The next event was an “excellence retreat”, a series of retreats that have been devised by Dharmachari Jivaka with my support. He has seen that many more successful middle class Buddhists don’t find the standard Ambedkarite approach that appealing, they want something much more personally relevant. They have achieved some considerable success as a result of Dr. Ambedkar’s great struggle, and their parents and grand parents enormous sacrifices, so they no longer find themselves suffering from the extremes of poverty and caste based oppression that their ancestors were oppressed by. Indeed in the end their concerns are more like those that bring people to our centres in the West: personal stress, a quest for real meaning, a sense of missing values. 80 people turned up, again in this sodden retreat centre which is certainly not up to middle class standards by and large. By this stage of the monsoon many of the rooms are permanently damp and bedding and soft furnishing and so forth can easily begin to take on a patina of mould. Whatsmore there is the ever present danger of snakes! Indeed on the first evening of the retreat I did warn people just to be careful, not to be anxious, but to be prudent; and it was reported to me that while I was speaking a snake had found it’s way into the shrine room behind where the ladies were sitting - fortunately some enterprising young man had brushed it out of the door before anyone noticed. I’ve seen a few snakes myself during this visit including a beautiful small silvery snake that had found it’s way into Maitriveer Nagarjuna room and lodged itself under his bed. I can’t say I’m scared of snakes although I do feel circumspect in their presence, I don’t have the visceral instinctive phobia that some have, so between us we manoeuvred it out of the door with a stick - and both slept with half an ear out for a slithering sound! Most people on the retreat were professionals: doctors, lawyers, lecturers, accountants etc. and a fair number government officers, including a very senior IAS officer who is serving in the central government in Delhi. One man introduced himself to me in the middle of the retreat giving me a book which was about a Dalit business man published by Random House. He proudly showed me his own name with a short chapter on his life and work - and he certainly had a lot to be proud of. He was born into a slum in Pune, his father having died when he was very young, and through sheer hard work and enterprise, and an intelligent eye to opportunity, he’s become one of the major pest controllers in the area, even with international operations. But he was a delightfully simple and humble man and clearly very much taken with our retreat.
Posted on: Wed, 13 Aug 2014 07:24:21 +0000
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