a sense of sky

Posted on January 19, 2016 by tiramit

OLD NOTEBOOKS: There’s a sense of sky, thoughts like clouds drifting through the vast space in the head… but I really don’t want to call it anything; giving things names gives them an identity and what happens next is, I become the ‘happy’ feeling. Feeling “happy” creates a ‘self’ where there wasn’t one before – “I” want to be happy, and don’t want to be ‘sad’, or unhappy. So maybe everything was okay before that ‘happy’ word arrived.

Something deeply understood by every human being in the world is the thought: ‘I am the only one that’s ‘me’, somehow ignoring the overwhelming fact that 7 billion people feel the same way. These days I’m returning to my old notebooks written when I was first discovering Buddhism, it’s this sudden PHN physical condition that’s throwing things all over the place and I need to remember how it all began. It really feels like the best thing to do is return the focus to that sense of sky, nothingness, no-thingness, and anatta, ‘no-self’, nobody at home…

How does it work? For me now, ‘no-self’ describes it well; it’s all just an operating system, same as Windows 10, Mac OS X El Capitain, and a determined and purposeful search to find out exactly where and how this ‘no-self’ exists will yield nothing, because “non self” doesn’t substantially exist – there isn’t any ‘thingness’ about non-self. No substance to it. In fact, ‘no-self’ is just another way of saying nothing substantially exists anywhere. There’s a wonderful fragility, a transparency about the world.

So the Buddha discovered this by way of his own research, 2500 years before Quantum physicists started to come up with empirical evidence that nothing substantially exists. Same thing in so many words. I started to investigate this further, because the question is, if there is no “self”, who or what “sees” there is no “self”? It’s an interesting direction the Dhamma takes that seems to hold my attention. I asked a monk about it in Thailand: ‘If everything without exception is “non self” including the “I” that’s investigating this, then who or what is there to see it’s non self… where does it all lead to? Without hesitation the monk just looked at me calmly and said “enlightenment.” That kinda stopped the conversation for a while …

The process of conceptualising is just a process – no person there doing it. just a process of how one thing is naturally linked to the next thing it’s most likely to link with, and that in turn linked to the next and it goes around like a wheel turning; the extreme point is suffering and unknowing (ignorance: the act of ignoring) and continues on from there following links that the Buddha showed us how to see. It can happen in a millisecond or in a slightly longer extended time… and that’s when we see it. There is a way out, of course, and that happens around steps 6,7 & 8 in the 12 step cycle. I’m not going to talk about that specifically here, check out the link below. So the main thing is all of these cycles, all these other behaviours that go on in life, have no ‘self’ in the background somehow pulling the strings. I find that remembering this helps me in dealing with pain; the pain is not happening to ‘me’ – there is no ‘me’ it’s happening to… just a series of processes. I allow it to pass, in the same way as ‘it’ is raining, wait for it to end… all things do.

“When Hanshan got up from his seat and walked around, he did not see things in motion. When he opened the window blind, suddenly a wind blew the trees in the yard, and the leaves flew all over the sky. However, he did not see any signs of motion. He understood what the text spoke of as, “Streams and rivers run into the ocean and yet there is no flowing.” [Han-shan Te-Ching (1546 – 1623)]

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Note: The source of the Han-Shan Te-Ching quote is the Mindfulbalance blog, post titled: Present in the midst of change. I’m grateful to the researcher for finding this wonderful group of words.
For the cycles of causality follow this link to the Buddha’s teaching on Dependent Origination (Paticcsammupada)

high altitude pain

Posted on January 15, 2016 by tiramit

POSTCARD #187: Bangkok/Delhi flight: The journey is by way of a series of crowded corridors connected like tubes in a telescope, one inside the other, becoming smaller and smaller, reduced to squeeze us into the self construct; the way we are and the lifetimes lived with it. The ‘me’ in the body, the voice in my head, the narrator telling the story. This is how it is… and already there’s a sense of distance from the world (‘this’ was). Keep moving, we pass through security as if it were the eyepiece of the telescope, examined through a lens; cameras watch us standing in line. We are subject to causes and conditions… shoes off, gentlemen remove belt, anything in your pockets Sir? Take off watch please. Enter the X-ray cubicle, stand with legs apart, arms extended, wind blows clothes aside and hair ruffled. I’m suddenly aware the viewer behind the lens can see everything underneath clothing. Shoes on, thread belt through loops, pick up watch and things. Collect computer from tray put it back inside bag and get organised. Step out of there, aware, balanced, easy breathing and it’s okay right now (except piercing high frequency air-conditioning sound, waiting for pain to arrive but it doesn’t come), sensory mechanisms function without my involvement. Continue with the slow foot shuffle (high pitched voices, mysterious kerfuffle), but we’re all moving along here. I’m like an antenna receiving data; seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching and cognitive functioning receptor, waiting for things to happen.

Hand passport to officer, look at the camera, facial recognition, the self I inhabit… this is who I ‘am’ (the same as everyone else ‘is’). The officer stamps twice, thump… thump (the sound of it), walk through and out to the duty-free extravaganza (piercing light enters neural pathways), suddenly blinded for a moment in the reflected glow of gold watches, jewelry, the made-up lips and eyes in vivid, max-pixel pictures, videos of popular celebrities, cosmetic dentistry, facial alterations, images in unflawed focus and good-looking lighting; commonplace works of art, masterpieces of trivialities. I could use the television analogy; I’m watching this channel and all the other people are watching their channels – and if there were separate channels for every single being in the world, that would be the correct analogy.

We’re in another tunnel sloping downwards, becoming smaller at the end where painted ladies wait, show me where I have to go; turn right into an even smaller tube with seats on either side of a corridor, and I’m in my numbered seat. It’s made to measure, low ceiling, knees touch the seat in front, elbows touching the guy next to me, hairy arms. It’s like being on a bus at night, except less space. No view from the window, can see only the blank video screen at eye level, 18 inches in front of me… everything is too near and a feeling of blackness. Try to read my book on the Kindle but the words appear strange, three-dimensional, as if embossed on the screen, the lines of text are not straight; flowing in a gentle curve. Then I feel the pain behind my right eye like a sharp steel knife entering my head, and pushed right up to the hilt. Gasp! The painted ladies bring me a plastic glass of water. Searching in my pockets for the meds…the huge pain has reached its max, the steel blade withdraws; a devastation of everything, catastrophic, frantic looking for something to hold on to, or let go of, and it all tips over like a building falls on its face in slow motion, desolation, wreckage and some relief as I see it’s not happening to ‘me’ – it’s not ‘my’ pain, too big for that, much too big. It’s the force of pain on its own, like the huge wind blows, the vast rain falls, a storm at sea. Swallow two capsules, lie back, close my eyes and the curve I was seeing earlier becomes the curve of a thick dark smoke rising up from my head, swirling up through the paper-thin structure of the plane, the sky above and space all around.

Relaxed with the seat back, pain gone and all that remains is the sound of the engines at 600 mph and altitude 38,000 feet. The mind makes a ‘story’ out of it, a stretched sense of reality that includes the video I’m watching in the darkness. Memory allows all kinds of out-of-context events to be there and acceptably part of it.

Landing, bump… bump, long lumpy runway to get to the airport buildings, then the clamber and struggle for overhead baggage, push, shove. Intrude, squeeze as they do here, full body contact with total strangers, and out into a tunnel again, more tunnels becoming wider, wider then a corridor and out onto the miles of ochre coloured carpet with patterns of planets and stars. High speed moving walkways and we’re in India.

“God is a mythical word, a mumbo-jumbo word that is the invention of the priesthood. Actually, to ask whether God exists is absurd. God is existence, the very isness. When we say God exists we create something out of the word God, then God becomes a thing. But God is not a thing, nor is God a person, he is pure existence. The word is misleading because the word personifies. It is better to use the word existence. The totality of existence is God.” [Osho]

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Photo: Free internet image
Quote: Source, God is Existence itself – Osho

obviously unexpected

Posted on January 12, 2016 by tiramit

POSTCARD #186: Bangkok: Easily said in hindsight, but there’s a sense of helplessness, as I take leave of the birds nesting in the ceiling fan; now it depends entirely on their strength and vigor – anything could happen to these small creatures … and it’ll all take place without me being here because I’m leaving. Bag is packed on my way to the airport, flight to Delhi and swept away in the wave of circumstances. It was that kind of unexpected situation that obviously decided everything finally when we had the birds on the balcony the last time, in Switzerland.

Things came to a head. Events occurred, a change, suddenly this U-turn showed up and we had to follow it around. I was lying on the sofa in the front room, one day, head propped up on a large cushion, staring at my feet down there and the vague space beyond, when suddenly I became aware of something moving in the room, a shadow reflected in the shiny floor surface. A bird with folded wings striding boldly across the floor… quite far into the room – HEY get out of here! Strange to have a wild bird suddenly fly across the room, bird-wing-flap disturbing the air, the acoustics – a very odd thing. It shot out through the open door, into the outside world, straight over the balcony rail and immediately gone in a direct line further and further away in the vast sky until it vanished as a tiny dot.

I stood on the balcony and watched it for a moment then dismantled the perch I’d built and removed the artist’s easel; scraped off all the bird mess and washed down the whole floor. It’s that farmyard thing; dung and downy feathers blowing around inside the apartment because we have to have the balcony doors open in the hot weather, and even if I vacuum up all the feathers, one or two still seem to be fluttering through the rooms of the apartment. My wife Jiab continues to be nice about it but doesn’t actually answer the question when I ask how she feels about the birds. So it’s that awkward silence…

When the birds came back in the evening, there was tremendous confusion: where’s our perch gone? Flapping of wings, feathers flying and hovering in the air where the easel used to be. Then one of them figured it was a good idea to perch on the door stop bracket at the top of the door – never noticed it before – it sticks out about 5 cm with a rubber stopper on the end. An ideal perch. Also the top of the door, which had to be open in the warm evening. So much flapping of wings to see who had the right to be where, the doorstop perch seemed to be top in the hierarchy. That night I put out the easel again (for the last time) and things quietened down, back the way they were.

The following day, after the birds left, I cleaned up again and took the easel inside, locked the door and we were off for a week’s holiday. Mixed feelings, we left them to look after themselves, letting go of attachments. It’s always like this, uneasy feeling, leaving the place where you were. Gratitude for everything received here, loving kindness, anjali, blessings, time to move on…

Our skills and abilities all come from the kindness of others; we had to be taught how to eat, how to walk, how to talk, and how to read and write. Even the language we speak is not our own invention but the product of many generations. Without it we could not communicate with others nor share their ideas. We could not read this book, learn Dharma, nor even think clearly. [Excerpt from: “Eight Steps to Happiness” by Geshe Kelsang Gyatso]

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camouflage

Posted on January 9, 2016 by tiramit

POSTCARD #185: Bangkok: It might look like a small heap of dirt stuck in a ceiling fan, but it’s a bird’s nest and the tiny bird, hatched out, is just sitting there, not moving… camouflaged, trying to look like a small heap of dirt stuck in a ceiling fan.

Almost impossible to see, but there’s a shape of a head there, and a small body. I can see it sometimes when it appears from under the wing of the parent bird but whenever I lift the camera, parent bird glares at me with this slightly fierce stare.

As soon as the parent bird leaves the nest, the other one gets in… unless I’m standing on top of a chair wobbling around with a phone camera and not getting anywhere. So I’m looking for an opportunity to get a better pic but that’s the best I can do without disturbing things too much.

Yep, some familiarity with this kind of situation because this is the second time around. We used to have doves on the balcony in an apartment on the seventh floor, 70-80 feet up, well above street level, above the treetops, just clouds and sky. I was surprised the birds would fly as high as seven floors. They’d come in the evening, stay the night and fly away each day at dawn – I should say they flew down each day because there really wasn’t any up. Following is a section of notes made at that time:

old notebooks: The birds have decided to roost on that big old artist’s easel on the balcony we have no room for in the apartment; somehow sculptural, artistic in a puzzling conceptual way, birds perched on the cross-piece and silhouetted against the evening sky. I’ll have to try to get them not to roost there; the smears of paint on the easel are becoming more of an ochre/white/grey smearing and dropping off onto the floor.

I spent the whole day today building a structure of bird perches made from bamboo canes bound with string, glue, duct tape and screwed to the wall. Then I waited until evening when the birds came back… but they didn’t seem to notice it at all and continued to perch on the artist’s easel. It must be about having your own place and your own identity, ‘self’, this is ‘my’ territory; this is me, myself, and this is where I am. None of the birds moved from where they were, and my elaborate new perch remains unoccupied.

Two days later: new birds have arrived and assembled on it, checking out the situation with this nearly 360 degrees sweep of vision they have, and thinking, well, it looks like this fine perch must be for us! But the old birds on the easel don’t like the new ones on the perch. There’s some upset-wing-flap and the deliberate pushy invasion of each other’s space with puffed-out, chest and assertive walk thus forcing the unwanted bird off its perch. Gained some understanding of the term: “the pecking order”.

About 15 birds now on the balcony, too much noise every night, small feathers blowing around and coming into the house. My wife Jiab really doesn’t like the idea of it and has spoken wise words about how it is getting quite crowded out there and how this is getting to be a problem. So I have to persuade the birds, I invited to stay, to go away… that’s a whole story in itself and I’ll write about it later.

LATE NEWS: I managed to get a very blurred pic of the nest and I think there are two hatchlings, not one.

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ceiling-fan-nest, 1 egg

Posted on January 6, 2016 by tiramit

POSTCARD #184: Bangkok: The ceiling fan is situated in the open air of the balcony and hasn’t been used in years – the on/off switch sealed with Scotch tape now the birds have claimed the space. When the nesting bird left this morning, I took the photo, standing on a chair with arms stretched up, hands holding the phone-camera at a slight angle pointing downwards at where I thought the nest would be: click… a few tries and I got the picture showing the egg in a fragile little nest, then got down and quickly put the chair away. A very small nest, temporary structure made from stalks of grass individually placed. There’s lightness, like the wind and the air about it.

Shortly after that, the parent bird comes back, sees me watching (it knew I had been up there), looks around with an almost 180° sweep of vision that brings the cranium all the way round as far as it’ll go, then back the other way to where it started and there’s just that little bit of vision obscured by the back of the head. Also some movement on the vertical plane looking up and down with eyes on each side so, somehow choosing which eye to focus with. The head appears to spin around over the top in and in absolutely any direction… it makes me quite dizzy to watch. Bird gets back on nest by sliding through the upper bar of the ceiling fan guard and shuffling in.

Now I’m pacing around the room wondering if this is what it feels like to be expecting a child? The womb is placed outside the body; parent bird feels pecks from a small beak. Tiny beings find there is a way out of their enclosed shell. They learn how to fly quickly and abandon the nest to the monsoon winds, which will demolish it immediately.

Our own life is the instrument with which we experiment with truth. [Thich Nhat Hanh]

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birds nest update

Posted on December 31, 2015 by tiramit

POSTCARD #183: Bangkok: I have to say that there’s not a lot happening here. One bird is tucked away down inside the ceiling fan wire guard and the other bird flies in with two or three longish springy lengths of leaf growth I can’t really identify. The seated bird inside takes the nest-building material in its beak, pulls it inside the enclosure and tucks it in around the space. The other bird watches for a while then flies away. In the photo you can see the long tail of the seated bird sticking up. The bird is inside the wire cage of the ceiling fan and the other one perched on top watching me take the photo.

Most of the day I’m sitting next to the glass doors of the patio, reading my book and a small flicker against the sky tells me when a bird is either coming or going. Strange how this whole thing is happening a second time… some years ago in Switzerland a couple of birds built a nest on the balcony and I encouraged this in the same way I’m doing now; next thing we had a whole colony of pigeons and doves, creatures of the air perched out there on the balcony among old discarded objects and summer furniture. I wrote a few posts about the experience, excerpts follow:

Switzerland, August 29, 2012: Awake at 4:00 AM this morning, came through and switched on the kitchen light; old style fluorescent neon tube-light, flicker-flicker flick. And a bluish white light everywhere with electronic buzz you don’t notice after a while. The light shines through the windows illuminating the balcony of this 7th floor apartment and the pigeons wake up. A very loud sound: croo-croo, croo-croo, croo-croo, croo-croo! So I switch off the light again and they’re quiet as soon as I do that. Now I’m sitting in the darkness, held back in my domestic activities by the wildlife on the balcony. What to do now? Can’t read my book. Stand there in the darkness, and it takes a moment to notice the silence the birds are in. I sit in my chair and fall into meditation state… first thing I’m aware of is entering the quiet space of the perched birds – so silent here, 7 floors above street level. There’s a presence around these birds in roost mode; it takes my breath away, winged animals, so close to me… metta loving-kindness to all beings. I can’t see them but I know I’m very close to a small family group inhabiting the balcony. Two adults and two young birds and there’s another one – the mysterious ‘other’ … the alpha male has taken a second wife? I’m saying this because in the evenings there’s often some extended flapping of wings as they get their places in the hierarchy settled for the night – it’s like who gets to be next to whom. I can’t imagine… return to mindfulness mode.

After a while, and maybe I’ve fallen asleep, the wing-flutter, flap gets my attention, in the light of very early morning. Then there’s an odd silence in the bird group out there; no wing-flap. I get up quietly and go over to see. They’re poised on the balcony handrail; all looking out, little necks extended, heads focused downwards on the space below; the great swimming pool of sky. Still no movement. Then simultaneously they burst into an instant wing-flutter-flap-flick of feather tip flip of flight, and they’re gone. As one unit they drop over the balcony and down. A moment later I see them swoop and swirl in a great arc in the sky then on eye level with this 7th floor and in a direct line away from me, they vanish in the distance.

‘… so with a boundless heart should one cherish all living beings; radiating kindness over the entire world: spreading upwards to the skies, and downwards to the depths; outwards and unbounded, freed from hatred and ill-will. Whether standing or walking, seated or lying down free from drowsiness, one should sustain this recollection.’ [from: Karaniya Metta Sutta]

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Happy New Year Everyone all the best for 2016

every picture tells a story

Posted on December 29, 2015 by tiramit

POSTCARD #182: Bangkok: Some kind of cute little long-tailed dove-like bird has built a tiny nest in the ceiling fan we never use that’s outside on the porch; formerly the porch was where compulsive smokers would sit and flick ash into their ashtrays. Then smokers became less and less, dwindled away, became non-smokers like everyone else or joined la résistance, an underground movement. The fan hasn’t been switched on in years, the ashtrays were removed and everything was renewed, painted and no one ever went out there again.

So the birds decided it must be for them. We’re now standing behind glass doors, watching a bird arriving with small twigs held in the beak and squeezing through the bars with the structure of twigs to create a small nest base inside the metal guard. The process strikes a memory of another post in this blog from our time in Switzerland [Birds on the Balcony 1] about pigeons nesting on our balcony up there on the 7th floor. I had no camera and made a sketch of it.

The nest was in the old Christmas tree bucket we’d just put out on the balcony after Christmas had been and gone. Some of the bells and everything still dangling from the branches, the faded coloured paper of Christmas-Past… a forgotten thing. So the bird(s) just went ahead and built a nest in the abandoned tub. Strange really because the wrappings were intact, it was as if it were a continuation of a pagan rite. After a while two eggs appeared, which became two living beings with wings – and I saw the whole thing; their getting fed from the beak of the parent bird and the flapping of little downy wings. The birds on the balcony were the main focus of my attention for a long time. I feel I know such a lot about rearing birds, I’ve been through the whole thing.

Early on I realized they build their nests near human habitation because the proximity to humans is a good thing; humans chase away crows. And it was then I knew I had a part to play in this little family situation, patron and benefactor, and sure enough, security system… I had no time to prepare.

One day, I was looking out at the two cute little baby birds all huddled up in there, parent bird off to get food leaving me in charge, and suddenly I become aware of a black shape in the centre of my vision. It didn’t immediately click in my brain that it was a huge crow because maybe it’s so black, mysterious and a peculiar invisibility, a photographic negative, something that’s not supposed to be there, glinting a kind of deep purple and blue… a being materialised out of the unknown. And I’m kinda, speechless; hypnotized by it’s presence.

It slants its head with long pointed beak in the direction of the baby birds and makes a hop in their direction. I fall out of my chair, knocking over a few things in the scramble to get to the balcony door; collisions with the furniture: then a primal roar: ‘AAAAAHHHHHH!’ and wild flailing of arms, fling open the sliding glass door and the crow was gone, two little birds happy and safe, barely aware of the interruption.

My relationship with the birds became quite bonded since the visit of the crow and I felt a certain sadness when they both got their flying sense and left the balcony. Now another opportunity arises to see the beginning, and not the end….

Beauty is not caused, it is.
Chase it and it ceases,
Chase it not and it abides.
[Emily Dickinson]

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hypothesis

Posted on December 26, 2015 by tiramit

POSTCARD #181: Chiang Mai/Bangkok flight: Here today and gone tomorrow or here today, next week tomorrow, time warp in an itinerary that is only continuous interchanges. Shrill announcements in Chinese, nine tones, so much air needed to get it all to sound clear, they’re almost shouting. Pain in the head, swallow medicine with a glass of water. Small tables seem to leap up and strike me with food, stabbed by cutlery and glass in the mouth, at night soft pillows try to smother me. Now sitting in an airport coffee shop with M my niece and she says, Look Toong-Ting there’s a mosquito on my chocolate brownie! And I need a moment to figure out what she just said, M looking into my disbelieving face, almond shaped eyes, black pupil almost fills the space. So I lean over to her small plate and M points cautiously with her little finger and there is a mosquito sitting there, or standing there (do they have knees?) on the edge of her brownie. I look at it closely. Do you see it Toong-ting? It’s a boy mosquito. This intrigues me… so small, the genetalia would be hypothetical – how can she tell? Where is this conversation going? Girl mosquitos drink the blood, she says. I shoo away this rude boy mosquito, and ask M if she would like me to go buy her a new chocolate brownie instead of that one that’s been walked upon by a boy mosquito? No she’ll just not eat the bit where the boy mosquito was standing. And she’s eating with a spoon so that looks possible; yes she carves away that chocolate brownie so what’s left is the tiniest cliff teetering on its own in a sea of white porcelain plate with crumbs of its relatives scattered around.

The whole world is a hypothesis – that’s the hypothesis. I’m reminded of something I think I heard somebody tell me about already, it’s only the females who go for the blood, hmmmm, typical, the males hang out in coffee shops and eat chocolate brownies. Then it’s boarding and we’re passing through apertures in walls, holes in the fuselage and sitting in 43H&J. I stow away the hand-carry bags in the locker above, a volume inside a volume, and M selects the aisle seat, sits quietly and perfectly straight, long-necked and graceful, looks around to the back with a fleeting glance that scans for detail all around the inside of the plane, right down to the front, her small eye beams flash through the interior between seats and all through the crowd unnoticed, absorb all data, processed to the brain to see if anybody looks interesting.

Meanwhile I’m sitting with my knees squashed up against the seat in front trying to find the optimum position of comfort – Thai planes are made for little people – ask M if I can put my leg in the space on her side and she agrees and seems pleased to have it there, a fallen tree trunk occupies part of her space. Asks me if I want to put the other one in as well, so I do that, one leg folded on the other and she’s fascinated by the size anomaly, but it’s too much. People will think I’m taking advantage so I take one out and fold it up against the seat in front like the mattress on a bed settee when it’s closed… it’s only a 50 minute flight

She continues looking around, stands up to look at where her seat belt is at, with head spinning nearly 360 degrees, long black hair sweeps around like curtains, then settles into her seat with the thump of her small weight and ‘click’ goes the fastener of her seat belt. These days, M is being an individual, self-contained ‘self’. She’s nearly twelve – and at that age you’ve got to know what you’re doing … I’m thinking it’s a bit sad that the crazy playfulness is gone. There’s just this beauty and sweetness and I don’t know where it comes from. M tells me to fasten my seat belt. I feel that soon it’ll be M taking care of me on these flights.

“A king heard the sound of a lute and it delighted him, so he ordered them to bring that sound. The servants brought him the lute, not the sound, and they had to explain to the king that the sound has no independent existence, but is created by the separate strings, box and arch, all elements acting simultaneously. Just as the king cannot find the sound of the lute, we can not find our self. “ [Buddha, Samyutta Nikaya]

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With thanks to to inaendelea @ the closed room for the end-quote
~ G R A T I T U D E ~
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all in the blogosphere

words

Posted on December 19, 2015 by tiramit

POSTCARD #179: Delhi/Bangkok/ChiangMai flight: It’s four hours flying time overnight, travelling West/East, same direction as the rotation of the planet. Arriving in a different time zone, and it’ll be morning when we get there but still night at the point of origin – flying away from something that’s not happened yet, a directionless experience, darkness, an invisible route that leads to its destination without any sense of getting there. Falling into occasional sleep with the sound of the engines, the hiss of the air… it feels like we could be flying sideways or in a slow rotating movement. Wake up with no time for anything, gather up my things and leave the plane.

Transit time at Bangkok for Chiang Mai is precise, speeding along moving walkways. Standing people coming towards me or going along with me, behind and in front. We’re all in transit to or from the domestic terminal; entering-into, and getting-lost-in long halls of steel and glass mirrors, holding on to signs as indicators in the mind. Noticeably more Chinese than Indians, the geographical switchover…

This is where the road takes two directions. Instead of the Hindi I’m used to all around me, there’s Standard Chinese (Hànyǔ), spoken by Southern Chinese tourists on their way to or coming back from Chiang Mai. A language of soft syllables and unexpected melodic intervals, a kind of tumbling down of words scattered on the floor. And blending through it all is the unobtrusive birdsong that is Thai, a language that sometimes enters a different frequency of intonation; sounds are simply known to be there and barely pronounced.

Through the gate and boarding the Chiang Mai plane, passengers already here in transit from Singapore. Find my seat and Chinese Singaporeans mostly Mandarin speakers (Singdarin) all around. They can get along reasonably well with the Chinese tourists from Southern China visiting Chiang Mai – listening and watching, interested in their shared roots, aware of the ancestors and historical meanings contained in language. Words cling to things, insist on their identity.

Indian Sanskrit is found all the way through Thai. Spiritual meanings found in Chinese are mostly assimilated and they’ve called it their own. In English we lost most of our conscious history but words are like acrobats, they name, describe, improvise; a metaphor just falls into place quite often, or like glass beads of different colours on a tablecloth gathered up, strung together with a little rethreading of the sequence and it’s a necklace.

All we have are words; there are no actual people here in our WordPress blogging world. No ‘you’, no ‘me’, just words and a dialogue. Friendships that go on for years. There are times when I hear something in the words, a familiarity in a voice I recognize. I can’t see you or hear you. I can’t touch you and will never meet you in the normal sense of the word. I just know you’re there (or ‘here’), or somewhere nearby and coming back later. Whatever language is yours, words are the same, arise from and return to a shared, received consciousness. Wherever you are it’s ‘here’ for you, and I’m ‘here’ too. Greetings, it’s the season of good will. Fare well, go with a clear, easy composure and abide peacefully.

Everything that’s created comes out of silence. Your thoughts emerge from the nothingness of silence. Your words come out of this void. Your very essence emerged from emptiness. All creativity requires some stillness. [Wayne Dyer]

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enfold/unfold

Posted on December 15, 2015 by tiramit

POSTCARD #178: Delhi: The way things are in the new place is still unfolding, and the memory of the old place, sadly enfolded, objects wrapped up, tucked away in boxes and closed, sealed with lengths of parcel tape in rolls… prrrrrp-stick! The sound of it went on and on: prrrrrp-stick! prrrrrp-stick! I had to get out of there; the prrrrrp-stick was giving me a headache. When I came back, the rooms were emptying fast; a change in acoustics, the sound of a handclap creates an echo… household objects vanishing at the same rate as large sealed boxes appear – rooms starting to vanish, the void begins to emerge through the windows, floor gives way and everything falls in, turns inside out and soon, every single thing is gone, floors swept… nothing remained at all. Our world, enfolded in packaging and placed in a truck, driven away and we left from the empty house… never saw it again.

Sad to leave that place. I was not there when it happened. When I got back, the new setting began to have a familiarity; I expected it would. The same thing in a different context, but something entirely new was starting to unfold, a ‘holomovement, indefinable and immeasurable’ (David Bohm). The world as we see it, is only part of a movement enfolding and unfolding. And there’s the paper-folding exercise with a sheet of paper, folding it many times and marking it in some way, making holes in it, cutting the corners off and opening it out, unfolding the whole pattern. ‘Enfolding and unfolding is the primary reality, and the pattern is secondary’*. Moving to a new house with a complete set of household items means the same characteristics are seen in a new arrangement and this strange familiarity, a transition, continues unfolding until you start to re-cognize it. This becomes the place where you are now, the place where you wake up every morning and gradually it becomes home.

The whole nature and appearance of things transforming, evolving, taking new shape, and the metamorphosis that moving-house entails, everything we might think it is or think it’s not, or could have been, might have been, or would have been nice if it weren’t for that something else that’s always impossibly difficult… all that is simply part of it too and contributes to the whole transfiguration. The extent of it would seem like it could break me to pieces if I tried to comprehend it in all its parts, and there’s a dependence on a subjective ‘self’ constructed out there in the world of objects, like a chess piece you can have control over, move around, and say, ‘this’ is mine, this is ‘me’, cushioned against the immensity which is held in awe.

I am infinite like space, and the natural world is like a jar
I am like the ocean, and the multiplicity of objects is comparable to a wave
I am like the mother of pearl, and the imagined world is like the silver
… I am in all beings, and all beings are in me. To know this is knowledge, and then there is neither renunciation, acceptance, or cessation of it.’ [Ashtavakra Gita 6.1 – 6.4]

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