A jacket 一件外套

Sept 6, 2014

i will be travelling to some remote places this month where the weather will be  cold, sometimes windy and rainy, therefore i need a good jacket to cope with this weather.

for a few days i have been thinking whether i should buy a new jacket because my existing ones are not quite suitable, (the one that might work was left in toronto).  i even thought that i could use andrews old yellow down jacket (see photo) which could serve the purpose, however its very bulky (it occupies almost half of my suitcase's space) and heavy.

then yesterday i suddenly thought: i have been spending lots of money on helping family members to maintain their well being, and when my grandchildren came last month, i spent multiple thousands of dollars to take them travelling around Australia, then WHY should i not be generous to myself?

so this morning when i was doing my morning gongyo, i was clear about my objective: i need a jacket that is: light, waterproof, windproof, keeps warmth, with a hood and bright colour (being in the wilderness its better to be visible), and in the region of about A$200 (in the past 10 odd years the most i spent on a jacket is about A$200).

after chanting, i drove one hour to a specialized store.  there I found a shocking pink Gortex jacket which is exactly what i want (see photo) , its marked A$500, too expensive, however i was able to negotiate down to A$300.  :)

going home i felt very very happy that i am now doing things to please myself.  later i  stopped by a CD store and bought two nice CDs: Engelbert Humperdinck and the Carpenters.  After dinnerwhen i was baking a cake for SGIs meeting tomorrow, I turned on the music which brings back lots of memories.   i felt really good!

now i really am learning to be nice to myself!  i am sooo happy that i can be nice to myself finally.

Glad to share

Lydia

月中我會到幾處地方旅行，那些地方溫度很低,而且可能有風雨，所以我需要一件能保暖，防風及防雨的外套
我用了幾天時間考慮應當怎做，其中也試看能否用andrew黃色羽絨防水外套，但它好bulky和重

後來我告訴自己：我㑹用很多錢去照顧家人，最近孫兒們來澳洲我用了很多錢💰帶他們旅行，為什麼我不能對自己好些呢?

於是我在早上唱題時定下目標，要找到一件能保暖，防風雨及輕便，更要顏色鮮豔的外套（因為我可能到荒山，鮮豔顏色安全些），價錢大約是澳幣二百元。(以往十多年，我買的外套都不會超過這個價錢)

我開了一小時車到一間專門店，終於看到一件完全合適的粉紅色gortex

外套，由原價$500減到$300,我十分滿意，即買下來

回家後我為自己做了一件自己滿意的事非常開心

是時候我要善代自己了，接下來我買了兩隻CD，晚上在廚房為明天學會活動焗疍糕時一邊做一聽音樂，超爽！

today i watched a documentary about Dr. Sun Yat-sun, the revolutionary leader who overthrew the corrupted Qing Dynasty.

this documentary started with the opium war telling us how England, for its own benefits, sold opium to china and was making lots and lots of money. (see photo no. 2 showing how opium was weighed and traded in china)

 At one time, more than 70% of chinese people in a few counties were addicted to opium, lots of families were broken and even beggars also smoked opium (see no. 4 cartoon picture attached).  

 When china decided to stop and reject the import of opium, England forced its way by war. With the corruption, greed and selfishness of the emperors and their subordinates, the Qing dynasty had become very weak  and was unable to stand against foreign armies, giving a chance to England, France, etc. to claim their rights to take over lands in china, and the rights to import opium freely into china.

it really made me very angry to see all the unequal terms in the treaty of nanking, see one condition  and link below:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Nanking

The Qing government was obliged to pay the British government six million silver dollars for the opium that had been confiscated by Lin Zexu in 1839 (Article IV), 3 million dollars in compensation for debts that the Hong merchants in Canton owed British merchants (Article V), and a further 12 million dollars in war reparations for the cost of the war (VI). The total sum of 21 million dollars was to be paid in installments over three years and the Qing government would be charged an annual interest rate of 5 percent for the money that was not paid in a timely manner (Article VII).

while being angry, i started to reflect on what i have learned from our buddhist philosophy: the environment is just a reflection of our own self: the Qing emperors and officials only cared about their own indulgence in pleasure and greed, and would not take action to strengthen their country,  thus became incredibly fragile giving chances to (or maybe unknowingly attracted)  invaders to attack and win.

SGI President Ikeda teaches us to learn,  to better and improve ourselves everyday in all aspects, if we have courage, are strong and have confidence (this comes with my buddhist practice), we are less liable to be attacked