London in the wake the bombing- A diary on revisiting London, UK

Ken Howell & Luchia Lee

About one year after our last visit, and two years after Master’s Tao Lecture in London at SOAS, we returned to meet with those people who received Tao after Master’s lecture. Compared to the chilly and rainy weather in late June 2003, the weather this time was hot and humid.

Sadly, the meetings took place in the shadow of the four suicide bombings that shook London, two of them only a few steps from SOAS in the Russell Square neighborhood.

The morning of the first day, we took the underground to visit the Kuan Hua book store, and talked with the wife of the owner, Ms. Lin, to learn how our Tao’s Culture books had fared in the Kuan Hua bookstore. The Diamond Sutra, Heart Sutra, and Chun Jen book were sold out, and Ms. Lin asked me to bring more copies. During our chat, I came to understand how insecure she felt after the bombing. It is true that in these days you may not necessarily wish to hurt other people, but other people will come to attack you. Life has changed drastically recently, although these terrorist incidents in London recall those perpetrated by the Irish Republican Army, and before them during World War II.

The second day, we had dinner with Candice and Helly at a south Indian restaurant. Helly was familiar with the south Indian food and was able to recommend a very special drink as well as some sculptured Indian bread. Then he contributed his view, as a person from the south Asian community, on the bombings. Helly said many people eyed him suspiciously in the underground when he carried a bag. He definitely felt discriminated against, and like a second class citizen. It is Helly’s misfortune that the bombers were British citizens and second-generation immigrants, just as he is.

Peifen took us to dinner at an Italian restaurant in South Kensington. We exchanged ideas about the art world. She said that the morning of the bombings, she was taking the underground to work as usual. There was an announcement that the underground was delayed because of a broken train. It was only later that she learned about the explosions. As with New Yorkers on September 11, she left the underground and walked for several hours to get to work. Peifun said that she never takes the underground anymore, preferring to use the bus. After dinner we went to her home to get copies of some books published by Tao’s culture

On a brighter note, Candice mentioned the existence of a space near her office that may be suitable for future lectures on Tao. Sweet as always, Candice prepared chocolate for Tao’s family. She also expressed her wish to go to New York to visit Master and her other friends in Tao, and she showed interest in the vegetarian restaurant business.

In contrast to the hot, busy capital reeling from the bombings, we found in Cambridge the very quiet atmosphere of an old college town. We admired the architecture of the various colleges, which ranged in date from the 16^th century to the 20^th. We saw where Isaac Newton once presided, we drifted down the river Cam, and we walked through medieval streets. We even met in a Chinese restaurant a woman named Chris Ko from Hong Kong who studied physics at Kings College, Cambridge.

Hong Bing and Nancy came to meet us at Ken’s sister’s house. We had brunch together our last day in London, until the last minute before we had to leave for the airport. We talked about various topics, from politics to philosophy. We also discussed the practical issue of belonging to a different race in a foreign country. Nancy recounted that she had tried to become a vegetarian. For three months she was successful, but ultimately the desire to eat meat became too strong and she abandoned vegetarianism. During the meal, she vowed to try again to become a vegetarian. Both Hong Bing and Nancy mentioned how eager they are to visit New York and see Master and hear him lecture. Also, they have many questions about both philosophy and life.

Everyday life is consumed with small worries and seems peaceful on the surface. From time to time, however, the calm is shattered by momentous events – such as terrorist attacks – that in retrospect should have been foreseen but rarely are. This is a lesson to us to remember the larger purposes in life. These explosions, while tragically killing over 50 people, may serve the purpose of awakening people to the state of race relations in Britain. Of course the number of people killed in London was relatively small; approximately 4,000 people died in New York on 9/11; over 100,000 have died in Iraq; over 300,000 died in the recent tsunamis.

More generally, it should bring to those of us in Tao renewed devotion to the cause of cultivating Tao and overlooking the details of our lives. The age is transforming, from Pisces to Aquarius, the new age is coming to us and the whole world is in an unstable situation, so many disasters result – arising either from natural causes or from human ones.

As a final sad note, the terrorists have struck again with more explosions. Luckily none were killed and there was only one injury – an asthma attack. Also, two of the four planned explosions did not materialize, because two of the bombs did not detonate. While these attacks seem amateurish compared to the ones two weeks ago that killed 56 people and injured approximately 700 more, authorities say that they see many resemblances between the two attacks. They suspect that the same group, if not the same set of actual bombers, is responsible for both attacks.