The Golden Buddha

In Bangkok, there’s a 10 foot tall Golden Buddha at the Temple of Wat Traimit, which for centuries was covered in stucco and dust. But in the 1950s, monks discovered something glimmering inside. When they chipped away the primordial clay they found the statue was five tons of solid gold. They also found a key.

When I left the café that morning, they slammed the door behind me. Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. My throat closed. My eyes burned. I couldn’t catch my breath. Where was everyone? Not a soul on the streets. Abdoun was a ghost town. Unexpectedly dark. The silence surreal, electric. Even the doves guarded their songs, and held their babies close. I sensed it before I saw it….low rumbling…..a massive black cloud roiling in across the desert highway like a furious tsunami of dust and sand. Blocking out the sun. The ferocious tail of a gigantic Saharan sand storm the locals call Khamsin.

I covered my face with a scarf and ran to my car. Rolled up the windows. Blasted the air. It was harder to breathe every second. Dust from the far reaches of the Sahara invaded my every pore. Khamsin means 50 in Arabic, because of the number of days these deadly sandstorms descend like hurricanes. The radio crackled thinly, the airports shutdown in Jordan and Israel. People say Khamsin carry viruses and spread disease as they blow sorrow across North Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. Sand silicosis.

I didn’t live far. I drove fast. Torrents of angry sand rained from the sky. Windshield wipers useless. My car died. Carburetor clogged. I wrapped the scarf tighter over my face, eyes blind, fleeing the fierce African dust. I ran terrified into my building, trying again to catch just one breath. My neighbors huddled behind massive steel shutters. They knew what to expect….to wait and hide from the extreme winds pounding at their windows, threatening to get in. I struggled to secure my shutters too and locked them tight…Power was out. Stifling darkness. I found the shower, closed my eyes, hoping the water would clear my lungs, wash away the dust and fear. Like a nightmare I could never forget. I still find it hard to breathe. I will never be the same.

You see, it wasn’t just the storm. I couldn’t get the thoughts out of my head. What was in this toxic sand? The ashes of dead Palestinian children? The dust of their grieving mothers? Where did it come from? Gaza? Iraq? Syria? Iran? Just miles away, in Beirut, homes were burning from the bombings that week. Darkened clouds. Towns were on fire. Homes. Young families fleeing for safety. Mothers carrying children on their backs. Fathers holding terrified sons in their arms. Walking. Walking. Abandoning worn out grandmothers in the rubble to fend for themselves. Everyone knew the young had to flee the violence or they would never survive. They prayed they would see each other again. One last look at that beautiful child. Hope for their future. “Don’t forget me”, they cried.

Forever suffocated by sorrow, I will always remember that deadly storm and grieve for those families. Refugees begging in Sweifya. Dust covered children, limp in their arms. Omi…my mother. Please…. I wonder about them. Care about them. Did they find their way home? Could they forgive? Did they forget? And their children…will they remember all this…and them?

Some say we are made of stardust, of ancient shattered star systems. But is that really all we are…innately volatile, violent …. Does God have more important work to do? But, if what they say is true, why do we still care? Caring takes a lot of energy. Then, I understood. Buddha’s mystery resolved. The key is the caring that heals our wounded hearts and reveals that glimmer of hope. It reminds us of our incredible capacity to be renewed, and to love and love and love. After all these celestial explosions, the stardust returns to create again …. to create us.

Recently, I met a Moroccan mother near my home in Virginia. She told me about her lost life, her family torn apart. Arab Spring. We cried, familiar tears. But this time, I knew what to do. I held her hand. Just listened. Compassion. And in that moment, we both were comforted…there it was…we felt it…we recognized it in each other’s eyes….that spark of humanity called love.