Land Of The Thunder Dragon

by Dave Williams

  “Ok, look, I don’t really mind the cow shit smell so much, a change of clothes will be enough for me,” said Timothy quietly.

  “No Arguments.” The old lady yelled through the door. “Soap is on the shelf, and if you two don’t pass the smell test when I walk in there in two minutes I’ll be scrubbing you myself,” She winked at Skye as if to say, that will fix them. Skye laughed loudly.

  “Oh well,” Wayne said, “Time to harden up I suppose.” And he gasped as he tipped the dipper of freezing cold water over himself, then lathered up and gasped again as he rinsed with another one. “Refreshing hey?” he said to Timothy as he too gasped in shock from the cold water.

  There was a pile of warm looking jackets and hats on the floor, as well as some other clothes. They all took what they thought they needed, but they couldn’t carry anything, so it was only what they could wear.

  Everyone was offered a fresh smelling piece of Tibetan bread as they walked back out of the door into the cold. A faint glow of pre-dawn could be seen in the East, finally giving them a sense of direction.

  The old lady hurried them on, they were starting to head out of the built up area of Paro, and as the sky lightened they could see that they were out in the midst of a large rice paddy. The outline of the surrounding mountains was becoming more obvious and they started to realise the scale of the dramatic landscape around them.

  Without really noticing, they all of a sudden realised that they were standing in front of a very plain, but extremely old building.

  “We have arrived at Jowo Lakhang,” the old lady said quietly. “I leave you here young ones, good luck.” And she walked off toward the sunrise.

  As they stood at the entrance to the monastery, David thought they must have looked a strange sight. “Five raggedy looking kids and a one armed robot called Lurch,” he laughed just as the door cracked open, revealing an imposing looking monk in Saffron coloured robes.

  “My name is Ugyen” he said with a serene, almost detached voice. Ugyen turned and walked back into the monastery. David looked at the others as if to ask if they thought they were meant to follow. “And leave your shoes outside please,” Ugyen said as he disappeared through a doorway at the end of a long corridor.

  They all kicked their shoes off and stepped up through the monastery door. The corridor was draped in very old, smoky looking tapestries. The whole place smelled of the rancid smoke that comes from burning yak butter candles, not unpleasant, but distinctive.

  They emerged from the corridor and into a large room. They looked on in wonder at the massive gold statue of Buddha that almost filled the space. It was glistening and sparkling from the flickering glow of hundreds of butter candles. David felt compelled to look at his staff and saw that the inscription was saying, “Look Down.”

  David looked down at the ancient wooden floor boards and noticed that he was standing next to two depressions that were almost five centimetres deep, with two channels running away from them towards the golden Buddha. The others followed his gaze as David knelt down and touched the depressions in the old oak floor boards.

  Ugyen noticed that David had stopped here, and explained. “These depressions are where the wood has slowly worn away when worshippers prostrate themselves in front of Buddha and pray. This monastery was built in the seventh century, and those oak floor boards are the original boards. You can stand in them if you wish.”

  David stood, and placed a bare foot into each depression. It was amazing, it was like he could feel the presence of fourteen hundred years of worshippers that had stood here before him.

  Wayne shattered the atmosphere by saying, “So it’s some old floorboards, get over it, can we get our names now?” Everyone turned and looked at Wayne with incredulity. Skye rolled her eyes and said, “You just don’t get it twitter brain.” Skye stormed off after Ugyen who had disappeared through the next door, leaving David standing alone in front of the golden Buddha. He rolled his eyes again as he heard Timothy wondering out loud if the Buddha was solid gold?

  David passed into the next room and was immediately hit by a new smell. The smell of libraries, or an old book shop. One of old books and paper, mixed with the scent of incense, a wonderful aroma.

  He looked around and saw shelves, stacked to the ceiling with old rolls of parchment, books and prayer cards. Along with this, there was a splash of colour from a few strings of prayer flags hanging high from wall to wall. Bright morning light beamed in through a high window, illuminating a counter in the back corner of the room. Behind the counter stood an old monk, hunched over some scrolls that were spread over the top of the counter.

  He looked up over his wire framed glasses at the six of them as they walked through the door together. As they walked over to the counter, his eyes never left David. “Welcome,” he said, “My name is Thinley.”

  He looked over at Ugyen, “Why are these strange young people here Ugyen? One of them appears to have lost an arm.”

  David spoke up, “Excuse me sir, umm, Thinley, we are here on a grand adventure to activate something called ‘The Device’ and to save planet earth. We were told that the first step in that process was to come here to seek advice about our Buddhist names. Can you help us with that?”

  Thinley sat back down on his stool and regarded David for a moment. “Confident he is Ugyen. Have them wait in the shrine room and bring them to me one at a time. The confident one shall see me last.” With that he went back to whatever he had been reading as Ugyen ushered them back out the way they had come in.

  Ugyen indicated that they should sit down on the floor and wait. He left, closing the door to the library behind him.

  Timothy’s stomach growled loudly as they all realised that it had been quite a while since they had eaten. As if on cue, a small door on the far side of the shrine room opened and six young monks entered carrying small metal bowls. They filed around the Buddha statue and placed a bowl down in front of each of their visitors and stood back up to leave. “Thank you,” said Skye. She looked into the small bowl of plain white rice and a few vegetables and was quite relieved to see that it wasn’t the hot chilli dish that Timothy had embarrassed himself with. “Umm, do you have a fork or spoon that we could use?”

  One of the young monks met Skye’s eyes and held up both hands as he smiled at her. And then he madesigns to indicate, “Eat with the right,” putting the fingers of his right hand to his mouth. “Wipe with the left,” he rubbed his backside with that hand.

  “Oh, Ok,” said Skye, as everyone else in the room finally got the joke and cracked up laughing. Lurch looked around and held up his only hand, his left, “I think I’m in trouble,” he said, and they all laughed again.

  They ate ravenously with their right hands, as suddenly, the door to the library opened. Ugyel indicated for the first one to enter. “Please present yourselves to the Lama youngest to oldest, but the confident one,” indicating David, “is to be last, please knock, then enter.”

  Skye got up to go in, but Lurch said, “I suppose that technically, I am the youngest.”

  They all looked around and wondered what the Lama’s reaction would be when he realised that Lurch was a Synth, but they all shrugged an ok as Flynn said, “The Lama did ask to see all six of us, Lurch is part of our team.”

  With that, Lurch walked over to the door, knocked twice with his left hand then turned the door knob and walked in, closing the door behind him.

  Chapter 21

  “Two Names You Have”

  David waited, not very patiently, as the others filed in, one by one. The others weren’t coming back into the shrine room, so he had no idea what was going on inside.

  When he was the last one left, he went over and sat cross legged in the footmarks in front of the Buddha. He closed his eyes and tried to concentrate on relaxing and clearing his mind. Grandpa Jack had once tried to teach him how to meditate, without much success. He had never been able to totally clear his mind.

  But now, sitting here with the
good intentions of fourteen hundred years of good people worshipping where he sat, he finally understood. David’s mind cleared and he drifted off to who knows where. There were no thoughts, he simply felt connected, through his contact with the floor. And powerful, very powerful, but in a very kind way.

  David slowly began to be aware of his surroundings, he could feel the presence of others, and noticed that in a semi-circle behind him, the six young monks who had offered the food earlier, were also sitting cross legged on the ancient oak floor. His cousins had all left the room, and he hadn’t even noticed until now.

  Slowly, he looked to his left and saw that Ugyen was waiting by the door to the library. He said nothing, and David wondered how long he had been sitting there. He got up and knocked gently on the library door, then opened it and walked in. He was shocked to observe that the light from the high window was gone, replaced by darkness.

  The Lama, Thinley, indicated towards the stool in front of the counter, “Please, be seated David, let us get started.”

  David sat. He could not remember ever having felt so calm. No, serene would be a better word. He looked at Thinley and all around the library, just soaking up the atmosphere, it was wonderful. “Ok, I am ready,” David said to Thinley.

  “First I will explain the process of how we will find your Buddhist name,” he began. “I will cross reference your given names at birth, with your birth day, birth month and birth year. That will lead me to various scrolls and charts which I must interpret to arrive at your name. You need to understand that this is not my choice, it is written already within this room. It is up to me to find it, and that could take some time. Once I have discovered your name, I will write that name on a paper that will wrap a set of prayer flags. That name will not officially be yours until you have erected those prayer flags on a high mountain pass or peak. I will not be able to speak your name, until that has happened, no matter how long it takes.”

  “Understand this,” Thinley continued. “This is not so much a name, as a calling. A thing to guide your life by. Do you understand what I mean by this?”

  “My Grandpa Jack explained that very well to me yesterday while we were in the plane. Yes, I understand that.”

  “Very well, let us begin with your full birth name,” Thinley asked.

  “David Matson.”

  “No middle name?” he asked.

  “No,” replied David.

  “Very well,” Thinley said in a way that implied that his job just got a lot harder. He went over to a low cupboard and withdrew a large bound volume from the lowest shelf and began looking through it. After a while he made a note and asked, “Birthday?”

  David was about to reply when he remembered that despite having always believed that his birthday was the fourteenth of February, two days ago, his eyes had changed colour, signifying that that was his birthday. He explained this to the Lama who looked right into his eyes as if trying to tell if he was fibbing.

  Thinley held up his hand as if to say something, then he changed his mind and went in search of something in the library. Books and scrolls were being thrown in all directions. “The number nine is of utmost importance here,” he muttered to himself as he dug deeper.

  David heard him say from underneath the pile, “This makes it very interesting, this could take a while my young friend, please be patient. I know what I am looking for, but not where it is. I am going to have to let it find me.”

  David got up and went to look at some of the things in the room. There were small statues of all shapes, sizes and designs, brass tubes with unusual lettering on them. And many more wooden and brass phalluses of varying sizes. When he opened books that seemed to call to him, he couldn’t read anything as they were in a strange lettering he didn’t recognise. “Sanskrit,” said Thinley, “The lettering, the language, it’s called Sanskrit.”

  “Is it hard to learn?” asked David, “I would like to understand it. They seem to call to me.”

  Thinley looked at David, dumbfounded. “What do you mean they call to you?”

  “Well, it’s like this tiny little book here,” he began.

  “Wait, that’s it, that’s the book I’ve been looking for. Very curious, it found you, instead of me. Don’t open it. I have to think on this for a minute,” Thinley implored.

  David was trying desperately not to open it, he turned it over and over, looking at the cover, the spine, the back cover. There were Sanskrit markings on it, but of course he didn’t understand them, so he didn’t understand why there would be any harm in opening it if he wouldn’t be able to read it. Then, suddenly the cover markings glowed and reformed themselves into English characters, saying

  “The Book of People With Two Names”

  “Open Me Now David”

  The door on the other side of the room opened, Skye entered, followed by Wayne, Timothy, Flynn and then Lurch.

  “David, is everything ok?” Skye asked. “We’ve been sitting outside freezing our butts off in the dark, and we were starting to worry.”

  “Everything is ok Skye. Weird, but ok.” David looked at the book that was still compelling him to open it. The words seemed to be flashing like a neon sign. He opened the cover, the page was blank. He kept turning pages. He looked up to Thinley and said. “It’s blank inside.”

  Just as he said this, words appeared on the open page.

  “Outer Space” And “Nature”

  Wayne and Timothy were looking over David’s shoulder as this was happening. The room erupted in laughter as Wayne and Timothy both blurted out, “Outer Space and Nature! Your name is “Outer Space Nature Boy?” They were rolling on the floor laughing hilariously.

  David just looked over at Skye, “What on earth did I do to deserve this?”

  Skye laughed good naturedly and said, “Well at least yours isn’t ‘Spark’.”

  “Or ‘Snow Leopard’,” said Flynn.

  “Or ‘Tripod’,” said the one armed Lurch.

  This just set Wayne and Timothy off again, they had now reached that point of uncontrollable laughter where they couldn’t stop if they wanted to.

  Finally, they got control of the hilarity.

  “Or, or, or, ‘Words’,” blurted Wayne, followed by more uncontrolled Laughter.

  “Traveller”, Timothy laughed out. “They called me ‘Traveller’, can you believe that? I’ve never been anywhere, how can my name be Traveller? Well, until now I suppose.”

  Thinley interrupted. “Remember what I said, a Buddhist name is not a name, it is a code, a key to live your life through. It is about the future, and has very little, in some cases nothing, to do with the past. For example, if your name was ‘Snow Leopard’, you could choose that it meant that you would spend your life protecting the habitat of the Snow Leopard. Or, you could choose that it meant that you were ‘stealthy’ and ‘a loner’ and ‘vicious when cornered’. Never forget this, only you can decide it’s meaning.”

  “The hour is late,” Thinley said. “Ugyen has prepared a meal and a warm place for you to sleep before you continue on your adventure in the morning. I wish you all well.” He handed David a roll of prayer flags wrapped in a sheet of newspaper, with “Outer Space” “Nature” written on it in coarse black ink.

  Thinley shook everyone’s hand and spoke briefly and quietly with each of them. He lingered a little longer with David, just looking into his eyes. “Extraordinary,” he said, and he turned and walked back to his counter and opened a book to read. “Extraordinary,” he muttered again to himself, not looking up from his book.

  Ugyen motioned for them to head through the door, and led them through a series of corridors to a small room with six mats on the floor, each with a neatly folded blanket at the end. A smoky fire sputtered away in a hearth at one end, barely enough to cheer them, let alone warm them.

  The six young monks brought in six metal trays with small bowls on them, filled with things that smelled very nice. More than one stomach growled after receiving this wonderful aroma.
They placed one on each mat and left without saying a word. “The monastery meal tonight is Dhal Bhaat, a lentil curry with rice and roti bread,” said Ugyen. “Sleep well, I can send you in the right direction in the morning, as long as I do not leave the monastery, but I believe that there are six young monks who are keen for a hike to the Takstang Monastery in the morning. So do not fear being left alone.” He smiled at them all, and bowed towards David, “Outer Space Nature Boy.” He turned and left.

  As the door closed behind Ugyen, they all looked at each other and burst out laughing. “What a strange day,” said Flynn, as they all huddled together around the fire with their bowls, trying to keep warm. “Outer Space Nature Boy, hey?” He winked at David. “Just imagine what you could do with a name like that.”