Senior Uncle seemed to have noticed everyone's confusion and explained to us that we had walked around the temple one and a half times from the backyard, which meant we would need to walk two full circles to return to the backyard door. However, there was a possibility of making a mistake since everything we were seeing could be an illusion; we might have never left the backyard at all. With things as they were, we could only try.
After we walked another half circle, we found the temple gate was still wet, which confirmed what Senior Uncle had said: this gate must definitely be the true backyard gate.
"Old Hong, what do we do now? You can't expect me to carry this guy forever," Old Donkey started complaining after we got into the courtyard.
"Put him down for now; let me assess the situation," Senior Uncle said, not taking his eyes off the hanging straw man.