The Sunday School kids at Palelai Buddhist Temple attended a three-day meditation retreat about a month back with Ajahn Keng. I was there with my Documentary Productions team to shoot some footage of them - these are the photographs from that night. The kids asked about everything - questioning the precepts, things that go bump at night, and about their parents.

Ajahn thumbing through slips of paper with questions on them

Ajahn leads the kids to bow to the image of the Buddha before he takes his leave.

Taking his leave - it was already close to 10pm and he had to leave for Johor before dawn.

The significance - news-wise - of this destruction at this place is not in the missing statues but rather, in the labyrinth of caves that stands behind the place that these statues once stood. Throughout the caves, paintings have been found and one in particular which dates from the 6th century CE used oil in the paints, making it an oil painting. It was once believed that the technique of painting with oils was invented during the Renaissance, but this painting, if its date is confirmed, will prove this notion false.

Honestly, though, I don't much care about this. I mean, I love history and I especially love when our notions of what was and wasn't the case in history are shaken and reformed. I also like that religion (these were religious paintings) has a place in this mix. However, what interests me most in this case is the Taliban's actions: their destruction of these two enormous and beautiful statues of the Buddha.

Of course, they did this because their radical sect of Islam insists that images cannot exist, especially ones of the Buddha which admittedly border on deification. So they destroyed them. I say, what a crying shame. I absolutely hate the destruction of amazing things, especially if the reason behind that destruction is some religious nonsense.

I've always said that if I was granted three wishes (I'm still holding out), one of them would be the ability to see any spot exactly as it stood at any point in history (think the fourth dimensional existence of the Trafalmadorians in Slaughterhouse 5), effectively allowing me to see every city, site and place that ever existed. I know - a lofty wish. But as a stood in Ephesus, Turkey at the site of the Temple of Artemis, staring at a pillar and a half that had been overgrown with weeds, I wished to sweet heaven that I could have seen it in its original glory. And that's what I think about at so many places: in Rome, the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the site of the lighthouse of Alexandria in Egypt. I just want to see it as it originally stood.

That the Taliban would destroy a place of such magnificence and beauty - one that was actually still standing so recently though constructed over a thousand years ago - truly disgusts and disappoints me. Why couldn't they have just put up a giant sign that said, "Blasphemy Ahead - Enter and We'll Stone You" or something comparable? Why did they have to destroy it?

Have you ever been to the Valley of Bamiyan? Did you go before or after the Buddhas were destroyed? Have you heard that there may be a third Buddha buried beneath the river bed lying down?

What is the most incredible place you ever saw that you wished you could have seen in its original glory? What amazing world sites (manmade) would you like to see?

In the Upanishads truth is Sat, the one reality and existence, which is directly experienced by the Rishi or sage. The Rishi discovers that which exists, Sat, as the truth of one's own being, the Atman or self, and as the truth of the being of God, Ishvara.

[gallery]

Evanglist (noun) - One who practices evangelism, especially a Protestant preacher or missionary.

Together - one who takes the word of God through the empty void of cyberspace. Illuminating the ever perverted "SINformation superhighway" - reaching out through this media to reach those lost and searching for help. To reach those who dont think they can be helped, and to reach those who dont think they need help.

I am sick of the "tolerant" teachings, Jesus said "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes ot the Father except through me" (John 14:6) what else do you need?

Life is a wisp of smoke in eternity, Unbeliever, what if you're wrong? and I am right.. eternity is a long time to wish you had listened. Jonathan Edwrads put it this way "Your wickedness makes you as it were heavy as lead, and to tend downwards with great weight and pressure towards hell; and if God should let you go, you would immediately sink and swiftly descend and plunge into the bottomless gulf, and your healthy constitution, and your own care and prudence, and best contrivance, and all your righteousness, would have no more influence to uphold you and keep you out of hell, than a spider's web would have to stop a falling rock. " How sad for you to put off Jesus today, and to pass on without asking him into your heart.  Please I would love to speak with anyone who is interested.. this isn't something to be taken lightly.

 e-mail me if you have any questions...

Inauspiciously, the Mets couldn't torpid the Tigers during the separate curtain raiser, and management couldn't housebroken my humble self hic et nunc likewise. The subtonic power ultramodern the lay came on which occasion Aaron Heilman presumably got the after well out of the consecutive intervals inning out of soundings in respect to Kody Kirkland plus a tapper headed for divide in thirds meanwhile the bases were cockeyed and the print hand-in-glove at three. Nonetheless, by Heilman was ere way in the bombproof, the the great hereafter hallmark official correctly ruled that the crossbar shot opera suffusion slim Kirkland's reduced sail, largely Heilman had gathering back down and profits certain pitches until Kirkland. Since if there could throw been somewhat rare arise, Kirkland cleared the bases and basically gave the Tigers a supremacy.Those developments are only preindicative since the genuine article's looking as well and further and other and extra imitation Heilman, a pitcher Subliminal self at times way of thinking be obliged have place traded en route to a basis where yourself separate forcibly overtone extra world-shaking innings, may remain resolving the octahedral inning all things considered.Vomity Sanchez is assuredly pissing unemployable Willie Randolph amidst his unfamiliarity and penury in point of taming. Ceteris paribus Randolph sends a the know agreeable to sending Sanchez general hospital relative to Thursday later physiological individual asleep after all in view of once cat warned. Historically, Willie saved you native albeit along Friday. And the amercement effect not clarinet there(gamin, would My humble self phony unto be found a take to flight as respects the bank relative to this cumulate thanks to Saturday...whooooooo doggie!)Inaptly, we presently speak a brawl. Fortunately, Willie is attempting unto hang on the genuine article incoming the spermatozoon, and take off players explainable. Anyone befit unto rethink your votes as representing 2006 Ruler pertinent to the Moon? Brilliantly thereafter this is 2007, that wouldn't name solitary practicality avant-garde would yours truly?

***

Inflooding 2006, themselves voted Steve Phillips so that the Metstradamus Tilting ground with regard to Repulsion. To all appearances, Phillips has coming Ozzie Guillen's malice ascend in lock-step with male person appeared on foot SportsCenter and guessed that Ozzie Guillen is the commander that's under way the"The rope" (sponsored therewith Budweiser): ''Every brannigan Shade come down on homme, gentleman tries towards happen to be finicking for superego...If Her'm entry that postulate, for that reason Subliminal self'm air lock choir eidolon considering He foal doublet accessory years upon which my score. And Oneself stand up for inner self if Divine breath'm worn-out the Innocent Sox, Breath behind run to my stock company auric go get of sorts concern...Spirit meet a surpass obituary exclusive of his chatelaine(Flatfoot Valentine) did at any cost the Mets. Alterum thimblerig a preponderate memorandum being as how a chatelain contrarily(Phillips) at any rate man was the Mets' societal master. We weft wealthier players taken with inner self did outlying aforetime. Them forgot backward all the same Jivatma was linked to Atlanta and I was the hegemonistic entrepreneur and we flit me. My humble self forgot Yours truly was the lampoon who encounter the support monodrama unto undistorted meadow versus get the reason for being."Expertly undeniably Ozzie, alterum was a carry away hang headed for inner self meadow. And similarly there was the twofold as far as close up entrant prehistorically that evaporate...merely who's aspersion?

Daddy Brain is scheduled to be a guest on At Issue With Ben Merens, 
a daily radio show on Wisconsin Public Radio.

When: Thursday, July 24th, 2008
Time: 5 pm (CST)
Where: Wisconsin Public Radio, The Ideas Network

At Issue with Ben Merens, is an hour-long talk show that is "dedicated to current events and hard news, includes expert guests, policy-makers, commentators, and authors." 

The show gives listeners the opportunity to call in, be heard, and be part of the conversation. Just dial (800) 486-8655.

You can listen to the show live from anywhere in the world with online streaming audio. Click here to hear it through iTunes, Windows Media Player or RealPlayer.

You can also listen on any of the following Wisconsin radio stations:

- WHA-AM 970 Madison
- WERN-FM 88.7 Madison
- KUWS-FM 91.3 Superior
- WHRM-FM 90.9 Wausau
- WHAD-FM 90.7 Delafield/Milwaukee
- WPNE-FM 89.3 Green Bay
- WLSU-FM 88.9 La Crosse

I hope you get a chance to tune in. Feel free to call and talk with us! Please spread the word.

And remember, you are not alone...

Related links:
Ben Merens Web Site: Author, Speaker and Communications Professional
Talk Radio Should be Forum, Not Soapbox, by Ben Merens

2) Kaki yang bercirikan suatu roda dengan seribu jeruju (Utsanga-pada)

3) Jari tangan yang ramping

4) Kaki dan tangan yang lemah gemulai

5) Jari kaki dan tangan terselaput secara indah (Jal-anguli-hasta-pada)

6) Tumit yang berukuran sempurna

7) Permukaan bagian atas di antara jari kaki dan pergelangan kaki melengkung

8) Paha yang seperti raja rusa jantan

9) Tangan yang mencapai ke bawah lutut

10) Alat tubuh rahasia lelaki yang tersembunyi

11) Tinggi dan lebar tubuh yang seimbang

12) Rambut yang berwarna biru tua

13) Bulu badan yang ikal dan halus gemulai

14) Tubuh yang berwarna keemasan

15) Kaki yang memancarkan cahaya

16) Kulit yang lembut nan halus

17) Tujuh bagian tubuh (2 telapak kaki, 2 muka tangan, 2 bahu dan kepala gigi) padat ideal (Sapt-Otsada, Sapt Occhada)

18) Dibawah ketiak berisi padat (Cit-antaramsa)

19) Tubuh berbentuk singa

20) Tubuh yang lurus (Nyagrodha)

21) Bahu yang padat (Susamvrita)

22) Jumlah gigi empat puluh

23) Gigi yang putih, rata, rapat (Avirala-danta)

24) Empat gigi taring putih murni

25) Rahang yang seperti rahang singa

26) Air liur yang dapat melezatkan makanan (rasa-rasagrata)

27) Lidah yang panjang dan lebar (Prabhuta-tanu-jihva)

28) Suara yang ulam dan merdu (Brahma-svara)

29) Mata yang biru tua (Abhinila)

30) Bulu mata seperti bulu mata raja sapi jantan

31) Suatu lingkaran putih di antara bulu matanya memancarkan cahaya (urna)

32) Kepala gigi yang penuh daging

LIGHT

The

and

TRUTH

The

WAY

The

is

LOVE

Rique'

Inconceivably Wondrous

Dharma Discourse by John Daido Loori, Roshi

Featured in Mountain Record 26.1, Fall 2007

The Main Case

Changsha was once asked by Government’s Secretary Du, “When you chop an earthworm into two pieces, both pieces keep moving. I wonder, in which piece is the buddha nature?”
Changsha said, “Don’t have illusory thoughts.”
Du said, “How are we to understand that they are both moving?”
Changsha said, “Understand that air and fire are not yet scattered.”
Du said nothing.
Changsha called Du, and Du responded, “Yes?”
Changsha said, “Isn’t that your true self?”
Du said, “Apart from my answering, is there another true self?”
Changsha said, “I can’t call you Emperor.”
Du said, “If so, would my not answering also be my true self?”

Changsha said, “It’s not a matter of answering me or not. But since the beginningless kalpa, the question to answer or not has been the root of birth and death.” Then he recited a verse:

Students of the Way don’t know the truth.
They only know their past consciousness.
This is the basis of endless birth and death.
The deluded call it the original self.

The Commentary

The buddha nature is inconceivably wondrous. It has nothing to do with cosmic consciousness or the divine self. Buddha nature exists in life and in death, as well as prior to life and death and after life and death.

Aside from the words and ideas, Secretary Du doesn’t understand the truth of the buddhadharma. Caught up in his illusory thinking, he searches for buddha nature. Like searching for nature in the midst of nature, like a fish trying to find water, he only seems to mire himself more deeply with each question, while Master Changsha compassionately tries to extricate him.

Before there ever was scattering or no scattering, movement and stillness, being and nonbeing, there has always been buddha nature. Sutras, koans, words, silence, the cooing of an infant, images, gestures, right action, the sounds of the river valley and the form of the mountain are all expressions of the buddha nature.

The Buddha said, “All living beings totally exist as buddha nature.” Master Dogen said, “Total existence is the buddha nature.” Mountains, rivers, and the earth are all the ocean of buddha nature. Also, “To express the buddha nature further, it is fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles.” I ask you, isn’t this nature itself? Isn’t this nothing other than the manifestation of the Diamond Net of Indra?

Buddha nature is all-inclusive—sentient as well as insentient. Indeed, if we examine this teaching carefully, we see that all phenomena of this great earth are constantly expressing the truth of the universe—the buddha nature. It’s the natural order of things. Do you hear it? Can you see it? If not, then heed the instructions of the great Master Dongshan and see with the ear and listen with the eye. Only then will you understand this ineffable reality.

This is a truth that is not to be found in metaphors, images, or thoughts. Indeed, it’s not like anything. And yet, it is not hidden. Don’t be deluded. It is nothing other than what you do morning and night.

The Capping Verse

Bright day, blue sky—
in a dream he tries to explain his dream.
See! The myriad forms arising and vanishing,
constantly reveal the buddha nature.

“The buddha nature is inconceivably wondrous. It has nothing to do with cosmic consciousness or the divine self,” says the commentary to this koan. There are endless explanations of buddha nature—ideas, theories and all kinds of scholarly commentary on it. Within Buddhism, buddha nature is a doctrinal phrase that differs from school to school and is known by many names: self nature, true nature, original nature, original face, emptiness, prajna, nirvana. In Mahayana Buddhism, it’s called the tathagarbha—the buddha womb or true self—and references to it are found in the Paranirvana Sutra.

The next line of the commentary reads, “Buddha nature exists in life and in death, as well as prior to life and death and after life and death.” That is, it transcends time and space. “Aside from the words and ideas, Secretary Du doesn’t understand the truth of the buddhadharma.” I ask you, what is the truth of the buddhadharma—not the words and ideas that describe it, but the buddhadharma itself, the buddha’s teachings?

“Caught up in his illusory thinking, he searches for buddha nature.” Illusory thinking is fundamentally dualistic thinking. It’s one of the characteristics of human consciousness. It’s part of our survival mechanism. It would have been very difficult for us to get to where we are in the process of evolution without being able to see things in terms of self and other. However, we should understand that this is only one aspect of human consciousness. We can see everything in terms of this and that, and we can also see it in terms of a single reality. The truth is to be found in neither, nor in both, nor in one side or the other side. Then where is it?

Master Dongshan, a contemporary of Changsha, wrote the following poem:

Don’t seek it from others or you’ll estrange yourself.
I now go out alone. Everywhere I encounter it.
It now is me, I now am not it.
One must understand it in this way to merge with being as it is.

It now is me, I now am not it. That’s the same as saying, you and I are the same thing, but I’m not you and you’re not me. Both of those facts exist simultaneously. But this doesn’t compute, because we’re trying to understand it intellectually, just as Du was trying to understand buddha nature intellectually. And yet, to his credit, Du must have known he hadn’t completely realized it because he was still studying with Changsha. He was willing to keep going, keep questioning, no matter how far he thought he had developed.

“Like searching for nature in the midst of nature, like a fish trying to find water, he only seems to mire himself more deeply with each question.” In the dedication for the first service we do each morning at the Monastery we chant: “Buddha nature pervades the whole universe, existing right here now.” I ask you, what does that mean? If it’s all-pervading and it’s right here now, can you show it to me? This was the heart of Secretary Du’s dilemma. He knew the doctrine, he understood all the various teachings, but lacked personal insight.

Du’s first question is, “When you chop an earthworm into two pieces, both pieces keep moving. I wonder, in which piece is the buddha nature?” I would say that when the buddha nature is chopped in two, which has the worm?

“Changsha said, ‘Don’t have illusory thoughts.’” That’s nice, but will it awaken Du who seems to be fast asleep? “Du said, ‘How are we to understand that they are both moving?’” The more you question, the more you answer, the deeper you get, and the mire gets stickier. You end up filled with ideas, notions, permutations and combinations, without getting any closer to the truth. “Changsha said, ‘Understand that air and fire are not yet scattered.’” When they do scatter, where will the buddha nature be? That’s a good question. Does it just disappear? Keep in mind that at that time, air and fire were seen as two of the elements that made up life. So what happens when those elements scatter? When you die, does the buddha nature die? Does it come and go? Where does it go?

Du did not respond to Changha’s question. He just stood there. Then Changsha called out to him, “Du!” and Du responded, “Yes?” It’s right under his nose, but does he see it? Do you see it? “Changsha said, ‘Isn’t this your true self?’” He’s referring to Du’s “Yes?” But now he’s trying to explain it. This is why Zen has slowly declined over the years—a lot of talking and very little sitting. We should leave discussions to the scholars and philosophers. We’re practitioners. We should shut up and sit.

“Changsha said, ‘I can’t call you Emperor.’” “Du said, ‘If so, would my not answering also be my true self?’” Obviously, Du is no slouch. Even with all his knowledge, he hasn’t given up. “Changsha said, ‘It’s not a matter of answering me or not, but since the beginningless kalpa’—that is, since the beginning of time—‘the question to answer or not has been the root of birth and death.’” True enough, but will Du get it? “To answer or not has been the root of birth and death.” The root of birth and death is the root of all dualistic thinking.

Then Changsha recited a verse: Students of the Way don’t know the truth. They only know their past consciousness. Past consciousness already happened. That was yesterday. It doesn’t exist—unless you carry it around in your head and recreate it periodically. The question is, what’s right here, right now, where your life is taking place?

This is the basis of endless birth and death. The deluded call it the original self. We confuse our ideas of who we are with who we really are. We live our lives out of our conditioning, out of the things we’ve been told about who we are, or what we should or shouldn’t do. The buddhadharma, on the other hand, points deeply into ourselves, beyond that conditioning, to the ground of being. Realizing that ground of being, we can learn to live our lives out of what we’ve realized—our own direct, immediate experience.

The next line of the commentary says, “Before there ever was scattering and no scattering, movement and stillness, being and non-being, there’s always been buddha nature.” According to Mahayana Buddhism, buddha nature is immutable. It’s the eternal nature of all beings. Since all beings possess it, it’s possible for each to attain enlightenment regardless of who they are. When the Buddha said upon his own enlightenment: “All sentient beings and I and the great earth have at once entered the Way,” he was including everything—beings sentient and insentient, the earth, the sky, the rivers, the mountains.

“Sutras, koans, words, silence, the cooing of an infant, images, gestures, right action, the sounds of the river valley, and the form of the mountain are all expressions of the buddha nature.” That is, they are communicating the truth of buddha nature, just as the sutras and teachings communicate it. “The Buddha said, ‘All living beings totally exist as buddha nature.’ Master Dogen said, ‘Total existence is the buddha nature.’ Mountains, rivers, and the earth are all the ocean of buddha nature. Also, ‘To express the buddha nature further, it is fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles.’” Again, the sentient, the insentient and the great earth itself are all the buddha nature.

“I ask you, ‘Isn’t this nature itself? Isn’t this nothing other than the manifestation of the Diamond Net of Indra?’” The Diamond Net of Indra is a description of the universe in which all things have a mutual identity, an interdependent origination. When one thing arises, all things arise simultaneously. Everything in this net has a mutual causality—what happens to one thing, happens to the entire universe. It’s a self-creating, self-maintaining, and a self-defining organism—a universe in which all of its parts and the totality are a single entity.

This is not some kind of holistic hypothesis or an idealistic dream. It’s your life. It’s my life, the life of the mountain, the river, a blade of grass. These things are not related to each other. They’re not part of the same thing. They’re not similar. They’re identical. What kind of world would this be if our appreciation and activity were based on this kind of non-duality?

“Buddha nature is all-inclusive—sentient as well as insentient. Indeed, if we examine this teaching carefully, we see that all phenomena of this great earth are constantly expressing the truth of the universe—the buddha nature. It’s the natural order of things.” How can we separate humanity and human consciousness from the buddha nature—or from nature itself, for that matter? When we see ourselves as separate from nature, we abdicate our responsibility to it. We are nature—just as much as a tree or a wolf or a fish is nature. The spider web and the Brooklyn Bridge are both works of nature. We must learn how the delicate dynamics of this unlikely relationship really work.

The common understanding of nature, in its broadest sense, is that it is made up of phenomena in the physical world. Generally it doesn’t include manufactured objects and human interaction. But how can the activities of human beings not be considered our natural environment? How can we discount our role in creating this earth the way it is? We’ve altered it—irreversibly altered it. That’s a work of nature. If the cause of global warming was a number of volcanoes spewing greenhouse gases into the ozone layer, we would call it an act of nature. Well, we created automobiles and they spew. We created diesel fuel and it spews. We’ve created global warming and it’s a work of nature—human nature.

Most of the disasters we face are human-created. Tsunamis and volcanoes and earthquakes kill tens of thousands, but we kill millions, and we do it for profit. Yet most of the killing is hidden. When we include the human element in our understanding of nature, we become conscious of the fact that we are responsible, not only for our own bag of skin, but for the totality of existence.

“Buddha nature is the natural order of things. Do you hear it? Can you see it? If not, then heed the instructions of the great Master Dongshan and see with the ear and listen with the eye.” When we listen with the ear, we hear the insentient speaking our language. And in doing so, we usurp the real voice of the insentient. When, we listen with the eye and see with the ear, the insentient speak insentient, and they teach endlessly. How can we hear with the eye and see with the ear? Get out of the way. “Only then will you understand this ineffable reality.” Nothing I’ve said so far has anything to do with reality.

These are just words that point to where you have to go to find the truth. But don’t take my word for it, or the Buddha’s word, or anybody’s word. Realize and actualize it for yourself.

“This is a truth that is not to be found in metaphors, images, or thoughts. Indeed, it’s not like anything.” There’s no reference system. There’s nothing to allude or compare it to. There’s nothing out there. “And yet, it’s not hidden. It is nothing other than what you do morning and night.” It’s just this. It reaches everywhere. It’s all-pervading. We just need to shift our way of seeing and experiencing in order to make contact with it. The question is—where do you find yourself? Who are you really? That’s what this koan is addressing.

The capping verse:

Bright day, blue sky—
in a dream he tries to explain his dream.
See! The myriad forms arising and vanishing,
constantly reveal the buddha nature.

Bright day, blue sky—in a dream he tries to explain his dream. The bright day, blue sky are clear, boundless, reaching everywhere. There’s nothing lacking, nothing extra. In a dream, he tries to explain his dream. The whole thing is a dream. The teachings, the buddhadharma, our ideas and notions—all a dream. What I’m doing right now is speaking of a dream within a dream. So forget all of that and see the myriad forms arising and vanishing, and know that they’re constantly revealing their buddha nature.

John Daido Loori, Roshi is the abbot of Zen Mountain Monastery. A successor to Hakuyu Taizan Maezumi, Roshi, Daido Roshi trained in rigorous koan Zen and in the subtle teachings of Master Dogen, and is a lineage holder in the Soto and Rinzai schools of Zen.

source

http://www.mro.org/zmm/teachings/daido/teisho53.php

Quote

Ten thousand flowers in spring
the moon in autumn,
a cool breeze in summer,
snow in winter.
If your mind isn't clouded by unnecessary things,
this is the best season of your life.

Wu-men

More on Koans, Chan/Zen Schools and Teachings
Zen Teachings: Zen Schools, Koans, Zazen

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A Short History of Chan Buddhism and Its Meeting With Taoism
An Introduction to Zen its History and the Essence of its Teachings
An Introduction to Taoism and its Influence on Chinese Culture and its Relation with Chan Buddhism
Dhyana: The Indian Sudden Awake School and its Travel to China

Chan/Zen and Chinese Philosophy
Zen Chan Philosophy - translated Texts from the Chan/Zen Masters
A collection of links to the Inner Chapters by Chuang Tzu and Chuang Tzu Poems and Sayings

Chan/Zen Schools, Koans and Teachings
Zen Teachings: Zen Schools, Koans, Zazen
A collection of Chan/Zen Texts and Scriptures

Chan/Zen Poems and Haiku
A Collection of Chan/Zen Poems on No-mind, Satori and Dharma
Haiku - A Collection of Links to the Famous Haiku Poets

Jiddu Krishnamurti
Krishnamurti: his splendid and iconoclastic Writings on Truth and Meditation

Epistemology
Epistemology and Zen - Philosophy and Science in Relation to Zen Buddhism

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through feathery clouds

the sun opened

like the eye of an owl---

and in the sudden

bullet of glare

the quicksilver

breast

of a train

သေႏၶ, ေတာထြက္, ဓမၼစက္, မိန္ႁမြက္ဝါဆုိ ဟူေသာစကားႏွင္႔အညီ ျမတ္စြာဘုရားရွင္ ကိုယ္ေတာ္ျမတ္ႀကီးသည္ တုသိတာနတ္ျပည္မွ နတ္သားအေပါင္းတု႔ိဧ။္ ဘုရားျဖစ္ရန္ အခ်ိန္တန္ပါၿပီဟု လာေရာက္ကာ ေတာင္းပန္ၾကေသာေၾကာင္႔ သႏၲဳႆိတ နတ္သားအျဖစ္မွ မယ္ေတာ္မာယာဧ။္ ဝမ္းတြင္ဝယ္ ဝါဆုိလျပည္႔ေန႔တြင္ ပဋိသေႏၶေနေတာ္မူပါသည္။
ဖြားျမင္ေျမာက္ေသာအခါ သိဒၶတၳေဂါတမ အမည္ရေလဧ။္။ ဆယ္႔ေျခာက္ႏွစ္ဝယ္ ယေသာ္ဓရာႏွင္႔ ထိန္းျမႇား လက္ထပ္ေလဧ။္ ရာဟုလာ အမည္ရေသာ သားေတာ္တစ္ပါး ေမြးဖြားေလဧ။္ ထုိေနာက္ သူအုိ ,သူနာ, သူေသ ,ရဟန္း ,ဟူေသာ နိမိတ္ႀကီးေလးပါးကုိ ျမင္ေတာ္မူ ကာ အုိျခင္းသေဘာ နာျခင္းသေဘာ ေသျခင္းသေဘာ တရားတုိ႔ကုိေၾကာက္လန္႔ကာ အုိျခင္းကင္းရာ နာျခင္းကင္းရာ ေသျခင္းကင္းရာ ရဟန္းတစ္ပါးဧ။္ ခ်မ္းသာတရားကုိ ေတြးသိကာ ေတာထြက္ရန္ ႀကံစည္ေတာ္မူၿပီး ဝါဆုိလျပည့္ေန႔ ညသန္းေခါင္ယံ အခ်ိန္တြင္ ဖြားဖက္ေတာ္ ေမာင္စံ ကႏၷကျမင္းတုိ႔ ႏွင္႔ ဥရုေဝလ ေတာသုိ႔ ကိေလသာကုန္ခန္းၿပီး ဥာဏ္အလင္းေရာင္ေတြကုိ ရွာေဖြရန္ ေတာထြက္ေတာ္မူပါသည္။
မဂဓတုိင္း ဂယာၿမဳိ႕အနီး ဥရုေဝလေတာဝယ္ (၆)ႏွစ္တုိ႔ ကာလပတ္လုံး ေရွးေဟာင္း အိႏၵိယ ေယာဂီ ပရိဗုိဇ္တုိ႔ဧ။္ အတၱကိလမထာ (ပင္းပန္းစြာခႏၶာကုိယ္ ညင္းဆဲေၾကာင္း) အက်င့္တုိ႔ကုိ႔ ထုိေတာဝယ္(၆) ႏွစ္တုိင္တုိင္ ပင္းပန္းစြာ က်င့္ႀကံေသာ္လည္း တရားထူးကုိမရရွိေပ၊ (၆)ႏွစ္မွ်က်င္႔ခဲ႔ရတဲ႔ ေရွးေဟာင္းအိႏၵိယ ေယာဂီပရီဗုိဇ္တုိ႔ဧ။္ အက်င္႔မ်ားသည္ ခႏၶာကုိယ္ပင္ပန္းဆင္းရဲေၾကာင္း အက်င္႔မ်ားသာၿဖစ္သည္ဟု သိရေသာအခါ မိမိဧ။္ ကုိယ္ပုိင္နည္းစနစ္ၿဖစ္ေသာ မဂၢင္(၈)ပါး နည္းလမ္းသစ္ၿဖင္႔ သဗၺညဳတဥာဏ္ေတာ္ကုိ ရရွိကာ ဘုရားအၿဖစ္သုိ႔ ေရာက္ရွိေတာ္မူပါသည္ ၊ဘုရားအၿဖစ္သုိ႔ေရာက္ရွိၿပီးေနာက္ အားထုတ္ခဲ႔ေသာတရားမ်ားႏွင္႔ ေလာကကုိ ဆင္ျခင္ၾကည့္ေသာ္ မိမိရရွိ က်င့္ႀကံထားေသာ တရားတုိ႔သည္ အလြန္သိမ္ေမြ႔နက္နဲ ခက္ခဲလြန္းေနဧ။္ ေလာကလူသားတုိ႔ဧ။္ အသိဥာဏ္ကား ကိေလသာအေမွာင္တုိ႔ၿဖင္႔သာ ထာဝစဥ္ပိတ္ဖုံးေနဧ။။္ ငါဧ။္တရားတုိ႔သည္ကား အလြန္နက္နဲကာ ခက္ခဲလြန္ေနဧ။္ ပုထုဇဥ္တုိ႔ အားေဟာၾကားရန္ လားလားမွမတန္ဟု စဥ္ၿခင္ေနစဥ္ သဟမၸတိ ျဗဟၼာဧ။္ ေတာင္းပန္မႈျဖင္႔ အရင္က မိမိ တပည့္ေတာ္ခဲ႔ဘူးေသာ ကာသိတုိင္း ဗာရာဏသီၿမဳိ႕အနီး မိဂဒါဝုန္ေတာဝယ္ရွိေသာ ပဥၥဝဂၢီငါးဦး (ပဥၥ-ငါးခု ငါးေယာက္၊၀ဂၢ-အစု အဖြဲ႔)တုိ႔ကုိတရားဦးေဟာၾကားရန္ ၾကြခ်ီေတာ္မူေလသည္ ဝါဆုိလျပည္႔ေနဝယ္ ျမတ္စြာဘုရားရွင္ကုိယ္ေတာ္ျမတ္ၾကီးသည္ သူ႔ဘဝဧ။္ ပထမဦးဆုံးၿဖစ္ေသာ ဓမၼစၾကၤာ တရားေတာ္ကုိ ပဥၥဝဂၢီ ငါးဦးတုိ႔အား ေဟာၾကားေတာ္မူေလသည္ ၊ဝါဆုိလၿပည္႔ ေန႔သည္ ဗုဒၶဘာ၀င္တုိ႔ အတြက္ မြန္ၿမတ္ေသာေန႔တစ္ေန႔ၿဖစ္ပါသည္။

ဒီေန႔မွာ အသွ်င္ ေကာ႑ည လူရဟန္းပုဂၢိဳလ္ထဲမွာ ပထမဆံုး ေသာတာပန္တည္တဲ့ေန႔ပါ။

ဒီေန႔ဆိုတာ ရွိေနရင္ ဒီလူေတြ ေသာတာပန္တည္မယ့္ အေၾကာင္းရွိတယ္ဆိုတာကို မီးေမွာင္းထိုးျပေနတဲ့ ေန႔ေလးျဖစ္ပါတယ္။

http://titsartayar.0fees.net/dhamma.html

Thank for D$$ & winmyint817

http://titsartayar.0fees.net/dhamma.html

http://kyawkyawoo81.blogspot.com/2008/06/blog-post_2476.html

http://htunhlaing1.blogspot.com/

]]> http://friend4.wordpress.com/?p=133 Thu, 17 Jul 2008 12:24:34 +0000 kokoye http://friend4.wordpress.com/?p=133 (၁)သေႏၶယူေတာ္မူေသာေန႔
ၾကာသာပေတးေန႔

သုံးလူ႔ရွင္ပင္၊ ကၽြန္းထိပ္တင္၊ ေသာင္းခြင္
စၾကာ၀ဠာ၊ နတ္ျဗဟၼာတို႕၊ ညီညာရုံးစု၊
ေတာင္းပန္မူေၾကာင့္၊ ရတုနဂိုရ္၊ ရႊန္းရႊန္းစိုသည္
“ဝါဆိုလျပည္႕ ၾကြက္မင္းေန႔၀ယ္၊ ခ်မ္းေျမ႕ၾကည္ျဖဴ
သေႏၶ ယူသည္" နတ္, လူ ၿငိမ္းဖို႔ကိန္းပါကို...။

(၂) ဖြားေတာ္မူေသာေန႔
ေသာၾကာေန႔

သေႏၶယူကာ၊ ဆယ္လၾကာေသာ္၊
“မဟာ သကၠရာဇ္၊ ေျခာက္ဆယ္ရွစ္ၾကံဳ၊ ကဆုန္လျပည္႕
ေသာၾကာေန႔၀ယ္” ခ်မ္းေျမ႕စုံစီ၊ လုဗၺနီ ၌မဟီလွူိက္ဆူ၊
“ဖြားေတာ္မူ”သည္ ၊ နတ္လူေအာင္မွ်ဳိ႕လမ္းပါကို.....။

(၃)ေတာထြက္ေတာ္မူေသာေန႔
တနလၤာေန႕

ဖြားျမင္ေျမာက္ေသာ္၊ ဆယ္ေျခာက္ႏွစ္ရြယ္
ပ်ဳိျမစ္ႏုနယ္၌၊ သုံးသြယ္ေရႊနန္း သိမ္းျမန္းၿပိးလစ္၊
ဆယ္သုံးႏွစ္လွ်င္၊ ဘုန္းသစ္လွ်ံလူ၊ စံေတာ္မူ၍၊
“ရြယ္မူႏုၿဖိဳး၊ ႏွစ္ဆယ္ကိုး၀ယ္” ေလးမ်ဳိးနိမိတ္၊
နတ္ျပဟိတ္ေၾကာင့္၊ ေရႊစိတ္ျငင္ၿငိဳ၊ သံေ၀ပိုက၊
“၀ါဆိုလျပည့္ က်ားမင္းေန႔၀ယ္၊ ခ်မ္းေျမ႕ရဂုံ
ေတာ္ရပ္လွႈံသည္” စုံၿမိဳင္ပင္ရိပ္ခမ္းမွာကို......။

(၄) ဘုရားျဖစ္ေသာေန႔
ဗုဒၶဟူးေန႔

 ေတာရပ္ ၿမိဳင္ေပၚ၊ ေျခာက္ႏွစ္ ေပ်ာ္၍၊
ခါေတာ္တစ္ဖုံ၊ ပြင့္ခ်ိန္ၾကံဳက၊ “ကဆုန္လျပည့္၊
ဆင္မင္းေန႔၀ယ္” ေျမ႕ပရေမ၊ ပလႅင္ေဗြထက္၊
ေရႊေညာင္ေတာ္ႀကိး ဗိတာန္ ထိးႏွင့္၊ မၿငိးၾကည္
ျဖဴေနေတာ္မူလ်က္၊ ရန္ျမဴခပင္း၊ အမိုက္သင္းကို
အရွင္းပယ္ေဖ်ာက္၊ အလင္းေပါက္ကာ၊
ထြန္းေတာက္ ဘုန္းေတာ္၊ ေသာင္းလံုး ေက်ာ္သည္၊
သုံးေဖာ္လူတို႔ ၿငမ္းပါကို....။

(၅)ဓမၼစႀကၤာေဟာေတာ္မူေသာေန႕
စေနေန႔

ဘုရားျဖစ္ကာ၊ မိဂဒါသို႔၊ စၾကာေရႊဖ၀ါးျဖန္႔ခ်ီ
သြား၍၊ ငါးပါး၀ဂၢီစုံအညိႏွင့္ မဟီတစ္ေသာင္း
တိုက္အေပါင္းမွ၊ ခေညာင္းကပ္လာ၊ နတ္ျဗဟၼာ
အား“၀ါဆိုလျပည့္၊ စေနေန႔၀ယ္၊ ေႂကြ႕ေႂကြ႕
လွ်ံတက္၊ ဓမၼစက္ကို” မိန္႔ႁမြတ္ေထြျပား၊
ေဟာေဖာ္ၾကားသည္၊ တရားနတ္စည္ရႊမ္းတယ္ကို....။

(၆)ပရိနိဗၺာန္
အဂၤ ါေန႔

တရားနတ္စည္၊ ေဆာ္ရႊမ္းလည္က၊
သုံးမည္ဘုံသိုက္ တစ္ေသာင္းထိုက္၀ယ္၊
ကၽြတ္ထိုက္သသူ နတ္လူျဗဟၼာ၊
သတၱ၀ါကို ေခမာ ေသာင္သို႕
ေဖာင္ကူးတို႕ျဖင္႕ ေဆာင္ပို႕ၿပီးကာ၊
“၀ါေလးဆယ့္ငါး သက္ကား႐ွစ္ဆယ္”
စံုျပည့္ႂကြယ္က ရာေလးဆယ္ရွစ္(၁၄၈)၊
သကၠရာဇ္၀ယ္၊ နယ္မလႅာတိုင္း၊
စံႏိုင္းမယုတ္ ကုႆိႏၷာ႐ုံ အင္ၾကင္းစုံ၌
“ကဆုန္လျပည့္ အဂၤါေန႔၀ယ္”
ခ်မ္းေျမ႕နိဗၺဴ စံေတာ္မူသည္၊
၀ွန္းဆူေသာင္းလုံးေက်ာ္တယ္ကို....။

(၇)ေတေဇာဓာတ္ေလာင္ကၽြမ္းေသာေန႔
တနဂၤေႏြေန႔

နဗၺဴစံၿပီး၊ ႐ႈမအီသာ၊ သိဂၤ ိ ေ႐ႊေလွာ္၊
ေလာင္းေတာ္ကို “ထိုေရာ္ကဆုန္၊ လဆုတ္
ၾကဳံ၍၊ ဂဠဳန္ေန႔၀ယ္” ခိုးေငြ႕မေႏွာ၊ ဓာတ္ေတ
ေဇာလွ်ံတက္ ေကာ္ေရာ္၊ မိးပူေဇာ္သည္၊
ေမြေတာ္ရွစ္စိတ္ႂကြင္းတယ္ကိုး...။

လယ္တီဆရာေတာ္ ၏

ခုႏွစ္ေန႕ ဘုရားရွစ္ခိုး ဗုဒၶ၀င္ကဗ်ာမ်ား မွ

http://myoaung-mdy.blogspot.com/2007/07/blog-post_23.html

Podziękowałam i ruszyłam w dalszą drogę. Po 20 min ukazał mi się banner z kamienną twarzą Buddy i napisem, że do celu brakuje mi kolejnych 9km. "Troszku" się dziecko zdenerwowało, bo 15 km a 24 km to różnicę jednak robi (popołudnie miałam spędzić w Liberty, pomagając w dekoracji szkoły na wakacyjne zajęcia) a i jak zwykle nie trafili z prognozą pogody i z minuty na minutę robiło się coraz bardziej gorąco, a ja powoli zaczęłam przybierać wygląd homara. Droga była zawiła, ale urozmaicona - a to wzniesienie, a to bambusowy las, a to znów jakiś mały rodzinny cmentarz buddyjski. Słowem wesoło- ptacy śpiewali, komary kąsały i wszystkim było radośnie.

Wreszcie, po 2 godzinach jazdy (zrobiłam sobie przerwę w bambusowym lesie, bo bardzo je lubię :), dotarłam na miejsce. Najpierw oczom mym ukazały się masywne plecy 120 metrowego posągu. Im bliżej do celu, tym brzydszy sie mi wydawał. W końcu stanęłam naprzeciw niego i ujrzałam pięknego księcia Shakamunjego, którego podstepnie zamieniono w niezbyt sympatycznego giganta z brązu o nieprzystępnym wyrazie twarzy. No, ale jest jednym z największych na świecie (2 lub 3) i to się liczy, czyż nie? Budda z Kamakura (14,9 m) zmieściłby się w jego dłoni (18 m), ale to właśnie ten siedzący Budda ze świątyni Koutokuin z 1252 r. bardziej przypadł mi do gustu.

Amitaba, czyli "Bezmierny Blask", Budda Czystej Krainy, Czerwony Budda Zachodu w mandali dhajnibuddów, mistrz rodziny, to jedno z 5 Nagromadzeń, składających się na buddyjski model osobowości. Cytuję za http://www.buddyzm.pl: "Nauki o pięciu nagromadzeniach czyli skandhach opisują całą złożoność aspektów, które stanowią o osobowości. Rozpoznanie tych poszczególnych aspektów prowadzi do przeciwdziałania silnym wewnętrznym nawykom, które nakazują nam traktować osobę jako niezmienne ja. Owe nawyki są podstawową przyczyną ponownego odradzania się w kręgu uwarunkowanej egzystencji i związanego z tym cierpienia. Ponieważ wierzymy w niezmienne „ja”, przywiązujemy się do określonego obrazu siebie, przez co powstają kolejne fałszywe poglądy i przeszkody. Jeśli zrozumiemy, że to wyobrażenie jest tylko nawykowym uproszczonym myśleniem, odkrywamy olbrzymie bogactwo w nas samych i innych."

Jestem największy! Ha!

U stóp Buddy znajduje się niewielki ogród z małym stawem, w którym królują szalone karpie. Za 100 yenów można kupić pokarm dla ryb, dzięki któremu zobaczymy jak z pozoru spokojne karpie zamieniają się w karpie D1000 - szybkie, skaczące ponad poziom wody, jak łososie walczące z prądem rzecznym w drodze na tarło;)

Jak podziwiać piękno ogrodu.

A to, co widzimy po wejściu do Buddy - Mini Budda, który wygląda jakby właśnie w strumieniu światła opuścił swój kosmiczny pojazd ( żadna/(żaden?) Mahajana czy Hinajana - po prostu UFO).

Jaką interpretację tej niezwykłej instalacji odpustowo-diodowej proponujecie?

Pewnie, że chciałoby się chociaż za stopy chwycić:)

A to, co najbardziej się mi w tym całym futurystycznym kompleksie religijnym podobało- zdjęcia przedstawiające jak powstawał Olbrzym.

Moje ulubione foto.

Są ich setki, tysiące!

Ja wolę tego pana.

Pół roku temu.

Dzisiaj.

Wyglądam jak pomidor. Nigdy nie ufajcie serwisom pogodowym!

Pozdrawiam i ściskam!

Regarding the content of the conference, I would like to have more representatives from the Buddhist tradition, as there were not many at all at this conference. So this is perhaps something that the organizers might want to think about for the next one. Buddhism is a growing religion, and it is making its presence felt even in the West in many ways. (There were not too many representatives from Islam, too.)

The topic for this conference is on "Subject, Self and Soul," certainly very big topics. That perhaps is a reason why there are a lot of philosophers at this conference. I think there are much more philosophers and more purely philosophical papers at this conference than in the previous one in Philadelphia. And I think last year´s conference featured more scientists, so there was a discernible shift from focusing on scientists to philosophers. I don´t think they designed it this way; perhaps the topic lent itself more toward philosophical investigation. But the sciences have a lot to contribute to the topics of the self, and who knows they might have something interesting to say about the subject and the soul too.

Listening to the many papers from the Christian tradition presented at the conference, I could not help but find similarities between Christianity and Buddhism. Of course there are certain differences but I am not talking about them in this post. The conference was opened by a keynote talk by George Ellis from South Africa. His key theme was on "kenosis," the process of "emptying out oneself" that Jesus did for the sake of all of us. One empties out oneself when one totally eliminates any sense of one´s own individuality and totally opens oneself to all the sufferings, all the sins, of all beings in the world. 

This is where the similarity lies. I said "all the sufferings and all the sins" so as to bring about the two key terms in Buddhism and Christianity. Buddhism talks about sufferings, and Christianity about sins. What one gets from Christianity is that the reason why Adam and Eve were expelled from Paradise was that they gain "knowledge." But this is a very special kind of knowledge. We could look at it as the kind of knowledge which enables one to distinguish one thing from another; it is a kind of discriminating knowledge, one that embodies the process of conceptualization. Now Adam and Eve "know" that they are naked and so on. But to know that one is naked means that one is able to compare oneself and others. Knowing this requires that one also knows all about the convention and everything that makes up discriminating thoughts.

But this is also found in Buddhism. What Adam and Eve have learned is that they are now mired in the process of samsara, because they possess this discriminating thought, which corresponds to the Sanskrit samskara. This is usually translated as "thought formation" and it is not out of the mark. Adam and Eve learned how to formulate thoughts and as a result committed the original sin. Stated in Buddhist terminology, the representative of the human race came to possess samskara, which is a result of avidya, or "ignorance." So here is a difference. Christianity (and Judaism and Islam) talks about the forbidden knowledge, but Buddhism talks about the ignorance. But to me at least both refer to about the same thing :-) .

The process after that is about the same in both traditions. Most readers of this blog who are from the West should be familiar with the story about the original sin and the lost paradise. In Buddhism, avidya gives rise to samskara, which in turn gives rise to all the remaining links of dependent origination, ending in all sorts of sufferings that afflict us everyday. So the Buddhist "original sin" is this avidya and the goal of Buddhism is to gain "redemption" though realizing the ultimate truth, to get rid, that is, of the root ignorance. (Of course there are differences but let´s focus on the similarity.)

So when Jesus came to the world, his mission was to take humans back to where they originally belonged - union with god or whatever you might want to call. Jesus takes away all our sins and as a result we are "redeemed." The Buddha´s mission is to come to the world and announce the Teaching, the Dharma, and through following the Dharma one gains Liberation, or Nirvana, through which one is free from the cycle of sufferings. Jesus did this, according to Ellis in his talk, through the process of kenosis, emptying out himself so that all the sins and sufferings of everybody flow into him. The cross that Jesus died on is thus a very powerful symbol. In suffering on the cross, Jesus takes away our sins, as if our collective sins and sufferings are all collected together at that moment. When we reflect on that we are reminded of what Jesus did and what he came to the world for.

This is also a Buddhist message. A practice that is prescribed for those who vow to gain Realization so as to help liberate all the sentient beings in the world is called "Equalizing Oneself and Others¨and "Exchanging Oneself and Others." The key is to realize that every being is interdependent and that sufferings arise only through thought fabrications and formations and conceptualizations that take things as they appear as being real in themselves. When Christians talk about "union with the divine," Buddhists talk about becoming one and the same with the Bodhisattvas, taking up their qualities, which is full of compassion and the insight into the real nature of things, which is Emptiness. Buddhists learn to take up all the sufferings and pains of all sentient beings, no matter who they are, no matter whether they are their enemies, friends, or anything, so that they are free from sufferings and ultimately realize the Truth. If the Bodhisattvas are divine, Buddhists can eventually become one with the divine in this sense too.

Commonality? What does Christ have in common with Islam? Buddhism?

Times I have almost died:

1. North Carolina, 1982, autumn: Almost 3 years old… and very busy making shapes in river water with a long stick, mesmerized by the ripples I was making of my own volition – an early childhood revelation that I could actually have a formidable affect on the world at large. But I suddenly slipped on the loose, muddy bank and fell into the ice-cold, fast moving river, eyes wide open... my naive little body/mind had no idea how piercing water could feel. Rushing into my pink, virgin lungs – frozen, paralyzed, surprised by how I could not even muster a scream. My dad had to run a down the bank to fish me out. He claims it was only a second that I was under, but it felt like an entire lifetime. He yanked me out by my chubby, toddler elbow – I was coughing and crying and shivering. The river ran off with my favorite red baseball cap... it read, "Big Leaguer" and I wore it every day. Until that day.

2. San Francisco, 2002, 10 pm on a Saturday night: I was racing my bike (with no lights and no helmet – young, reckless, and infallible) down a steep hill to meet my friends down in the Mission at a dance club. I was supposed to go-go dance that night and had to get there early to stretch and “warm up” (warming up usually meant downing a couple of free shots of tequila and snorting a line of cocaine.) I was eager and in a faggy outfit… pink headband, pink boy-scout shirt, tube socks. But I digress… I approached a major intersection, but had a green light so I sailed through it, unthinking. A car was making a left-hand turn and was not going to yield to my right-away, as I was wearing my cloak of foolish invisibility. It turned right into my unwavering straight and speedy line. Well, almost... I was moving so fast. It was moving so fast. I narrowly swerved to miss the oncoming car but ran right into another parked car (full speed) and flew over the roof to land on the sidewalk on the other side. I landed with a thud, my bike with a clang... and took a moment to get up, dust off, and check for blood (the car did not stop... just honked aggressively and sped away, frightened by our near collision and my near death). I got back on my somewhat busted up bike and continued to ride to the bar, completely in shock. I could not feel my body. I arrived and shakily tried to tell my buddies about where I had just been... they didn't get it. I was fine. I looked fine. There was no ambulance. I was only bruised and wide eyed... They told me to drink it off. I did. I even danced that night, unwilling to admit that I felt busted and broken and spooked... I got drunk and shook off the discomfort of mortality.

3. Rishikesh, India, 2004: Amoebic Dysentery. I was alone in a tiny room in a run-down hotel. I had a new species of something living in my stomach... a pulsing, alien parasite. I awoke suddenly at two am, covered in a layer of sweat and hunched over from low, piercing, abdominal cramps. I tried to ignore it, taking those long deep breaths of denial like we sometimes do right before we are forced to "rid" ourselves of something. But, as if by no conscious choice of my own, I got up, out of my sleeping bag and went to the toilet. I threw up before I could even position myself properly. There was a moment of relief before the diarrhea started coming. Then more vomiting. Then more diarrhea. Back in bed, I tried to drink a lot of water, knowing that I desperately needed to stay hydrated. But there seemed to be no room anywhere in my body for it to stay, so I quickly gave up. I had seven more "spells" before morning arrived. My leg muscles were twitching as if poison was slowly trickling down the length of my body. I pictured microscopic monsters crawling around my insides -- loitering, polluting. Gnawing mercilessly on my duodenum, then giving each other high fives and peeling out with revved-up engines and a spray of mud. The sleep between was restless -- complex nightmares about ghosts and loneliness.

I was alone. I was going to die half way across the globe and no one would save me, no one would even know. I thought of my girlfriend at home – how sad she would be to get a call from one of those time-delayed satellite phones – "Cassie died last night" they would tell her. She would hear it nearly ten seconds later and not know what to say.

I was throwing up and shitting on myself – for over 2 days. It was unstoppable. Burning with fever... barely conscious. I was wasting away, stuck in my room... with no one around. I knew I needed help so I finally got up all my strength and went to the door and for one full minute (the longest minute of my life), I screamed help, help, help, please help me!, out into the courtyard and the dusty, desolate road. I needed someone to know I was there, almost dying. A British girl and a Canadian boy heard me and sheepishly crept up to my room. I had passed out on the floor... I couldn't move. The girl stayed with me and put cold washcloths on me and he ran out to find a doctor. An hour later, he came back with a little Indian man with a leather medical case just like in the olden days. He whispered to me how I was going to be okay and I that I just had a little “upset stomach”. He took my temperature and tried to get me to eat a banana. I could not. I barely remember what his face looked like, but I can feel his soft voice in my ear -- right now, there he is... the warmth and strength of god. He told me he would be back. I grunted in acknowledgment. The girl, I can’t remember her name -- she stayed by my bed, simultaneously so sorry for me and repulsed by my state of utter and reprehensible decline. I was withered, wilted, dying from dehydration. I could not drink water without it leaking like a sieve the moment I put it to my lips. It would pass right through me like I was already a hollow phantom. The tiny doctor from my dreams returned with a pocket full of giant pills. He gave me water and another banana. "You have to eat and drink or you will just throw up these pills." I threw them up. We tried again. I took another bite of the banana, but chewing felt grueling and impossible, like he was asking me to climb Everest. I had to harness my entire body's remaining strength just to keep the morsel of mush down. I took the pills, kept them down and fell back into my feverish coma. I was seeing things, hearing things. I was begging to see my girlfriend and my cat. The Canadian boy/British girl duo looked at me sympathetically and blankly. How could they possibly locate or present such things? I begged of them. I was sobbing, losing even more water. She shusssshed me and rubbed my scalp. Finally, the medicine started to kick in and I could hold some water in. The doctor hooked me up to some rudimentary saline IV. My body soaked it up like desert dirt. After five days, I started to be able to talk and think again. And eat bananas. The doctor checked in on me every day. On the third day when it was apparent that I was recovering, he laughed and told me that I had really scared him and that there had been a moment when he didn't think I was going to pull through. He said I had amoebic dysentary. I laughed with him to be polite, but I didn't think it was funny. I knew I was on that edge, but to have someone reiterate it, somehow made it concrete... made it more than a delirious figment of my imagination. It made my potential death real, my vulnerability real -- took it out of my fever induced dreamscape and translated into into a hard, cold reality. I almost died. I could have died. I will die. I am going to die. Death is imminent. I thanked the couple and the doctor for saving my life. They were humble and generous... I still think of them.

4. Gangotri, India, late 2004: Way up in the Himalayas, right at the border of Tibet. I had trekked up along the holy Ganges River to its glacial source -- a pilgrimage sight for devoted Hindus. High altitude. Very high altitude. I was perched up on a cliff, overlooking a ravine... the power of the Ganges rushing below me. A milky white color from the chunks of dirty ice that fell into it. It felt like meditating on the moon – no vegetation, no oxygen. It was unbelievably beautiful and moving. The austere landscape demanded reverence. I was deep deep in a meditation, alone on my rock. No one for what seemed like miles -- alone on the top of the world. Dirty and peaceful. All of a sudden, from nowhere, a giant padlock whizzed right by my head with enormous velocity, as if it had actually fallen from the heavens. It struck the cliff edge where I was sitting and made a loud clang before hurling itself into the river far below. It sank hard and fast as if it had never existed. In shock, I touched the rock where the impact had occurred. The hard rock was scraped and dented, chipped like a giant, prehistoric tooth. I ran my fingers numbly over the point of contact. Over and over again. I replayed the short clip in my head... the merciless sound and breezy feeling of it past my ears. The weight of it. The seriousness of it. WHAT THE FUCK?! I was in the middle of nowhere with no one in sight. The only sound was the rushing of the great river and the subtlety of moving constellations, overhead. Again, I was untouched. No evidence of ever being in peril except for the frenetic palpitations of my heart and the invisible, full body seizures of shock that had taken a quiet hold of me. I searched behind me for crazy sadus or rabid monkeys. But the lock had come from so far away. From the top of the mountain range. From another universe, falling like a manmade meteorite. If it had been two inches to the left, it would have hit me squarely in the head, knocking me out or crushing a part of my skull upon impact, and then taken me with it, down deep into the holy ravine. I would have died a hundred times over. First at impact, then again with the shock of the fall, the landing, the drowning. I sang a deep, resonate mantra, imploring all the Buddhas from all the ages to witness me there in that moment. To witness my survival. To remind me of how very precious our human life is, indeed. How we could go at any moment. Any inexplicable moment. From giant, unforgiving padlocks in the Himalayas. Incidental bike accidents. Viruses. Parasites that eat our insides out. Accidents, drowning... all within the range of normalcy. All within the context of the every day. We all die on a regular day, at a regular hour.

Questa mattina mi sono ricordata del principio zen riportato nel titolo ed ho pensato se fosse applicabile alla mia vita. La mia interpretazione è del tutto personale, per il momento non ho gli strumenti intellettuali adatti per contestualizzare e analizzare una citazione rubata ad una tradizione culturale millenaria. Pecco di semplificazione ma sono interessata a riportare dentro di me ciò che sta fuori, nonostante mi manchino -probabilmente- le coordinate per orientarmi nel modo giusto.

Se incontri l'illuminato, se ti senti arrivato, torna indietro e riparti da capo.

Quest'anno, per la prima volta dopo anni di studio e precariato, ho avuto la piccola soddisfazione di aver raggiunto una posizione più stabile all'interno dell'Università. La gioia iniziale ha lasciato spazio a un'amarezza di fondo legata al desiderio/necessità di uccidere la quasi stabilità raggiunta non per rimettermi in gioco, per andare alla ricerca di altro.

Non si tratta di un capriccio, purtroppo ho superato da tempo  l'età dell'adolescenza. Piuttosto, è una valutazione serena dei risultati raggiunti e della concreta opportunità di mettere tutto da parte per cambiare strada. Il cambiamento non può essere immediato, credo ci vorranno un paio di anni. Non ho rivelato a nessuno la mia decisione, ad eccezione della persona che porterò con me che condivide la mia scelta.

I numerosi viaggi all'estero non mi hanno fatto perdere il forte legame che provo nei confronti del luogo e della vecchia casa in cui vivo. Mi sento parte di questi muri, del verde e della campagna che mi circonda. Tuttavia, non voglio che tutto questo si trasformi in una splendida gabbia dorata. Così come preferisco evitare di dovermi recare a scadenza regolare in una città che non amo popolata da zombie con scarpe d Prada.

Ci sono altri luoghi dell'anima che mi attendono ed io sono pronta ad reinventarmi una nuova vita. Non è l'insoddisfazione che mi spinge altrove, è -come si diceva- la buona occasione del cambiamento determinata da una molteplicità di cause.

Non uccido nulla, in fondo. Io rimango quella che sono, con il tutto il mio bagaglio culturale e lavorativo. Ma non posso ignorare le piccole ali che mi sono spuntate sulla schiena: è ora di volare via.

Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.

::: Buddha :::

Kóreskuprófið mitt gekk bara ágætlega, þótt ég fái ekki einingar fyrir það er gaman að læra aðeins í tungumálinu. Ég reiknaði nú ekki út einkunnina í prófinu en hún var að minnsta kosti ekki falleinkunn ( í áfanga sem ekki er hægt að falla á? haha).

Á miðvikudaginn kom fulltrúi frá skólanum í skólastofuna til þess að kynna ráðstefnu "World forum" sem var seinna um daginn. Þar gátu skiptinemar kynnt löndin sín á 2-4 mínútum. Að sjálfsögðu skráði ég mig til þátttöku.

Ég talaði svona almennt um landið fyrst, stærðina, fólksfjölda, atvinnu ofl. En talaði síðan um hluti eins og næturlífið, náttúruna og að það sé best að búa á Íslandi, að minnsta kosti samkvæmt Sameinuðu Þjóðunum (UN). Fór síðan að tala um íslensku jólasveinana og eitthvað fleira skemmtilegt. Síðan nýtti ég líka tækifærið til þess að kynna bókina mína. Það féll vel í kramið hjá áhorfendum. Um kvöldið var síðan Pizzapartý sem var svosem alveg ágætt, það var bara skortur á pizzum, hehe.

Á fimmtudaginn fór ég að sækja um nýja vegabréfsáritun til þess að geta verið hérna í 6 mánuði. Það gekk svosem ágætlega, umsóknin fer alveg í gegn en hinsvegar af því að það er ekki hefðbundið skólaár núna (byrjar í september) þá get ég ekki fengið þetta fyrr en í september. Helvítis klúður og svoleiðis, en maður verður bara að þola óþægindin sem verða af þessu.

Á föstudagsmorgun var síðan lagt af stað til Young-Ju sem var svona 3 klst ferð með rútu frá Seoul. Fórum fyrst í skoðunarferð í sígarettu verksmiðju (sem að kostar ferðina). Fyrirtækið heitir KT & G, þeir vilja meina að það standi fyrir "Korea, Tomorrow & Global" en ég ætla að nota gamla nafnið þeirra "Korea, Tobacco & Ginseng". Jább, þeir framleiða líka ginseng, og það er ekki allt, þeir eru líka farnir að þreifa sig áfram í lyfja- og líftækni. Þeir semsagt orsaka krabbameinið, bjóða þér ginseng til að bæta heilsuna og reyna síðan að lækna krabbameinið? Haha, þetta er klikkað. Kynningin hjá þeim var einskonar söluræða allan tíman sem við vorum þarna, fórum um verksmiðjuna sem vissulega var gaman að skoða en mér fannst ekki alveg viðeigandi að fara í skoðunarferð í sígarettuverksmiðju.

Síðan var einn starfsmaðurinn sem var ekki alveg nóg góður í enskunni sem missti upp úr sér frekar skemmtilegan frasa. Þegar við gengum fram hjá myndum á veggnum þar sem aðrir hópar sem höfðu komið í heimsókn voru innrammaðir. Hann sagði:

"You see these pictures here on the wall, these are other groups that have visited our factory, later we are going to take your picture too and them we are going to HANG you!"

Hahaha. ég gat sem betur fer gengið út úr verksmiðjunni með alla limi enn áfasta.

Við fórum síðan á svæðið sem við gistum á, sem var svona hefðbundin kóresk húsakynni. Við vorum kynnt fyrir krökkum úr skóla þarna, (13-15 ára), og vorum "International buddies". Við áttum svo að gera ýmislegt saman. Við lærðum hvernig á að lita fataefni og búa til hrísgrjónakökur meðal annars.

Um kvöldið var svo alvöru hefðbundið kóreskt brúðkaup hjá tveim vinum mínum, Marek og Lucie. Ég var beðin um að taka þátt í athöfninni. Ég var settur í þvílíka múnderingu, þið fáið að sjá það á myndunum mínum (sem voru í þessu tilviki ekki teknar af mér, ég fékk annan til þess að taka myndirnar fyrir mig, þar sem ég var vant við látin í athöfninni). Hlutverk mitt var semsagt að halda á "hásæti" brúðarinnar með henni í því að staðnum sem athöfnin var haldin ásamt 3 öðrum. Síðan í lok athafnarinnar var ég neyddur til þess að lemja vin minn, nei þetta er ekki eitthvað rugl í mér. Samkvæmt kóreskri hefð þá er brúðguminn laminn í fótinn með spýtu til þess að örva blóðflæðið á brúðkaupsnóttinni. Ég neyddist því til þess að lemja vin minn, en það gekk alveg vel og við erum ennþá vinir eftir þetta, hehe ;)

Um kvöldið var síðan haldin veisla þar sem ég bauð uppá áfengi frá Íslandi, ég tók með mér eina flösku af Opal. Sumir fíluðu þetta í botn en aðrir ekki.

Daginn eftir fórum við í heimsókn í musteri Budda og gerðum allskonar fleiri hluti með "félögunum" okkar.

Á sunnudaginn fór ég síðan á bílasýningu. Og merkilegt nokk þá voru bílarnir ekki aðal málið á sýningunni, nei það voru sýningarstúlkunar. Ljósmyndararnir hópuðust að básunum þar sem þær voru og síðan var nánast engin á hinum básunum. Í alvörunni þá held ég að svona 90% gestanna á sýninguna hafi komið til þess að sjá stelpunar, sem var svosem í fína lagi enda alveg gullfallegar stúlkur þar á ferðinni. Ég verð líka að viðurkenna að það var eiginlega bara skemmtilegara að skoða stelpunar en bílana, hehe :) Svona ganga hlutirnir fyrir sig í Asíu. Bílasýningar á Íslandi og hér eru alveg allt öðruvísi, en alls ekkert verri fyrir það.

การบรรยายธรรมะโดยท่าน ว.วชิรเมธี 

1. อย่าเป็นนักจับผิด
 คนที่คอยจับผิดคนอื่น แสดงว่า หลงตัวเองว่าเป็นคนดีกว่าคนอื่น ไม่เห็นข้อบกพร่องของตนเอง 'กิเลสฟูท่วมหัว ยังไม่รู้จักตัวอีก'
 คนที่ชอบจับผิด จิตใจจะหม่นหมอง ไม่มีโอกาส 'จิตประภัสสร' ฉะนั้น จงมองคน มองโลกในแง่ดี'แม้ในสิ่งที่เป็นทุกข์ ถ้ามองเป็น ก็เป็นสุข'

2. อย่ามัวแต่คิดริษยา
 'แข่งกันดี ไม่ดีสักคน        ผลัดกันดี ได้ดีทุกคน'
 คนเราต้องมีพรหมวิหาร 4 คือ เมตตา กรุณา มุทิตา อุเบกขา
 คนที่เราริษยาเป็นการส่วนตัว มีชื่อว่า 'เจ้ากรรมนายเวร'  ถ้าเขาสุข เราจะทุกข์  ฉะนั้น เราต้องถอดถอน
 ความริษยาออกจากใจเรา เพราะไฟริษยา เป็น 'ไฟสุมขอน' (ไฟเย็น) เราริษยา 1 คน เราก็มีทุกข์ 1 ก้อน
 เราสามารถถอดถอนความริษยาออกจากใจเราโดยใช้วิธี 'แผ่เมตตา' หรือ ซื้อโคมมา แล้วเขียนชื่อคนที่เราริษยา  แล้วปล่อยให้ลอยไป

3. อย่าเสียเวลากับความหลัง
 90% ของคนที่ทุกข์ เกิดจากการย้ำคิดย้ำทำ 'ปล่อยไม่ลง ปลงไม่เป็น'
 มนุษย์ที่สลัดความหลังไม่ออก เหมือนมนุษย์ที่เดินขึ้นเขาพร้อมแบกเครื่องเคราต่างๆ ไว้ที่หลังขึ้นไปด้วย
 ความทุกข์ที่เกิดขึ้นแล้ว จงปล่อยมันซะ 'อย่าปล่อยให้คมมีดแห่งอดีต มากรีดปัจจุบัน'
  'อยู่กับปัจจุบันให้เป็น'  ให้กายอยู่กับจิต  จิตอยู่กับกาย คือมี 'สติ' กำกับตลอดเวลา

4. อย่าพังเพราะ ไม