..续本文上一页t then a little later in the morning they”d serve a regular meal with bean and sesame curries and rice — but no meat. We ate vegetarian-style, although some days there would be fish.

　　There was chanting every evening during the Rains Retreat. They chanted just like we do in Thailand, only very fast. When the chanting was over I”d go to pay my respects to the great ruined chedi to the north of the sanctuary. Some days I”d go into Benares to look at the temples of the Hindus, Tibetans, Burmese, Singhalese, etc. One night, towards the end of the rains, when the moon was bright, I went to sit alone in front of the sanctuary after we had finished our chants. I sat there in meditation in the middle of the bright, moonlit night, focusing on the top of the chedi, thinking of King Asoka, who had done so much for the religion. After I had focused on the chedi a long while, a brilliant light began to flicker and flash around the trees and the chedi. I thought to myself: "Relics of the Lord Buddha probably really do exist."

　　One day, when the rains were almost over, the officials of the Maha Bodhi Society invited us to go to the airport to meet a plane carrying relics of Phra Moggallana and Phra Sariputta that were on their way back from a celebration organized by the Indian government in New Delhi. So we all went along to the airport. When the plane landed, a little after 11 a.m., they had us get on the plane to receive the small bronze chedi containing the relics. We then took the chedi to the Sarnath Maha Bodhi Society. I didn”t ask for a chance to look at the relics because I wasn”t really interested. Afterwards they sent the relics for safe keeping to the Calcutta office, and so I never got to see them.

　　After the rains were over I began receiving letters — some by special delivery, others by ordinary mail — from Thailand and Burma. The gist of them all was that they wanted me to return right away to Rangoon because Princess Sudanta Chandadevi was now receiving a stipend and was overjoyed. Her children had gotten their friends together and were planning to build a temple in Rangoon, so would I please come right away and help with the arrangements.

　　Learning this I hurried back to Calcutta, got my travel papers in order and flew to Rangoon. There I was met at the airport by members of the temple committee. They took me straight to the princess" palace, where a committee of 30 or so people were in the midst of holding a meeting. The committee — composed of old nobility, government officials, merchants and householders — was discussing plans to buy land for the temple: seven acres on a tall hill. The owner was willing to sell the land for around 30,000 rupees. When I had learned the general outlines of their proposal, I returned to stay, as before, at Schwe Dagon.

　　I then took the matter to the Thai embassy to seek their advice. By that time Phra Mahiddha had been transferred to another country, leaving M.L. Piikthip Malakun acting in his place. He told me that it would be good to handle the matter through official channels so that the embassy would be in a position to give its full cooperation. As for the temple committee, they were looking for help from Thailand because their objective was to build a temple Thai in every way. The chairman of the committee was an old man of about 70, a former politician who in the old days had commanded great respect. He was the mentor of U Nu, the prime minister of Burma. It seemed to me that the matter was sure to come through. I was put in contact with scores of Thai people in Rangoon, and everyone seemed enthusiastic about the project.

　　Not long afterwards, though, I started receiving frequent letters from Bangkok containing news that didn”t sound very good, some of it having to do with Nai Bunchuay Su…

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