If I start talking, can you hear me and will you stop talking yourselves or when will it take to get some quiet here, just talk away and just we'll see what happens if I just talk a lot, you know? See if people want to listen to me? Really? So you all hear that important thing I had to say? Oh, I'm about to give you the great secret of Zen, for those of you who are listening. So, welcome back from your break and I thought it was very important to have what some people felt was a lengthy break because part of the excuse of the conference here is for a lot of people to visit with each other who haven't seen each other for a long time. But now it's a quarter to four and we're going to follow Suzuki Roshi to America. And he came to America on May 22nd, 1959 and as we've heard, it was something that he aspired

[01:08]

to for a long time since he was a young man, he had a great dedication, desire to come to America. And the little drawing of the dragon on your program, I found it in his diary, I dug through all his little books in his library in the Dokusan room at Page Street and tucked away in there was his diary from 1959 and that drawing was in the diary for the day he was on his way to America. And that wonderful mischievous smile that that dragon has, maybe it was somehow a self-caricature. Also in this diary, in the first couple of months that he's in America, he has various people write down their names and addresses that he meets. And you see there about once a week he has in there the assignment or whatever, the date, meditation class.

[02:08]

And he started teaching meditation classes pretty quickly once he came here. And one of the first people he met when he came to America, peoples he met, who became his students was Betty Warren and Della Gertz and Gene Ross who were friends and they were very close. You'll hear in a few minutes how that went. And so in a sense they're among his most senior, one of our most senior students in our lineage, our venerable elders who we respect and honor. And I want to say, just to take a kind of footnote, that part of, I guess for me doing the conference, is a way of honoring and respecting not just Suzuki Roshi but all the people who knew and supported him and practiced with him because it was that kind of group and collective effort, all of you, all of you who were there, who made it possible for the rest of us to practice and to encounter Zen Center and Suzuki Roshi's teachings and everything.

[03:14]

So I really want to honor all of you and in particular the most senior students in Della and Betty. Gene is no longer alive. So in this diary, in the July 15th entry, what almost certainly is in Betty Warren's own handwriting, she has her name and her address. So this is the historical proof. And then two days later, on July 17th, Della writes her name and her address in the book. So with great pleasure, I want to invite Betty up and you can speak to us a little bit about what it was like, that first encounter with Suzuki Roshi. Hello.

[04:16]

Can you hear me? Yeah. It's a hard number to follow. David had such wonderful stories to tell us. I just have a few personal impressions here. And remember the great day, a day that changed my life and others also, that when I met Suzuki Roshi, Della and some others, Gene Ross among them, and I were taking this class in Zen Buddhism at the Asian Academy. And at that time, our teacher Kato knew Suzuki Roshi and invited him to come to our class. So here we had a real live Zen master to meet. And we were very much impressed, but he was very shy and very subtle and a little unassuming.

[05:20]

And later in the evening, he said, I sit every morning at six o'clock. Please join me. I think you heard something of the sort earlier from Rick. But anyway, three of us did join him and we began meditating in a rather awkward way. It was this old church, Sokoji, and there were pews and they somehow turned two pews to face each other. And we would climb up into the pews and sit there, having no Zabatons or Zafus as yet. Well, we finally, we did soon acquire Zafus and Zabatons. And we then had mats and began to sit on the floor in a more proper fashion.

[06:22]

Now, at first, it took a little while to really get acquainted with Suzuki Roshi, but we soon realized that he had a deep wisdom and was also a warm human being. And this is above all what I think has made him successful here. That he was not someone up here in an ivory tower, someone preaching the old scriptures. He was a living person. He taught living Buddhism. And this is what we learned, what we sort of absorbed from him, because it was something that could not be put into words. Something that is not in the books. But it was something that we got from him by osmosis or whatever you might say.

[07:24]

But it was his presence and his actions and his rather unique way of teaching. So we did have lectures and so on as he became more accustomed, more free to speak in English. And it was amazing how his English improved and how he could pick just the right word that would explain just the right shade of meaning, the right nuance. It was amazing how he could communicate, actually. Also, something that was mentioned earlier, he had this way of looking at you and you knew that he was looking right at you and he was looking right at everyone else at the same time.

[08:25]

He was looking right at you and he was reading your mind, so you'd better be careful of what you were thinking about. So, anyway, we felt that we really learned a living Buddhism, not an academic exercise, anything of that sort, but it was a Buddhism to live in this moment, a Buddhism to live in this day and every day of our lives. And so I really am most thankful for that day when we met. His teaching methods might have seemed a little odd at times. Very often he was warm and friendly, but one morning I remember half a dozen of us were gathered on the sidewalk in front of the door at Sokoji, and we were waiting for him

[09:30]

to throw the door keys out the top window, his bedroom window, and we waited, waited. Finally, he stuck his head out and said, go away. And so we went away, we sort of scratched our heads, and the next day of meditation, we were back again and there was just no comment whatsoever as to why I guess he was not feeling well that day. And then another time, we had the custom of coming on Saturday mornings and sitting early and then having breakfast and then sitting again later. And once everything was peaceful, except perhaps the pigeons cooing on the roof, and all of this, and he got up and he made various noises like, various barking and disapproving noises.

[10:40]

And he said, so you think you're sitting jazzy? Well, you're not. And he got up and he picked up the stick, the kiosko, and came around and he gave each person a solid swat on the shoulders, you know, right here and here. He walked right down the row. Everybody got two swats, then he went back to his seat, sat down, silence again. So we sort of got used to his different way of teaching and we appreciated whatever way it was, and especially if anyone thought that they were beginning to know something, if their ego was becoming a little bit too inflated, he would find a way of pulling the rug out from under them very quickly, so that we were really kept on our toes.

[11:48]

And very often if we asked a question, he would just throw the question back to us so that we realized that we had to think for ourselves. We had to really come to whatever realization that we were going to come to by just really figuring these things out and, well, so many things that have no answers, but the answer, no answer is the answer. Well, as we learn, it's important to know what we don't know as well as what we know. So we're always very grateful and I'm very grateful for knowing Della. Della was such a great help to Suzuki Roshi when he was first here. She would take him places and feed him cookies and take care of him so wonderfully.

[12:55]

Anyway, out of this first meditation class, Zen Center grew and this is how it began. We had several quite capable people like Richard Braker and Graham Petchy and some others that soon got us really up there as they found Tassajara. Richard Baker knew the owner of Tassajara and that is how we came to acquire Tassajara. And then later on, Green Gulch and so on, so we're very thankful for the first people there who were so talented and knew how to move Zen Center to where it is now. So, thank you very much. And then I'm also very pleased to introduce to you the Reverend Koshin Ogui, who I'm happy

[14:17]

to introduce to you because he was one of the early students of Suzuki Roshi and also because he has maybe a little bit different perspective on Suzuki Roshi than the Zen Center crowd because he wasn't exactly part of Zen Center as I know it. Reverend Ogui is a Japanese Pure Land priest and one of the tenets of Pure Land Buddhism, simplistically, is you don't practice. You can't practice in a kind of formal way. Formal way of practice is no longer possible or it reinforces a sense of self, perhaps, and it gets in the way of real realization. And so meditation is usually not considered something that Pure Land Buddhists do. But Reverend Ogui became a student of Suzuki Roshi and went on to become one of the important teachers and ministers of Pure Land Buddhism in America. But in doing that, he also teaches Zazen, which is a little bit of a radical thing to do, I believe.

[15:18]

So I'm very glad that he's here and glad that he can offer his perspective of Suzuki Roshi. Thank you. Thank you. What a strange man is Shinryu Suzuki Roshi. My meeting was scheduled first weekend of June. And because of the head of administrators' convenience, rescheduled to this weekend, which I had to fly in from Chicago.

[16:21]

Here I am. Very strange man he is. At his death, of course, I was saddened. And yet something woke me up early in the morning. Something made me to write something about him. So I followed such inner energies, karmic energy. And I can help myself to write about him on the Hokupei Times, about 10, 13, 14 times, which I forgot. But here you are. Here you are. That is amazing. And here I am, meeting together under the name of Suzuki Roshi's conference.

[17:27]

What kind of being is he? I'm very honored to meet with senior leaders of Zen Center, such as Tenshin, Rick Anderson, and list of senior leaders, teachers. And Gil was kind enough to make arrangements. Melanie pulled me up from meeting. Again, Suzuki Roshi was kind enough to pull me out from business meeting, which I didn't like it. Very strange. I came to the United States in 1962. Then I had an argument with my senior monk or ministers in Los Angeles so that I was under care of head administrator.

[18:32]

Socho, like archbishop type. Under care, sound is good, but under, watch. I was very much depressed. I was ready to go back to Japan because of so many reasons. What I had to do in Los Angeles was nothing but memorial service and funeral services, putting all the papers in the envelopes and so on, which is fine. Yet, I was among the middest of Japanese and Japanese-Americans community, which is fine too. But I kind of questions, where is the rest of the Americans? And of course, because of my limited ability of English, frustrations, excitements made me very difficult crisis or difficult situations.

[19:40]

And I was under care of the head administrator in San Francisco. I was ready to go back to Japan. Then one day, a very cute Zen priest walked into the Buddhist bookstore. He foresaw my insight, I think, as you're mentioning. But someone mentioning about, he could read the mind. And he said, well, even Jodo Shinshu minister, why not come to the Buddhist bookstore? Sit with me. I had such experience when I was in Japan. My father was very strange again. Even he was Jodo Shinshu priest at 17th generation. He sent me to Rinzai-den temple, which is located to next village when I was small,

[20:46]

which means I was bad boy. Because I did not behave well, same as with rest of the brother and sister. He sent me to specially to the Zen temple. When I was glamorous school, so which means fifth or sixth grade, I believe. So I was curious that why I am the only one who had to go to different temple to stay with old, distinguished, nice Zen priest. But because of such a calm relationship, invitation from Suzuki-doshi was not much strange. So I started honor to practice Zazen meditation again at Soko-ji. As someone was mentioning, it was a time when I came back to San Francisco from Los Angeles, 1963, 4, 5, 6, that area.

[21:53]

The area was a time of hippies, cultural evolution of time. Day of flower boys and girls like that. Then one time, I remember that, the young flower girl walked in, who is almost naked, but she has some kind of tennis court netting as a dress. And this is a true story which I experienced, which means you could see everything as well, right? Then Suzuki-doshi said, well, Katagi-doshi was there too. Could you tell her to wear a little more?

[22:57]

Then Katagi-doshi, he had a habit to scratch his head. Ah, I'm in trouble. He always said, I don't know what to do. That was his habit. Sometimes he said that. Then he looked at me. Looked at me and said, could you tell her? But I didn't know how do I say in English, you know? But in the other hand, I was young. I was at the age of 23, so that I was sort of enjoying it, you know? So I started thinking, how do I say in English, wear a little more? Then Katagi-doshi didn't know the exact English word to say it.

[24:00]

Anyway, I approached her and said, Suzuki-doshi is saying, you better wear a little more. Otherwise, that was a difficult word. Otherwise, other will get excited. She cried and she said, this is my best dress. And Katagi-doshi always said, you know, I don't know what to do. But he did so many things. And Suzuki-doshi was, as you mentioned that, very compassionate. And at the same time, very powerful, personal wisdom. He accepted anyone to come. And one day, he was giving a talk.

[25:01]

And he said, today is walking slowly. My English is better than his English at the time, you know? In contrast to what I'm talking now. He was much dignified in English. Today is. Today is. Today is. Ja is Japanese, you know? Emphasis of a word. Today is. Today it is, indeed. In Japanese, it's ja. Today is walking around. Today. Today, ja. Then, walking around, I was waiting for the next word. And he said, today is not yesterday. Then, he said, today is not tomorrow.

[26:18]

Ja. Then, he walked toward one of the persons in front. He grabbed him. Do you understand? Then, he smiled. And he said, that's all today. So, I was astonished, you know? One of my frustrations is because I could not speak English. But what he spoke the words, today is today. Today is not tomorrow. And today is not yesterday. Five different words. That astonished me. I could speak, I could use five words. Oh, it is. I was serious. Five words. That was such an impact.

[27:27]

Something dropped. Wow. I could be very useful. Not like him, but useful. Wow. Of course, later I realized the more important things. In Japanese expression, it's a hara ga suwaru. Hara is abdomen, belly. Suwaru means sit down. The one whose belly is sit down. It's kind of firm, which I was not, of course. That impact, I could say, stopped me to stay in America. Only six or five or six words. So, I could say, because of him, I am still keep doing,

[28:32]

following my karmic path as Choza Shinshu minister. And one day, at the Koma Cemetery, it was a day of memorial, National Memorial Day. Totagiri Roshi and I will start talking about financial difficulties. We talked about all kinds of things. They came to the financial difficulties, because he had to take care of his wife and children and so on. Then he was saying, oh, then in that case, I should, I better become Choza Shinshu minister, who is more financially purported. Then I said, well, but I rather attracted by Zen priest than I should become Zen priest. So, why don't we change it? Then, I intentionally asked Suzuki Roshi who was sitting next to us,

[29:35]

is that possible that I become Zen priest? Then he said, that's difficult. Then, how about Totagiri Roshi to become Choza Shinshu minister? He said, same answer. He gave us same answer. That's difficult. So, I didn't ask him anymore. But in the back, I felt that I'm talking, while he was talking in such a silence, saying like, each one has karmic path, karmic path, karmic path to go. That's, I heard. Again, made me so, ah. Determined or, to go my karmic path. Then one night, someone knocked my door.

[30:51]

I was taking easy after shower. So, I opened the door. Then, Suzuki Roshi was standing right front of the door. And he smiled and he said, can you serve me a cup of tea? So, kind of embarrassing with such a shorts. And I changed, changed clothes. And I welcomed him to cup of tea. He enjoyed the tea and stayed in my apartment for few hours. Then he thanked and left. Later, I found, found out, he run away from the meetings. After so-called, I heard from Mr. Suzuki. He, he suddenly disappears from the meeting. He said he goes to restroom, but he didn't come back.

[31:57]

Then I found out, that was a meeting, that he was asked to choose which one he should take. Which one means, former members of so-called temple or Hakujin people. Hakujin means white people, non-former members of temple. So, I asked Mr. Suzuki, what did he say? She said, he kept saying, saying things again and again. She was kind of excited. Saying, he should say something more, different way. But he kept saying, I take people who come to meditation practice. Isn't that beautiful? He said, Suzuki, you're wrong.

[33:08]

Kept saying, same things. I take people. I go along with the people who come to Sazen meditation. All of you know that, right? When he is in Tassajala, he won't come back to Sokoji for a couple months. When he's re-concentrated, being with you, he forgot even his wife. She got excited one time. He completely forgot her. So, concentrating, writing something to talk to you tomorrow morning or tomorrow evening. So, he locked the door. And he couldn't hear even Mr. Suzuki banging the door from outside. So, she said, she once slept in the bathtub.

[34:11]

I think she was almost going to divorce him. And of course, he had to go back to Japan. But he decided to stay. He decided to stay with the people who like to practice Zen way. Way of Zen. Which means, he left temple for people who practice Zen. He stayed for people who practice Zen. And he's still staying with us. And even he pulled me out from meeting today. What a being he is. I'm so grateful that I could be here today what I am.

[35:20]

And thank you, all of you who are still living with his spirit. Again, thank you. Thank you very much.

[35:34]

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