Jean's tour to Pure Land Learning College

This is my wife, Jean, standing by the entrance of Pure Land Learning College. Picture was taken during her recent visit/learning trip to this school (or monastery) from 24/2/07 to 10/3/07.

In June 2001, Master Chin Kung established Pure Land Learning College in Toowoomba, Brisbane, Australia. In order to continue the mission of spreading Buddha’s education, he found it was necessary to have a homebase where decent Buddhism lecturers can settle in and concentrate on their cultivation and learning. From time to time, they invite adherents from all over the world to the College to witness their learning outcome.

The most recent visit/learning activity was scheduled on 24/2/07 for 2 weeks. Having learned a lot from others about Master Chin Kung, we took this as a very precious opportunity to meet the master in person and to treat ourselves with an overseas trip together. However, at the last minute of the decision process, we realized that one of us had to stay at home to look after our dog, Spot. As Spot listens to me more than to anyone else of the family, I decided that I gave up this opportunity, and let Jean travel with the New Zealand group of 10 to enjoy her first time ever of a visit/learning tour. Through the assistance of Amituofo Chanting Society of Auckland, this group of 10, led by Mr. Lee, set off for Brisbane on 24/2/07.

Jean was very much impressed by the College’s valuing the real essence of things instead of pursuing the appearance. For instance, she thought the school building could be something like a traditional Chinese temple. But it is not. It is just an ordinary Australian building. She was told that the building used to be a Catholic church. The College maintained it as it was after the purchase. This enables them to save a great amount of money and energy in property maintenance, and thus, their delivery of education quality can be more assured, and more resourses can be saved for education related activities.

A short distance from the main building is a vegetable farming section growing organic produce. This is where the residents of the school can exercise their physical body by involving in the garden jobs apart from the spiritual cultivation. Together with another even bigger area of vegetable garden farther away, the amount of vegetable produce is sufficient to feed the 1000 visitors of this activity. The 3 meals each day are simple but abundant and fresh.

It is said that Master Chin Kung’s biggest dharma protector, Mrs. Han Ying, was very good at cooking, and also took the meals provided to visitors as a very important part of the religious activity. So during her life time, she had created a lot of recipes of vegetarian dishes. In this activity which Jean attended, each of the visitors was given a recipe book based on Mrs. Han Ying’s cooking principles. After Jean returned home, she made a few dishes following the recipes and found that we all liked their taste. Most important is that the materials required in the recipe are very ordinary stuff and the cooking process is simple.

The daily activities started from 6:15am in the morning and ended at 9:00pm in the night. Each of Master Chin Kung’s disciples was allocated at least one lecturing session of two hours. The topics were surrounding the three classical works – The Ten Good Deeds Sutra (十善業道經); The Supreme Response Chapter(太上感應篇); Disciples Regulations(弟子規). This covers the 3 major beliefs of Chinese community: Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism. Master Chin Kungs believes that the teachings taught in these three classical works are like the three legs of a Tripod. That means attaining Buddhahood begins from fulfilling the teachings of these three works.

Besides the three lecture sessions each day, there are Buddha chanting practices in between the classes. Buddha chanting is held at Ten Thousand Surnames Ancestors Memorial Hall (萬姓先祖紀念堂). In the hall, Jean saw that the three sides of the wall were full of wooden plaques each of them represents a family branch in Chinese history. A religious ceremony called ‘Three times reminder" (三時繫念) is conducted here regularly to remind both the ancestors and the alive of their endeavour to immigrate to the Pure Land.

With this tight learning schedule, Jean said, one can empty their mind easily for receiving the good knowledge. To her personal experience, she totally dropped the material world matters as soon as the first two days had past. She felt her mind was full of dharma pleasure since the 3rd day and onward.

On 4th March, the visit/learning activity came to its peak because the Master Chin Kung arrived the College from Hong Kong to conduct a memorial ceremony for his biggest dharma protector, Mrs. Han Ying, and his dharma initiator, Master Zhang Jia(章嘉大師).

For years, most of the adherents have been learning Buddhism with Master Chin Kung by means of CDs, books or on-line videos without having a chance to see their teacher in person. So the atmosphere in the hall was a mixture of respectful, exciting and surprising when Master Chin Kung entered the hall. They have known from CDs that their teacher looks young and is healthy despite his being 81 years old. Now they witnessed this fact by themselves. After the ceremony was done, the adherents of each region had a photo with their teachers and the master.

Time flies. On 6th March, they said goodbye to the college and carried on their remaining activities at Amitabha Brisbane Association. On 10th March, they came back home with a more purified mind. I am surprised to see that Jean has become a more committed vegetarian after this visit/learning trip.

Our dog, Spot

This is our dog, a mix breed of Labrador and Jack Russell. We call him Spot. Spot became part of our family in 1998 when my son, Chenny was in his last year of the primary school.

Chenny had asked me for a dog well before 1998. Knowing that having a dog means a lot of responsibility and daily care, I turned his request down many times. Once, he raised the same dog issue again, in order to shut him up, I bought him a dog, an electronic one. This electronic dog only made him happy for a couple of weeks. The desire for a real dog never had disappeared from his mind.

One weekend mid day in October 1998, while we were passing by a business area in car, Chenny saw a child walking a dog. His constant desire for a dog erupted at that moment. As usual, I refused by telling him reasons why we should not own a dog. But this did not work. He began to cry. My mother, sitting in the passenger seat, saw her beloved grandson crying, urged me to nod my head. I knew this dog issue had to be settled this time.

We went to a pet shop, but there were no dogs. The owner said we could buy dog from the classified advertisement section of the newspaper. Chenny was then smiling but still quite anxious. So we bought a paper and drove home immediately to call up the dog breeders and made inquiries.

By the time we were going through the advertisement, we saw all sorts of dog breeds listed on the paper. We only knew that each breed had its unique character, but after all, which was the most suitable to Chenny and our family? Being anxious to get his own dog, Chenny said: “just get any dog!” At that moment, the Telecom icon, a very cute Jack Russell dog called Spot, came up my mind. I said to Chenny: “how about buying a Telecom dog because it is medium in size, and it is clever?” “Yes, any dog! Let’s make phone call now!” He replied.

I called the first breeder under the Jack Russell section. A lady answered my call. We negotiated on the price. Got her address and route instruction, and there we hopped onto the car and headed toward the breeder’s place, Western part of Auckland while we were at the Northern part.

When we finally arrived at the breeder’s place, a rather small Jack Russell dog ran up the driveway to see us. It looked very impressively smart. I thought that was the dog we were going to take home, but the owner said it was the mother. We were showed the way to the back yard where we saw two puppies were playing fighting energetically to each other. The owner said that were the only remainder of the 7 puppies born by the bitch we saw just now.

Chenny was showing a bright big smiley face staring at the puppies. “Which one do you like?” asked the owner, “one is a boy and the other is a girl.” “I want to get that boy as I am a boy.” The owner handed the male puppy to Chenny. The puppy seemed to be very happy with Chenny’s affection; it sniffed all over his chest, and even tried to climb up to sniff his face. On the way home, its name had been decided. He was named after the Telecom icon, Spot.

It was already getting dark by the time we arrived home. Where were we going to keep Spot? Seeing him walking all over the place and beginning to shit on the carpet, I realized that the first thing he needed was a bed in a confined area in the basement. So despite the dinner was ready, I set off to build a 2 metre by 2 metre confinement using the board from a wooden case.

Lacking of experience in raising a dog, I had been busy with Spot for the following few weeks. First I found that I didn’t take his growth into account. The confinement was built too low that one week after his arrival, he could easily escape from his area. So I extended the height, but 3 weeks later he demonstrated his skill of climbing over the confinement wall. So I built a gate in the BBQ area and kept Spot out there.

His new area was big for him to run about and play with Chenny. But one night at about 12 O’clock, he barked furiously for some reason. I had to get up to check. He stood against the retainer wall barking at the direction where I saw a round pile of something about 2 metres away. When I touched it, my finger tips were jabbed by needle like thorns. It was a hedgehog. So I went to garage to get a bag and moved the hedgehog to other part of the garden. This kind of scenario repeated about a dozen times before winter arrived and I rearranged a place in the basement for Spot to spend his night.

I did regret buying Spot because of all the hassles. However, he did have brought us some security and happiness. One mid night, he barked furiously toward outside of the basement where we hang clothes under the car port when weather was not so stable. I commanded him to be quiet, but he would not. So I came down to check, turned the light on. I found nothing wrong. Next morning, my wife found a couple of Chenny’s T-shirts were missing from the clothing lines. We then realized why Spot barked so furiously last night. The second time Spot just scared off the thief with his loud barking.

On every Thursday night, every household in our area is supposed to put their rubbish bag or wheelie bin out on the roadside for the truck to collect or clear. My property has a long and slop up driveway. So I have to struggle with pushing the wheelie bin up the drive way once a week. One night, I had an idea of getting Spot’s help in pulling the bin up the drive way. I secure the leash on the handle of the bin while my hands firmly hold on the handle. When this was ready, I tilt the bin on the wheels and commanded “Let’s go Spot!” You know what? Upon hearing “Let’s go!”, he turned his face forward, his tail erected high up, put all the strength he had on his four legs, and pulled enthusiastically all the way to the road side. And I only needed to steer the bin at the right direction.

Time flies. Spot is now over 8 years old, equivalent to 56 years of human age. He is more matured now, not as neurotic and restless as before. By October he will be turning 9 years old, and become the oldest in my family in terms of life span. I realize one day we will separate from each other for our own reincarnation. So I teach him this sound “Amitofo” which contains Buddha’s vow of receiving the soul of the being whoever recites “Amitofo”. Interestingly, each time I do this ritual before him, he always stares at me with a wondering facial expression as if saying to me: “Mate, what are you talking about?”