Original story in Chinese by Prof. Lee Chack-fan; retold by Raymond Lam Abel Dubois liked taking his Lamborghini to Pierre’s Car Repairs. He would sometimes stop there, on the outskirts of Paris, before driving into his favorite nightclub district on hilly Montmartre. The service was crisp and efficient, his car always emerged as if it […]
Raymond Lam
Into the Dharmadhatu: China, India, and Asia’s Buddhist Destiny
At a recent meeting with Buddhistdoor Global, British-born Lokamitra, who has long been involved in Indian (particularly Dalit) affairs since the 1970s, ended his presentation on his institute, Nagaloka Centre in Nagpur, with an observation: “The future of the world will be strongly influenced by relations between India and China. The Buddhist connection can contribute […]
The Sheep Thief and the Saint
Original story in Chinese by Prof. Lee Chack-fan; retold by Raymond Lam In Old Scotland, from a century long past… “That shall teach you to steal sheep from Mister Dunn again, scummy ingrates!” bellowed three burly men. They grabbed William and Christopher and threw them out of the sweltering blacksmith’s. The brothers wailed in pain, writhing on […]
Terry’s Candies
Original story in Chinese by Prof. Lee Chack-fan; retold by Raymond Lam No student in their right mind wanted to have to see Mr. Tao at lunchtime. The uniformed boy shuffled his leather shoes nervously in the principal’s office, the clock’s arms inching right at a tortuously slow pace. There was a small chair, but […]
Landscapes of the Heart
Buddhistdoor Global presents Landscapes of the Heart, a series of Buddhist themed short stories on Tea House, Buddhistdoor Global’s webzine. This collection features stories originally written in Chinese-language anthologies by emeritus professor Lee Chack-fan, director of the Jao Tsung-I Petite Ecole at The University of Hong Kong. Now retold in English prose by Buddhistdoor Global […]
Kelaniya University: Looking East
I’ve long admired the monk and academic Prof. Ven. Dhammajoti, who founded the Buddha-Dharma Centre of Hong Kong, in the heart of Shek Tong Tsui near Kennedy Town. I like to call BDC one of the “big four” institutes of Buddhist Studies in our city: there’s the Centre of Buddhist Studies at The University of […]
Buddhist Media: Sketching the History of a Vibrant Discipline
Yang Renshan and one of his sons. From Weibo Here’s a bit of a Zen koan: how do you keep still in the Colorado rapids? How do you maintain that mental gap in between events – the gap that allows you to respond to those events in a considered way, with compassion and insight, rather […]
What’s in a Name This Lunar New Year?
Recently there has been a surge of popular interest in tracing one’s ancestral roots. Aristocrats and noble families have been obsessed with bloodlines for centuries. For the common person, it’s always a spot of fun (and soothing to the ego?) to discover an illustrious name somewhere in the family line, no matter how distant or […]
Book Review – “Symbols & Symbolism: Embrace Multiculturalism”
What symbols do we recognize most in our corporatized world today? Logos like those of the apple of Apple Inc. or the arched M of McDonald’s? What about images as innocuous as the male and female figures on restroom doors, ingraining in us specific assumptions about reality and directing us to live our lives in […]
Refusing to See Reality in “In the Mood for Love”
In the Mood for Love did for Hong Kong what La Dolce Vita did for Rome. Just as the Trevi Fountain was relatively unknown as a tourist spot before Anita Ekberg and Marcello Mastroianni’s iconic embrace, In the Mood for Love is a sensuous, colourful masterpiece that eroticizes cramped living spaces and romanticizes the gritty alleyways […]