The King walks the Path of the Odes in the bamboo forest.

When I travel to another country, I listen to stories the tour guides recount and try to gather from local residents stories the guides don't tell. On a trip to Asia I was fascinated with the story of the furin, a temple bell-shaped chime. The furin originated with the Chinese, who called the bell a fung-ling, and eventually was adopted by the Japanese. (It was also known as a futaku, fukin, or tetsuba.) The wind chimes we enjoy today may have originated with the fung-ling/furin. This is my interpretation of the story.

The breath of fung-shui

More than a thousand years ago, a king in China wandered alone in his bamboo grove. It had been a stressful day. There were problems in his country. The rainy season had been exceptionally dry, with just one shower in three months. Water was scarce. Without water, there could be no new rice crop. Rations from the last harvest could not satisfy his people's hunger.