“So what are these lotus things?” You’ve asked.

Pretty.

Very pretty.

Still not a good enough answer? If you’re a SuperNerd you can do a GoogleScholar search for “lotus botany. You can get your Dharma on at BuddhaNet by reading an overview of lotus symbolism. The USDA informational site for [tag]Nelumbo nucifera[/tag] is serviceable, but Wikipedia has a decent [tag]lotus[/tag] page. It does fail to mention that you can use roasted lotus seeds as a substitute for coffee. I have no idea if this is something one would actually want to do, or whether it’s something one would ever do twice, but allegedly you can do so.