Buddhist Audio Books

Dear Upasakas and Upasikas,

It is 10 a.m. in Auckland, New Zealand. The sky is grey and overcast, but the weather is not at all cold. At Suvarnaketu ('Golden Comet'), the men's community at 46 Sarsfield Street, we have just finished breakfast, and the lads have scattered over the house to get on with various jobs – Purna to phone Vijaya about my arrangements for visiting Christchurch next month. Priyananda and I arrived from Sydney the day before yesterday, 15 March, [1979] at about 6:30 (local time), exactly one calendar month after our departure from England. Megha, Purna, Udaya, and Priyananda's brother Tony were waiting for us at the barrier, and within minutes we were driving through the warm night air of Auckland in the direction of Sarsfield Street.

Here I was soon installed in the two rooms, a bedroom and an office, which had been got ready for me. On the chest of drawers was a large, hand-painted greetings card depicting a rising sun and hordes of joyful Mitras and Friends apparently engaged in welcoming Bhante to New Zealand. It was signed by all those who had decided to greet me in this way rather than 'overwhelm' me at the airport. Also on the chest of drawers were framed photographs of Jamyang Khyentse Rimpoche and Dhardo Rimpoche and lots of flowers – roses, michaelmas daisies, and chrysanthemums, and a yellow, poppy-like New Zealand flower that I couldn't identify. My journey was at an end. I had reached New Zealand at last. After an absence of four years I was back in the Land of the Long White Cloud. No doubt a lot is going to happen during the next two months, so before getting into my New Zealand programme I think I had better stop and tell you something about our journey out here and our experiences in India, Malaysia, and Australia, since impressions of the earlier stages of the journey are already becoming a little blurred.