(a)

Walk through a tranquil courtyard filled with the scent of flowers, cross the streets and cross the river of couples from all over the world, and take a seat at the bar that winds through the path. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 ｉｎｆｏ

That's where S asked me to meet.

Although it is a bar, it is not noisy at all, it is very quiet, and it has a little bit of a casual taste of a small café. The environment is also very warm and comfortable, with small white daisies on each table and large bar.

I sat down at a table near the bar, asked for a soda in the dim light, and waited quietly for S to show up.

An irresistible tiredness rose from the depths of my life, and I seemed to be swept away by it again, straight into the abyss.

A faint voice sounded in my heart: everything around me was coming in pairs, and only someone had lost his partner forever and was alone.

A little sour pain pierced his throat.

I'm desperately thinking about what you taught me back then, all those things about "oneness."

I said to myself: there is no such thing as loneliness. Loneliness is just a false illusion.

No, I'm not alone. Nothing and no life has been, is, and will be alone.

Everything around me is me. The light was me, the foam in the beer was me, the twins who were singing "Affectionate Talk" in Italian dreamily on stage, the same me, the fat swallows around me who were talking and laughing softly in various languages and clinking glasses, all of them.

I hear your voice coming from the past: Settle in such an environment, do not move, do not flee, do not be penetrated and conquered by the sharp loneliness of your heart.

(b)

The German lady came over and greeted me. She asked, "Are you here alone?" Coming to us for the first time? ”

I said, "It's my first time, I don't usually go to bars. But it's not alone, I'm waiting for a friend, maybe he's stuck in traffic on the road during the evening rush hour. ”

The proprietress saw the white jade Buddha bead bracelet on my wrist and said, "Oh, this is a Buddha bead." Immediately, she said that she was also a disciple of the Buddha and had taken refuge from Guru so-and-so. "I also have a refuge certificate, and I attend the monastery twice a month, and I am official," she said. ”

Officially? However, one of the five precepts of Buddhism is not to drink alcohol? Selling wine is even worse than the law. However, she opened a bar.

She saw what I was thinking, and said, "So, you see, our bar isn't as noisy as the other bars on this street." I don't like the people who come here to feel more confused, and I want them to come in and be a little quieter. ”

I said, "But drinking alcohol can make a person's heart more troublesome." ”

She said, "Yes." I'm going to change it slowly, and in the future I want to sell tea, so I'll change it to a tea. ”

I said, "That way, business might be a lot worse." ”

She said: "It doesn't matter, money can never be earned, and if you are insatiable, there will never be a time to stop." ”

Our conversation attracted a tall, fat Nordic tourist to the next table. He was able to speak Chinese very fluently. He took the initiative to come over and say that he was also a disciple of the Buddha, and he was not here to drink, but just to have a light meal of bread and vegetable salad. The bread here is quite well baked, and the grilled mushroom skewers are also famous.

Then the conversation turned to the issue of vegetarianism. The Nordic man asked me that Chinese Buddhist disciples are the most vegetarian in the world, and in many parts of Southeast Asia, monks are born by begging for food, and meat is not strictly prohibited, while in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, because vegetables are difficult to grow, the monks there are not particularly strict emphasis on meat. He asked me what the fundamental purpose of a vegetarian diet was.

Actually, I wasn't a disciple of the Buddha at that time. At that time, I only dabbled in ancient books in this area, and I read a lot, because I admired it, so I wore a bracelet of Buddhist beads.

I awkwardly replied that the purpose of vegetarianism was to cultivate compassion, to train a new habit of inflicting great pain on other beings for the sake of one's own little pleasures.

I felt that my answer was really stupid and unconvincing. But both of them actually said very seriously: Your statement is very reasonable, and it has benefited deeply. We remembered, and we accepted it.

The proprietress said that if you can't stop meat for a while, can you make a vow to quit meat first.

For a while, I was very moved, I didn't break the meat at that time, I think they are all more motivated and harder than me, I feel a little ashamed as a Chinese, I don't know if I can make a wish to cut off the meat first, I dare not answer indiscriminately to mislead her, I don't know what to say for a while.

The man from Northern Europe said that he had not completely cut off meat yet, but that his wife had been cutting meat for years.

He said that his wife refused to use any pots and chopsticks that had been used with meat oil, and even when she went on a trip, she ate the clean food she brought with her. He said that this made his family's life very inconvenient, so the family had to go vegetarian with his wife.

He kept talking. I felt a little confused, and I didn't know whether he sympathized with his wife and supported her, or if he complained and couldn't do anything.

He showed me another picture and said it was his wife's guru.

I saw a woman with curly blond hair and a shawl, but with a yellow face, reclining on a chaise longone. A Nordic tourist asked me if I knew this person. From the tone of his voice, I sensed that this person was very important, as if everyone in the world who was related to Buddhism should know him. But I was unheard of, I really hadn't heard of her, and I didn't know her. In my heart, I really think that this person's temperament looks a bit similar to a shemale. But I didn't say that.

The Nordic man really didn't know and couldn't help but be a little disappointed. Immediately, he told me that this was Venerable So-and-so, and that throughout Southeast Asia, including the Philippines, Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Vietnam, there were many devotees who followed him with all their hearts, saying that his wife was very devout in believing in this Guru, and that she was firmly abiding by everything that Guru said. Being completely vegetarian and not touching any meat is what the guru taught them.

As he chattered and talked to me and the proprietress when I heard the bell ringing crisply in front of the bar. A man in a trench coat with a tiger's back hurriedly walked in. His tall figure completely obscured the entire door.

S！ Although after so many years, and he has changed beyond recognition, from a tall and thin boy to a big man, I still recognize him at a moment.

My eyes immediately fell on him.

I apologized and said to the proprietress and the Nordic man, "I'm sorry, but my friend has already arrived." ”

They looked at S and said a few words, the proprietress went to the other table to say hello, and the Nordic man returned to his own table and continued to enjoy his delicious bread and vegetable salad.