Compassion
26 April 2004, the wee hours
I saw the Dalai Lama speak today. He began by mocking himself and his age, when he explained his need for a translator stems from the fact that the older he gets, the worse his english gets. (That said, almost all of the talk was given in english.) There are two qualities about the man I was most impressed with. First, he is quite humble. Second, he is quite funny. The self-mockery illustrates this point I suppose. He joked about his inability to learn quantum physics as well, something he is apparently interested in. The Dali Lama is probably the only religious leader who doesn’t strike me as a hypocrite at all.
The day was centered around the Dalai Lama’s talk. I had lunch with Riadh and Shima at Kama, and Indian buffet restaurant downtown. I’m not a big fan of buffets, but the food at Kama was pretty tasty. I think perhaps the fact they had good naan bread left me biased.
After lunch we walked through the rain to the Sky Dome, where the Dalai Lama would be speaking. The line to get in was huge. We must have been standing in the cold for a little under an hour. Poor Shima had left her shoes in Waterloo, so she was standing in the cold in a pair of white flip flops.
After the talk, I saw Shima off at the bus station. Shima had gotten a locker to store her laptop and backpack while we were downtown. She managed to put money in the one broken locker in Dundas station. A friendly attendant helped her get her money back. I saw the same attendant when I went back to get her stuff, and once more at Dundas station. Shima caught the seven o’clock train back to Waterloo. I grabbed the TTC back to Scarborough. I got home the same time she did.
Tomorrow I begin looking for a job. I bought the shoes I was going to get if I got into grad school. They’re more like motivational shoes now.
I was going to see him speak yesterday but I couldn’t get someone to switch shifts with me at work. Dammit.
by Dave on April 26 2004, 1:30 am #
Dala*i* Lama.. not Dali Lama silly boy.
and your white shoes are growing on me. :P
by sh!ma on April 26 2004, 1:38 am #
I’m glad. They’re great shoes. And his holiness’ name is now spelt correctly.
by ramanan on April 26 2004, 1:45 am #
Wow, glad I stopped by, how cool! What’s the Dalai Lama doing in Ontario?
Hey, the link to me in “Debug” is broken. Might as well change it to my new site anyway, it’s just barely viewable now, although I have so much work to do still (I don’t have an “about” page yet, for example). I used the right link in this form.
BTW, when I hit “comments” for the Debug article, it took me to what I guess is the old part of your site. Then when I hit “home” it went to a section called “abuse”. Very confusing.
PS: nice shoes
by Hass on April 26 2004, 4:09 am #
You’re quite the lucky one to get to see the Dalai Lama give a speech.
by val on April 26 2004, 1:24 pm #
I have to thank my girlfriend for that. She found out he was coming quite some time ago, and bought me a ticket.
by ramanan on April 26 2004, 2:47 pm #