I miss my cousin. I miss Gracie and Pie, too, but mostly I miss my wonderful cousin.

Englewood Cliffs, NJ
Back in the U.S.S.A. (I have a stutter).

Kaohsiung, Taiwan
After I ended up not going to Taipei, my cousin ended being admitted to the hospital on Sunday. Which still shouldn't have affected my plans either way. I didn't see her on Sunday until after I would have returned from Taipei. So my last week in Taiwan, and my cousin is in the hospital. I've been staying with her since I'm the only person who has no where to go and nothing to do. Still, I'm mostly just a presence since there are constant interruptions by doctors and nurses and phonecalls and people visiting, so I just mindfully chill in the. . . living room. My cousin's father-in-law is chairman of the board of the hospital, and his father founded the hospital. My cousin's husband is head of IT, so she's in the VIP room. The room the president would be put in if he was admitted to the hospital. Apparently all hospitals have them, and it would be mistaken to think Bill Clinton was in a regular hospital room when he was admitted in New York last year.

I'm still going to Taipei this weekend and my cousin being in the hospital isn't going to change that. It doesn't sound like I'm being very compassionate about her being in the hospital, but I'm taking care of her and tending to her when I'm there. I just don't want the point to be missed that this could have been avoided if she had taken care of herself and gone to the doctor at the first sign of trouble more than two weeks ago. It was really irresponsible for her to ignore it, considering she has two young children and her mother died of breast cancer. So with my left hand I care for her, while my right hand berates her for. . . really, that was just plain stupid. When you have so many people around you relying on you, you need to have the wisdom to be selfish and take care of your own health.

But I go to visit a monastery in Taipei for a full day retreat on Saturday, I return to Kaohsiung on Sunday afternoon, and if I can't get a seat on the flight next Wednesday, on which I'm waitlisted, I leave the next day on Monday. Easy come, easy go.

Kaohsiung, Taiwan
Postponed my trip to Taipei to next week at the last minute because it looked like my cousin was in particularly bad shape; exceptional circumstances. She said she was on the verge of coming down with a fever, and she also had to go to the doctor again in the afternoon because of a medical condition she came down with (and neglected) in the last two weeks. I already took her to the doctor, so I had reason to believe this was serious. Turns out it was business as usual, no fever, no doctor, and as bad as she looked, she looks like that about half the time I go over to see her anyway. Usually because the kids tag-team to keep her up all night.

It wouldn't cross my cousin's mind to intentionally, consciously disrupt my plans to keep me around. Unconsciously, I wouldn't put it past her. Mind you, the decision not to go was completely, utterly my decision, and I wasn't going to hear two ways about it. And mind you, I am very glad and relieved that my cousin didn't come down with a fever and her condition didn't require a second visit to the doctor. Still, when I place a lot of effort into planning something, especially something practice-related, and it gets disrupted, my mind still reacts. Negatively.

So as the day progressed and I realized that everything was normal and my cousin was even happy, the feeling came up that I disrupted my plans for nothing. It wasn't for nothing, but I violated my own principle to not disrupt my plans for my cousin - especially plans that are practice related. I knew my mind was going to spiral into negativity, and for the rest of the afternoon, all my energy went into preventing it.

From the outside, it may have looked like I was closing off a bit, I was quieter, not as responsive, not as present, but it was steeling mental reinforcements to contain the negativity. A lot of energy went into actively clearing and stilling my mind, because if I let my mind move and start thinking, it would move quickly into negativity. It had nothing to do with my cousin, it had nothing to do with not going to Taipei or disrupting my plans or my practice. There was an outside stimuli that tripped the negativity wire in my mind, and all it was about was the negativity and dealing with it.

At one point when we were with her kids in the park, I was struggling with the negativity, stripping away the outside forms of it - feelings, blame - that are illusory and will pass - they will not be issues in a few days time - and I was confronted once more with the iron core edifice of my negativity, staring at it, wondering what to do about it, thinking I had to transform this core. Then one of Thich Nhat Hahn's terms came to me - transformation at the base. Transformation at the core, it's the same thing. I might want to look into what he's had to say about that, maybe even read his book with that title, although I think it's a book of verse.

Anyway, today I'm going to mostly keep for myself. I won't avoid my cousin, and I might even go over later for a short while, but today is for me to walk in the nearby mountains and sit in a nearby temple:

Yuan Heng Temple:


This isn't even a Zen temple, but it has a central public location where anyone can come in and practice in whatever school they're familiar with. That, I think, is the biggest flaw of every "Zen" temple/monastery that I've seen in Taiwan and Japan. At the heart of the public life of every Zen temple should be a place where the public can come in and do sitting or walking meditation. The public should not be met with this:

Kaohsiung, Taiwan
For my first month here, I was good about waking up early for morning sitting, but after coming back from Japan, when my uncle was gone for a week, I started getting up later. That led to getting to sleep later. I don't know if it has something to do with me being in the tropics, but I can't sleep past about 8:00, so if I'm going to sleep later and later, I start losing sleep. That's what happened, and I think I want to get back to a schedule of going to sleep earlier and waking up early. Today I was toast for all sitting.

Tomorrow I'm flying up to Taipei solo for the weekend. My cousin initially wanted to come with me because she has an aunt on her mother's side there who could have showed us around, and cousins who could help take care of the kids. But a social engagement came up that she couldn't get out of because her father organized it. My main purpose is to go to Dharma Drum Mountain monastery for Saturday morning practice in English. I was impressed by their five year relief plan for tsunami victims in case world interest and aid fades over time, so I want to see how their practice is, maybe talk to people to get ideas to bring back to Deer Park. I'm prepared to not be too impressed, though, in case it's just another compromising Buddhist institution. If it is a cool place, I will go again next weekend (when my parents are in Kaohsiung) for a full day retreat next Saturday. My cousin will probably come along, too, since she doesn't want any excuse to come up where she has to see my mother.

I also think I want to check out the Museum of World Religions which looks intriguing, but might also need to be approached cautiously. I think there will be plenty to do in Taipei, so I shouldn't be apprehensive about this solo trip, although I shouldn't compare this to my traveling in Japan, since I had at least some language skills there. Here, I have zilch, although Taipei is supposed to be comparable to Japan in terms of chances of people understanding some English.

And crikey, I'm in Taiwan, I need to go to the (current) tallest building in the world the Taipei 101 building!

I also found a tourist "temple walk" in a brochure that I can do if I want to hang out at Taoist/Confucian temples, and night markets are well-marked on tourist maps, so those are a must. I also caught wind of some apparently exceptional dumpling (dim sum) restaurants that I might want to contact a cousin I just found out about to go to with. OK, now I'm looking forward to going, even without my cousin, who I think was silently hoping I wouldn't go since she still needs as much help as she can get with the kids. What's the deal with needing so much help with these two kids? Let's just say that I nicknamed the older one "the rainmaker" and the little one "Godzilla". They're sweet kids, just a handful.

Kaohsiung, Taiwan
Yea, so I walked away from Deer Park with a lot of negative baggage, and then continued to foment that negativity about Deer Park, Thich Nhat Hanh, and the Plum Village system, forgetting that I really connected with those people, that they really cared and tried to push me towards what my own heart was saying. They weren't trying to make the monastic path hard, they weren't trying to suck me in against my will, all they wanted was for me to listen to my own heart to make the right decision for myself. I can't even think of when I got such support in anything before.

I sent an email to the Deer Park office administrator just to touch base, and he sent a reply that blew me away. My message was kind of informal, "hey, how ya doin'?", but his reply indicated that he read every word and he responded to every thing I mentioned I was up to. His reply said, "You matter, and I'm listening to everything you say". And this person isn't even a monastic, just someone who works for the community, but experiences it five days a week and is steeped in it.

I write about my critical mind and my cultometer. Deer Park is not the cult. The cult-like behavior is in my family members who are trying to distract me from the path. They're the ones with an agenda and give no regard to what I want or who I am. Deer Park is just saying that they like me, they see that my practice has potential, and their gates are open for me when I'm ready, but if I decide against it, they support any continuation of my practice, as long as it is in furtherance of peace, compassion, and mindful living.

My parents are the only evil ones. My uncle doesn't want me to be a monk just because he doesn't understand. He's simple. My cousin told me he doesn't want me to become a monk because he loves me, that's his way of showing his love. I said that's twisted. "Why?" He's showing his love by going against what I want to do? Thanks, but I get enough of that kind of love from my parents. She smiled said she'd tell her father (my uncle) that.

My cousin has mixed feelings. I think she feels it would be an honor to have a family member become a monk. At the same time, I think she feels she would be losing me. As a monk, we couldn't have the same relationship we have now. We couldn't spend time like we do now. And it forecloses any future where we can be closer. I understand her feelings, I even share them, and that's why she's also a distraction. And I need to be clear. I am pursuing this path. I don't know if I'll complete it, but I have to pursue it, arrow shot straight and true.

She really appreciates my being here, that I've helped her a lot and helped get her practice back on track a little bit to deal with her daily stresses. She really wishes I could stay longer. But then I realized and told her that the benefit she got from my being here was the result of my practice with the Deer Park monastics. To interrupt the schedule I've set for myself to continue my development and transformation in order to be with her to help her out would render those benefits meaningless. That's not logical, but it's true, and I'm glad when I told her that, she understood the meaning without trying to make me explain it. The practice is on another level. It's a circle that needs to be completed. She knows to interrupt it would be wrong for whatever reason.

I need to be adamant, I need to be disciplined, and I need resolve. I'm going back to Deer Park soon, and I need to make my travel arrangements. Taiwan is an illusion. It's not reality. It's a vacation. And my cousin? . . . hasn't been a part of my life for years.

Kaohsiung, Taiwan
I think I have about two weeks left in Taiwan. My parents will be gone from New Jersey to travel, so I don't have to avoid New Jersey to avoid them. I think I'll go back to New Jersey at the end of March, spend about a week in New Jersey, and I'm still deciding whether to return to Deer Park before my parents return from traveling, or maybe the day after they return. I feel, just on my own, that it would be rude to avoid them completely and that I should leave the day after they return, but then I reflect on every other occasion that I've done something not to be rude, and found that it didn't matter to them one way or another. So no sweat whatever I decide, I suppose.

More pressing is that they will be traveling to East Asia: read Taiwan, and I do want to avoid them here. On one hand, it will just be really weird for me to be with them out of context of New Jersey, the only context in which I know them, and also because I don't want to risk being sour at them for being duplicitous about the monastic thing - telling me to my face that they're OK with it, but then telling everyone else they're against it and their footing the bill for my traveling to Taiwan is in hopes that I will change my mind, which at best is benign and uninformed, but at worst, condescending and offensive. On the other hand, I need to watch my negativity, and avoiding them would be a manifestation of it, and all of the "evil plan" theories of my parents' actions are hearsay through my cousin. It's not that I don't trust my cousin, but she certainly is biased, both against my parents and for me.

The point might be moot, however, since the weekend they said they'd be in Kaohsiung, I had already discussed with my cousin to visit a monastery in Taipei. I might get back the night before they leave (not so ironically to go to Taipei for a class reunion).

So I never did get the motivation to seriously consider joining up with the Deer Park monastics in Vietnam. I did find a blog of someone, a woman I think, who has been following them through Vietnam. I'll have to go back in her archives to get the whole experience, but I'm kinda glad that I didn't go. I'm still processing why. When she mentions "Thay", she's referring to Thich Nhat Hahn.

Go Figure:

Boston Herald:
ATLANTA - A man about to stand trial for a brutal rape yesterday overpowered a female deputy in a courthouse hallway and took her gun, then shot her in the mouth and went into the courtroom, where he killed the judge and a court stenographer.

SFGate:
The deputy who was overpowered at the courthouse remained in critical condition Sunday, Grady Memorial Hospital officials said. Although hospital officials initially reported she may have suffered a grazing bullet wound to her forehead, they now believe she was struck on the head, said spokeswoman Denise Simpson.

Reporting that a deputy was shot in the mouth is far more inflammatory than reporting that she was struck on the head. I'm definitely not convinced that bloggers should be considered 'journalists' in the professional sense of the word, but this kind of discrepancy gives bloggers good fuel to accuse mainstream journalists of being just as subjective and biased. Either way, it's things like this that make me consume news media critically and carefully.

The monastics from Deer Park are in Vietnam until the middle of April, and I plan to be back there before then. My plan to return hasn't changed, nor has my intent to sincerely pursue monastic aspirancy in the Plum Village system. It doesn't help, however, that at the time I left, I was grappling with my negativity issues that extended to encompass the place and what I was doing there.

And I'm not sure what to make of articles regarding Thich Nhat Hanh's visit to Vietnam that aren't exactly glowing. Thich Nhat Hanh is held in pretty high esteem in Western Buddhist circles, and from my experience, the teachings and the community are pretty good, if not incredible. So why the chilly reception in the media? Are they biased against him and why? Why aren't there positive reports from parties biased for him?

(links removed because I have been able to verify that the sources are biased and the facts were misrepresented)
+ Thich Nhat Hanh seeks to meet UBCV dignitaries Thich Quang Do and Thich Tue Sy
+ Thich Nhat Hanh’s visit to Vietnam causes deep concern to UBCV Buddhists
+ Buddhist monk Thich Vien Dinh writes to Thich Nhat Hanh
+ Buddhist monk returns from exile to political storm in Vietnam

This, I shouldn't wonder, is more of my negative impulses manifesting. I shouldn't reflect on the negative aspect these articles bring until I wait and hear the positive accounts. Maybe it's not fair of me to be linking these articles without finding more balanced reports. But I'm already in the Plum Village system. That's where I'm pursuing aspirancy and they already get any benefit of my doubts. So while I need to be watchful of my negativity, I need to keep up a skeptical review and stay on guard for any mindless, cult-like behavior.

By "cult-like behavior", I just mean an atmosphere where critical thinking and open inquiry is supressed. So if the Deer Park monks express unhappiness over my linking these negative articles about Thich Nhat Hahn without proving that: A) they are inaccurate or one-sided, and B) providing a credible motivation by the writers/publishers to publish negative reports about Thich Nhat Hahn, that might be considered cult-like behavior.

I don't feel like these articles are helping me and my negativity personally, but they might be helping me in my quest. When I walk back up the mountain to Deer Park, I will be walking very carefully, balancing the positive and negative to keep an objective viewpoint, open to both sides to find my truth about the place and what I'm doing.

addendum: one of the articles states that Thich Nhat Hanh's "sect" allows monks and nuns to marry, which is against the Buddhist monastic tradition and is simply false. That blatant falsehood, which I can personally verify for myself, is a prima facie indicator that the article is biased, and puts the motivation behind the article in question. There are no two sides of some objective fact, that's a libelous falsehood.

Kaohsiung, Taiwan
Back in Taiwan again. I came back a day earlier than planned for several reasons. First of all, this week was going to be really busy for Mad*ka (as if any week isn't?), and she had to be at work by 10:00 on Monday morning (my flight was at 4:30 P.M.), and I thought it would be good to get out of her hair and cramped apartment to give her a bit of a breather, even if she didn't necessarily need it and seems to appreciate my company. Also the flight on Monday was completely booked, and the flight on Sunday wasn't, and I prefer to avoid any crush of people, but especially in flying. Lastly, I felt my cousin would appreciate my coming back early to help out with the kids.

And it was cold in Japan. So nice to be back in the tropics, short-sleeve shirts and denim jacket. My cousin picked me up from the airport and informed me my uncle was gone on vacation for the week! He went to Cambodia. I think he didn't mention this trip to me on purpose. Partly because he's a bit absent-minded, but also to not have the possibility that I might want to go with him, which I wouldn't have. But he's great, he's in his late 70s but his mind is still in his 20s and he likes having fun without the burden of watching out for a nephew, so god bless him going on the trip without mentioning it to me!

It's good for me, too. After a week of not actively practicing and no sitting, I wanted to come back adamantly insisting on extended sitting each day, hour and a half in the morning and evening, including a 10 minute walking. So with my uncle on vacation, I can use the rooftop shrine room at will, and the roof is perfect for 10 minutes of walking, too.

Now I just have to consider returning to Deer Park.

Nagasaki, Japan
I chose Nagasaki as my other destination in my travels because I've never been here. Never been in this part of Japan, never been to Kyushu. I also wanted to visit a city where there was a definite reason aside from usual touristy stuff, and I thought Nagasaki could be a pilgrimage of human suffering because of the Atomic Bombing. I've already been to Hiroshima in August 1995.

Wow, I love Nagasaki! Kyoto was a bit of a drag in comparison. I wish I knew more about the nooks and crannies of the city and if there are more bohemian quarters, but Nagasaki is already distinguished because of the strong foreign influence on the culture here. There's a heavy Korean and Chinese population due to the proximity to the Asian mainland, and there's also a strong Western influence because for centuries of national isolation, Nagasaki was the only port where foreigners were allowed.

It also feels a little bit like San Francisco, but maybe that's because it rained all day today. But also because there are a lot of hills, they use street cars like the Muni light rail, there is a harbor with waterfront access like the bay, and they're even a building a bridge over the mouth of the harbor like the Golden Gate.

Climbing hills gives panoramic views like San Francisco. You can just make out the bridge building in progress on this foggy, rainy day:


But my main reason for coming to Nagasaki was to visit the Ground Zero memorial and the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum. The convenient circular form around the Ground Zero monument made for good walking, and I ended up walking around and around, albeit slowly, for over 45 minutes.


The museum left a lot to be desired, though. The raw material they had for the museum was good, as was the information, but the multi-media presentation was confusing and distracting and always required multiple viewings for it to sink in. I also thought the layout of the exhibition could have been better, but maybe I'm just griping because I was hungry.

As a pilgrimage, it was really good to come here. It wasn't as intense as when I was in Hiroshima, on the 50th anniversary of that bombing, but the magnitude of what happened here still demanded deep reflection and sadness (and anger, but that's another story).

In the afternoon, I went to a section of town called Teramachi (tera=temple, machi=town). It was fantastic, one street lined with Buddhist temples. Apparently the Shogunate at one point issued an order that each sect of Buddhism build a temple on Teramachi in Nagasaki. For Buddhism, Nagasaki clearly outshines poseur Kyoto. Kyoto is just about that pompous Zen aesthetic. The truth about Buddhism in Chinese and Japanese spirituality is that it was most looked upon for funerals. Many times monks bemoaned their duties focusing on performing funerals instead of practicing. In Teramachi, the cemeteries associated with the temples line the mountainside against which Teramachi lies, and they go all the way up the mountain. You see nothing like that in Kyoto.

Like the temples in Kyoto, you don't see a lot happening. You wander in, you wander around, then you wander out. There were two famous temples that are on the tourist maps, and those temples charged admission, and I didn't go to them. All the other temples didn't charge admission, and were basically the same thing.

Temple cemetery lining the mountain side:


I came here knowing nothing about the city except that the second Atomic Bomb was dropped here. Knowing nothing about where to go, what there is to do, or what it's like, and my knowledge only marginally better now, I must say I really do like this city. If I had a choice of all the cities I've visited in Japan, I'd choose to live here.