Lady of the Realm

by Ash Fitzsimmons

  1E

  “I see. Anh Tài and Ch CB Liên. Your loyalty now is to the party that liberated you from the puppet forces. Not to your ancestors or your village. Your loyalty is for your fellow comrades. I expect to see you at the village meeting tonight.”

  He dismissed us with a wave of his hand.

  We scuttled out the door and quickly returned to Bình’s empty house. Once safely inside Tài locked the door.

  “Where is Bình?” Tài asked. He had seen through my lie.

  “I don’t know,” I said truthfully. I was scared. I did not know whether Bình’s bribes would work on a young fervent Communist or whether she would end up in prison.

  “I did not come back South for this,” Tài said to me angrily. “I had heard in the South they were more lax.”

  “They usually are,” I told him miserably. I was now beginning to realise how influential Bình was in the village.

  “What do they do at these village meetings?” he asked me.

  1E

  “Usually they get the children to sing songs to H D3 ` Chí Minh.

  Nothing more than that. We are too poor and uneducated to be sent to a camp.”

  “I see. Liên …” he looked at me strangely and I wondered what he was thinking.

  “Liên, I did not come back only for my ancestors. I heard that for a fee, you can be smuggled by fishing boat out to the ocean to Malaysia. Do you know anything about this?”

  I nearly laughed out loud from nervousness.

  “No I don’t,” I lied. When Bình returned, I would suggest him as a customer to her. If she returned.

  “Would you leave me so soon?” I asked lightly.

  “I would want you to come with me,” he said seriously.

  Stunned, I could only swallow at his suggestion. My ancestors were here. Bà was here.

  And one day, peace would come. Or would it?

  I had begun to doubt my own prescience, I had held on to that dream for years and it was still no closer to being fulfilled.

  “Think about it, Liên.” He drew me close and I smelt his cigarettes on his breath and sweat. But still it was comforting when he put his arms around me and kissed me on the hair.

  The rest of the day, the village was tense as the new cadre made himself known. Everyone turned up early for the village meeting, no one wanted to be accused of being laggard.

  The straggly choir of fisher children were waving new red flags and their piping voices sang to Uncle Ho as the cadres made their way to the centre of the marketplace.

  The new cadre opened the proceedings with a speech about how Uncle Ho had benefitted the people. Then he denounced those who helped people escape to foreign shores and how the village would be rewarded if the people smugglers were turned in.

  During his speech, Bình suddenly appeared behind me and Tài, with her son. She was carrying a bag of candies and tobacco from town.

  When the speech finished, she bobbed her head up and down, looking like another serene old woman. She stumbled and walked slowly over to the communist cadres and gave them all wrapped red presents. Then she distributed the candies to the children and the tobacco to the men with her son’s help.

  The new cadre did not open his present. I prayed that Bình had not put a customary bribe in the present. Then Bình returned to my side with her son.

  “Cousin,” she greeted me and Tài formally. To the new cadre’s eyes, she seemed to be just another peasant trying to please. But to the villagers, she was someone reminding them of her ability to gift them with her money. Bình, I was discovering, was the real village head not the communist cadres posted far from Hanoi.

  When the village meeting broke up with all the adults and children singing the national anthem, I finally was able to smile at Bình and be glad of her return.

  Bình and her son resumed fishing with Tài’s and my assistance over the next few days. It was after Bình had warmed to Tài that I surreptitiously mentioned to her his interest in her smuggling operation.

  “You trust this man?” Bình asked me seriously and I nodded.

  “It cannot be now. Maybe a month or two from now. When the new cadre will either stay or leave.”

  The wily, cautious woman would not even talk about the smuggling in detail in front of me.

  Tai sighed when I told him that the smuggling network was dormant until the cadre left.

  “I did not think it would be easy,” he said.

  “I don’t know if I will go with you,” I said tentatively. I told him all the horror stories that I had heard from Bình’s son. Only one or two of those who had left by boat had been heard of again by people in Vietnam. There were pirates, and many people died at sea.

  “I don’t know if I can risk my life. Having been close to dying so many times already.”

  “I feel dead being here,” Tài tried to explain to me. “I cannot do well like your friend Bình living a duplicitous life.

  Wondering who is going to inform on me so I will be forced to go to a re-education camp instead of them. Don’t you wish to be somewhere that you can worship openly? Maybe your peace is overseas not here.”

  I fell mute. I could not tell him that I had not dreamed of him one way or the other. All my recent dreams were of peace, and I was certain it was in Vietnam. The Lady had blessed me and I had to stay and make sure she was not forgotten in our village.

  It was the only topic in which we would halt conversation, in a growing unease that some day we would be parted.

  Finally the day came when Bình offered Tài a passage on a fishing boat. She only gave him a day’s notice, which gave me less than 24 hours to grieve.

  “Are you sure you will not come with me, Liên?” He only asked me one more time, as I knotted a banana leaf rice cake for him to take on the trip.

  “Are you sure you will not stay?” I asked, but he was silent.

  “I will contact you as soon as I can,” he said. “You know they are going to come looking for me.”

  I gave him a thin smile. “I will wail into their ears that no man can be trusted with your heart. That you have run away with a younger woman to the city. That you have deserted me.” Although I did not intend it, on the last sentence I felt a pang of truth.

  We held each other close in those last few hours, and I treasured his solid presence. His love for me had restored my faith in the goodness of the human heart. That I understood why he had to go made it all the more painful.

  “Liên, you have always been in my mind and my — ”

  I put a finger on my lips. I did not want to hear a romantic lie in my last moments with him. He had loved his wife and children and he had thought me dead. Just like I had thought of him, and had tried to replace him with others in my heart.

  When Bình’s son came to accompany him, I could not help the tears that welled up in my eyes. I could see that Tài too was trying not to cry in front of another man.

  We embraced one last time and then let each other go.

  MAITREYA, TRUE LOVE

  SOUTH VIETNAM, 2007

  I have arrived, I am home.

  In the here and in the now.

  1E

  1E

  THÍCH NH A4 T H A0 NH

  It took another decade before word reached the village that foreigners were being let into the country again. I had found some measure of peace, praying to the Lady and meditating next to the stone monolith that looked out onto the village. Bình was right. She grew more prosperous even under the Communist eye.

  Somehow she was lucky and was never caught. I doubted it was just luck, though; she knew all the Communist cadres by name and never failed to give them gifts.

  I helped her with the money lending but she never let me into the ins and outs of her people smuggling business. This way, you cannot speak if you are taken in, she said to me when I once offered to help.

  I aged slowly with the quiet days weaving in and out. Every night I thanked the Lady that I was whole and untouched, and I
lived to 1E

  see another day. I heard and saw pictures of H D3 ` Chí Minh City with wealth beyond imagining. Some of the young people of the village went there to seek their fortunes. But I was never tempted. Seeing the first mopeds come into the village was enough, and white ghosts with backpacks carefree and light sans responsibility. The television in Bình’s house showed me prosperity in the world outside the village. White ghosts populated some of the programs and I learned that they had love stories much like our own.

  As the years went by, I stopped waiting for Tài to contact me.

  There was no way of contacting him if he had survived the trip to Malaysia. Bình promised to inform me of news, but she had rarely heard of whether the trips she had organised had been successful or not. They all knew that contacting her would be the prelude to her being investigated by the communist cadres.

  1E

  1E

  Then one day I heard that Thích Nh A5 t H A1 nh was being allowed to visit the country and do public dharma talks.

  “After suppressing the Buddhists for so long, why?” I asked, fearing it was a trap to assassinate the Zen Master who resided in France.

  “He is going to perform Great Ceremonies of Mourning for those who have suffered during the wars from all sides,” Bình told me, as she split a pumpkin seed with her teeth.

  I shook my head in disbelief. This opening of religious freedom from the government was too good to be true.

  1E

  Bình gave me a flyer with Th A7 y’s tour dates and told her son to take me to Saigon.

  1E

  H D3 Ch í Minh City had outgrown itself over the decades. The foreign neon signs and the density of all the people on mopeds 1E

  and bicycles overwhelmed me. Bình’s son Hi BF u was at ease with all this wealth, he talked on his mobile phone while riding his motorcycle. It was only his filial piety to his mother that kept him in the village, he told me. That and frequent ‘business’

  1E

  trips to H D3 Ch í Minh City. When we arrived, he had to show me the central shopping district with foreign Western brands and shopping malls. I blinked in the light of this extravagance and marvelled at the carefree youth with their foreign clothes, fashions and gadgets.

  1E

  Was this what peace and prosperity looked like? Hi BF u bragged to 1E

  me that Western cities were like H D3 ` Ch í Minh City. Wide, clean pavements and shops glistening behind clean plate-glass windows.

  Then we encountered a build up of parked mopeds and buses blocking the roads. It was like a festival with flower sellers and food vendors mingling around the crush of the crowd.

  1E

  1E

  “Th A7 y is speaking in there,” Hi BF u pointed somewhere in the middle of the crowds. He parked his motorcycle and we began to weave in and out of the crush of people. Speakers and lights were rigged up along the road and the glare of white reflected off the 1E

  expectant people’s faces. A vendor with pirated copies of Th A7

  1E

  y’s books brushed past us as Hi BF u pushed his way further into the crowd. Sweat soaked my best plain white shirt and pants. The people were hemmed in so closely together, it made me dizzy.

  1E

  Finally Hi BF u had to stop when the masses of people refused to give way to him. In front of us was the giant stage set out on the road glittering in the spotlights. Gold umbrellas framed 1E

  where Th A7 y was going to sit, and behind him were monks and nuns dressed in brown from Plum Village. They were standing, their hands clasped in prayer. A bell sounded and the people around us 1E

  rustled for a better view as Th A7 y slowly proceeded through the crowds, gladioli flowers waving in the wake of his passing. I could not see much but I shared the crowd’s anticipation and awe as he ascended to the dais where he was to speak.

  The Zen Master was still youthful at eighty years old, his bald head shiny and his presence radiating peace. Then the monks and nuns began to chant Avoliketera’s name, accompanying the tears sliding down my cheeks.

  Nam Mô A Di Đà. Nam Mô A Di Đà. Nam Mô A Di Đà 1E

  In his dharma talk that day, Th A7 y spoke about family and our ancestors, which brought more tears to my eyes. He spoke about anger and how we needed to cradle our anger like a baby, and practice loving speech and deep listening for those we loved.

  Loneliness crept into my being as I found myself thinking of Tài and how he had left. But as the nuns and monks sang, I felt energy inside myself rise and take wing.

  1E

  There was talk that Prajna Monastery in Bát Nh A3 was now open to the public. People were able to worship openly and young people 1E

  were flocking to join the temple. Th A7 y was going to do a public 1E

  retreat there, the monastics said. So I followed Th A7 y’s tour 1E

  from Saigon to Bát Nh A3 in a crowded public bus. I left Bình’s son to go back home and tell his mother where I had gone.

  Although she did not believe, I thought the money-lender would understand.

  When we came upon Prajna Monastery in the embrace of some small hills, I felt memory fall into place. The gates loomed above us and as we walked in, I saw a gorgeous white meditation hall with wide windows looking out onto tea plantations on the hills.

  Excitement stirred within me. Was this the site of what I had dreamed about for so long?

  People milled around me while monastics staffed tables with laptop computers, registering people for the retreat. The joy of the crowd was infectious, this sort of public teaching was rarely allowed. Even the obvious presence of communist cadres scattered through the crowd in cheap blue suits was not enough to quell people’s enthusiasm.

  Books were being sold and enterprising photographers sold pictures of the Zen Master from his public talks in Saigon.

  Though the crowd numbered thousands, I felt safe among them in a way I had never felt before. It was as if mindfulness had affected us all.

  Present moment, wonderful moment.

  I decided to explore the monastery. Stepping on the paving stones I wandered under the shadows of young pine trees down the slope to find a giant statue of Quan m sitting on top of a miniature lake. Monastics and lay people were clustered around the white

  stone statue chatting quietly. My memories of my dreams shifted and stirred.

  This was close, but not identical, to the dream I’d had for so long. Already the peace and hope that threatened to overwhelm me was cracking through my reserve. After all the suffering, maybe now the Communists were at peace enough to allow the nation’s spirit to shine again.

  I wandered down the hill. The slope of the tea plantations was familiar to my eye. I followed two novices with their shaved heads and brown robes strolling along a winding path. I passed by two large white halls, with bright mosaics of the Buddha and animals – clean and modern.

  The peace and tranquillity touched an old chord in me from when I was a monastic during the American War. But this time, the skies were clear and the people around me unwounded.

  I have arrived, I am home.

  The path followed the slope to the river. I looked to my left and there was the white-seated Buddha statue of my dream almost hidden by the trees looking over to the tea plantations.

  Tears streamed down my face as I stumbled down to the river.

  A wooden bridge went across it to a wooden gazebo. I found a rock to sit on. I did not meditate at first but slowly breathed in and out as I felt the rightness of the scenery settle around me.

  I had dreamed of peace. And finally it had come when the Communists opened the doors to their old perceived enemies, 1E

  1E

  foreigners and Thích Nh A5 t H A1 nh. I was old now. But Quan m had heard my prayers.

  Na-mo A-vo- li-ke-te-ra. Na-mo A-vo- li-ke-te-ra.

  In Prajna Monastery, I dared to hope that peace is possible. The 1E

  1E

  government allowed Thích Nh A5 t
H A1 nh, the exiled Zen Master, to come to teach the people and publish his books. Perhaps the government had finally realised the spirit of the people and Buddhist liberation is no threat to them. And even foreigners have taken to the fruit of the practice. Their white faces mirror our calm and their joy is like the spring from the river. When we sing of the island, the inner island of peace that we return to, it is my turn to weep.

  Present moment, wonderful moment.

  I like to return to my island.

  1E

  Our teacher Th A7 y says, though we have suffered at the hands of the foreigners, they were once children too and we can feel compassion for the suffering children the invaders once were.

  Form is emptiness, emptiness is form.

  Gate, gate, paragate, parasamgate bodhi svaha.

  Gone, gone to the other shore. All Hail!

  There are Americans and French laypeople from the international 1E

  Plum Village sangha who accompany Th A7 y on his visit. Their faces shine with mindfulness like the monks and nuns. One American man, tall and large approaches me and apologises for America’s involvement in the war with tears in his eyes.

  1E

  I cannot hate these people or even fear them. When Th A7 y says the Great Ceremonies he conducts are for all that suffered during the wars, I believe him. At first I could not believe that Westerners would believe in Buddhist practice. But now when I see them sitting cross-legged and meditating, standing up for the monks and nuns, and breathing mindfully in and out, I see the Buddha within them.

  I have arrived, I am home.

  During the morning walking meditation I feel myself smile at the stillness permeating through the young pine forest of the Prajna Monastery grounds.

  I am calm like the lake.

  I am solid as the mountain.

  1E

  When Th A7 y says we all inter-be and inter-are, and I see foreigners holding the hands of the Vietnamese congregation, I understand the Heart Sutra at last.

  We all inter-be and inter-are. Our enemy is not other humans but fear and anger.

  When I reach inside myself and meditate on compassion for the poor children the northerners once were, something inside me dissolves. I am free, I am free.