000 works in its permanent collection cover the history of art in the province, beginning with the French colonial period and including artists who are still active today. The museum also holds one of the world’s most important collections of Inuit art, with some 100 pieces—mostly carvings in stone, whalebone, or ivory—on display at any one time. Temporary exhibitions focus on both local and international artists. If you have time for a sit-down meal, Tempéra Québecor—helmed by Marie-Chantal Lepage, one of Québec’s best-known chefs—is near the entrance of the new pavilion, with floor-to-ceiling windows looking out over the grounds and the Grande Allée.

Wat Phra Kaew, the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, is revered as the most sacred Buddhist temple in Thailand. The temple is located on the grounds of the Grand Palace at the historic center of Bangkok, and it is a highly important site to the Thai national identity. The Emerald Buddha itself is a 26-inch-high statue hewn from a single piece of deep-green jade stone, and no one but the Thai King is allowed to touch it. Visit the shrine to understand an intimate piece of Thai culture, but be sure to exercise the utmost respect!

The French destroyed this famous temple in 1954, but it was lovingly rebuilt and remains a favorite with locals. The structure commemorates the legend of Emperor Ly Thai Tong who originally built the temple way back in 1049. The distinctive single pillar is meant to signify the stalk of the lotus flower, a sacred Vietnamese symbol of purity.

Both Tokyo‘s largest and oldest Buddhist temple, Senso-ji is one of the city’s must see sights. The streets leading to Senso-ji are filled with souvenir shops where you can find tapestries, kimonos, kitschy key chains, and finger foods. Surrounding the temple you’ll also find yatai (food stalls) selling Japanese favorites like yakisoba (fried buckwheat noodles) and okonomiyaki (savory pancakes with a mix of ingredients including eggs, noodles, beef, octopus, squid, and green onion). Inside Senso-ji receive your omikuji (fortune) and if it’s not to your liking leave it behind on the wall of bad fortunes. Take your time exploring the grounds around Senso-ji, which are rich in pristine Japanese landscape design.

Under the eave, a monkey supports the weight of a temple roof on Ganghwa Island, in the Han river estuary, northwest of Seoul, a stone’s throw from North Korea... On one of my teen-age visits to Korea, an uncle took us to spend the day here, an island dotted with prehistoric dolmens, Buddhist temples, and 19th-century fortresses that kept out the French and the Americans in the last days before the ‘Hermit Kingdom’ finally opened up to the West. Jeondeung-sa temple, where I took this photo, has been a Buddhist sanctuary since the late 7th century. And here, I first tasted ‘dol-sot-bi-bim-bap,’ the quintessential Korean hot-pot rice dish, served sizzling in a stone bowl.

Parque de Oueste is a shady park toward the north of the city. The park is known for its rose gardens, as well as being home to the Temple of Debod, a gift for the Egyptian state in 1968. The overlook of the park offers beautiful views of the Royal Palace and the larger Casa Del Campo. It’s an ideal spot to split a bottle of wine with friends and watch the sunset after a long day of exploring Madrid.

Entering Hikawa shrine requires a purification ritual that begins with washing your hands, right then left, and rinsing your mouth (with your left hand). Next is the burning fire with smoke to waft over your head to burn off impurities and perhaps bring the blessings of Susanoo, the Shinto god of storms and seas. Now in your new state of purification, you can enter this Shinto shrine between wires covered with fluttering osame-fuda, the prayer paper strips pilgrims tie up at each shrine. White prayer papers are for novice pilgrims who aspire to progress to red papers and then to silver and gold as they become veteran pilgrims. Inside the shrine, take a moment to toss a coin into the offering box or perhaps make a prayer or a wish to the god of the shrine. Sometimes photography is forbidden and other shrines forbid shoes so pay attention to signage. If you have an injury, buy some incense, light it in the shrine and waft the smoke toward your injury to get Susanoo’s attention. Almost every Shinto shrine in Japan (9,000 of them!) has a temple stamp and resident monks to hand paint the stamp into your temple book for a few yen. Purchase a temple book at any shrine and collect intricate stamps at all your temple stops. A full temple book is a gorgeous souvenir from Japan. Should you be lucky enough to visit Japan in September, go to the Akasaka Hikawa Shrine festival.

The Western Wall (also called the Kotel) is a remnant of the ancient wall that surrounded the Jewish Temple’s courtyard in the Old City of Jerusalem. It is one of the most sacred sites in Judaism, outside the Temple Mount itself. The plaza in front of the wall is divided into separate sections for women and men. Some worshipers wedge their prayers, written on small scraps of paper, into crevices between the stones in the wall, while others stand and pray, sometimes for hours. Archeologists have uncovered layers of the wall underground through years of excavation, and via a guided tour, visitors can walk through areas of this original, unrestored site that dates back to the 1st century C.E.