Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Meeting the Monkey

I'm settling down here in Shanghai. Finding a place to live, making friends, learning the city streets, taking care of the specifics so I can feel supported as I continue living my dream.

I just dug up an email I sent to friends a few years ago, thought it would be helpful to remember the words of a monk whose book once inspired me. You might appreciate them, too. Here they are.


Many things we consume in our daily lives are spiked to create addiction. Not only cigarettes, but TV, ice cream, pop music, mainstream news, etc. Everything that is ubiquitous is addictive.

The quality of your life depends on your relationship to wisdom. If you choose to live your life on the comic book level, pursuing material objects and immersing yourself in drama, your life will lack subtle refinement or poetry.

Aspire to go beyond the ordinary.

Although we all need to live our lives through our conditioned character, we don’t need to act like a character. Life is not a sitcom.

Examine your life carefully and sensitively. There are areas of your life that you avoid.

If you really want to resolve your problems, you must sit with them patiently until the solution reveals itself. If a solution doesn’t come, then it isn’t your problem and there is nothing you need to do.

Follow your gut feeling about what is right and do it! Do what you need to do with a willing heart and with all the energy you can muster.

Do the difficult and meet the challenge!

Patience is the most important element in “problem solving.” Action is next in importance. We usually get it backwards.

By continually putting yourself in the present, the future sorts itself out.

Focus on the big problems. Then, the small problems will sort themselves out.

Silence is a great asset. If you don’t have any in your life, be kind to yourself and create some. Silence is a form of mercy.

The best medicines are those that work gradually to restore the original balance of the body, such as herbs and homeopathic remedies. Medicines that are formulated to kill the problem end up overkilling it. Nature will not tolerate this type of problem solving, as it presents the same situation in another form.

Keep your body balanced and nourish it with healthy food.

Illness is more a warning than a problem. It is a signal that something is out of harmony.

Moderation and balance are a way to honor your life. On one hand, there is intoxication. On the other despair and depression. When you find the middle way, your life unexpectedly gets better.

Shocking but true: we are all going to die.

The less you take things personally, the more cool and at peace you will feel.

Be modest. Be content and grateful for whatever you have.

To get exactly what you need at precisely the right time, put yourself in a mindful and reflective state of mind. You will put yourself directly into the hands of the universe.

The way in which you do things is more important than what you do. The way we do anything is the way we do everything.

If you don’t do good, who will?

Can you be as happy when things are “just okay” as when life is “high”? If you can, you have passed the course.

Leave everything better than when you came upon it.

Be careful of overthinking. This can lead to total confusion.

Meditation is not just sitting on a cushion. Awareness of reality should be seamless, continuing on and off the cushion.

Future plans are built on banana peels. Cultivate an effort to do your best in the present without expectation. Be at peace with whatever comes up, whether it is cherries, oranges, or the big jackpot.

Remember: everything, yes everything, changes.

Unplug yourself from that which drains your heart.

Don’t feel stuck at red lights. Use them as opportunities for reflection. The red light is actually our ally. If life were all green lights, we would have run ourselves over the edge by now.

Peace means no trouble. Period. If you live peacefully, you don’t make trouble.

To connect to the present moment, take five deep breaths. Five deep breaths can take you out from under any heavy situation.

Five things to encourage awakening: 1) Don’t take things personally, 2) All situations are really lessons, 3) Be a student in every moment, 4) Exceed your patience barrier (i.e., feel the distress of impatience), 5) Listen to silence.

Subdue the fear of death until death is afraid of you. Fear of death is a cultural implant.

The harder you drive your life toward money and security, the harder it is to get enough of it. You can never get enough of what you don’t need.

Life is more about letting go than about grasping more and more.

(From Meeting the Monkey Halfway by Ajahn Sumano Bhikku. Edited, with minor changes, by Ron Elkayam.)

Saturday, October 20, 2007

My Chinese Eyes

Before I go to sleep last night, I go to the corner store to buy a bottle of water. As usual, when Chinese people with poor English accents try to talk to me in English, I tell them in Chinese, "Excuse me, I don't understand English." The laoban (shop owner) is trying to tell me how much my water costs. We start talking in Chinese and he thinks my Chinese is pretty good. He guesses I like Chinese culture. "I do, I do," I respond.

"Are you Chinese?" he asks, making me think he must have had one too many Tsing Tao beers with dinner. "Well, look at my face," I say. He says, "Perhaps you are of mixed Chinese blood." Of course, I am smiling. "Yeah," he says, "I can see it in your eyes."

"Well, maybe in a past life," I say. "A hundred years ago, two hundred, three hundred?" he asks. "I don't know," I say.

"If you have time during your stay, come by and talk," he says as I leave.

I go back to my hotel, have a drink of my water, and get ready for bed, but not without checking out my Chinese eyes in the mirror.

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Making Friends with China

I'm in the south of China in Guilin in Guangxi province. If I were Vietnamese, I could hop on a train and cross the border to Hanoi in about ten hours. However, I'm not Vietnamese, so I have other dreams.

I've just gotten off the plane from Shanghai and am sitting not too far from the baggage claim area of the Guilin airport in an internet "business center" where you can check your email for about 75 cents an hour. There aren't any businessmen here, just a few high school students fooling around on the net. One girl is yapping away in her mainland Chinese accent with her tongxue (classmates) on an instant messenging program.

After working hard to save money for my trip in the past month, I feel like I am coming alive again as I begin to explore this new place. I was happy to be in the States--to see my family on the East coast, to see my friends in Berkeley. To feel how much my psyche is changing living in Chinese culture. To see the things about American culture that I am finding stranger and stranger the more I live here in Asia. But it's good to be on the road again here in Asia, speaking Chinese, working toward my dream, whatever that may be.

I am in the middle of something. Something that feels much larger than me. I am reminded of the words of Seung Sahn, the Korean Zen master. "Don't know, only don't know." Westerners (and I think most people) have a tough time with this. We always want to know what comes next. For now, I am okay with "don't know". It's fun to be curious, to live with mystery, to listen to the present as it unfolds. "Dancing with the moment as she flies," a famous poet once said.

This morning, I woke up in Shanghai in my friend's high-rise apartment which looks out directly on the modern Pudong skyline. Next to the famous Jinmao building (which sure looks like Taipei's 101 to me), they are building an even taller structure, the World Finance Building, which will be 90 storeys and 460m, in case you were wondering.

After showering and preparing my pack for my trip to Yangshuo, I head out for my first day in China. I go to the bank and while waiting for my number to be called, one of the managers asks whether everything is all right. I explain to her what I need and she kindly helps me at the bank teller's window. The bank teller is smiling as we walk away and talk more. I tell her that today is my first day in China and that she is my first friend. Our meeting is yuan fen, she says. Meant to be.

It's a good way to start the day.

Across the street from the bank is Yuyuan Gardens, where I will get some breakfast. This is a beautiful compound full of classical Chinese pavilions where you can buy all manner of Chinese gifts, from marble chops to calligraphy brushes and scarfs to knockoff watches and luggage. There are salespeople walking around hawking their wares. When they see me, a foreigner, they say "watchey, luggitch?" And I really appreciate how just as soon as I said "bu yao" they stop and smile. And most importantly, continue on in their search for another waiguoren.

I ask one of the hawkers where I can get some food and he points me around the corner with a smile. I get some carrot dumpings and a cup of wulong tea at a little stall and began to talk to the laobanniang (the owner). Fortunately, everyone here understands my Chinese and everyone is pretty complimentary. I guess they're all used to a lot of Danish retirees. (These compliments are good encouragement, but as my friend Michael says, if one day you are not complimented, you know you are getting really good.)

There's a McDonald's nearby and I tell her that I don't eat McDonald's, that I prefer more traditional, natural food. She admits that she doesn't like it either. She explains that it's mostly a place for foreigners and young kids.

I tell her it's my first day here and that she is my second friend in China. It's time for me to be on my way and I thank her for the good and authentic food.

Now, time to get a card for my cellphone. These are the things you do when you land in a new place. I go to the China Mobile shop around the corner and get a phone number here in China. I have to tell you that life is a lot easier (and much more fun) because I can speak basic Chinese. I get my card and phone number, noticing that mobile phone numbers in China are eleven digits long. It's a big country.

I need some tea and I need to charge my phone, so I go to one of the many tea shops in Yuyuan Gardens. The shopkeeper is friendly and asks me to sit down for some wulong tea. I tell him a little about my story, that I've studied Chinese, and that I want to study more Chinese Medicine here. He is happy to let me charge my phone while we chat.

He brings out his wife, who tells me she was a rash that itches and won't go away. She is not more than thirty, and very friendly. As if I am her doctor, she starts pulling up her pantslegs to show me the red marks near her knees. I look at her tongue and feel her pulse and tell her what I think is going on. But then I tell her that I'm not such an experienced doctor and that she should find one nearby who specializes in dermatology.

The laoban gives me his card and says that I will be a good doctor in a few years and that he would like to visit me in my clinic. He's got some good tea and some fine-looking teapots, and so I make a note to go back there when I return to Shanghai in about a week.

After an overpriced lunch in Yuyuan gardens, I get on a taxi to Hongqiao airport, check in, and all of us passengers board a bus which takes us to our plane. Behind me is a young couple. The husband is on the phone and I start talking to his wife. In the next fifteen minutes, I discover some more of that yuan fen as I find my fifth and sixth friends here in China.

I am lucky. And hopefully, I'll be lucky enough to lose count of my friends in China in the next few days.

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Taiwanese Buddhists at the Airport

I arrive at the San Francisco Airport about to embark on my journey to China. For the past six weeks, I have been working, saving up some extra money for my trip, connecting with my family on both coasts, talking lots of English, and eating as much Middle Eastern food as possible. I almost can't believe it. The time has come to get on a plane to China.

The line at United check-in is long, mostly Chinese people. I assume they are all going to Shanghai like me. But in front of me is a group of people and they're all speaking Chinese with a Taiwanese accent (then they speak Taiwanese). It feels comfortable, reminds me of my time in Taiwan. So, I start talking to them.

They are from Banqiao, a suburb of Taipei which I have been to several times, and they are going home. They are disciples of the Chinese Zen master Sheng Yen and have come to the States to teach meditation for a few weeks to stressed-out American Buddhists (or perhaps Taiwanese/Chinese American Buddhists).

I tell them that I studied at National Cheng Chi University for the past year, and of course they are very warm. Of course, I tell them I miss Taiwan and all my friends there.

It's a good way to start my trip. More good yuan fen.