I came to Taiwan in 1990 and met Ven. Ruheng and Ven. Ruzhi in Yuankuang, Zhongli. This forged the beginning of my Dharma bond with Haoyue Vihara. We were all in the first restructured undergraduate class of Yuankuang Buddhist College. In addition, there were two other classmates, Ven.Xingshi and Ven. Benji. At that time, the five of us were the only male students in the undergraduate program, so we were jokingly called the “Five Bhikkhus“.

Except for Ven. Xingshi, who was busy with YuankuangTemple affairs on weekdays, we always routinely gathered together every Sunday to study the Dharma without interruption. We went through the “Origin and Development of Early Mahayana Buddhism” by Master Yinshun, “Visuddhimagga” (“The Path of Purification”), compared six parallel Vinaya traditions, and read “The Tattvasiddhi-Śāstra “(True Attainment Treatise”; ) which was left unfinished by us.

After graduating in 1995, I stayed in YuanKuang to teach, and the following year I went to Fuyan Buddhist Institute, Hsinchu to help with school duties. During this period, I would go south to Chiayi every Friday after teaching and return to Hsinchu on Sunday. During my stay in Chiayi, along with the three brothers Ruheng, Ruzhi, Rufan, we shared long and good talks about Buddhism, meditation, and sometimes topics related to Chinese culture, such as calligraphy and other arts. Over the years, these memories left a deep imprint in my mind.

After leaving the teaching responsibilities, we had a chance to tour the monasteries in Myanmar together, including Mogok, Sun Lun, Mahasi, U Ba Khin and Goenka Meditation Centers. In the end, we chose Mawlamyine and followed Pa-Auk Sayadaw as our meditation Acariya.

Haoyue Vihara in Taiwan and Santavana Forest Hermitage in Malaysia were both founded in 1998 (Haoyue seemed to be even earlier). From prototype to formation, like babies, children to middle-aged, Haoyue Vihara spared no effort to advocate and promote Dharma education, meditation, calligraphy, and tea ceremony culture. It has begun to take shape since inception.

In fact, it is not easy to “sustainably run” Buddhist education in Taiwan without resorting to Ritual ceremonies. The same truth goes for Santavana Forest Hermitage in Malaysia. Early in the pioneering stage, some elders and seniors in Buddhist communities privately expressed to me concerns about the sources of funding. Of course, the Haoyue Vihara and SantavanaForest Hermitage are fortunate to have successfully passed through the 20 years to just scrape through with a narrow pass. The journey is hard earned in its entirety!

Treaded on Yuankuang’s rice paddy fields, traces remained
Journeyed far to practice meditation, altogether bonded
Old friendships, old affections, many old stories recalled
A prosaic and ordinary life, but extraordinarily revealed

I miss Bhikkhu Ruheng who has passed away. I also admire the fact that my fellow monks at Haoyue have always adhered to its simple and unadorned path. May this extraordinary feature elevate them above the ordinary; may Haoyue keep this earnest discipline and run a long course.

The 20th anniversary of Chiayi Haoyue Vihara and SantavanaForest Hermitage will be at the end of this year (2018), With my deepest blessings to Haoyue, I would like to designate this preface with a brief note of my past memories.

Sep 24th 2018
Denver, USA