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Authors: Tan Twan Eng
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the balance of trade and the flow of foreign exchange in their favor. Why talk of events that did not concern us?
I looked at the wall of photographs in his home while he was cooking. He was an avid photographer. There were pictures of Japan, mostly of villages, mountains, and botanical gardens, but not a single one of his family. In fact almost none of the photographs were of people. There was a certain blandness about them, an emptiness which I disliked. They appeared to have been hurriedly taken, as if to serve only as a reminder, and not a memory. There was one taken of high, snow-covered mountains that caught my attention.
“Where’s that?” I asked him.
“That is the world’s highest mountain, in India.”
“And that?” I pointed to what appeared to be the only photograph that he had posed for, and even then he appeared tiny and almost indistinguishable beneath a massive sandstone statue of the Buddha carved into a hillside.
“Bamiyan, in Afghanistan. That is one of three statues of the Buddha. That one I am standing in front of is a hundred and seventy feet tall, carved in the third century. A group of Indian boys took the photograph for me.”
“You’ve traveled much,” I said. Photographs of dense forests and deserted beaches, as well as formidable mountains, were pinned to another wall. I recognized the tin mines of Ipoh and the rows of rubber trees that covered much of the west coast of Malaya. Hutton & Sons owned a large number of rubber plantations, and the photographs brought back to me the quiet of the mornings when the estate workers walked back and forth along the lines of rubber trees and made cuttings in the bark of the trees, coaxing trickles of milky sap to fill the cups hanging below the cut sections.
A painting in a little alcove caught my attention. It was a drawing, done in shades of black ink diluted in water, the brush strokes simple and almost casual. It showed a bald man with a heavy beard and an unbroken stroke of paint that implied his robes. His eyes were open wide and I thought they looked lidless. The rest of the painting was empty space. I walked nearer to study it, disturbed by the wide staring eyes and the black eyeballs.
Endo-san, seeing I was transfixed, explained. “That is my copy of a painting by Miyamoto Musashi. The man in the painting is Daruma, a Zen Buddhist monk. Do not touch it,” he said sharply, as I raised my fingers to stroke the eyes, as though I could close them for the monk and give him rest.
I knew what a Buddhist was, due to the influence of my mother’s sister: Aunt Yu Mei was a firm follower of the Buddha. But what was a Zen Buddhist, I asked Endo-san.
“A branch of Buddhism very much influenced by Daruma. It teaches its adherents to find Enlightenment by way of meditation and rigorous physical discipline. And before you ask what is Enlightenment, it is a moment of complete clarity, of pure bliss. At that instant everything will be revealed to you. Some take years to achieve this, some months, days perhaps, some never at all. In Japan we call such Enlightenment satori. The annals of Zen Buddhism have recorded it happening to young novices, untrained monks and temple sweepers, as well as to learned sages and temple patriarchs.” Now his eyes became fleetingly humorous. “It is indiscriminate. When it comes, it comes.”
“Are you Enlightened?”
He stopped what he was doing, gave a sad smile and said, “No, I am not. I have never been.”
“Why not?”
“That is a question I can never answer. I doubt if even my sensei can.”
“Will I become Enlightened?” I asked, although at this point I could only understand traces of his words. Still, the asking of the question made me sound serious and intelligent. It seemed to have been an expected query.
“I can only teach you the way, that is all. What you do with it and what it
I looked at the wall of photographs in his home while he was cooking. He was an avid photographer. There were pictures of Japan, mostly of villages, mountains, and botanical gardens, but not a single one of his family. In fact almost none of the photographs were of people. There was a certain blandness about them, an emptiness which I disliked. They appeared to have been hurriedly taken, as if to serve only as a reminder, and not a memory. There was one taken of high, snow-covered mountains that caught my attention.
“Where’s that?” I asked him.
“That is the world’s highest mountain, in India.”
“And that?” I pointed to what appeared to be the only photograph that he had posed for, and even then he appeared tiny and almost indistinguishable beneath a massive sandstone statue of the Buddha carved into a hillside.
“Bamiyan, in Afghanistan. That is one of three statues of the Buddha. That one I am standing in front of is a hundred and seventy feet tall, carved in the third century. A group of Indian boys took the photograph for me.”
“You’ve traveled much,” I said. Photographs of dense forests and deserted beaches, as well as formidable mountains, were pinned to another wall. I recognized the tin mines of Ipoh and the rows of rubber trees that covered much of the west coast of Malaya. Hutton & Sons owned a large number of rubber plantations, and the photographs brought back to me the quiet of the mornings when the estate workers walked back and forth along the lines of rubber trees and made cuttings in the bark of the trees, coaxing trickles of milky sap to fill the cups hanging below the cut sections.
A painting in a little alcove caught my attention. It was a drawing, done in shades of black ink diluted in water, the brush strokes simple and almost casual. It showed a bald man with a heavy beard and an unbroken stroke of paint that implied his robes. His eyes were open wide and I thought they looked lidless. The rest of the painting was empty space. I walked nearer to study it, disturbed by the wide staring eyes and the black eyeballs.
Endo-san, seeing I was transfixed, explained. “That is my copy of a painting by Miyamoto Musashi. The man in the painting is Daruma, a Zen Buddhist monk. Do not touch it,” he said sharply, as I raised my fingers to stroke the eyes, as though I could close them for the monk and give him rest.
I knew what a Buddhist was, due to the influence of my mother’s sister: Aunt Yu Mei was a firm follower of the Buddha. But what was a Zen Buddhist, I asked Endo-san.
“A branch of Buddhism very much influenced by Daruma. It teaches its adherents to find Enlightenment by way of meditation and rigorous physical discipline. And before you ask what is Enlightenment, it is a moment of complete clarity, of pure bliss. At that instant everything will be revealed to you. Some take years to achieve this, some months, days perhaps, some never at all. In Japan we call such Enlightenment satori. The annals of Zen Buddhism have recorded it happening to young novices, untrained monks and temple sweepers, as well as to learned sages and temple patriarchs.” Now his eyes became fleetingly humorous. “It is indiscriminate. When it comes, it comes.”
“Are you Enlightened?”
He stopped what he was doing, gave a sad smile and said, “No, I am not. I have never been.”
“Why not?”
“That is a question I can never answer. I doubt if even my sensei can.”
“Will I become Enlightened?” I asked, although at this point I could only understand traces of his words. Still, the asking of the question made me sound serious and intelligent. It seemed to have been an expected query.
“I can only teach you the way, that is all. What you do with it and what it
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