Monday, 12/09/2024
Tùy Bút
Won’t Venerable come back pagoda for Tet?
Update: 04/03/2015
“No, I won’t, Mom, I am busy studyingâ€.
“But New Year is not the time for study!†Mom\r\nreproached me in an unhappy tone and it worried me.
\r\n\r\nI reckon that though wherever all over the globe the\r\nVietnamese are, they gather in harmony to bring and share the traditional\r\nspring atmosphere reminding their next generation about their roots. And their\r\nchildren should not leave that tradition behind but enjoy it together. My living\r\nplace is distant from Bangkok and it has few Vietnamese, which\r\ngradually takes unforgettable memory about the spring away from\r\nme.
Each time Mom asked: “Will you come back home\r\nthis new year? I sadly replied the same answer “I’m sorry but I am\r\nbusy studying!†Mom said in a voice choked with emotion: “so you won’t come\r\nback home, will you?â€
I am addressed as a Master by my mom because I am\r\na Buddhist Monk. Maybe you think that a monk like me will have less emotional\r\nconnection with family so whether I come back to Vietnam in New Year holiday or\r\nnot won’t be a problem.
\r\n\r\nIf that is the case, the story seems so boring! Therefore I\r\nwant to tell you one thing which worries me for a long time. Mom’s question\r\nwouldn’t bother if she just asked me only once. Any week I\r\ncalled back to inquire after mom, she didn’t forget to ask me\r\n“Master, will you come back this new year?â€
I believed she already knew the answer but she kept asking\r\nto find a chance of hearing a different reply. And whenever she asked that\r\nquestion, I was choked with emotion. I love and miss her so much. I think lots\r\nof people who can’t reunite with their families will share the same feeling\r\nwith me
My mom is an honest, sincere and emotional farmer. I still\r\nremembered few years ago when I left home to become a monk, she cried a lot.\r\nUntil now she still keeps my shirt under her pillow. I sometimes sent her my\r\npictures taken at the temple and she conserved it well. When I went back to see\r\nher, she took me to her room and carefully show me my pictures in happiness.\r\nSeeing her smile in tears I overcame with emotion. When I had to leave, she\r\nwanted me to stay longer and was unwilling to let me go.
\r\n\r\nMom is very frugal. She rarely buys a new shirt or a pair of\r\nshoes for herself. She saves all the money she was received for the only reason\r\n“buying medicines in case she gets sickâ€. When she was young and strong, she\r\nworked very hard. She still couldn’t make ends meet. Now life is much easier,\r\nshe must abstain from lots of things because of diseases.
\r\n\r\nI once joked with her that I didn’t have money to come back.\r\nAnd she said she would give me money. I thought it was a joke but when I went\r\nhome she secretly stuffed 5 pages of 200 thousand folded carefully into my\r\nhand. I obviously didn’t take her money and she was sad.
\r\n\r\nShe is old and I feel worried. I worried that I can’t come\r\nback this year, perhaps neither next year. And if I can come back whether she\r\nis still in good health? Some time, I want to ask for a week off to go\r\ninquire after her but my study is so busy. I miss her, miss the flavor of her\r\njam, miss the smell of burning leaves and miss the atmosphere gather with\r\nfamily in the New Year’s eve. Who live far from home and parents may share the\r\nfeeling.
\r\n\r\nTet holiday is coming why I feel melancholy? While people\r\ngather happily with the families in New Year, I am alone missing my parents.\r\nPerhaps, the memory of a spring reunion with family was deep in an expatriate’s\r\nmind. It is an invisible power which led tears silently flow back into my\r\nheart.
\r\n\r\nMom, I can’t come back, but you are always in my heart. I\r\nwill bring the spring into my soul, the spring with my love for you. And at\r\nhome, mom let’s feel my love for you and our family!
I wish for all parents that they all have dutiful children.
Happy New Year!
Translated into English by Thai Nhuoc Don.