The next day Ralo arose early again, washed his face, combed his braid, and awaited the arrival of Guru Kyi with an even greater eagerness than the day before, but once more it was one of the children from Chaktar’s family that brought his breakfast. Ralo was both disappointed and angry. “Why isn’t your grandmother here?” he demanded, grabbing the boy’s hand.
“Grandma went to the monastery yesterday.”
“What did she go to the monastery for? Oh … I see, I see.” Ralo’s face broke into a smile, something that hadn’t happened for some time, and he released the boy’s hand. “Yes, yes, she’s gone to see about the wedding day.”
“Is a wedding day a good thing?” asked the boy, looking at Ralo innocently.
“Hahaha! Yes, it’s a good thing. A very good thing.” Ralo smacked the boy’s behind merrily, and he ran off rubbing his butt with a whimper.
As he cleaned off the thick layer of dust that had accumulated on his household possessions, Ralo’s restless mind was filled with expectant thoughts of his soon-to-be life with Guru Kyi. One afternoon a few days later he finally caught sight of her, but when he got close, he discovered that that sleek, glistening black hair, which inflamed his passions and which, to put it bluntly, was primarily responsible for relieving him of his land, had been completely shaved off, leaving a bald crimson pate in its place. Ralo couldn’t believe his eyes. As he examined her he realized she was wearing maroon clothes that weren’t quite layman’s and weren’t quite nun’s, and the cheap jewelry that she was never without was nowhere to be seen. All of this was a horrible testament to the fact that she had taken her lay vows.
Ralo stood like a statue, mouth agape, gawking, his snot running. “Haha,” he said eventually, shaking his head slowly, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. “Guru Kyi, you old hag …”
“My name is Chökyi Drölma now.”
“Get away from me.”
“Ah tsi.” Chökyi Drölma feigned confusion. “Are you feeling unwell or something?” she said, approaching him, but this made Ralo even more angry. He fixed her with a cold glare, then spun around and went back into his house. The house felt even more empty and silent now than it had after his wife died. He pulled the collar of his fur jacket up over his head and lay down on the floor.
After Ralo and his “mom” passed away, someone from the camp said, “Ah ho, looks like he’s been dead for a while. If others hear about this it’ll be an embarrassment to our community.” One of his neighbors said, “It’s been no more than two days since he passed. Yesterday morning he came over to our place, said he wasn’t feeling well and that he wanted to go see Alak Drong. He asked to borrow a hundred yuan in case he had to pay for a healing ritual. ‘Isn’t that pencil-necked Chaktar using your land for nothing?’ I said. ‘Why don’t you go over there and ask him? He ought to give you a hundred yuan. If he doesn’t you can come back here and I’ll loan it to you,’ I said. But he never came back.” He continued, “He really wasn’t looking well at all, and he was breathing rapidly. But to just … om mani padme hum, what a pity.”
When they were sorting through Ralo’s possessions they discovered that there wasn’t a single thing to eat in his home. Without a word to one another, they brought over some butter and lit lamps of offering, which they kept burning for seven days and nights. After this they took all his possessions, leaving not so much as a needle and thread, and donated them to the monastery. His remaining livestock were wrested from Chaktar’s possession and given to Alak Drong. “Om mani padme hum,” someone said on the way back. “Even if he’d left a will, that’s all there would have been.”
* * *
1. Aro is common a term of greeting in Tibetan. Aluo, its approximate pronunciation in Chinese, is a derogatory term used by Han Chinese to refer to Tibetans.
4
A SHOW TO DELIGHT THE MASSES
It was a late autumn day in 1993, if you count in human years. The Lord of Death, having just reviewed and signed his name to one last document, lifted his head, stretched his arms, and with a satisfied yawn thought, Time for a break. It was nearly noon.
At just that moment, however, a staff member walked in with a sheet of paper and addressed him, standing at attention:
Are you free, Your Majesty?
There is a man whose time is up
today at one o’clock.
Lozang Gyatso is his name,
the Tsezhung County Governor,
in China, on the realm of Earth.
If you could authorize this soon …
He handed the paper to the Lord of Death and stepped aside.
The Lord of Death, with the utmost attention as always, read the document thoroughly and even verified Lozang Gyatso’s age using the calculator on his desk. He then signed his name and returned the paper to his aide.
It was one o’clock sharp when Lozang Gyatso finished lunch. He figured he would quickly go to the bathroom. But as he stood up, the room went dark and before he knew what was happening, two burly men from the Public Security Bureau were leading him away by the shoulders.
“Huh? What’s this? Hey! Have you gone mad? Assuming a crow hasn’t plucked out your eyes, take a good look! I’m Lozang, the county governor!” he shouted fiercely, but the two forced him on without heed.
“Hey! You two sons of bitches! I’m Lozang, the county governor! Do you realize that the head of the PSB is a friend of mine? Do you realize that Sherap—the judge—is my brother-in-law? Let me go! Ya. Okay—you just see if I’m not a man! I’ll break your rice bowls and turn you into a couple of stray dogs!”
The two messengers laughed. “Friend, even if you were the queen of England or the president of the United States, it wouldn’t do you any good. Don’t make it any harder on yourself. Come on. We are going to see the Lord of Death. If you were good, you’ll be happier than before. If you were bad, no one can save you. We are the Lord of Death’s messengers.”
Slowly, it dawned on Lozang Gyatso that these two “PSB officers” were not, in fact, of this world. Rather, they were the Lord of Death’s two aides, the ones mentioned in mythology: Boarhead and Bullhead. He felt a certain terror, as if molten lead had been poured into his lower legs. He couldn’t take another step. With quivering lips he asked, “What? My time is up? Oh, Three Jewels! Is life so short? Really, it can’t be.” He shook his head.
Bullhead replied, “What? You’re sixty years old, aren’t you? That’s not so short, as far as human lives are concerned.”
“Oh … I still haven’t found jobs for my two sons! That’s why I’ve been waiting to write my resignation letter, even though I’m old enough to retire. Alas. My sons aren’t good students. If I go now, they’ll never get jobs.”
He clasped his hands and began to wail loudly, singing this strain as might a howling dog:
Gracious brother messengers,
for a moment pity me.
Give me one year and I’ll find
jobs for both these sons of mine.
Let me then collect my due,
for my wife will need help too.
After these deeds, then I’ll come.
Whatever you need, I’ll bring you some!
He beseeched them with repeated prostrations.
“What’s this?” the two messengers retorted. “Stop your nonsense!” They continued steering him ahead. He grew despondent. Feeling the urge to smoke, he slid his hand into his pocket, where lay a pack of good cigarettes. He lit one, inhaled, and offered a cigarette to each of the messengers. He lit theirs as well, with a deferential show of respect.
Slightly taken aback, the two messengers nevertheless savored their cigarettes. “Tastes good. Very good!” they said.
Lozang promptly offered the rest of the pack to Bullhead. (He sensed that of the two messengers, Bullhead probably had the higher position.) “If you think so, brothers, help yourselves to more.”
He adopted the bobbing head and ingratiating smile that he had used before assuming his present position, and
after some sweet and sundry talk, he proposed, “Brothers, if you like these cigarettes, I have all you could want at home. Why don’t I just go back and get them?”
The two messengers considered this for a moment, but replied, “No. Forget it. Once we hit the trail leading up to the Lord of Death’s place we won’t be able to bring anything else, not even a needle.”
“Whether we bring them or not is up to you. What are you afraid of?”
“Friend, you don’t understand, There’s a guard at every post on the way to the great king’s place. And especially now that he has that thing that looks like a glass box, one of those many computer devices that the Lord of Death imports from your world. On its face you can clearly see—even better than in the mirror the Lord of Death used to have—every last virtue and fault of any sentient being. If we let you return, there’s a good chance that the king would see it. So we’d better not.”
Gyatso pleaded, tears streaming down his face. “Even if he can see a person’s every action during our lifetime, he can’t possibly pay that much attention once we’re dead. Besides, I didn’t even have time to write a will for my family, my death was so sudden. Brothers, please show me some compassion!”
At that, the two messengers looked at each other and said, “It really is sad. Anyway, there’s no place for him to escape.” They nodded assent. “Okay. We’ll give you twenty minutes. Go now, but come back at once. We will wait here for you.”
In a flash, Lozang Gyatso was back at home. His wife and younger son were clutching at his corpse, sobbing loudly. They couldn’t see him, nor could they hear when he addressed them. He was sorely disappointed.
Meanwhile, his elder son had arrived and was calling his office manager. “My father has died. It was unexpected. We need a vehicle right away.”
The manager paused for a moment and then replied that he’d made plans to go somewhere with the vice-governor and since the other cars were already in use, none was available.
Lozang Gyatso’s son grew angry. “Have you no shame? Do you recall that it was my father who promoted you? Have you forgotten already?”
To which the manager merely sniffed—“Pfft!”—and slammed the receiver down.
His son continued to call their family and friends. Lozang was quite sure that if he had offered any one of them his piss while he was alive, they would have drunk it. But now, they were all searching for an excuse in order to avoid any commitment.
The elder boy tried again and again to reach his younger brother and sister, who lived elsewhere. When he finally managed to inform them that their father had died, they showed not the slightest remorse. Moreover, they reminded him, “All of us have rights to Father’s money and things. You can’t hoard them all yourself. We all need to meet and divide them up fairly.” His daughter even added, “Father told me before he died that he was going to give that gold watch of his to my husband. Nobody else should take it.” (This was, in fact, a lie.)
Taking all this in, Lozang Gyatso lost any sense of attachment to the world. He took as many of his valuables as he could carry and returned to where the two messengers were waiting. Lozang treated them with the utmost courtesy and offered a gift to the guards at every post. As a result, he was spared the usual hardships along the way and soon found himself standing before the Lord of Death.
When Lozang Gyatso glanced about and noticed that the Lord of Death was alone with no staff, he began to smile. “Heh, heh. Reverend king, how are you? Healthy, right? You may have some years on you, but you’re in great shape!”
Saying this, he pulled out a bottle of quality chang and a pack of good cigarettes, as well as some musk, white herbal medicine, butter, and droma [wild miniature sweet potatoes], and placed the lot down on the desk in front of him. “Heh, heh. I had to walk that long road, so I couldn’t carry any more than this. These are merely a token of my goodwill.”
“Good grief! Merciful Buddha!” The Lord of Death’s jaw dropped as he stared wide-eyed at the items on his desk. Lozang Gyatso thought, Now everything will be okay! As the saying goes, “A bribe will always do the trick, even with the Lord of Death.” Surely he too must lust for material things, and I doubt anyone has ever brought him this many gifts. But, “One has a lot of dreams if the night is long.” I’d better leave now before I miss my chance.
He got up to go. “Hey, reverend king, look after your health. ‘However important our affairs might be, health should be our priority.’ I’d best be getting along now. Oh—is Paradise still where it used to be?”
But as Lozang made motions to leave, the Lord of Death’s eyes flashed red as lightning and his voice roared like thunder. “Sit down!” He pounded the desk with his fist. “You, you, you …” He pressed a button on his desk, and two of his aides walked in, armed with some modern-looking contraptions. (Lozang Gyatso had only seen such devices in foreign films.)
“This man is really something else! Take him away for now, and keep him under close observation.” The great king dismissed Lozang Gyatso with the two aides and picked up a yellow phone into which he barked, “Send for some staff from Special Investigations—immediately!”
Ministers from the Lord of Death’s Special Investigations Committee began to stream in. As soon as they had all taken their seats, the Lord of Death made the following pronouncement:
Gathered staff, now listen up.
This afternoon a man from Earth
named Lozang Gyatso walked in here.
His crafty eyes are never still.
His talk is sweet, the nectar spills!
He brought these gifts—in fact, a bribe.
My royal eyes have never seen this type.
That’s why I’ve called you here. You see,
he’s not your normal sort of guy.
Good or bad, I still can’t tell,
but we should really test him well.
Such is how the case strikes me.
Tell me now what you believe.
In unison, the ministers resolved, “As the king has decreed, so be it!” Seeing the objects that Lozang Gyatso had brought, they were embarrassed for the man.
The Lord of Death rose, and his two aides led Lozang Gyatso in. “Ya! Our enigmatic fellow! Once upon a time, in the country of China on planet Earth, people of all nationalities were oppressed by the three mountains of imperialism, feudalism, and corrupt capitalism. They were bowed down by these, and the country was a virtual hell realm. But the great Mao Zedong studied well the theories of Marx and Lenin, and in accord with the reality of conditions in China he championed the working class, established a united front with the peasants, and utterly smashed the three mountains. Differences between rich and poor were eliminated. With no distinctions between the strong and the weak or the high and the low, the country became a virtual Western Paradise ruled by the deities of earth and sky. As we know, the Communist Party—savior of those oppressed by imperialists and otherwise weak—devotes its life to the truth, thinking only of the welfare of human beings.
“And you are not only a member of the Communist Party but also a high official. In particular, having been born in the Land of Snows, the realm of Avalokiteśvara, surely you value the laws of universal love, compassion, and justice. I imagine you must be a conscientious sort. Now, tell us. Your salary having come from the country’s coffers, what bit of good did you do for the people? With the authority of the Party, what just deeds did you perform? Having been granted this golden stupa—a human body—what legacy did you leave for sentient beings? At the same time, please tell my Special Court today—frankly and honestly—what acts of nonvirtue you have committed.”
Lozang Gyatso blushed, as he couldn’t recall having accomplished anything of such value during his sixty years. They knew he had been a Party member. That wasn’t good, he figured, given that the Party was atheistic. He felt fearful, but taking heart when a few religious acts he had performed came to mind, he began this ingenious song:
Listen, brothers gathered here.
Though I may look materialistic,
actually, I am pure Buddhistic.
Ten years after I was born,
I said my vows, my head was shorn.
But later, liberation came
and I disrobed. What’s to blame?
Seeing that I was fair and square,
they offered me the accountant’s chair.
Though chances to steal were many,
I never took a single penny.
For this reason I was retained.
Join the Party! they refrained.
I thought not joining would be best,
because the Party’s atheist.
Yet, when some higher-ups insisted,
into the Party I was enlisted.
They made me governor, and from the start,
I served the masses with all my heart.
Once the revolution passed,
religious policy relaxed.
Only then were our minds at ease
to foster spiritual activities.
So that all might benefit from their bounty,
I called countless lamas to our county.
To help fulfill the people’s every wish,
to Lhasa I have made three trips.
As for my prostrations—they’re in the millions.
My circumambulations total zillions.
Khatas, money, and much more, to temples I have offered these,
whether they were large or small, Tibetan, Mongolian, or Chinese.
What haven’t I done for religion’s sake?
But you have asked what role I played!
Given what I’ve just outlined,
you should rush me to the realms sublime.
“All right. Ya. And so it is,” The Lord of Death replied. “By your talk one would think you only did good and no bad. But you Tibetans have a saying, ‘The one who knows his faults is a buddha.’ Those who can admit their shortcomings are few enough, but those who can offer a self-criticism are even rarer. Now, let’s hear from your personal lha and personal dü, who have accompanied you since birth. The former will present evidence of the virtuous acts you performed; the latter will present evidence of your wrongdoings.”
The Handsome Monk and Other Stories Page 9