03/21/2025

Xiang Yun Temple’s YAD Members Attended the White Elephant Leadership Training Camp

Reported by Junhui Fitch, Humanistic Society, Austin

On March 21st-23rd, members of Xiang Yun Temple’s Young Adult Division (YAD) attended the annual BLIA-YAD White Elephant Executive Training in St. Louis, Missouri. The 9 representatives from Austin were Junhui Fitch, Claire Qu, Rishi Subramani, Ethan Wang, Yoyo Wang, Bella Qiu, Haylee Wu, Natalie Wu, and Alex Tran. The White Elephant is an important marker within BLIA-YAD. Individuals who achieve this status are well versed in Humanistic Buddhism, and have proven themselves as leaders not only in their own community, but also across branch temples. This year, the theme of the event was “Building a Better You”. Attendees studied various essentials of Buddhist thought, practiced meditation, and took part in several team building activities. 

One popular activity was the competition to build a paper replica of the famous Gateway Arch landmark. Attendees were split into smaller groups, and raced to see who could build their replica the fastest. Another memorable activity was cooking dinner on Saturday evening. Each group was put in charge of preparing one dish for dinner. Working together in the kitchen was not only a lesson in teamwork, but also an important cultural activity. Some dishes such as spring rolls were from traditional Chinese cuisine, while other dishes such as “ooey gooey butter cake” were from local St. Louis cuisine. This fusion of dishes represented a greater ideal than just food; It is important for Buddhist young adults to know their own cultural heritage, as well as enjoy and respect the heritage of others. 

On Sunday to conclude the training, all YAD participants took the Buddhism written exam. In addition, select qualified candidates took the White Elephant assessment in hopes of obtaining the White Elephant Executive status.

Claire Qu, 13, shared her experience over the weekend: “During my time at St.Louis, I enjoyed spending time around people who were not only my age but also older than me. I got to learn more about the people from other YADs and how things are in their temple. I enjoyed doing all the fun activities that they had planned and I believe they were all very special and important towards the white elephant training program.”

Rishi Subramani, 15, also gave his thoughts: “St. Louis was a wonderful experience to learn about our theme which was "building a better you". Aspiration was one of the main things we learned about on the first day as we learned how everyone has a goal to achieve an aspiration is a way to make your goals into a reality. We learned about the different types of aspirations youths can have. For example, an aspiration to have compassion or an aspiration to help others. Lastly, we also learned about ways to practice aspirations!”