I sat next to a monk on the flight from Oakland. Not right next to him. He was sitting in the window seat, and I was sitting on the aisle. He was a Buddhist monk, Asian, in orange and burgundy robes, and he had a brown, flimsy-looking cloth bag next to him on the middle seat, and I was worried, at first, about sitting in his row, thinking that there might be some kind of rule about not getting too close to a woman (they’re not supposed to touch money, after all, or eat solid food after noon, so I figured all kinds of regular things must be restricted), but he smiled at me as I stood in the aisle, so I went ahead and sat down. There was another monk sitting in the window seat behind him. I didn’t see an assistant or a translator or anyone like that, but the monks seemed relaxed and almost at home. I thought it was funny, though, because the plane was going to Las Vegas, and I couldn’t quite imagine why a couple of monks would be going to Las Vegas.
But it was fun to see them. It was kind of exotic. Special somehow. And it made me feel happy. I wanted to tell this to the monk I was sitting with. I wanted to tell him that I knew about Buddhism. That I listened to tapes. That I went on retreats. But he was busy chatting with the monk sitting behind him—they weren’t speaking English—and I thought, what was there to say? So I put on my headphones. And I got out my book. And then I sneezed.
Immediately, the monk turned to me and said, “Bless you.”
It seemed funny, for a monk to be saying that. Even though, of course, it was the normal thing to say. But it made me laugh. I said thank you. And the monk laughed too.
I turned on my iPod. It was set to shuffle and Billy Holiday came on, then Pavarotti, the Band, Etta James, the Rolling Stones….and then one of the Dharma Seed tapes I’d downloaded, a closing ceremony with Ajahn Sumadho, where he and a group of monastics chant blessings in Pali to the people at their retreat, and then on to all beings, in all realms, and all dimensions, out across the cosmos, and throughout universe. I thought: what a coincidence.
The plane flew on. The usual things happened. The cabin dimmed. I might have dozed. The flight attendant came by. I ordered club soda. The monk got juice. After awhile, the lights of Las Vegas appeared outside the window, and both the monks got very excited. They chattered and pointed and smile and nodded. At one point, the monk I was sitting with turned to me and pointed out the window. I smiled back and nodded and said, “Beautiful.”
The monk leaned toward me. “One night, Las Vegas,” he said and held up one finger. “One night, New York.”
I nodded.
“Where you go?” he asked.
“St. Louis.”
He gave me a blank look. I didn’t know what to say after that, but I wanted to be friendly, so I asked, “Where are you from?”
“Burma,” he answered.
“Ah, Burma.” I didn’t know what else to say.
“You know Burma?”
I nodded. “Aung San Suu Kyi.”
“Ahhh!” He grinned—hugely—and started talking rapidly to the monk behind him, repeating “Aung San Suu Kyi,” then turned back to me, nodding, nodding, and made a big, thumbs-up gesture. Which looked pretty funny, but I nodded, too, and gave him a thumbs-up right back.
I wanted to say something more. Something about the military junta, about the pro-democracy movement, the terrible treatment of the monks and the nuns, and how fearlessly they’ve stood up to the repression and cruelty. But I barely know how to begin talking about that, even with someone fluent in English, so I just nodded some more and continued to smile.
The plane was close to landing by then, and the monk in the row behind me handed a video camera to the monk sitting beside me, and the two of them gestured until I understood that they wanted me to take their picture. I did the best I could—I even stood up as we were landing to get them both in view—but I don’t use a video camera very often and I’m not sure what kind of picture, if any, I got. I did what I could, then made what I hoped would be understood as an apologetic gesture to the monk sitting beside me, and gave him back the camera…which, I hoped, I had not messed up.
He looked at me in a way that I took to mean: no problem; it’s fine; you’re alright. I felt such a sweetness from him that I was determined to try to say something. I wanted him to know that I valued what he stood for, that I was on the path too, and that I respect the life he was leading.
So I leaned over and recited the one Pali phrase that I knew: Namo tassa bhagavato arahato samma sambuddhassa. It’s what I’ve learned to say at the start of a retreat, to acknowledge the Buddha and his teachings. It means something like: Honor to the Blessed One, the Holy One, the Fully Enlightened One.
He looked at me quizzically. “Say again,” he said.
So I did. More slowly and carefully this time.
“Very good,” he said. “You Buddhist?”
“Yes!”
“Ahhhh,” he said, smiling, smiling now. He took my hand in both of his and shook it warmly. Then he turned to the monk behind him, spoke rapidly, then more “ahhhs,” then he turned back to me and shook my hand again.
He started talking to me rapidly then—but in Pali—and all I could catch was sila, which means “virtue” or “ethics.” I repeated sila, and smiled and nodded, but it was clear that I didn’t really know what he was saying.
He stopped then, and just smiled at me. “Five precepts?” he said, tentatively.
“Yes, yes,” I said. “ Five precepts!”
I wanted to say: I know these! They are: Not killing…Not stealing…Not lying…Not using sex in a harmful way…Not clouding the mind with alcohol and drugs. I wished I could have said them in Pali. I wished I could have said what I understand them to mean: that non-harming is fundamental to having a happy life. But, of course, all I could say was, “Yes!”
The monk looked pleased. “Five precepts,” he said. “Very important.”
“Yes.” I said again. “Five precepts.” And I smiled and nodded again.
The plane had landed by then and there was nothing else to do but get up and get my bag. I wanted to say: “thank you,” and “be safe,” and “I really wish I had been able to talk to you,” but I had the sense that whatever I could have said, it would not have been enough.
So I bowed.
I’m not sure if I did it right, but I bowed slowly and deeply and with complete attention. And then I turned to the other monk and bowed again.
Immediately, they chanted in unison: Sadhu, sadhu, sadhu.
Which startled me because I didn’t really know what that meant. But I’ve heard it on the tapes I’ve listened to, and I know it’s something the monastics say at the end of things. I wasn’t really sure what to do after that. I was aware of the other passengers all around me, watching. And then the second monk pulled out another camera—a still camera this time—and I thought he wanted me to try again to take their picture. But when I reached for the camera, he shook his head and pointed, and I realized that he wanted to take a picture of me!
So I smiled, and instinctively, I put my hands together in the namate gesture, and both of the monks “ahhhed” with delight.
I got off the plane then and waved goodbye as I left to make my connecting flight. I had been traveling since lunchtime, and it was almost midnight, but I felt fine. In fact, I felt wonderful. What had happened? Nothing, really. A monk had said a few words to me. I had said some words back. And I had bowed. But it felt like something had happened.
I walked to the next gate, beaming. My connecting flight had been delayed another hour, but it didn’t bother me at all. I bought a pretzel and a coke and I chatted with the vendor and it felt like I was talking to an old friend. I sat in a row of chairs, across from a woman on a phone, who was eating an ice cream and complaining about the delay, and when her cone started to drip, I gave her a handful of napkins, and in an instant she was laughing and telling her friend on the phone that she had just been rescued. Then the man next to me asked me to watch his bags while he went to the bathroom, and the mother on the other side of me looked worried, then thankful, when I smile at the toddler she was trying to hold who kept wanting to play with his toy by pushing it into my hair. And it went on like that. I was tired and it was late and I was sitting in the Las Vegas airport, but I was relaxed and happy.
I felt peaceful.
I felt blessed.
