When we suffer, we are experiencing the effects of frustrated desire, expectations and conditioning, but we are also on the verge of breaking out into the light. Let me explain . . .
I remember when I did my first intro course in Buddhism on the way to my PhD in Religion: I heard Buddha saying Desire causes Suffering, and to me from a very Christian background this made no sense at all. I could quote it and get 100% in the course, but there was absolutely no resonance in me to this sacred truth. More than a decade later, when due to being tired of too much suffering in my life, and yet again finding myself full of peace, love and joy after one of Sri Sri Ravi Shankar's advanced silence courses, I decided that I needed the knowledge, I needed to understand why I always ended up emeshed in suffering after the effects of the course wore off.
As I opened to the knowledge and pursued it with all my heart, with my full attention, it opened to me like a lovely flower, bit by bit revealing the sweetness and perfection of these sacred truths. Guruji's style of teaching was so simple: I got one basic principle through his example of coffee and a gulubjamon (a favourite Indian sweet): He gave us the example of sipping a sweetened coffee, then taking a bite of the gulubjamon and then taking another sip of the coffee. On the 2nd sip it tastes quite bitter, but it is the same coffee. The light came on for me. Our reality, what we experience in life is constructed: our perceptual abilities have been conditioned by cultural judgements and personal experiences. We don't see things as they are, but as we expect them to be. Any student of human perception knows that this is the case: that we don't see things that are there because we don't expect to see them, and we see things that are not there, because we expect to see them. This is a fundamental truth about the human condition, our experience of reality is illusory; we live in a world built of illusions.
So it is the illusory world we individually and collectively construct that gets us all mixed up with desire: because we are taught what is desirable and what is repulsive. In our consumerist world, where we are fed lies by advertizers all day long about what we need to be happy, this web of illusions has certain predictable if unfortunate results, such as young girls and women suffering from Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia because of having been seduced by false or illusory visions of what it is to be an attractive female. The point is that one of the ways that desire causes suffering is by the fact that what we desire hurts or kills us like tobacco and yet theses desires seem inescapable for many.
Desire also causes suffering when what we desire is harmful for others, either directly or indirectly. Men's desire for young females is a case in point, as is our desire for personal comfort and wealth that is satisfied off of the backs of very poor, even starving people. Desire also causes suffering when our way of providing for our needs and wants leads us to damage and destroy the environment that sustains us: witness that increasing industrialization in 3rd world countries that is resulting in so much air pollution that lung and heart diseases are on their way to being the leading causes of death. Despite how obvious this pollution is they have nothing on us asa the first world's contributions to degrading the planet on which we live is so much greater than theirs. A wise friend of mine, who has witnessed the relentless onslaught against the Congo River Basin Rainforest said to me, perhaps we really do deserve to be annilahated, or at least, that's likely what we're going to do to ourselves.
Finally desire causes suffering when we can't have what we desire with responses ranging from fear and anxiety that we won't get it or we'll lose it to unhappy disappointment to bitterness and anger or despondency and despair. All of this is caused by inappropriate ways of constructing our reality, of deciding what is important and what it is that we must have or else. But I have good news: the good news is that suffering opens the possibiity of escaping these illusory constructions, these empty promises of fulfillment and happiness, because all human contructions are flawed, are imperfect, are incomplete versions of reality and human nature. As Leonard Cohen, my favourite musician and poet, famously says, "there is a crack, there is a crack in everything; that's how the light gets in!"
People "broken" by suffering, often end up being healthier, stronger and freer than those still caught in their illusions, still running the rat race, feeding the beast, trying to stay happy, when at heart they know they are as fragile as anyone else, that disaster can strike anyone, anytime, no matter how strong your illusions are. You see suffering often knocks people out of the mainstream, at least for a while, and in that time, reality can break through one's illusory defences.
All this to say, that if you're suffering, I want to encourage you by saying this is not all bad: stop to consider just how your desires, expectations, and related fears are at the root of your suffering, or are greatly amplifying the effect. I can tell you from my own personal experience that you are in fact, in the natural/spiritual centre of your being, peace and joy and love. If you can remember how infants and little children experience the world, you still have that capacity, that child-like way of being within you if only you can drop the fear, the desire for control and abandon yourself to the care of the Universe, to God, to whatever you can call that in which we live and move and have our being. I know that each of us is loved and precious and a channel of joy and peace and love for others if only we can awake. The ones who can hear me now are the ones who have already suffered, and who have already realized that there must be something more than career, possessions and family: to you I say, don't be discouraged by your suffering but surrender and find the meaning of this suffering, the liberating truth of who you are. To those of you so caught up in the pursuit of happiness, of wealth, of being somebody, I wish you the blessing of suffering when you are ready to benefit from it!
grace and peace to you all
your brother Daniel
Friday, October 23, 2009
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Everything is always changing and Some things never change!
My former teacher, His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, once had all the people on a course go through the following process: we were to pair up and take turns complaining to each other about the biggest problems we had in life. The person listening was instructed to give one of two responses: "Everything is always Changing," and "Some things never change!" Well as first I sat and listened to my partner complain it was amazing how well one or the other response suited what I was being told. The same happened when it was my turn. You see my teacher was a subtle user of paradox. No system of thought and belief no matter how well elaborated and defined can cover all of our human experience: but contrasting truths go a lot further in that direction.
What brought this memory to mind for me in the last few days was just how much my life keeps on changing. As I wander from person to person, from place to place, simply being with people, supporting them, and then moving on, my chosen path is one of transience, of fleeting moments of insight, times of grace and love which then have tranformative impacts both on myself and those I'm with. And yet, increasingly I find myself being drawn back into business activity, albeit business activity that not only is good for those involved, but that contributes to worthy causes at the same time. I am finding more and more like-minded people, people wanting to build businesses that mean something as well as earning an income. So I have quite a balancing act now with this will-o-the-wisp style of being in the world with my friends which clashes some with the different demands of being in the business world.
Now Ethiopia, Ethiopia was a wonderful, challenging, transformative experience. I watched one person almost come apart because of the stress of the culture shock; I experienced a lot of really bad customer service in hotels built to be real estate investments rather than client service establishments; I experienced the joys and hazards of a "working girl" culture where the bar us white guys were patronizing would suddenly fill up will all manner of attractive, hungry women, and in one case they found out where we were staying and tried to get to us through the front desk; I experience the joys of a new cuisine (the raw meat was wonderful!) and the pain in my guts as new bacteria caused havoc; I found generous friendly people, but also on all sides people with their hands out, even people with good jobs looking at us as a cash grab opportunity.
A Begging Culture
On the last point, while in Dese, there was an old woman outside our restaurant begging: now when you've just had scrambled eggs, toast and coffee, it's natural to want to give something to those who apparently are in need. So after avoiding her eyes for some time so that she wouldn't be all over us, when our car was approaching I went over and gave her a couple of Birr - a generous enough gift when most people give them much less than a Birr. She was at first really grateful and talking to us about the little ritual she wanted me to go through with her in accepting her thanksgiving as an instrument of God, etc. But then it shifted suddenly as she shifted into greed; she even grabbed my arm, digging her nails in as my companions intervened and steered her away with a vigorous scolding. I'm sure they were saying something like get a hold of yourself, you should be ashamed, etc. This small event is a microcosm of what has gripped many in this way from very young children who instead of waving, yell "money" as they run after us. Where there is a clear need, generosity is likely appropriate although in reality the beggars are putting in a full day's work like anyone else, except their work is to try to attract enough sympathy and money rather than sell enough of this or that. But it is really sad to have children, adults, and older people who clearly have a life, clothes on their backs, are healthy enough and food to eat, to have them chasing tourists hoping to get money. They are in fact driving many tourists away, as are the speculators who happen to have chosen a hotel as their way to make money in real estate, but allow them to fall into disrepair, and have not a clue about good client service.
This is the country that we plan to build a tourist business in; where we will give nature lovers, those who wish to experience different cultures and cuisines, where we will give them the wonderful experience that Ethiopia is, while working to eliminate the more aggressive, greedy pursuit of tourists. Our plan is to build up the tourism infrastructure in the Woldiya region by both writing up the sights and sites so that people know what they're looking at, what the human and/or geological history is what they're looking at; as well as training communities in how to welcome tourists into their village so to speak so that they have self-respect as they peform their cultural rituals such as the coffee ceremony. With this arranged provision of services will also come the opportunity to purchase cultural arts and crafts from a local outlet rather than from the crowd of artists and vendors hoping to score a sale from this or that hapless tourist.
As you can see, Ethiopia is calling me back, because white guys like me with 3 decades of experience in all things western, business, etc. are needed there to build their emerging economy. So I went to Ethiopia knowing that I needed to experience and understand what was there in order to build the kind of business that would be good for Ethiopia and good for us white guys who wanted to contribute meaningfully somewhere. I mean, in my case for example, who wants to keep on producing shelfware (reports that get shelved) no matter how much you get paid to write it. I'd rather go and work with teams of Ethiopian developers who've been trained but don't have much experience, and help them set up their governments computer systems.
The founder of Alchemy World Projects, http://alchemyworld.org/, told me that in his estimation 85% of people in Ethiopia, all hard-working people, work either in subsistence agriculture or subsistence trading. We will work together (One Village Foundation Canada and Alchemy World Projects) to train local people in internet, English and business so that they can become 21st century entrepreneurs. If I can add a recent discovery of interest, Canada in the original aboriginal language meant "Big Village" and our hotels, touring business and web development businesses are all going operate under variations of One Village Ethiopia. The genius of our Hotel and Tour approach is to ensure that tourists always feel like they're being welcomed into a new village, their new home for a day or two. For we all despite our differences are part of our one global village! :)
But I digress from my main theme of how everything is always changing and yet some things are always the same. I now have many Canadian and Ethiopian irons in the business fire, and more and more of my waking hours is consumed with the many activities required to keep things heating up on all fronts. Yet, I continue to experience the synchronicities of apparent happenstance which opens this door, pauses this effort, moves my focus here for a bit, and so everything is getting done, but in a flow, rather than by a well-organized project plan. As it says in Proverbs, and I requote colloquially, "Man proposes but God disposes" or even better, if you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans!! :o))
So what remains the same is a certain uncertainty as to what is next, and yet the certainty that meaningful and significant events will continue to occur with transformative impacts on myself and those around me; what never remains the same is "the plan" what in fact exactly is going to get done!! It's really quite entertaining if one can maintain a certain level of detachment as one continues on towards the goal, whatever that goal might be. Returning to my former teacher again, it is so Guru and disciple for the teacher to tell their disciple to do so and so, not so much because they want it done,but because of the impact of trying to do so on the disciple!! :)
For those on the path, whose life is being guided, turn upside down, and transformed, may you be swift to see and slow to fear; for those are still stuck in the traces, still caught in the rat traps and chains of work with the pitiful inducements of more comfort, more stuff, more prestige keeping you there; well, may you have the grace to wake up some day soon!! :o))
your brother Daniel
What brought this memory to mind for me in the last few days was just how much my life keeps on changing. As I wander from person to person, from place to place, simply being with people, supporting them, and then moving on, my chosen path is one of transience, of fleeting moments of insight, times of grace and love which then have tranformative impacts both on myself and those I'm with. And yet, increasingly I find myself being drawn back into business activity, albeit business activity that not only is good for those involved, but that contributes to worthy causes at the same time. I am finding more and more like-minded people, people wanting to build businesses that mean something as well as earning an income. So I have quite a balancing act now with this will-o-the-wisp style of being in the world with my friends which clashes some with the different demands of being in the business world.
Now Ethiopia, Ethiopia was a wonderful, challenging, transformative experience. I watched one person almost come apart because of the stress of the culture shock; I experienced a lot of really bad customer service in hotels built to be real estate investments rather than client service establishments; I experienced the joys and hazards of a "working girl" culture where the bar us white guys were patronizing would suddenly fill up will all manner of attractive, hungry women, and in one case they found out where we were staying and tried to get to us through the front desk; I experience the joys of a new cuisine (the raw meat was wonderful!) and the pain in my guts as new bacteria caused havoc; I found generous friendly people, but also on all sides people with their hands out, even people with good jobs looking at us as a cash grab opportunity.
A Begging Culture
On the last point, while in Dese, there was an old woman outside our restaurant begging: now when you've just had scrambled eggs, toast and coffee, it's natural to want to give something to those who apparently are in need. So after avoiding her eyes for some time so that she wouldn't be all over us, when our car was approaching I went over and gave her a couple of Birr - a generous enough gift when most people give them much less than a Birr. She was at first really grateful and talking to us about the little ritual she wanted me to go through with her in accepting her thanksgiving as an instrument of God, etc. But then it shifted suddenly as she shifted into greed; she even grabbed my arm, digging her nails in as my companions intervened and steered her away with a vigorous scolding. I'm sure they were saying something like get a hold of yourself, you should be ashamed, etc. This small event is a microcosm of what has gripped many in this way from very young children who instead of waving, yell "money" as they run after us. Where there is a clear need, generosity is likely appropriate although in reality the beggars are putting in a full day's work like anyone else, except their work is to try to attract enough sympathy and money rather than sell enough of this or that. But it is really sad to have children, adults, and older people who clearly have a life, clothes on their backs, are healthy enough and food to eat, to have them chasing tourists hoping to get money. They are in fact driving many tourists away, as are the speculators who happen to have chosen a hotel as their way to make money in real estate, but allow them to fall into disrepair, and have not a clue about good client service.
This is the country that we plan to build a tourist business in; where we will give nature lovers, those who wish to experience different cultures and cuisines, where we will give them the wonderful experience that Ethiopia is, while working to eliminate the more aggressive, greedy pursuit of tourists. Our plan is to build up the tourism infrastructure in the Woldiya region by both writing up the sights and sites so that people know what they're looking at, what the human and/or geological history is what they're looking at; as well as training communities in how to welcome tourists into their village so to speak so that they have self-respect as they peform their cultural rituals such as the coffee ceremony. With this arranged provision of services will also come the opportunity to purchase cultural arts and crafts from a local outlet rather than from the crowd of artists and vendors hoping to score a sale from this or that hapless tourist.
As you can see, Ethiopia is calling me back, because white guys like me with 3 decades of experience in all things western, business, etc. are needed there to build their emerging economy. So I went to Ethiopia knowing that I needed to experience and understand what was there in order to build the kind of business that would be good for Ethiopia and good for us white guys who wanted to contribute meaningfully somewhere. I mean, in my case for example, who wants to keep on producing shelfware (reports that get shelved) no matter how much you get paid to write it. I'd rather go and work with teams of Ethiopian developers who've been trained but don't have much experience, and help them set up their governments computer systems.
The founder of Alchemy World Projects, http://alchemyworld.org/, told me that in his estimation 85% of people in Ethiopia, all hard-working people, work either in subsistence agriculture or subsistence trading. We will work together (One Village Foundation Canada and Alchemy World Projects) to train local people in internet, English and business so that they can become 21st century entrepreneurs. If I can add a recent discovery of interest, Canada in the original aboriginal language meant "Big Village" and our hotels, touring business and web development businesses are all going operate under variations of One Village Ethiopia. The genius of our Hotel and Tour approach is to ensure that tourists always feel like they're being welcomed into a new village, their new home for a day or two. For we all despite our differences are part of our one global village! :)
But I digress from my main theme of how everything is always changing and yet some things are always the same. I now have many Canadian and Ethiopian irons in the business fire, and more and more of my waking hours is consumed with the many activities required to keep things heating up on all fronts. Yet, I continue to experience the synchronicities of apparent happenstance which opens this door, pauses this effort, moves my focus here for a bit, and so everything is getting done, but in a flow, rather than by a well-organized project plan. As it says in Proverbs, and I requote colloquially, "Man proposes but God disposes" or even better, if you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans!! :o))
So what remains the same is a certain uncertainty as to what is next, and yet the certainty that meaningful and significant events will continue to occur with transformative impacts on myself and those around me; what never remains the same is "the plan" what in fact exactly is going to get done!! It's really quite entertaining if one can maintain a certain level of detachment as one continues on towards the goal, whatever that goal might be. Returning to my former teacher again, it is so Guru and disciple for the teacher to tell their disciple to do so and so, not so much because they want it done,but because of the impact of trying to do so on the disciple!! :)
For those on the path, whose life is being guided, turn upside down, and transformed, may you be swift to see and slow to fear; for those are still stuck in the traces, still caught in the rat traps and chains of work with the pitiful inducements of more comfort, more stuff, more prestige keeping you there; well, may you have the grace to wake up some day soon!! :o))
your brother Daniel
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Blog Action Day 2009 - Climate Change has to be Addressed NOW
As my readers know, I'm just back from Ethiopia. As much as I love Ethiopia, and for that matter, Ghana, China and India, I found the same pressing problem in each of these countries, and that is air pollution. These countries are often blanketed with a permanent haze, and being on the streets is dangerous to your health because of the diesel and other fumes that choke the roadways. People are of course dying, some slowly, some quickly as a result of this unchecked air pollution. However, we are also changing our planet, changing it in ways that will render it uninhabitable for humans.
Now it's not that I'm worried about Gaia, the name many call her when thinking of our planet as alive, as an organism, as goddess; Gaia has not always been habitable by us, and is not likely to always be habitable by us. No, the problem is what we're doing to our own environment and to that of our children and our grand-children.
We have to stop using petroleum for everything-- it is so dirty and it has been fouling up our planet and our bodies for a long time. We also have to stop consuming way more than we need. We have to stop designing campaigns to get people to buy things they don't need! Whoever dreamt up the expansion of the economy as some sort of inalienable good has left way too many things off the balance sheet. The cost of cleaning up our messes now has to added to this balance sheet in govenment and international policies, and, we need to aggressively invest in changing how we do things: the status quo of expanding consumption and our use of petroleum has to stop.
So I leave you with a citation from David Berman, who in is presentation "Weapon of Mass Deception" and his book "Do Good Design" (with Design Struck out) very effectively makes this point:
". . . global branding strategies are the most powerful tools used today to encourage over-consumption amongst growing Developing World populations, resulting in the largest long-term threat to global harmony and the environment. Communications professionals have more conspicuous power than they realize, and play a core role in helping some corporations mislead audiences in order to invent unfulfilled "needs" in larger and larger markets. In a World where design has become a recognized corporate asset, creative people have the opportunity to use their persuasive skills responsibly and to accelerate awareness of the messages the World really needs shared. Recent developments regarding professionalism and ethics offer hope. Designers and other professionals need to choose what their still-young professions will be about: creating visual lies to help sell stuff, or helping repair the World by bridging knowledge and understanding. http://davidberman.com/seminars/howlogo.php#description
grace and blessings
your brother Daniel
Now it's not that I'm worried about Gaia, the name many call her when thinking of our planet as alive, as an organism, as goddess; Gaia has not always been habitable by us, and is not likely to always be habitable by us. No, the problem is what we're doing to our own environment and to that of our children and our grand-children.
We have to stop using petroleum for everything-- it is so dirty and it has been fouling up our planet and our bodies for a long time. We also have to stop consuming way more than we need. We have to stop designing campaigns to get people to buy things they don't need! Whoever dreamt up the expansion of the economy as some sort of inalienable good has left way too many things off the balance sheet. The cost of cleaning up our messes now has to added to this balance sheet in govenment and international policies, and, we need to aggressively invest in changing how we do things: the status quo of expanding consumption and our use of petroleum has to stop.
So I leave you with a citation from David Berman, who in is presentation "Weapon of Mass Deception" and his book "Do Good Design" (with Design Struck out) very effectively makes this point:
". . . global branding strategies are the most powerful tools used today to encourage over-consumption amongst growing Developing World populations, resulting in the largest long-term threat to global harmony and the environment. Communications professionals have more conspicuous power than they realize, and play a core role in helping some corporations mislead audiences in order to invent unfulfilled "needs" in larger and larger markets. In a World where design has become a recognized corporate asset, creative people have the opportunity to use their persuasive skills responsibly and to accelerate awareness of the messages the World really needs shared. Recent developments regarding professionalism and ethics offer hope. Designers and other professionals need to choose what their still-young professions will be about: creating visual lies to help sell stuff, or helping repair the World by bridging knowledge and understanding. http://davidberman.com/seminars/howlogo.php#description
grace and blessings
your brother Daniel
Friday, October 2, 2009
What has happened here?
(Yesterday's post – accidentally appearing after today's! J
I came, I saw, I experienced, I fell in love! J This has happened to me so many times now! I'm this Canadian who keeps falling in love with very un-Canadian countries, peoples and ways of life. First it was India, back when I was a follower of His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, who I still respect more than any other person in this world. Being in India, immersed in the mystery and wisdom, yet poverty and disease, I was attracted and repulsed, but in the end very in love. More recently I spent time in China, again being impacted by the mystery and ancient wisdom, yet the poverty, disease and spiritual hunger of a people raised during the cultural revolution. In the end I was very much in love and happily would go there again for a protracted period of time. Last winter when I got to Ghana, it was again the same thing – in fact I thought I was back in India, it was so familiar to me what I was seeing: the air pollution, the dirt, poverty and disease, yet a vibrant, strong, virile people whose drive towards life is an expression of the ancient life force that emanates from the land. Three lands, three civilizations, three ways of being quite foreign to a Canadian and yet I felt so at home. Now here in Ethiopia it is starting all over again. But first let me tell you a bit about Ethiopia itself.
Ethiopia shares quite a bit with Ghana but has some very distinct differences as well. They are both very Christian with a sizeable Moslem minority, but Ethiopia is an ancient civilization, and both its Christian and Moslem roots go deeper and further back than in Ghana. In fact The Prophet Mohammed declared that Jihad would never be declared against Ethiopia, because the Ethiopian Christian king protected his family members when the rulers of the pagan city which he had offended with his new teaching and path, came with gifts asking for them. The king on listening to what they believed (the Mohammedites and the Pagans) said that the Mohammedites were closer to his beliefs, they were his guests, and that they were welcome to stay with him. So Ethiopia ever since has had a certain level of tolerance between their Christians, Moslems and traditional religionists. Although Ethiopia like Afghanistan has been conquered, it has never been colonized; Ethiopia like China went through a communist period (only 17 years), but it has shaken it off as a dark chapter in its history, not having suffered the same dislocation from its traditions and spirituality as happened in China. So today, Ethiopia is modernizing rapidly, and while much of the infrastructure has been delivered through international aid and development channels, today business is taking off in many sectors. But as it modernizes, the government is also working hard to support its poor, creating jobs like Street Parking Payment workers, and building thousands of low-cost, basic multi-story condominiums as it flattens one story slums. Ethiopia today is a multi-faith society that is opening up increasingly to investment and the modernization of its agriculturally-based economy. It is a place of opportunity for those with business skills and capital, a relatively stable society in which corruption is not such a feature of life as it is in so many other developing countries.
Whatever the case, again, I have seen, I have been repulsed by the air pollution, dirt and disease and yet I am deeply attracted to this place, to these people, to their food, to what it means to live and work here. So do come over here sometime and see for yourself about why it is that so many people like me, once they've been here, are bitten, changed, and never the same.
It’s a long road to freedom
It's a long road to freedom, a-winding steep and high. But when you walk in love with the wind on your wings and cover the earth with the songs you sing, the miles fly by. I love this old chorus from my charismatic renewal days: it is so easy to soar into ecstasy, or at least savour the memory and potential of ecstasy in the words and music. These days I am more likely to remember who I am, to soar into ecstasy with Rumi:
I am Life itself
You have been a prisoner
of a little pond
I am the ocean
and its turbulent flood
Come merge with me
leave this world of ignorance
Be with me
I will open
The gate to your love
And again . . .
Defeated by Love
The sky was lit
by the splendour of the moon
so powerful
I fell to the ground
I am ready to
forsake this worldly life
and surrender
to the magnificence
of your being.
I have tasted the joy, the ecstasy that flows from this knowing who I am, knowing the great I AM, knowing who I AM. And yet I continue to walk in this world, in this world but not of it; and as such I find myself increasingly immersed in business, in human frailties (including of course my own) rather than simply leaving it all behind me.
Today I am tired, today, my last day in Ethiopia for now I find myself already grieving this place, somehow wishing I was staying, and yet knowing there is much work to be done in Ottawa and other places before I can return. It is indeed a long road to freedom, when it winds through the valleys of this worldly existence rather than across the mountain tops of the sublime joy of merging with our creator, our lover, our mother, our Abba. Yet this is my path, learning as I go, dropping attachments as quickly as I can and yet finding myself tired this day . . .
It is of course all good, my arms are open wide as I walk and as I remember to sing. There are no easy answers, no quick solutions, I cannot give money to every beggar I see, not even to every seemingly deserving beggar I see. Even when meals cost a dollar or two, when bus fares are 15 to 35 cents, even with such a low cost of living, still I cannot give money to everyone who wants it from me. No, I have to harden myself, so against my nature, although yesterday I started telling little children to stop begging and they listened! J
On the path as it leads from Ethiopia back to Ottawa . . .
Your brother Daniel
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