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- According to Vietnamese tradition, every spring comes, no matter
what life circumstances, In the house also decorate a branch of
apricot blossom to celebrate Tet if you are living in southern
Viet Nam. If you live in the north, then the cherry blossoms
bloom. Because believing that apricot twigs and cherry blossom
branches have the ability to chase away evil spirits, bring luck
and happiness. In addition, both cherry blossoms, and Apricot
blossoms, not only a symbol of Spring, but the vibrant color of
flowers with small buds, and the young green shoots, as a wish
for New Year joy, fortune, and happiness.
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In terms of the meaning of the apricot blossom, from the past,
the apricot blossom was considered as one of the four types of
precious plants and flowers: conifer, chrysanthemum, bamboo, and
apricot. These plants and flowers all have striking properties
that symbolize the good qualities of the Vietnamese people:
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- The conifer is firm, resilient,
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- The bamboo is slender, but supple and durable;
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- Chrysanthemum has a simple and elegant beauty
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- Apricot flowers are beautiful, rich, and glorious.
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The idea of spring often not until after New Year's Eve, the
spring appears, but on the last day of December, when nature
stirring to the blooming flowers and the thousand of sprouting
leaves that people called that is the auspicious symbol. Right
that time, spring came back on the flower gardens, at the food
stalls waiting for people to start, while struggling for their
livelihoods and the New Year holiday.
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In those moments, children waited for the new year, and adults
after busy decoration in the house, outside the gate, now sat on
the porch, drinking wine filled with memories; And always hope
the joy it will last for the coming days, to make up for the
unsatisfied things that it does not expect but still comes.
Those are the days to enjoy the taste of spring or to celebrate
the traditional New Year of the nation. After that, everyone had
to whir around, planning, struggling for their daily living.
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As once said, every beginning of the year is the apricot blossom
bloom season, bright yellow like sunshine, the buds are full of
branches, racing to full bloom in the spring days. That is why
our ancestors chose this kind of flower as a symbol of Spring in
the past; Gradually, everyone grew apricot blossom, and
decorated apricot flower on the New Year's Day. Yellow apricot
flower not only exorcises but also a symbol of good luck and
prosperity throughout the year, and these young flower buds are
a blessing for the prosperous new year and a lot of fortune.
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As you all know, the yellow apricot flowers are both beautiful
and symbolic of the new year, so people are very fond of and
decorate more and more popular. Many people also graft a tree to
produce both yellow apricot and white apricot flowers.
Particularly yellow apricot, many people prefer it all, looking
at the radiant yellow colors of yellow apricot blossom is you
see the spring. Many people have experience and understanding of
apricot blossom, they have a way to take care of apricot blossom
and how to make an apricot bloom right in the new year; So, at
about 20th of December onwards, they began to leave apricot
leaves leaving only the branches, young leaves, and flower buds;
thus, flowering plants have enough nutrition to flower much.
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There are many people when they are buying apricot blossoms for
the new year, they choose beautiful trees, stout branches,
balanced, buds, and evenly distributed throughout the tree, so
when the flower bloom they look very beautiful. Today there are
many other flowers used for the new years such as the marigold,
orchid, lilies, etc ... and many other flowers, which are
beautiful, also bring good luck for the new year; But no matter
what, the branch of the yellow apricot flowers decorate on the
new year holiday is true to tradition. Therefore, if anyone
wants to be lucky the whole year, please buy a branch of yellow
apricot flower to decorate in the new year.
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Regarding apricot flowers, in Việt Nam, these apricot species
are most naturally distributed in the forests of long mountain
range and provinces from Quang Nam Da Nang to Khanh Hoa. This
apricot flower is also abundant in the mountains of the Mekong
delta, and also in the highlands, but in small numbers.
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In the northern of Viet Nam, there is Yen Tu yellow apricot was
determined to be the same species as the southern yellow
apricot. Northern apricot blossom not only in the mountain of
Yen Tu area, but also in the northern mountainous provinces.
According to the research of professor Dang Van Dong, head of
the research, conservation, storage, and development of Yen Tu
yellow apricot variety; Yellow apricot flower in the mountain of
Yen Tu area has up to 700-800-year-old trees, 40-50cm diameter.
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Yellow apricot flower tree is a perennial living species tree,
can live for over a hundred years, with large stump, convex and
concave roots, rough trunk, multiple branches, leaves
intertwined. Yellow apricot blossom blooms brightly every
spring, so it symbolizes the coming spring.
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In southern Viet Nam, there is a yellow apricot flower tree in
the grounds of Ba Chua Xu temple at Sam mountain. This is a
yellow apricot flower that grows wild in the forest, each flower
has from 5 to 9 wings, sometimes up to 12-18 wings, called the
mountain yellow apricot flower. In the Western Highlands,
mountain apricot flowers are distributed quite popular. In
addition, there are also yellow apricot forest with brown stems,
large leaves with serrated and glossy green, yellow flowers grow
in a cluster, so the call cluster apricot.
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From the point of view of producing many flowers, this species
has a hard stem, tumors growing on its branches, surrounding the
tumors, many young buds grow out, and from there the flower buds
grow quite thick when the flowers bloom close together and form
clusters. People called this species of yellow apricot flower is
the apricot king. Currently, in the South, there are many
varieties of yellow apricot flowers.
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Another kind of yellow apricot grows in sandy areas, in coastal
forests. This yellow apricot flower species has a straight and
round trunk, flowers are scattered on the branches. This yellow
apricot flower species are also scattered in the areas of the
middle provinces of Viet Nam from Quang Binh, Quang Tri to the
south until Dong Nai and Tay Ninh.
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Usually, the yellow apricot blossom scents are difficult to
recognize. In particular, in Viet Nam, there are five-petaled
yellow apricot species with a stronger flavor than other apricot
blossom species, so it is easy to recognize and is called
fragrant apricot. This kind of yellow apricot blossom is often
grown in Ben Tre in South Viet Nam.
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In the Ca Na forest area, there is a species apricot yellow
flower with small trunk and meager, very brittle branches, oval
leaves, slippery, and smooth serrated.
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In Vinh Hao forest area, there is also a species yellow apricot
flower, the trunk is heavy and hard, brittle branches, small
leaves, large and flat flowers, long-lasting. Because its trunk
is heavy and hard, so people often called it is the rock apricot
blossom.
- The people
living Central Viêt Nam often prefer Hue apricot and Binh Dinh
apricot to decorate in the new year. Binh Dinh apricot leaves
are thinner, tapered, and pointed than other types of apricot;
apricot flowers can be dark browner than other apricot
varieties, but Binh Dinh apricot is more popular because the
price is not too expensive.
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Hue apricot blossom is also popular because of its valuable,
beautiful stump and decorative for many years. This species
apricot flower grows only in the ancient capital of the Imperial
City and is also a specialty of the Huong River and Ngu mountain
area. Yellow apricot blossom in Hue must be five petals, very
rare to have many petals. Hue apricot has no red leaves like
pink leaves apricot of the Central region of Viet Nam or species
with many petals of South Viet Nam that Hue apricot has five
petals, green leaves and thick. In particular, bright yellow
flowers are more beautiful than other apricot flowers and is
pure in one color.
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The apricot is a species special flower that blooms only when
the weather gradually changes from cold winter to warm spring.
Therefore it is loved by the Vietnamese people as a close
friend, indispensable in the festivals, and the traditional new
year of the nation. In addition to that special feature, it is
also a symbol of the rising after sleep in the bleak days and
the cold of the autumn-winter season. When people see the bright
yellow of apricot blossom, people still think that it
accompanies spring in the occasional coming New Year. It brings
joy, happiness, luck, abundance, prosperity, health, and youth.
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The apricot blossom bloom season is also a season of magnanimous
vitality that makes people joyful, relax, optimistic, love life,
and love people more. Therefore, when yellow apricot blossomed
bloom, spring comes an endless source of inspiration for the
mind of writers and poets. Yellow apricot blossoms are a species
luxurious and precious flower, highly respected by many writers
and poets. But the group of words used as the title of books,
the title of the songs, the name of the villages, the name of
the people mentioned was mostly inspired by the
Chinese-Vietnamese poem " feign illness to teach disciples" of
Man Giac Zen Master in the Ly Dynasty(1052-1096). The original
Chinese-Vietnamese characters are as follows:
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Spring has passed, hundreds of flowers fall
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Spring comes, hundred of flowers bloom
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Things passed by the front of eyes
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Life is getting old now
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Do not think spring is over, flowers fall out
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Last night, apricot blossom in front of the corridor
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Or:
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Spring has passed, the weather has changed
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Hundred flowers withered and fallen
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The law of the perpetual circulation
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Then spring comes, hundreds of flowers bloom
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Life is very short, with time
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Youth through, old age to gray hair
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Do not think spring is over, flowers fall out
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Last night, apricot blossom in front of the corridor
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The poem of spring in the meditation door was reminded by many
people. Special is the last sentence:
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- Last night, apricot blossom in the front of the corridor
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There are only seven words in this short poem of thirty-four
words in Chinese-Vietnamese, many people have learned the
religion, many writers, poets, musicians, using the idea of the
poem a lot without being boring. A short poem, lasting for
nearly a thousand years, still affects the spirit and emotions
of the next generation in the country, abroad, and even for
foreigners, it must be said to be immortal. This is one of the
poems that the monks, writers, and poets often recall the depth,
the wonderful, the beauty of the idea of poetry in the spring
come back.
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The poem feigns illness to teach disciples by Man Giac, an 11th
century Vietnamese Meditation Master, during the Ly
Dynasty, nearly a thousand years ago. Speaking is a poem, but
actually not a poem. Saying It was not poetry because master Man
Giac was a Meditation Master, in fact he did not write poetry.
It can only be said, when the mind of the most tranquil and
peaceful, when the ups and downs of the world are no longer a
concern for him, when the broken petals of flowers fall down, it
does not disturb and scare his mind anymore. And when in the
fluctuations of all things, impermanent appears the everlasting,
eternal of the true mind; the Meditation Master suddenly let out
a surprised voice, suddenly enlightened to the intimate
connection of the human being and the phenomenon of the world.
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Quietly and feeling that bliss and boundless wisdom, the Zen
Master Master closed the door, reported the illness, and did not
step out with the disciple as usual. While the disciples waited
outside, anxious, restless, it felt like their master was about
to die. In the evening, so as not to betray the concerned
disciples, the Zen Master smiled and drafted a short verse, send
out to the masses.
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This short verse becomes the last Zen Master's teachings,
kindness, most touching, and most sublime to his disciples. And
the language of an enlightened person, standing on the towering
pinnacle of wisdom, though not whittling, shaping, finding
words, arranging ideas and words, had inadvertently become
poetry. The verse or poem fake illness to teach the disciples
becomes an immortal poem of humanity.
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We should know, flowers fall or flowers bloom according to the
weather is only for all things in this world over time that
there is prosperity or decline. As time goes by, everything also
transforms, relocates. As such, in this world there is nothing
that is not eroded, thin-file by time:
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- Things passed by the front of eyes
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Life is getting old now.
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Everything has passed on the front of one's eyes, looking at the
hair to know that old age has arrived. Every day, everything
changes, either growing or declining. In terms of growth, just
like we grow rice in a field, the rice grows from young
seedlings to flowering rice. In terms of decline, it is ripe,
golden rice, cut bring home to grind into rice for cooking. So
do we humans, as we grow or decline over time. Birth and then
grow there is growth, a moment of the silver head, wrinkled
skin, old death, that is decline.
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Thus, all things and people are dominant by time, change does
not stop. Life is a stream of impermanence, change, no one has
the power to make it stop. So, being old, illness, and dying is
a matter of course, we have to be willing to accept. Accepting
in the spirit of joy is the one who knows how to live and
freedom. Those who are faced with old age, sickness, and death
come sad, and lament, those are the person who does not know how
to live; Because people don't know how to live, so they have to
keep on living, life afterlife. The following two sentences, Zen
Master described things, and people always changing,
impermanent, arising, and passing with the time:
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- Do not think spring is over, flowers fall out
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Last night, apricot blossom in front of the corridor.
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Do not say that the end of spring flowers also withered away.
No, because last night in the front yard there was still a fresh
apricot branch. An apricot branch is not affected by the
weather. In order to enjoy the aroma of this apricot blossom,
the cultivators must endure the freezing cold bone marrow. So,
Zen Master Hoang Ba said:
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- There must be a cold bone,
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Apricot flowers do not smell easy.
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In this life from man to everything is governed by the Law of
Impermanent, but there is one thing that is not destroyed by
impermanent. That is the true mind and Buddha-nature is the
enlightenment symbolized by the lotus, the jewel; Here, Zen
Master Man Giac also shows the root of all Dharma, the wonderful
nature of each of us. That true mind and Buddha-nature, is not
dominated, destroyed by time. Thus the views of the Zen Masters
are the same, even in the life of impermanent and vandalism,
there is a constant that never disappears.
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You know that already, then when you witness the impermanent of
things, of the body, of the heart, you are not depressed. You
can do that to be a person who knows how to live, live
healthily, and live happily.
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Man Giac Zen Master sensed that the flow of the arising and
destroying was operating depending on each other, without the
independence that man was the victim of in that endless spin.
But, even Man Giac Zen Master does nothing else, to share with
those who have the same wistful, tumultuous mind…. Is it
possible, in this life, we all have not escaped that obvious and
harsh law, to have a lifetime of chasing time?
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But no, just reading the first two sentences of the verse, we
have already heard the shock of space, and the whole heart,
because of the uses of the precise and profound words to convey
ideas. Although, the words are very simple for those who rarely
use Chinese-Vietnamese words can still understand completely.;
And it contains extremely magical meaning and ideas. Let's try
to read the verbatim again:
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- Spring has passed, hundreds of fallen flowers
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When Spring comes, hundred of flowers bloom again.
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The operation of the natural like that. When the spring has
gone, hundreds of flowers fall, but when spring will coming,
spring is coming, hundreds of flowers bloom beautiful, under the
gentle sunshine and few breeze swaying flowers or leaves as
well. Spring comes and goes, in the eyes of the Zen Master is
so, serene, gentle, calm, and peaceful like that. Therefore,
even:
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- Short life with time
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The youth is over, the old age is quite surprising.
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Although a bit surprised, but nothing is bothered a mind.
Because Formation, stability or development, dissolution or
disintegration, and void are like that; So, just calmly live
with what is in the present. The passed should not regret, what
has not come, do not expect. The reason, every individual feels
happy, angry, love, afraid, hatred or wants to be imperative in
life because they can not control their desire.
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Such say, it is not necessary to eliminate the will to strive
for personal growth in the social machine. On the contrary, it
has a positive trend, contributing to stabilizing, development,
and bringing about world peace. Because each individual is a
member of a nation or more broadly a member of the human
community. So, each individual has perfect is social, the world
will be peaceful. That is the necessary condition must-have.
Therefore Man Giac Zen Master determined:
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- Do not think spring is over, flowers fall out
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Last night, apricot blossom in front of the corridor.
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To show us that, the law the universe's transformation and
destruction is a jock for those who stand outside the operation
of the universe and understand clearly life story like dust
falling into the eyes a flexible way and freedom as Van Hanh Zen
Master once saw:
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- Body as lightning in the afternoon
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Lush spring grass, to Autumn, wither
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Talk about failure and the vogue of life
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The failure and vogue like dewdrops on the top of branches.
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For the Zen Masters enlightened is so, calmly before the change
of weather, and the beach into a mulberry field; So, happy, sad,
win, lost do not flinch their spirits. Meanwhile, our minds are
always filled with the shadow of suffering, fear, anxiety, and
avoid the truth. Therefore, when you gain is happy, the loss is
sad. Separation is painful, close together is happy. Whoever
praises the radiant face, who criticized the moody. Satisfied
with you is rejoice, the opposite is angry. So, when face with
the changing circumstances of the universe is a pity, and
regrets as Mr. Nguyen Gia Thieu has once lamented:
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- Undergo a beach turned into a mulberry fields
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The things sight that painful heart.
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Meanwhile, in addition to the transformation of impermanent,
there is eternity, peace of mind, and external. However, these
profound and wonderful things must be cultivated, learned to
penetrate the truth of the problem. As we have read many times
the verse of Zen Master Man Giac, but still did not have the
view of being free, peaceful, and liberated like Zen Masters.
Reasonable, that is the key to the problem that Zen Master wants
to send a message to us, should cultivate and practice
meditation, living in meditation. Do not follow the external
phenomenon and split the hair into pieces to find the truth in
it.
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In short, the flowers bloom then decay, the full moon then
wanes, but the decay starts a new future. The branch of apricot
is still the wordless image of boundless optimism, and calmness.
This poem was read by Man Giac Zen Master to the masses when he
was about to die. So, in the poem of Man Giac Zen Master about
the dying flowers, the blooming flowers ... The life story
passes, the old age comes, etc. All everything is nothing to
worry about, but the opposite is the means of practice to
achieve enlightenment. About apricot branches are symbolic of
everlasting life.
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In the spring of this year, spring begin a new era, a promising
era of scientific achievement, to serve people in terms of the
material. Let's us read through the poem by Man Giac Zen Master,
a spiritual dish of the nation to have the opportunity to give
to relative, brothers, sisters, and friends when meeting in the
spring when lifting a cup of tea, jam to enjoy the taste of
spring spread and pervade in us.
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At the same time, you should also quiet feel the bliss of a new
spring, a spring of weather. But it brings a magnanimous
vitality that makes the people's mind joyful, serene, relaxed,
optimistic, loves life and lives of all, in the spirit of
non-ego, altruism, and equality. It is the message of the Man
Giac Zen Master had sent to us from centuries past!
