The Avatari (27 page)

While the monastery’s elders were revered, dissent was tolerated and questions encouraged. Fostering this spirit of enquiry was as important as the emphasis laid on social duty and service. Committed to serving the people, the monks could not possibly have carried out their obligations by cloistering themselves in the monastery and isolating themselves from the world. On the contrary, they made frequent trips to the villages and participated in all community functions: weddings, births, funerals. They also offered advice on political decisions and assistance in community projects. On the national level, they strived for unity and sought to give their country direction, a sense of purpose and, above all, moral standing.

In this religion, as in no other Ashton had known, the pursuit of harmony and freedom from contradiction in all walks of life, the achievement of a balance between extremes and the attempt to evolve against seemingly insurmountable odds were inextricably linked to the individual’s quest for inner peace. Ashton found himself seeking the last with an urgency that bordered on desperation.

Ru San Ko taught him to meditate, ‘to see the images of the flame’, as the experience was described.

‘How do I know if what I see has any meaning?’ Ashton asked the Teacher during one of their meetings. ‘How do I know that I am not subconsciously forcing myself to conjure up the images I would like to see?’

The old man looked at him and smiled before answering, ‘Perhaps you will learn something from this story I am about to narrate to you. There were once two acolytes who sought the knowledge of the universe from their teacher. This man taught them breathing and concentration techniques and not much else besides. Then one day, he announced that their education was over. They were to go up into the mountains, he said, and practise severe austerities, denying themselves food and water for days on end, while meditating without a break. At the end of that period, they were to return to society and get on with their lives. It was during their time in meditation that both the students saw images – the same ones. The first assumed that hunger and thirst had driven him mad and he was suffering from hallucinations. He came back from the mountains, forgot what he had seen, settled down, got married and lived a contented life.’

‘And the other?’ Ashton asked, filling the pause the Teacher had allowed for this precise question.

‘He founded a new religion,’ the Teacher said with a guffaw, and then, in a more serious tone, ‘have patience and you may eventually learn to trust your instincts.’

Apart from discussions with the Teacher and his meditation sessions with Ru San Ko, Ashton’s efforts to grow rice kept him busy.

The weather had favoured Ashton in his role as rice farmer. Taking advantage of the weeklong dry spell, he had sown the rice seeds. Now he concentrated on diverting the rivulet, as planned. He climbed to the top of the hill and studied the channel. Then he began piling up stones, cementing them with grass and wet clay dug up from the Mekong. He had to stop midway to transplant the rice seedlings and provided, in the process, much entertainment for the children who watched his crude efforts with amusement. It had looked rather easy when the women of the village did it; Ashton, on the other hand, managed to strain his back and pick up a few leeches as well. Still, the work did get completed, as did his water-diversion effort.

‘So how are your studies going?’ asked the Teacher who, having beaten Ashton at chess during their previous session, was in a good mood.

Ashton had not thrown that game; the Teacher was simply getting better at it.

‘Not very well, I’m afraid,’ he now replied honestly. ‘It appears to me that there is not much hope for the individual against the fates. The cosmic process is loaded against us.’

The Teacher contemplated him with a smile. His expression seemed to suggest that he was wondering whether to respond to Ashton’s observation. He did, finally.

‘The cosmic process, as you call it,’ he said slowly, ‘is difficult to comprehend and even more difficult to explain. There is one element in this process which is not predetermined: the choice an individual makes through his actions, his karma. Most people imagine that karma is fate. It is not. The meaning of “karma” in Sanskrit is “action”. Fate and the choices we make are intertwined, much as your modern physics says that light is made up of both matter and energy. At no point in time does light exist purely in one form.’ The Teacher paused, sipped his green tea and continued, ‘Perhaps we human beings have been given the best chance, compared to all the billions of other life forms we could have appeared as on this planet – say, a tree or an insect.’ He sipped his tea again. ‘
Cognito ergo sum
– we have the power to think and to know ourselves and in that, we also have the greatest freedom of choice. I would like to imagine that fate throws open a series of doors for us human beings; it is we who must decide which one to pass through and fate simply allows us to follow our choice. It is not the other way round, as many of us tend to believe.’

‘I have something to say – no, ask.’

The Teacher nodded encouragingly.

Ashton described the ambush in Malaya. ‘Sometimes,’ he said, ‘action can take place with lightning speed. You are fired upon and you fire back instinctively. It is over before you can consciously decide what you needed to do at that particular moment or should have done. But it was not so that day in the jungle in Malaya. I saw the white face in the foliage.
I knew it was the girl with the baby
. I knew it was she who had led us into this ambush, but I also knew she was unarmed. I had lost men and was filled with anger and hatred. Everything was very clear in my mind and time seemed to move slowly. I took aim with the full knowledge of who my target was. I knew, before I pulled the trigger, that I would kill her.’ Ashton paused, head bowed, needing to ask the question that had preyed on his mind for years. ‘My wife and unborn child were taken from me; is it my karma, a form of retribution for the lives I myself had taken?’

There was great compassion in the Teacher’s expression.

‘You know well that I will not give you an answer; it is for you to find one.’ He placed his hand on Ashton’s head and blessed him. ‘May you find peace,’ he murmured.

One night, a storm broke with all the fury of storms in the tropics. With the rain coming down in torrents like an opaque wall of water, Ashton could barely make out the outline of the river from his window. Flashes of lightning, however, lit up the scene sufficiently for him to see that the Mekong was in flood, its waters overflowing the banks, looking like a huge serpent moving in to attack its prey. The rain had come into his room and Ashton had to shift his mat, the spray from the window drenching him as he did so. In the morning, it was clear. Many trees had toppled over and the vegetation all around was still limp from the night’s onslaught of rain.

After the morning prayers, Ashton walked slowly to his ledge and looked out. There had been a landslide – a huge cascade of mud and rock that had made its way down the hillside, but come to rest on the wall he had erected as a barrier.

‘The wall held, Henry.’

Ashton turned. Ru San Ko and some younger monks had followed him to the ledge and were now smiling and applauding him. He looked at the wall again and then at his patch of rice which was flooded, but could be drained, nevertheless.

‘Yes, the wall has held,’ he said without emotion.

The following Tuesday, when he entered the Teacher’s room, Ashton was surprised to find that the chessboard had not been laid out. Instead, the Teacher asked him to sit down beside him.

‘I am told that your engineering has worked and that your rice is safe?’

‘Yes, Teacher.’

‘You must be feeling very proud of your achievement.’

‘On the contrary, I feel ashamed. I have to confess now that more of my ego was involved in the endeavour than the desire to grow rice. It would, perhaps, have been better for me if the wall had not held.’

The Teacher nodded, smiling, but rebuked him, nonetheless. ‘Nonsense!’ he said. ‘The rice you have grown will feed many. Do not belittle your efforts.’

He then called out to Ru San Ko, who was standing outside the door, and spoke to him in Lao. Then he handed him a key which always hung from a string around his own neck. Ru San Ko went to the metal cupboard, undid the padlock and pulled out a heavy book with metal leaves. At a gesture from the Teacher, he handed it to Ashton.

Ashton opened it. Painted in brilliant colours on each leaf were mandalas – intricate tantric symbols.

‘What do you think this is?’ the Teacher asked.

‘I don’t know,’ he replied honestly. ‘In the military, we have something like this to test recruits for colour-blindness.’

His reply seemed to amuse the Teacher immensely, for he gave a short laugh. ‘Perhaps this book is meant for those afflicted with a different form of blindness. Our
sangha
follows most of the traditional teachings, but we do acknowledge the influence of more ancient animist beliefs. Describe what you see on each page.’

Ashton did so, noticing that his replies were being closely followed by both men. As he came to the last page and began to describe what he saw, both the Teacher and Ru San Ko leaned forward, intent on his words.

‘The outer ring is of flowers – lotuses, I presume. There is an inner ring of elephants; and in the centre,’ he paused, for the images were blurred and he could not see them clearly, then said ‘in the centre, there are two serpents entwined around the Buddha.’

He heard Ru San Ko gasp. Then almost shouting, the young monk exclaimed in Lao, ‘He can see!’

A stream of Lao words, all uttered in an excited tone, followed. Ashton had no clue what they meant, but he saw, to his surprise, that they had angered the Teacher who was now shouting at the young monk. Ru San Ko fled the room.

‘I am sorry for his behaviour,’ the Teacher murmured, after he had regained his composure. ‘Are you sure you saw what you described?’

‘I shall look again,’ Ashton volunteered, embarrassed to be the cause of all the commotion.

‘That will not be necessary,’ the Teacher replied, looking at him intently.

‘What is the significance of this, Teacher?’ he asked, unable to contain his curiosity.

‘It is nothing,’ the old man said gruffly. ‘Just old beliefs. Some people might say you have a predisposition for great metaphysical enquiry.’

Ashton could see he was still annoyed with Ru San Ko’s outburst.

Before he could ask any further questions, the Teacher abruptly ended their meeting.

‘I am quite tired today and will rest,’ he announced.

Ashton bowed and left the room.

Eventually, the rice ripened and was harvested. It gave Ashton much joy to harvest his crop. There was a harvest festival in the village, with the Teacher making one of his rare trips down the steps to grace it with his presence. He was received with reverence, not only because of his position of spiritual authority, but because the local culture itself laid great emphasis on the veneration of elders and ancestors. The observance of protocol, hierarchy and tradition was inviolable. The Teacher enjoyed himself and blessed numerous newly weds, babes in arms and toddlers, some of whom he played with during the entire proceedings. After he had returned to the monastery, Ashton was summoned to his room.

‘The rice has been harvested,’ the Teacher said.

‘Yes, Teacher.’

‘We have come to a decision. We accept what you ask of us. It shall be as you say.’ The Teacher paused, then said softly, ‘You have given much of your time to the
sangha
which has been greatly enriched by your presence. But perhaps you would like to get on with the rest of your life now?’

Ashton looked up, anguished, but the Teacher nodded firmly. To argue was unthinkable. Overcome with emotion and unable to utter a word, Ashton slowly reciprocated with a nod.

When he had found his voice, he said, ‘It is the custom for monks leaving the
sangha
to make an offering – a
dakshina
to the guru. What offering of mine will please the Teacher?’

There was great sadness in the Teacher’s voice as he replied, the sadness of one endowed with the dubious gift of being able to foretell the future. ‘I will ask you for it, Henry,’ he murmured. ‘I will ask you when the time comes.’ Then he added with a wry smile, ‘You are, as they say, an honourable man and I will expect you to keep your word.’

‘It shall be as the Teacher desires,’ Ashton said with a bow.

He caught the boat to Vientiane, from where he took a flight back to London. He realized, as he caught up on the news, that the Teacher had not been entirely truthful with him; self-immolations by the Buddhists had come to a halt almost the very day that Ashton had reached the monastery. The time spent on harvesting of rice had had very little to do with it.

* * *

The tragedy of Vietnam was unfolding inexorably. In a classic case of paranoia, Diem had deluded himself into believing that he was indispensable to the Americans and launched a vindictive campaign against the Buddhists, who retaliated with mass protests on 21 August. By November, Diem had been overthrown by a coup which was successful only because Ambassador Lodge had not intervened; many said it had his tacit approval. The South Vietnamese President’s successors turned out to be no better, their only notable achievement in history being to assassinate Diem and his brother. Others would follow in rapid succession.

The war began in earnest, with neither the north nor the south heeding the Buddhists’ call for peace, a call which had, for centuries, held their country together, from the capital to the remotest village in the interior. The one indigenous organized force that had consistently called for an end to violence was not open to manipulation and could, therefore, never be considered by the US as a political alternative. More importantly, the Americans could never quite understand what the Buddhists stood for.

The war intensified. It was the price Indo-China would be forced to pay for its entry into the twentieth century and for all that came in its wake: roads, electricity, tin cans, plastic bags, drugs and prostitution. Ho Chi Minh had reportedly claimed that the odds of ten Vietnamese to four American or French lives were acceptable to him. In a way, he was wrong; ten times the anticipated number of Vietnamese, almost all unknown, lost their lives to napalm, shells, bullets and other military actions and, more ignominiously, to malnutrition and disease. The Vietnamese still won the war – or so it is said. Their neighbours fared no better; there was civil war in Laos and genocide in Cambodia. And back in the US, the names of 55,000 American casualties were engraved in black granite on the Washington Memorial.