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Wednesday, September 30, 2015

A to a Q

Actually, there is no inside or outside.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------from the transcript for the film Zen Mt. Center. And here's the cuke page for the ZMC film.

Cuke Video

Playlists for cuke video on Youtube. There's more at the video page on Shunryu Suzuki dot com. 

Leaving KL

Yesterday touching party for Katrinka and me at the school here in Kuala Lumpur where we stay. The theme was congratulating us for getting married and included looking at our wedding photos and videos (See Wedding label on the right) and cookies and cupcakes. Evening at Wai and Vidyas with food, puerh tea, sparkling grape juice toast, and music. Amrita and I played songs on the guitar and Wai played Chopin and son Arian played an amazing fierce piece from the soundtract of an anime film. Sam can play too but just did a little background with a yuke. Vidya was on drums in his office when we arrived. Such great people including Grandpa Brother and Granma Nancy. Laura and kids here at the school (Tuesday through Friday). We will miss them.

Leaving KL and this great fast fiber optic connection today. Got till noon to keep uploading. Getting the cuke video page with Youtube mirror upgraded and expanded would have taken so much longer in Bali.

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Shoganji


A page for Shoganji in Hiratsuka, Japan, the temple where Shunryu Suzuki was born - 1998 video by Mark Petchey and stills. 

Hakama untied at Shoganji

The front gate was big gate. Even though the temple was very poor, once that temple was very big temple in that area, so there was a big gate. As soon as I got out of the gate, I untied [laughs] my hakama and tied it as my friends did, without knowing my father was watching me [laughs, laughter]. He was very angry with me for untying the hakama, and tying it in some other way. from Why I came to America. --- Shoganji page - the temple where Suzuki was born.

photo off Web

Just working in KL

One day to go in KL. Have been working long hours here on the video section of Shunryu Suzuki dot com because the wifi is so fast here. This would take much longer in Bali. It's so fast, uploading doesn't even hold me up. Holiday is over. Kids are back. I'm sitting here in the main room typing and touch padding while they run around. - dc

Monday, September 28, 2015

Sunseed Tassajara film

On the Shunryu Suzuki dot com (ss.com) page for this film there is now a link to the film and excerpts on Youtube which is much easier to use though you can download them at higher resolution from the ss.com page. And now there are 60 stills plus a slideshow of them.

Enslaved

We are enslaved by some idea, you know . Innumerable words come to you one after another and you're chasing after words - sacrificing the birds you hear. That is how we get lost in this world where we have too much fun.---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- from the outtake of Shunryu Suzuki talking in the film Sunseed. Complete transcript of what he said is on Shunryu Suzuki dot com  as is the video and on Youtube also. Find that and more at this this link to Zen in America - Sunseed in the video section.

Brother

Puerh tea. That was a highlight last night. Brother poured one me one cup, small cup, after another. Rich, dark, and valuable. Katrinka had a couple but it'd keep her up so that was it. I'd never noticed the tea collection staring at us on the shelves in the corner.  It's massive and priceless. Wheels of puerh from a few inches to like a foot. Boxes, a whole shelf full of small round containers he said are now ten years old and worth a hundred bucks each. He won't sell.

Saturday, September 26, 2015

To Some Extent

To some extent, desire we have is good, but if we are enslaved by desire, you know, we will lose whole being. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- from the outtake of Shunryu Suzuki talking in the film Sunseed. Complete transcript of what he said is here on cuke.com following the film transcript. It will be entered on Shunryu Suzuki dot com soon as is the video now - link to Zen in America - Sunseed in the video section.

New and Improved Video

A new page for a film on Tassajara with Suzuki  n Shunryu Suzuki dot com's video section. The ten and a half minute segment is there and then broken up to allow other viewing options. Also included are the rarely before seen color faded outtakes from the film without sound except for five and a half minutes of Shunryu Suzuki talking. 

Industrial farming is one of the worst crimes in history

From the guardian. Good for them. Thinking about this. I have not been helping. - dc

The fate of industrially farmed animals is one of the most pressing ethical questions of our time. Tens of billions of sentient beings, each with complex sensations and emotions, live and die on a production line

Smokey

So it's smokey here today in KL. Cut our walk short because didn't want to be inhaling all that smoke. First day we've noticed it - not as bad as last year though. Showed Katrinka the field above the tunnel. We walked into it a bit but that's as far as she wanted to go - not worried about snakes but about mosquitoes. Friend of Lai Moon went into the water at Ampang Park, got bit some, died within a week of Dengue - Dengue type 1 - the hemorrhaging kind.  The mosquitoes with the white stripes carry it.

Friday, September 25, 2015

Prepare

If you want to appreciate a living flower, you cannot be selfish. Your mind should be instead in the state of selflessness.  You should be prepare for discouragement when the flower fades away. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Planting Zen in Siskiyou Square

and the May Sit & Indiegogo

That's Dharma Rain's new Sodo

Here's a page for the new campus

Dharma Rain Facebook

Tea Talk

At the Petronas Towers the other day, waiting for Lai Moon, sat drinkng teh tarik (pull tea) and watched three cranes working on tearing down a building across the street and back a ways. One of them had a mega jackhammer. Like big monsters chewing on the concrete skeleton. Asked a waiter about the recent demonstrations asking the PM to step down. I told him that my Chinese Malay friend, CK, said that there were half a million demonstrating. I figured that would be like having five million in the US demanding the president resign.

Thursday, September 24, 2015

Plum

Detachment means to live with people, with everything, with the beauty of the plum. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Moral Obsessions Conquered

Another day in Kuala Lumpur. Went to Indonesian Embassy yesterday - took a couple of hours, two trains and two taxis. One train was so stuffed we were all pushed up against each other. But people here are so polite and gentle - even more than Japan. No problem. After the embassy walked through a park to the Petronas Towers, no longer the tallest. Walked around outside and in with six stories of malls, seemingly endless

Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Sense

Forgetting all about breathing and thinking something wonderful [laughs] when you are practicing doesn't make any sense. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Militant Monks and Misnomers

The Tanah Melayu title of yesterday's post came from this line on the Malaysia Wikipedia page: 'Before the onset of European colonisation, the Malay Peninsula was known natively as "Tanah Melayu" ("Malay Land").'

Tuesday, September 22, 2015

Firefighters Winning in Cachagua

Cachagua Fire approaching Jamesburg and Tassajara's road house seems to be under control. Check out Cachagua Fire Dept. Facebook page. - thanks Jane Hirshfield

Tassajara Fire Page

Most famous Shunryu Suzuki line

Beginner's Mind letter to incoming college students at the start of a new school year from James Valentini, known as Deantini, chemistry professor and Dean of Columbia College (of Columbia University) in NYC - originally mistakenly sited as College in Columbia, Missouri. - thanks Rick Levine for the heads up.

Today's question: which one in the photo is Deantini?

Trouble in Tanah Melayu

We're in Kuala Lumpur for nine days to get new visas for Indonesia and the Malaysia PM scandel big in the news now, but for lots of people here, especially the Chinese, the autocratic fundamentalist religious moves of the government are more threatening and have led to some very large demonstrations The PM and his party are accusing them of being unpatriotic and attempting to overthrow the government.  

Monday, September 21, 2015

Watch like a watch

On each moment we have to renew ourselves as the clock goes. I don't know Sanskrit so well, but how to attain detachment is to watch or to gaze at something—upeksha. They say. Upeksha means to watch. To watch means to follow reality -- to follow reality like a clock goes. It does not go so fast, but it is not stopping. It is moving, but it doesn't go so fast.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Upeksha in Wikipedia - a liberal interpretation on Suzuki's part, but that doesn't matter. What matters is that he's saying to watch reality is the key. - dc

Haze

Arrived in KL, Kuala Lumpur, for a nine day stay. Here to get new visas for Indonesia. The big thing here is the haze. We were here six months ago and a year ago. A year ago same thing. It was worse last year. There were fires along the freeway coming in from the airport. But usually and mainly I think it's from uncontrolled slash burning. That photo is from ten years ago. It's an Asia wide problem, world wide consequences. We walked to dinner tonight and didn't seem so bad. It's subsided here a bit from some rain.

2015 Southeast Asian haze - on the causes

Saturday, September 19, 2015

Shoganji

New page for Shoganji, the temple where Shunryu Suzuki was born. Video, photos. Will add more as stumble on  it.


Stop

So when you practice zazen, you have to be prepared to accept the truth as truth and stop useless thinking and useless emotional activities which will not help you. To live on each moment is how to practice zazen.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

tennis

Playing tennis again. Got out of the habit at end of June when went to the retreat then married, honeymoon. Had gotten tired of the doubles game. Played a few times recently with marathon man Ian. He's 74. I'm 70. He doesn't get tired. Go to the Clay courts near here - just down the street into the Bali Beach Inna Grand Hotel - next to their golf course. There was an outdoor rock concert there today - nothing on a big scale but well amplified accompaniment. Today we played doubles with a couple of Indonesian guys who work there, one in the sports shop. I call him when we want to play and he comes and unlocks it. We played for a little over an hour. Three games then change partner so that each of us played with the other three in rotation. They're younger but it was pretty evenly matched. Kept the ball in play pretty well. Most pleasant. They don't speak much English at all so learned how to score in Indonesian.

Friday, September 18, 2015

Mnemotrix© Search

Shunryu Suzuki dot com now has Mnemotrix© Search as an option.  Check it out. ----"This is a completely different kind of research experience." "Dive deep into the content of the Shunryu Suzuki archive by choosing something from the Starter Query Menu. You can mix and match concepts and find something meaningful and relevant to what’s on your mind. Or if you have a simple query in mind, just enter in the query box below, where you are using Mnemotrix© Search for an advanced linguistic computational method of searching for intersections of keywords and related terms." - These quotes from the Marpa folks who created Mnemotrix. Thanks. - dc

Before

It is not attained, this selflessness, after enlightenment. Before you practice zazen, fix your mind in this truth which no one can deny. We think we have self, but actually, as you know, there is no such thing as self. Usually people think, “I am here,” but actually we do not exist here.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Pedobaptism

St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church
Katrinka and I went to Kuta for the baptism of almost five month old Mary, daughter of  blind Philip and sighted Rini next door. Rode in a van with the family following a bus load of Rini's friends and relatives from the western side of the island.  Philip had been given the runaround for a month from the even larger Catholic church near us in the Renon section of Denpasar. He had a little problem with his last marriage and divorce.

Thursday, September 17, 2015

Conviction

We have to live, so we have to take breath. This is absolutely necessary for us. So we just sit and keeping our mind on our breathing. We do not prepare anything. We just sit. And here the important thing is to have conviction, to have selflessness.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Lunch

There's this tiny warung, eating place, across the street that popped up during the Sanur Festival also across the street last month. It's got wheels and woman puts out a little table. Work going on here, Katrinka out, so walked over there and said "Sejara" meaning up to you and got nasi campur - rice with this and that mixed in. Just right - not too much. Ten thousand rupiah - sixty-nine yesterday.

Zig Zag Zen returns

Zig Zag Zen is being re-released by Synergetic Press. There's a piece in it by yours truly, DC, named Psychoactivism which emphasizes the harm caused by the war on drugs as my preferred focus for Buddhists on this subject.

Here's a link to a the unedited version on cuke.

Wednesday, September 16, 2015

Peter di Gesu on Shunryu Suzuki et al

Have had some neat back and forth email with Peter recently Here's what he recalls - with links to his great landscape art. - dc

Freedom

By nature we try to fortify ourselves spiritually and mentally or physically. That is why we lose our freedom from our surroundings.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Tukang Kayu


That means carpenter, skilled worker - wood. Two of them have been at it here - third day today. They're installing screens and windows and a screen door. They built them all from camphor which they call grade two wood, grade one being teak. Built them from scratch sitting on the cement carport. Very little use of power tools.

Tried to get the landlords to do it but they wouldn't even let us until our neighbor Philip did on his house and they relented. Philip's Balinese wife wouldn't let anything be open because she feared for their baby - mosquitoes. We want screens to keep mosquitoes out too and also to increase air flow.

That's Kadino in the photo, their motorbikes to his right. Philip's car. Our wall.
 

49% down, 51 to go

Drop in marine life reaching the halfway point. However, the obvious goal of human beings to self destruct and destroy all marine life along the way is unattainable. We'll be gone before that could happen and it will come back strong too - once we're out of the way.

World Suicide Club

Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Transmitted Way

Even though the mind exists, if we do not see or if we ignore it, it does not mean anything. So that is why this mind is transmitted mind. Transmitted mind is a transmitted way of observing the mind -- how to work on the mind. This is the way. Mind is actually the way to observe the way, not some thing which is permanent or not permanent, which is mortal or immortal. That is not the point. Whether we live in the mind or not is the point. So that is why it is called transmitted way. The transmitted way is mind-itself.

---------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Pulang

Pulang is a word in Indonesian that mean to return or go home. They use it a lot. When work was over today, a carpenter said just "Pulang." People ask you where you're going here a lot - just people you pass will call out and ask. The standard answer is jalan jalan which means going for a walk. Or ke pantai - going to the beach. All sorts of possibilities. But if you're going back home or homestay or hotel, you only need to know to say, "Pulang." It can also be used to mean to die in the right context and form. I think of the freedom song, Oh Freedom with its line, "Before I'd be a slave I'd be buried in my grave and go home to my Lord and be free."

Monday, September 14, 2015

The most important thing is how we observe -- how we observe the mind.


---------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Guest Quote today

“I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness, of spurious self-isolation in a special world, the world of renunciation and supposed holiness. . . . This sense of liberation from an illusory difference was such a relief and such a joy to me that I almost laughed out loud. . . . I have the immense joy of being man, a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate. As if the sorrows and stupidities of the human condition could overwhelm me, now I realize what we all are. And if only everybody could realize this! But it cannot be explained. There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.” - Thomas Merton from here. - thanks John Steiner

As I recall, the SFZC was one of the last places Merton visited before his fateful trip to India. He told Richard Baker that he really felt more like a Buddhist but it was too late to change. I'll write Baker and check. - dc

Interfaith Dailogue

Exchange between my Catholic priest bud SF and me, DC.

DC: My drunken Brit blind Catholic neighbor is going through hoops try to get the Bishop or whomever here to let his baby be baptized. I told him to fly you in her to Denpasar but he's going to keep at it. Has to get proof of an annulment.

Saturday, September 12, 2015

Realm of Thinking

When we say it exists or it does not exist we are discussing about mind in the realm of thinking. In realm of thinking we can say it exists or it does not exist, but how to understand our mind is not by thinking. It is deeper than our thinking.---------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts. 

Bundling up in the tropics

See lots of people here in heavy jackets and sweaters midday when it's in the eighties. They're on motorcycles. See the guy in that photo. His daughter is ready for school. That's also very common. So is three on a bike. So is four. Saw a bule (foreigner) come out of a motorcycle shop the other day and hop on a bike. Minute later a Muslim woman with two kids came out. They got on his bike and away they went.

Fr. Steve Frost's new art book

Friday, September 11, 2015

Mind

Our mind -- by mind we mean -- we do not mean some special substance or existence, but we do not say there is no mind. No-mind exists but no-mind is not some substance. It means -- this mind we mean cannot be understood by thinking. That is the point. This mind is something which is unintelligible. Even though it is unintelligible it does not mean it exists or it doesn’t exist. 

----------Excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki lecture 66-07-00 as found on shunryusuzuki.comEdited by DC - Shunryu Suzuki lecture excerpts on cuke.com - from there links to much more. - Go to cuke.com What's New [now at blogger] to see more daily posts.