“OF COBRA’S, OTHER SNAKES, CENTIPEDE’S, SPIDERS, FOUNDATION BOARDS AND OTHER POISONED CREATURES :-)”.
Well, dear friends, as you might guess from the heading we had some visitors lately.
During the last month or so the weather has been hot and wet, and this brings out all kind of creatures. The first who came to visit us where a few spiders, though not deadly poisoned, they where poisoned enough!
In the middle of the night I woke up with a shock when I was bitten in my big toe (seams funny, but it was not!), and the feeling as if the bones in my feet where burning; the pain was incredible and the bones of that feet still hurt! About 3 nights later I woke up in the night because the Rev. Ariyadhamma jumped out of his bed while screaming and started rolling on the floor with pain. He was bitten in his under belly by a spider which he saw just jumping away, he was in severe pain for a few hours before it diminished and it took about a week before the pain was gone. There was a bad swelling and it oozed water from the bite mark and he had quite a fever for a few days. Next was Rev. Tapassi; early morning he screamed and when we ran to the room where he was sleeping he was jumping up and down, he was bitten twice – once in his belly and once on his back! He also had a lot of pain and there where to bite marks and soon after these places developed swellings like with Rev. Ariyadhamma. This time Rev. Devarakkhita saw the spider and helped it to a new incarnation.
The family of Rev. Narada phoned us to inform us that they where coming from Weherajaya (6+ hours by bus) to visit us but that they would be late because they 1st had to go to hospital to get the 2nd serial of injections for Rev. Narada’s little brother (he’s only 4 years old) who was bitten by a dog with rabies. When they arrived later that afternoon the little one and Rev. Narada‘s sister where near the ditch next to our house and saw there 2 poisoned water snakes. Together with the fact that we have a cobra living on the backland which we just got donated by the fam. Gras from the Netherlands made me have a urgent talk with everybody present that they should be very aware and careful for snakes!!! Not that that helped much, because the same evening when they got ready to go to the house of Aruna to sleep there, I heard quite a commotion outside and it turned out that a very poisoned snake sneaked between the legs of the little one and his father could just in time lift him up. There is no antidote for the poison of this snake and Anura helped this one to his next reincarnation.
A week later we had 2 Patheya’s (poisoned centipede’s) making a house call, they where quite big; about 20-25 cm, and that sized ones will give serious problems if they bite you, they hopefully have a better next live now.
Because I had to register my last will and testament at the Ministry for Religious affairs so the different people and the foundation board in Holland of the Randolph Fellowship could be stopped worrying what would happen if I kick the bucket, I had to go to Colombo twice and when I returned the last time I was really dead tiered. I wanted to rest an hour and went to lie down on my bed. Being very tired I could not sleep and was looking at the wall, there I saw a movement and when I looked better I saw a snake of nearly 1 ½ meter on top of the wall. I called Sarath and Ariyadhamma to have a look and they said it was a hybrid kind; a mix of a Rat Snake and a Cobra and quite poisoned. (I don’t even know if such a combination is possible, but what the heck). They pushed the bastard outside and he disappeared to the next door land. The next day all the novices where gone to school and Sarath had his work in the rent house so I was alone at home. I was busy to send sms messages to Jaap (Plugge) and wanted to send him a email when I heard a noise in my bedroom, when I went to look I saw that the bastard of the day before has come back for a next visit! I locked the dogs in the other bedroom (don’t want them to be killed), and had a more then 10 minute fight with the serpent to finally work him out of the house, man that bastard was aggressive !!!!!! When I had him outside I gave him a farewell “soejang” (hit him nicely with the broom) and of he was!
Day before yesterday we had the next episode; people catched a BIG White Cobra a few meters away of our house on the path, he was 1.80m. long and fat as an arm!!! Half the village came out because most of the people here never saw a white cobra or any cobra so big for that matter! Eventually they wanted to kill him and we where just able to stop them and we put the fellow in our laundry basket and called to the wild park. Some rangers came to fetch him but when they saw him they returned to their station to fetch a strong metal case because such a big snake was too much to transport in a rice bag (lol), they measured it later. So now we only hope that this was the end of our poisoned visitors and we have some rest of them!!!!
As you might be aware of from the above I had to make my last will and testament, because of the worries about continuity etc. when I might kick the bucket. I appointed some people to take care of things if that happens and had my testament registered at the Ministry of Buddhist affairs. (Up till now the property is all privately bought – tough there is a loan which still stands open for a part of our house and land – we have been promised that for this and for the needed improvements there will be fund raising organized?). The other land is a donation I personally received from well wishers, and there is some land I bought more then 25 years ago and those lands will be inherited according to tradition by my pupils. The Blue Lotus Sangha Sabhava Foundation will manage them and has them under its control (in beheer), as entrusted property but according to law and tradition the “Paramparawa” the Linage of Monks owns them. That way nothing can ever be soled or disowned. Having said this I realize that;
"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former." - Albert Einstein.
Anyhow, I made my testament, visited the Ministers of ; Health, Education and Social affairs to make sure that when the time is there the registration of the “Randolph House” as a Vocational Training and Rehabilitation Centre will be accepted and go smoothly. Also I made sure that they will corporate and they offered tax deduction and in some cases even freedom of tax.
We now have to wait till funds are transferred from the Netherlands so we can buy land and buildings and start to build the “Randolph House” !!!.
It means that we will have a lot of work coming but we are very eager to start!
Also we found according to our ideas the right person to run, together with me, the building process and later the House. Hopefully our Dutch friends of the “Randolph Foundation” who sponsor this project understand that I can’t do everything myself (especially if I have to go on with my work for a longer time and my expiring date should be a bit later lol), and that we need someone to work fulltime on it and that such a person should be on “the payroll”. I am sure that this will be a good investment because this way we will safe quite some money on the material needed and we can be sure that we have good quality material and work done.
Our Sri Lankan Government has got the taste of things, and the MP’s have discovered that they are supposed to be lawmakers, so they make and chance laws on a nearly daily base now. Also the law on NGO’s and INGO’s has been changed again, sigh, and we had to change our board accordingly and where just in time to be within the deadline so we can be registered as a NGO.
So now we finally thought we had the two boards for the two foundations ready; but …. One of the two secretary’s who we invited was absent without leave and will be absent during the 1st few working months of the foundations. It’s a good person, and we assured that later he will still join! What to do?
“"Sometimes you just gotta let shit go and say to "hell with it" and move on"”
And that’s what we do! During the 1st period we will have 1 secretary for the 2 foundations and later we will see if we can persuade the intended other secretary on his return to Lanka to take over the post of secretary of the Blue Lotus Buddhist Fellowship our “working foundation”.
So its time for me to introduce our boards to you:
THE BLUE LOTUS SANGHA SABHAVA;
This is the foundation that is running the affairs of the Sangha, controlling and managing property and in charge of the religious affairs and activities. In future the board should mainly be made up by Sangha members except the treasurer which should preferably be a layman/woman. (We prefer woman to handle the money, in Sri Lanka its better anyhow and they know it very well)
President: Ven. H. Sri Devamitta Maha Thera.
Secretary: Mr. De Silva (Super intendent of a big rubber and thee estate and secretary of the Ruhuna Buddhist Council for Welfare and Social affairs.)
Treasurer: Mrs. M. Amaravithanage. (Housewife)
Gen. member: Mr. W.V. Karunasena Justice o/t Peace. Religious and welfare activities
Gen. member; Mr. I.D. Lasantha Udeya kumara De Silva (Bandara), youth activities and coordination projects.
THE BLUE LOTUS BUDDHIST FELLOWSHIP;
This is the “working foundation” which will execute the projects and be in charge of running them on a daily base.
President: Ven. H. Sri Devamitta Maha Thera.
Secretary: Mr. De Silva (see above).
Treasurer: Mrs. G. Shama Chandrika (Director Samurdi Bank Ambalangoda).
Gen. member: Mr. K.H. Chaminda Prasad (painter - contractor) Youth activities
Gen. member: Mrs. Karunasena (retired teacher) woman and children activities.
( I would like to put a face with the names and therefore you should have a look at the pics.)
I’m quit sure we have a good team and hope and wish that we will be able to work hard together for the benefit of the poor and needy, and for our society in general!
I like to wish all the members of our board good luck, and success in their work. I hope that they will find satisfaction in the work, and that the knowledge that they are working for the good, happiness and wellbeing of many will bring wellbeing and happiness to them to!!!!!!! Lastly I would like to thank them personally for their participation and their wish to help us do this often difficult work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ven. Holland Sri Devamitta Maha Thera.
