Living in Harmony…. WHEN THINGS FALL APART!!!!!!!!!
World Buddhist conference 201025th and 26th September Hotel Istana, kuala lumpur.
THE STAGE DURING A SESSION WITH THE BACKDROP OF THE CONFERENCE LOGO
Togetherness of lives and faces when every other thing lay scattered. How to address the time when all things fall apart? When to harness the compassion in us to soothe the pain of many?
ven. Thih nhat
Well, it started off well with the breakfast and the introduction. The key note address was the most exhilarating moment of the day as it was addressed by none other than Ven. Thich naht. He, having lived a tormenting life witnessing the horror of the Vietnam War, his words spoke high on the theme. The lesson that I got to learn from is enormous. The best aspect of his talk was the analogy that he illustrated for the perfect harmony. He said, he is a right-handed person and so his left hand is barely just a minor helper but the right hand never show its supremacy over the left hand and the left hand never feels inferior either. One fine day, he said he wasn’t in the state of his mindfulness, when the hammer in his right hand hit his left hand instead of hitting the nail that the left hand was holding. But the left never cursed the right hand infact the right hand covered the wound and protected it. I find this example very touching and very effective.
There were lots of eminent speakers, among which Ven. Thubtan Chondron brushed my conscience heavily. The softness in her voice, the warm smile that she wears all the time, captivates you all the time. She spoke on creating harmony in the work place and also about environmentalism in Buddhism. The most beautiful sentence that she phrased was “we should be cooperative rather than competitive in the corporate world”. I liked the whole concept about it. Real compassion should not be confused with sympathy. Its something like helping a drug addict to let go of the addiction rather than helping him to cling onto the addiction. which in both the cases is helping, but the real compassion is for the well-being of others.
SPEAKERS DURING THE PHOTO SHOOT...
Dr Rochi equally influenced me when she talked about caring for the dying people and prisoners. It’s one of the few areas in humanity where lots of things are being left undone. It takes an exceptional amount of courage and strength to be with the dying people. When you are walled among the people who are waiting for their death and people who are dying, it increasingly clogs your mind and matter. Hats off to her for being the one of few people who volunteers to risk their emotion every minute for the people who are a stranger to her eyes. She narrated a story about a man who was sentenced to death for murdering a 10 year old girl. She said the man locked up himself to his cell and would not talk to anybody. He even refused to seek for appeal order and accepted his death as his destiny. She said she could see the pain and the helplessness in his eyes that only spoke a tear. A day before his execution, he asked a friend of Dr. Rochi to be a witness to his execution. He was executed in the month of November in Mexico when the atmosphere is chilly and windy cold. On the day of his execution, the girl family and friends were sitting outside the prison wall and shouting “kill him”. Along with them were present along a total of 150 Buddhist people chanting the prayers for him. When he was taken to the execution area, her friend was there to witness his execution as a part of her promise. Before the black mask was worn around his head, she could see that he was saying thank you to the lady for being there. And so he was executed. She said it was the hardest promise to be kept. She said she felt pain for the man who accepted the death without any compromises. I liked the story so much but one thing that kept troubling me was why should she feel sorry for the man? He was punished for his crime. Why she didn’t felt the same for the girl who was murdered? I so wanted to ask her the question but we ran out of time. sad…
One of the speakers was a lady from Thailand (Ms Anchalee)who works with refugees and victims of domestic violence. She was inspirational in her own way. She very clearly said “no profile defines an abuser” that was so right. She talked about the lady who came to her for help because her husband was abusing her. It was a clear case of domestic violence. The lady had eight children and pregnant with one. She said when she saw the husband, she was shocked. He was short small man who looked completely innocent. Most of the time, we presume the abusers to be big built man. So it’s very true that no profile defines an abuser, by now i know!
THE EXHILARATING AUDIENCE!!!
I never admire psychiatrist just for the plain reason that i feel that aint nay profession to live by. often i have been proved wrong but to me they always appear as somebody trying to manipulate with the delicate mind and matter. this conference did help my clearing some of the doubts but i am still bit skeptical about it. Dr Tan ho soon was one of the speakers for the conference. the way he talked about applying Buddhist virtues and principles in the psychiatric arena was kind of interesting in one way. he talked a lot of compassion and mindfulness which are the key elements in harmonizing situations.
Ven. Tenzin zopa was explaining the of the appearance of the white light infront of the people who are at the dying stage. it made some sense to me and i would love to learn more about it. We went to take pictures with him and surprisingly, he gifted me a copy of the " unmistaken child" a film about his teacher. he said its amazing to know that we are from Ladakh. it was nice of him...
Ven. Tejadhammo was a very interesting monk from Australia. Living with purpose in Turbulent times, was hi given topic and it sounded well. i cant recall the whole thing except for the turbulence that he felt in the Russian airplance while he was flying to china. where the air hostess handed all the passengers a small cup and she started pouring hot water from a huge kettle. while she was still pouring the hot water, the plane was hit by a turbulence, she still kept doing her job. after a while, there was an announcement to put on the seat belt in case of turbulence. he was laughing out loud and so in conclusion, turbulence may mean different situation to everybody. what one person called chaotic may seem normal to the other. it all depends upon ones social and emotional circumstances.
MY BADGE....
it was a great two days of sitting in the banquet chairs and facing the panel of speakers. rushing to the washroom was an emergency coz it was an emergency. the food was OK in accordance with the Buddhist point of vegetarianism.
i am all thankful to bro. charlie for sponsoring me to the conference. it was a pretty handsome registration fee as far as i can recollect.(rm 180). it was educative and informative.... and very Buddhistic....
