This is the story of a 9th-century Japanese monk, Ennin (798), who crossed the ocean from Japan to Tang China as a member of an ambassadorial mission, retold by Virginia Anami, an admirer and researcher of Chinese culture and history. When the official mission finished its visiting to Chang'an, Tang's capital, and was about to return to Japan, Ennin made a tough and brave decision to stay in China to quest for Buddhist teachings. Ennin's four-scroll diary, The Record of a Pilgrimage to Tang China in Search of the Law, documenting his nine-year sojourn, was regarded as one of the three greatest travel notes of the world. The other two are Monk Xuanzang's Record  of the Western Regions and Marco Polo's Description of the world. It survived the ages and its English version translated by Professor Edwin Reischauer aroused Virginia's enthusiasm to trace the footsteps of Ennin in the 90's. Virginia was not yet able to make her dream come true until 980's when she began to reside in China with her diplomat husband, Ambassador Koreshige Anami. She pieced together Ennin's path over the past twenty-five years, visiting every sacred site mentioned in the monk's diary, photographing the same scenes she felt Ennin had seen ,200 years ago, talking to local people, writing diaries in the  style of Ennin, and thus organizing her new pilgrimage story.

Virginia Stibbs Anami was born an American in 1944 and became a naturalized Japanese citizen in 1970.She has resided in Beijing three times with her diplomat husband Ambassador Koreshige Anami.