Amicable Conflict or My Longest Wait for a Transport That Never Came

So today I was invited to Buddha Dhamma Mandala Society by Ven. S. Dhammika for a book launch. The book is interesting, and so is the author and the introduction of him given by Ven. Dhammika, but this blog entry is not about that. It’s about the seemingly impeccable ability for things to mess up whenever I’m visiting BDMS or Ven. Dhammika.

In this episode of Amicable Conflict, we look at how a simple affair of arranging for transport for a venerable (me in this case) to a place to attend a book launch can end up in a misunderstanding and ultimately a delayed book launch. And oh, did I mention an unhappy upassaka who refused to give transport thereafter “because he had to send in the car for servicing the next day”.

If this interests you, read on. Read More …

When Are We Allowed to Have Expectations?

When are we allowed to have expectations?

I know, I know. Some of you are probably thinking “But I thought having expectations leads to distraught and suffering?” Well, matter of fact, having expectations is part and parcel of everything. Because we expect to quench our thirst by drinking water, so we drink. And experience has shown that it did in the past not just for individuals but for almost all known cases. So we solve our thirst by this expectation and/or assumption, acquire water, drink it and ultimately quench our thirst. Will a day come when water won’t quench our thirst? Maybe, when the conditions are different, but in the mean time, drink … water, that is.

But that is not the point of this post. The point is this. Just as such simple expectation helps us along our simple basic needs of sustenance of our body, perhaps other forms of expectations are justified as well?

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Does Air-Conditioning Work?

Many years back, I learnt about how air-conditioning works. It basically works by transferring heat through conduction from the cooling fins to the air outside of the room/house/unit that it is supposed to cool.

Outside air < — Cooling fins <— metal tubes <— freon gas <— internal air (from room etc)

In the process, some heat is generated. This heat generated is due to inefficiency of the compressor, electronics etc found in air-conditioning units. This inefficiency is common in practically *all* electrical devices, where some electrical power is converted into actual intended work, while others are lost, either as heat, sound or kinetic energy or a combination of them all.

In a sense, air-conditioners do not create “coolness”. “Cold” cannot be created. Only heat can be created. Coldness appears to exist only in contrast to the lack or relative differences in heat. So while a heater generates heat, a cooler (eg air-con) does not actually create cold. It merely displaces it. Coldness itself is also empty of inherent characteristics.
Further to that, heaters do not actually generate or create heat as well. They merely release the potential energy “trapped” or “stored” in the fuel, or convert energy from one form to another, eg convert electrical energy to heat energy. In the process, most heaters “lose” some energy through ambient heating (ie, heating up the appliant itself in an unintended manner), unintended lighting, sound etc. We can perhaps say that heat itself is dependent arising, that it is also inherently empty.

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Catching Up with Old Friends … …

I recently met two old friends … no, not that they are old, but more that we knew each other a long time ago. 😉

To protect their identities (I always like this! :p) … let’s call my friend … ok, ok, let’s cut the bull and get it over. If my friend has problem with his name appearing on my obscure blog, then he needs to stop living under a rock! 😉

So ChingWi messaged me one day that she has a friend Hanguan who needs some advice from a monk and referred him to me. I agreed but didn’t thought much about the name, though I thought she was referring to Angguan, another friend from awhile back, but that’s another story.

Friday came, and when this Hanguan came over my cubicle (monks have cubicles? *gasp*), I was like “Hey, I know you!” and he was like “Yeah, wow … you … “

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