In Daoism (Taoism), the gourd shape is taken to represent heaven and earth with an extended meaning representing the entire universe.
Within the gourd there is a mystical zone in the form of an alternate universe or the entrance to another world, and Daoist immortals and practitioners can travel between these two worlds.
Because of this association, the bottle gourd has long been a Chinese symbol of self-containment and self-sufficiency. Old Chinese fables sometimes describe a person accidentally coming upon a small, narrow opening in the mountains and entering into a mystical or fairy world where people enjoy peace and long and happy lives.
This same physical characteristic of the gourd carries over into the traditional Chinese garden where a person enters an enclosed but spacious compound through a small opening or gate.
The gourd is also the Taoist (Daoist) symbol of alchemy. It was believed that the "elixir of immortality" could be produced through the distilling of red cinnabar placed in the upper chamber of the gourd and mercury placed in the lower chamber. The "marriage" of these two substances was a sexual metaphor for the union of semen and menstrual blood to create life.
Source: http://primaltrek.com/gourd.html
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