I think it was in the summer of 1991, but I’m not sure, when I drove from the North of Belgium to Plum Village in the South of France.

Unannounced I came, just wanting to spent some days in the community started by Thich Nhat Hahn…At that time I was especially naïve, I let myself to be led by what called me…I had just left my country for what seemed forever in hindsight.

I was accepted and Thay was there….he was not traveling.
Thay means master and that is how his disciples called him.
There were no tourists, no meditation retreat, just daily life going on with the sound of the bell…it looked like a nature monastery, a simple life with nature and Presence.

The food was made mindfully, with special Vietnamese herbs from the garden. I helped in the garden, and went for the very special Mindful walks which Thay led in silence. I still remember this as it was yesterday.

There were little boards everywhere reminding us to be mindful.
Then there were his teachings, what I specially remember were the stories of interconnectedness of all. I was not yet 30 years old, and the world of spirituality was just opening up since a few years. I had traveled to the east twice already, but here it touched me in its utter simplicity, almost a sort of aloneness shared among a Sangha.

Finally, unexpectedly, came a special invitation to have tea with Thay and a very few disciples in his personal hut…I was thrilled and almost shy to have such a privilege, specially seen afterwards. At that moment I did not know yet how special he was…

The tea ceremony was simple, I feel as if I still taste the tea and still hear his voice being in that moment. I think someone translated…His voice was like a music, the language invited me to dream away of an unknown country aware of a very painful past…
It was all very still…, in the special cup filled with a light coloured liquid I saw the whole world: what the cup was made of, where that material came from, the potter, his parents, the country, the hills, the moon, the sky, the sun, the earth, the streams, the wells, the people who planted the tea and watered it and made the tea grow….

It was such a magical time…
I had read one book of his, called ‘The Moon Bamboo’. Here you can listen to one of his stories.

https://listeningoutloud-site.valeriehaynesperry.com/?p=275

His style is magical realism, which I love, and the tales are interwoven with inte-rbeing and the pain of history.
The people at Plum village were refugees, and I think I did not get yet what that meant… I had been spared of the atrocities of the world. What they brought to me will stay carved in my heart.

I honor this man who was one of the great ones I met. I feel him in the rain, see him in the clouds….and remember him while looking at the moon and my bamboo.

He is in me and I’m in him.

I bow.

Aikya