#ex-buddhist

[an-unanonymous-messenger]

Ever wondered about the devil? Well, there's not much to say about him, besides the fact that he wants all to perish, since he lost his chance of being God. The devil also poisons people with a twisted mind, making them fall for his lies, misleading them into the lake of fire and brimstone. He is madly at work here, wanting to avenge his fall from the Kingdom, wanting to hurt God out of spite by dragging His creation from the promise made for them. The devil is a liar, a deceiver, and a murderer. Why would anyone want to follow that monster? Jesus Christ is the One Who has true promises for all of us who repent, and that is eternal life. Hell itself is not a party everyone thinks it is; it is eternal damnation for the rebellious, where they are not supposed to be. Turn to Jesus Christ in repentance, follow Him through this circus of a world, and you will see how much it is worth it! Bless you in Jesus' Name! Amen.

[buddhaearedgirl]

Nearing my limit with this shit.

[kojiarakiartworks]

June 2013 KTM Kathmandu Nepal 　Thamel

© KOJI ARAKI Art Works

Daily life and every small thing is the gate to the universe ：）

[marioluigimarioluigi]

Massed Prayer for Florian and Juliana go to Pasio

[troutfur]

The thing is, the distinction between types of irreligion or even non-Christianity is often lost on Christians and thus, as WC fans are overwhelmingly from historically Christian cultures, they are all lumped together. Misotheists, alatrists, apoststes, atheists, and even just non-Christians in general all are typically portrayed with the same set of tropes. Thus, I think it's perfectly fine to just refer to all these types of characters as "atheists" as short-hand.

Just a reminder for the official writing team and fandom

[guzhufuren]

Short breakdown of 19 QLs from GMMTV 2025 lineup

trailers: playlist link

Dare you to death

joongdunk investigating crime and murders

Head 2 Head

keensea cursing each other out as Bad Buddy 2.0 but they are rich, in fashion school and one of them magically saw visions of their shared future

Burnout Syndrome

dewoffgun in a love triangle (or poly please). Dew is a fortune teller who reads Gun's future from his palm. Gun becomes a hired double for Off because Off doesn't want to go to meetings himself. Gun is an artist and draws Off in nude lots. dewoffgun as a messy love triangle of weird coworkers

Whale Store xoxo

milklove as a depressed grocery store keeper and her flirty regular customer who is a teacher and a repairgirl. side couple exes who get back together junemewnich

Only Friends Dream On

spinoff of Only Friends. jossgawin, earthmix and ohmleng are in a messy love hexagon on a theatre play set because all of them want someone who wants someone else in that 6 angled shape. Boston is back and hopefully here to fuck all of them. Earth as director, Mix as actor, Ohm as musician, Leng as actor, Joss as actor, Gawin as costume designer, Neo as Boston the play's photographer

That Summer

winnysatang: after being found guilty of a crime Winny gets sent to the countryside and finds unconscious Satang being washed ashore. Satang has amnesia and later turns out to be a prince. side couple Mond and Ryu

My Romance Scammer

ohmfluke and juniormark in a gay marriage scam show. two brothers Junior and Ohm make two high standing men Mark and Fluke fall in love with them in order to deceive them, marry them in 1 month and get their money. after rich dudes' lawyer tells them the divorce will cost them losing half of their assets if scammers don't sign special asset-saving divorce papers, it becomes a battle of who will outwit the other and which one will fall in love

Melody of Secrets

forcebook in a mystical horror with gore. Force is a criminologist assisting the police with murders, Book is his ex suffering from memory loss and no remembrance of who Force is. Jan as the sheriff and Boun is also there

Love you teacher

perthsanta as established boyfriends. Perth is very bad at being a primary school teacher and only works as one because his boyfriend Santa is a teacher too and is very good at it. Santa gets into an accident which causes him part time amnesia and reverts him back to a state of his 7 year old self half of the time. Perth has to regularly deal with taking care of a 7 year old (man)child which was his most hated thing to do

MU-TE-LUV

7 love stories about fortune. keensea as high school rivals who are destined to fall in love. queer group of kathoey friends played by Fluke, Neo, Yacht and Lego are serving looks around their high school and decide they also want to meet men so they make prayers to a mother's spirit about sending them some. ohmpleng as rival buddhist temple gangs' enemies to lovers. and some hets

Cat for Cash

firstkhao in a cat cafe bl. First is a debt collector and gets a power of talking to cats from a debtee who dies during his visit. when the deceased debtee's son Khaotung comes to sell the shop, First convinces him to keep the business running and become business partners. they fall in love in the process with their laps full of cats

Girl Rules

messy dykes and lesbian wrongs the series. girl version of Only Friends with namtanfilm, milklove and viewmim. Namtan is a director, Love is her coworker stylist and they have a one night stand. Film is Namtan's ex. Milk is a model and pursues Film and Love. Milk isn't Love's type. View claims to be straight but Mim seems to be set on breaking her egg. it's horny, messy and blissfully gay

Boys in love

all fresh faces in the sweetest most precious high school bl ever written. a top marks student has to tutor a zero braincell student who falls for him immediately and flirts relentlessly. a different loverboy who just got rejected falls in love at first sight with a dimply cute new student. papangpodd as teachers who are shipped by everyone at that school

My Magic Prophecy

jimmysea falling in love in countryside while danger is looming over them. Sea can see the future and starts having visions of his friend's older brother Jimmy. Jimmy is an ER doctor who gets targeted by someone and has to quickly disappear and lay low for some time. Sea brings him to countryside and they gradually fall in love. side couple franctee

A Dog and A Plane

taynew in a deeply silly crack bl. Tay's friends get in trouble and he offers New to make it up to him himself instead. New asks him to find out if his flight captain boyfriend is cheating. he is, but he pays Tay off to keep it quiet and shenanigans proceed. Marc accuses the side piece flight attendant Poon of being an asshole. all branded couples fall in love

Me and Thee

pondphuwin in a mafia-ish bl. shady billionaire/mafia Pond who was raised on corny mafia soap operas pursues model Santa, but photographer Phuwin gives him a piece of mind regarding manners and consent, so Pond asks him to teach him how to pursue Santa correctly. Santa's not-boyfriend Perth is upset. Pond learns more about Phuwin, falls in love and starts an extravagant pursuit. Est is very handsome as a bodyguard butler

Wu

nanisky bl or a bromance that surely looks like a bl. a fortune teller Sky offers a failed athlete Nani to be his assistant. their meeting was predestined and they have a string of fate tying them together

Memoir of Rati

greatinn period bl. Great and Inn meet while watching the same street play in early 20th century. Inn works as a translator for a westerner and a teacher of french for thai bureaucrats. Great is a noble who sweetly romances Inn, but the familial expectations come into the picture. aouboom side couple where servant Boom secretly beats his master Aou in an underground fight

Ticket To Heaven

geminifourth bl by P'Aof set in 1996. young protege of a pastor Fourth and a defiant boy who lost his faith Gemini. Gemini moves into the seminary area to be guided back on the right path after his mother went to jail. young love, repression, homophobia, catholic guilt, and the love defying everything

[tanuki-kimono]

Lovely article+illustrations by Kimono Ichiba (via Tanpopo <3), overviewing famous "scary"patterns... which are in fact often auspicious as traditional Japanese patterns ;)

I believe I have them all on the blog somewhere but it's nice having them in one place so let's go!

Spiderwebs (kumo no su)

In ancient China, spider were seen as auspicious messengers connecting Heaven to Earth.

As the spider catches its prey in its web, spiderweb came to signify "grasping happiness".

Apparently during Edo period, prostitutes and geisha used spiderweb patterned items as a good luck charm (meaning something like "this customer will come back").

A very famous spiderweb depiction is the Lady Rokujo ukiyoe [焔 honô (the flame of passion)] by female artist Uemura Shoen. Wisteria caught in the web could mean ``I hope [Prince Genji] will come tonight'' which is pretty sad considering her story T_T

Skulls (dokuro)

Exact name for human remains pattern is "nozarashi" (lit. "weather beaten") ie bones scattered in a field. This depicts a corpse turned to bones/unveiled from its grave by the elements.

Skulls are thought to ward off evil and bad luck. Bones can also symbolize a do-or-die spirit​, or hope for rebirth after death.

OP stresses a theory linking bones pattern to a buddhist saying 色即是空 shikisokuzekū "form is emptiness, matter is void, all is vanity​". An interpetation is that we'll all turn to dust one day so we're all equal.

Bones patterns are often seen during Obon (Festival of the dead) season.

Monsters, ogres and ghosts (yôkai / oni / yûrei)

Monsters patterns were then worn to ward off bad luck and evil spirits. Reasoning is: let's repel scary things by wearing an even scarier monster!

Fearsome monsters were especially use by people with dangerous jobs, like Edo period firemen.

Firemen often had the lining of their heavy fire attire (火事装束 kajishouzoku) embelished with lavish designs of brave heroes and fantastic monsters. It was both a talisman and a way to show that they did not fear danger or death.

Another reason behing monsters patterns is the Edo period love for "scary" entertainements, be it ghost stories, parlor or other types of games, art (see for ex. Utagawa Kuniyoshi), etc. And Edo city dwellers were all about being fashionable so a monster pattern would have been considered quite iki!

[colourme-feral]

Translation notes for Miseinen: Mijukuna Oretachi wa Bukiyo ni Shinkochu / Our Youth ep 6

As always, I screamed with @nieves-de-sugui and consulted @my-rose-tinted-glasses.

After I graduate, I'm gonna start working right away and live independently/live with my own efforts. Note: Interestingly, the term, jiryoku (live independently/live with my own efforts) in Buddhism means self salvation. While the show isn't specfically Buddhist, I do think it's still interesting that this meaning exists for this term because Haruki is in fact planning on saving himself through leaving his father and making money to support himself.

Haruki: I just get entangled in situations easily. Haruki's mum: Your father was also prone to fighting. You take after him after all. Note: In this scene, Haruki's mother uses "your father" specifically, rather than just drop the "your", which she did when referring to her ex-husband in ep 5. "You take after him after all" is her remarking quite factly in a 'ah, so you two are similar, huh' type of way.

Haruki: Because… I am my old man's son. H: And I will become like my old man sooner or later. H: I might even end up hitting you. Jin: You won't become the same as your father. J: It will be fine/don't worry. H: Will you stand watch for me/look out for me?

Haruki: My mum has (made) a new family, there's only my old man and me left. That's why I think I was scared. If I were abandoned by my old man, I would truly be alone, was what I thought. But now I… want to become a decent person.

Note: In this scene, Haruki mentions mihatte (to stand watch/look out for) and misute (to be abandoned). Both words include the kanji, 見 and the use of them is very deliberate to suggest that they are exactly opposite in meaning to Haruki.

When I go home, I'll also write a letter to you.

Haruki: I've got something I wanna do now. I've gonna live for the thing I wanna do. Kyohei: Are you looking down on me? But aren't you inferior (below me, level wise) to me? K: Those wounds you have sometimes. Aren't those done by your old man? K: Mummy didn't help you either? K: That's way too pitiful. Note: Kyohei also uses mikudasu (to look down on), which also contains the same kanji, 見 as mentioned above.

Jin: Weren't you gonna become a decent person? What are you doing? Haruki: Right? Minase, don't go back. J: 'Your sea and mine have merged/mixed together and are being rocked by the same wave is what I had believed firmly.' J: '(But) it was so easy for you to become far away from me/it was so easy for distance to come in between you and me.' Note: The scene is particularly interesting because both of them have different approaches to being decent people. While Haruki wanted to further himself from the friends he'd made, he realised that he couldn't be a bystander in that situation, which is his decency, especially having been a victim of his father's abuse. However, Jin sees being decent as Haruki no longer involving himself with anything that happens with those friends, which is why he sees Haruki's choice as him choosing to go against what he had said about trying to become a decent person.

[teashoptiramisu]

Royalty converting to an outsider religion? Especially more associated with a group that their family/people isn’t exactly friendly with? Yeah, totally implausible, I’m sure that’s never happened before in history.

I dunno maybe the ttrpg plotline is bad but your guys’ criticisms of it are pretty weak. I’m more sympathetic to “there’s too much shit about the fire nation” but it IS what sells; if we want air nomad and water tribe stuff we’re gonna have to shower more love and funding on fan efforts. How are those Kyoshi Vnovel guys doing? Tbh that might be more earth kingdom than air nomads, i’m not sure.

my initial reaction to this new princess zeisan character was just to say her design was weird but honestly the problems with her design don't bode well for her writing. like already the premise of "fire nation royalty joins the air nomads" is kinda weird bc someone from a nation's royal family is probably one of the people LEAST able to break free from the propaganda. like it only happened to iroh and zuko because of major life-changing events (losing lu ten & being banished) and you wouldn't include their transformations in a short description of their characters bc iroh's is slowly revealed and zuko's happens over the course of the story. and her design is just an air nomad necklace and sash on top of a fire nation royal outfit so like...where's the transformation? and how are zuko and iroh notable for breaking free if someone barely two generations earlier was able to?

like are we supposed to believe everything was totally chill between the fire nation and the air nomads before the sozin's comet genocide? bc that's not how genocide works. how could sozin have justified sending all those soldiers to the air temples if there wasn't already a concerted anti-air nomad propaganda effort in the fire nation? not all fire nation citizens bought into it obviously (kuzon) but a member of the royal family? a member of the royal family wearing the whole fucking shoulderpads and hairpiece get-up? where's the treason haircut? the rags from living among the people for years unlearning what she was raised with? the visual reflection of her turning her back on her culture?

creating a new character that's an existing character's previously-unmentioned sibling is already hokey and fanfiction-y, having her be the air nomad convert sister of the Guy Who Committed Genocide Against The Air Nomads strains believability, and the laziness of her design means that i have little faith in her writers' ability to make anything good out of this

[an-unanonymous-messenger]

The so-called "Christian" witches are on the rise nowadays, and they are really trying to convince people that Christians can be witches. Isn't that controversial? You can't sit at the table of the Lord and at the table of demons at the same time. It would be like trying to give half your love to your family and half to the crowd that misleads you. It is not right to be a Christian and to practice witchcraft. That is not Christian. We should not show our Father partiality, but be completely committed to Him, as He has shown us His love through Jesus, in giving His all for us on the cross. He didn't give fifty percent, but a hundred percent of His blood for our salvation. We should learn to show Him the true thanks He deserves through our faithfulness, and not division of heart for these rituals, which do not even come from God. I pray you see things the way God teaches to, and read the Word in order to learn of God's true will for us. He is no tyrant or dictator, but a loving Creator Who knows what is for our good. Bless you in the Name of Jesus Christ our Saviour. Amen.

[ossidae-passeridae]

4. What’s the worst part of fanon? 😈

Question from here

That'd be the implicit racism thanks for asking!

A non snappy response, aka to explain what I mean by that:

A lot of fanon tropes implicitly reinforce a very white, America-centric POV, and in a universe like the GFFA which lies somewhere between heavily Asian-inspired and gloriously multicultural, that really rubs me the wrong way. (To clarify upfront: it is not racist or whatever to enjoy these tropes or to write them, but it worries me when people don't even seem to realise it)

An obvious, innocuous-seeming example is the tendency to use 'Ben' instead of Obi-Wan's actual name in AUs — especially when others' names (Anakin, Mace, Cody, etc) aren't changed as well. The biggest difference between those names and Obi-Wan's is that Obi-Wan's is obviously Asian inspired, and theirs aren't. It's not something I expect most people even think about! But it always leaves a sinking feeling in my chest.

(Obviously if, like in canon, Obi-Wan is using Ben as a pseudonym while in hiding that's a very different kettle of fish.)

A larger example is how incredibly common it is to cast the Jedi as space-Christians — some common examples being focus on tenets (the Jedi Code, which is a meditation mantra, not a rulebook), the pervasive Catholic Guilt which is very explicitly Christian in nature, the emphasis on worship as ritual rather than a state to work towards, the generalised "all organised religion must be Bad" sentiments that feel very specifically ex-Christian in nature.

Thinking about one's own religion and expressing thoughts through fiction/art isn't an issue in and of itself.

The thing is, the Jedi are explicitly based on Asian Buddhists. Not just in set dressing, but from the ground up, from their beliefs and the way they act, to their clothing to the structure of their temple — to strip that away is to remove what makes the Jedi the Jedi. It's to remove the Asian-ness and replace it with something predominantly white. It implies that Asian influence shouldn't or can't exist in the GFFA, or that there's something inferior or wrong about Buddhism that needs to be "fixed".

Again this isn't something where I think that fan authors are sitting there going "muhahaha I'm going to be RACIST today", I know that's not what's happening. But when so much Jedi-centric content being produced minimises the Asian influence and pushes a western one, it starts to say "there's something wrong with this group, we're trying to erase it because there shouldn't be representation at all" — an issue of scale, at its core.

(Then ofc there's all the "the Jedi steal babies" and "the Jedi ban emotions" and "the Jedi need to be destroyed" which, entirely separate from the above, if you replace 'Jedi' with 'Buddhists' I'm kind of starting to wonder why you hate Asian people/Asian religions, you know?)

I won't even get into the fanon surrounding the clones, because that'd require me to talk about KT far more than I'd like to on any day, but especially today 🤣

(All opinions expressed above are solely those of pass e. ridae and do not express the views or opinions of any affiliates or associates, passerine or otherwise)

[kojiarakiartworks]

June 2013 KTM Kathmandu Nepal 　Thamel

© KOJI ARAKI Art Works

Daily life and every small thing is the gate to the universe ：）

[booblywooblies]

some "chiller" christians wouldnt like this but i think christianity is inherently misogynist, like its right there in your creation myth theres nothing you can do to make it progressive

watching multiple videos on girl defined and how the younger sister got married recently and she was all i wont kiss before marriage and now shes married shes suddenly like wait sex should be pleasurable why do so many married women hate sex, why did no one warn us sex is a skill that needs to be developed

and its like, im not a christian im not even an ex christian but if youre the wait til marriage + no sodomy type person then just go whole hog on having bad sex, like at that point sex isnt for fun right its for procreation so you should only bother to do it to pump out more kids

and im not saying like just let your man have his way with you i dont think women should have to "put up" with sex just bc man horny its like, if youre gonna have this restrictive regressive view of sex then no one should get to have fun, including the men

i mean even then i guess its still annoying bc cis women just arent built the same way cis men are like, a cis man cumming is necessary for procreation and a cis woman cumming is completely irrelevant, like biology is already inherently unfair, but i think fundamentalist christian men should be punished more bc it would make me happy

youd think if there was a god hed make female orgasms relevant to procreation, probably some good evidence then that hes not bc why else would human biology be so slapdash and bare minimum like that

[phoenixyfriend]

Apologies if you’ve been asked this before, but do you have any thoughts on fanon!Obi-Wan vs. canon!Obi-Wan? And is there any part of his character that you wish fandom or fic would address more often?

I think that a lot of the fics I had a lot of frustration with aren't really in my search field anymore; I got really frustrated with Woobie-wan and some related themes, and those were really common in Cod*Wan... but since I don't really read that ship anymore, I come across that specific characterization a lot less. It still shows up (especially in fics that decide to have some fun with the Qui-Gon bashing), but less so.

I do think a lot of authors have difficulty balancing the Sass with the Competence etc. but ngl I think one of my biggest Wow That's Uncomfortable approaches is when people can't fathom the idea of Obi-Wan being happy as a monk; in those cases, he's either written as repressed and unable to fathom the idea of loving someone the way Anakin can, or he's written as Secretly Yearning To Break Free For The Ship. A lot of it also has some real shades of "ex-Christian Western Fans project their trauma onto a Space Buddhist who doesn't want to leave his religion/culture despite many opportunities to do so."

(Seriously, there is so much 'oh, you are definitely imagining the Jedi as a fundamentalist Christian sect with culty elements and can't fathom that they aren't evil' out there.)

And like. IDK. I hate that a lot. The man may not be celibate, but that doesn't mean he's unhappy with the life he's leading. He's a space buddhist and happy about it! He doesn't need to be fixed. There are other things he needs help with, other things where he could use therapy or family counseling or something, but his religion is never implied to be something that needs fixing.

IDK if that answers your question but it's definitely the two things I notice most often: Woobie-Wan and Jedi-As-Western-Cult stuff.

The stuff I wish I could see more of is unfortunately less easy to pin down because it's mostly about balancing character elements and that's a matter of skill, not choice.

[beemovieerotica]

trying to find like 1 buddhist temple near me to go to and braved reddit to find commentary on different sects and it's such a cesspool of both completely unaware hypocrisy and "all religion bad" shit.

the way americans talk about modern buddhism is like "it's such a cult...they require membership dues...and they get political sometimes...and the leaders are really charismatic speakers" as if. as if every community center doesn't have rent to pay. and makes commentary on society at large. and the people they choose to speak are probably good speakers. every christian church in america also does all these things. like if these are the requirements for a cult then every religion also does this and so of course the other half of the reddit comments go "and THIS is why all religions are cults!!"

I feel like I have a pretty good radar for cult behavior after matrix bullet dodging at least 2 in college and these people online are specifically talking about the sect my grandparents & extended family are in. and it's weird because the complaints are primarily philosophical in nature, like "they communicate with the spirit realm!!" and idk how to emphasize to people that it doesn't strictly matter how weird you think a belief system is, that's not what makes something a cult. it's whether or not the cult subsumes the person's life, isolates them from non-participants, forces an emotional dependency, deifies and makes unimpeachable a still-living leader, and/or requires an ever-escalating financial stake. the average evangelical church ticks off most boxes in this list, the temples they're talking about don't do any of these things, they have esoteric takes that at best will get an eyebrow raise in conversation.

like it's not terribly surprising that american ex-christians are put off by the idea of people connecting with their ancestors and deceased loved ones because of its contradiction with both atheism and the christian afterlife - and I wouldn't lump it in with spirit medium grifters since people are literally not being paid for this service. it's just really odd sifting through all of the commentary because I absolutely agree that any religious group can turn into a cult, I don't think buddhism is immune to that at all, I don't think any belief system is at its core immune to becoming an isolating force in someone's life - but it's just wild seeing these sects being but through a Good Religion purity test that no christian church would pass just based on the surface level strangeness of their beliefs versus the actual identifiers of what a cult looks like.

but anyway that's a long tangent. the temple that I'm looking at is not part of that sect but a different one, it's the only one within reasonable driving distance with an up-to-date calendar of events and responsive staff, and I'm feeling very cunty right now and I'm seeing that is has had concerns raised about it in the past of being "too political" "too fast-growing" "too aggressive in recruiting" and I simply love placing myself in circumstances and then telling everyone about the drama I find. that is worth jotting down. I'm going to record all my experiences and report back, and if I do end up in a cult, y'all will be the first to know - and if it's an unremarkable place with a normal staff, you will also know. I would preemptively rate my cult susceptibility a 3 out of 10 - but looking at this temple I'm going to say it's a 2 out of 10 because everyone there is white and I'm put off by overly-enthusiastic white people.

[niteshade925]

April 11, Xi'an, China, Xi'an City Museum/西安博物院 (Part 1):

Since I didn't take pictures of all the plaques, and some of these artifacts can be near impossible to look up, I will not attempt to name all of them.

The entrance to the Xi'an City Museum, also called 西安市博:

Xi'an city used to be called Chang'an/长安, and was the capital city of 13 different dynasties, including Qin dynasty, Han dynasty, and Tang dynasty. This is a (pretty big) model of Chang'an city in Tang dynasty, including parts of the palace:

Various Buddhist statues from different dynasties:

And a statue of Guanyin (Avalokiteśvara) that's in a pose I've never seen before:

Stone column with a loong dragon and clouds carved upon it:

I didn't take a picture of the plaque, but if I remember right this is a bixi/笔洗, or a small bowl containing water where you rinse your brush, and in this case it's fashioned from jade:

A carved jade decor (from a belt?):

A Qing dynasty jade zhaijie/斋戒 tag. Zhaijie is usually translated as "fasting", but it's more than that, it combines temporary dietary restrictions (definitely no meat or fish/seafood or alcohol, I'm not sure about animal products) and abstinence from a variety of activities, like enjoying feasts, entertainment, and working on official business. Those in mourning may be exempt from zhaijie. This tag was worn by officials when there were major national ceremonies going on, for example the annual ceremonies at Temple of Heaven/Tiantan/天坛 where the emperor prays for rain and a good harvest, as a reminder to observe the zhaijie rules during the ceremony:

Painting from Republic era (1946). I can literally read everything on the upper left but the name of the painter.........................sigh. Can't find it online either. Anyway I love how the painter created depth here:

This painting is by Qing era painter Zhang Qia/张洽 in 1787. I love the brushwork:

Totally forgot to take a picture of the plaque, but I love this calligraphy:

Bronze ritual wine vessel (called hé/盉) with phoenix head spout, from Warring States period (475 - 221 BC):

Bronze wine vessel (called jué/爵), if I remember right, this is from Zhou dynasty (1046 - 256 BC):

Bronze bells, part of a bianzhong/编钟 set. Although pentatonic scale has been seen as a key characteristic of traditional Chinese music, the bianzhong can play in heptatonic scale. And for the physics lovers out there, this kind of bell is very interesting in that the cross section is almond-shaped, and a single bell can produce two different tones depending on where it is struck. The protrusions on the bell (called mei/枚 or zhongru/钟乳) apparently affect the frequency of the sound produced as well.

The Bianzhong of Marquis Yi of Zeng (曾侯乙编钟) is the oldest playable set that has been found so far, discovered in the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng (died 430 BC). A full album was recorded with this ancient bianzhong set in 1989.

Early currency....yep these are shells. This is the reason why Chinese characters with the shell radical (贝/貝) usually have to do with money or treasure (ex: 财, 寶, 购, 赎, etc etc):

Different coins from different states in the Warring States period:

Different coins and molds after Qin dynasty (the weirdly shaped ones are apparently all from Xin dynasty/新莽):

Different seal stamps. I love the one with the turtle on it