Master Man Kuan, a Buddhist nun and a very good friend of mine, recently went on a pilgrimage along with thirty-one other monks and nuns to all the sacred places in northern India.

They started their pilgrimage in Lumbini, the place where the Buddha was born, near the border between India and Nepal. After that they went to Buddhagaya, the place where the Buddha attained enlightenment under the Bodhi Tree; to the Deer Park, the place where the Buddha gave the first exposition of his teachings to the five monks; and to Kusinagara, the place where the Buddha entered nirvana at the age of eighty.

"What impressed you the most during your twelve-day pilgrimage to our spiritual home?" I asked curiously.

"It was our trip to the last remaining traces of Vulture Peak Mountain, northeast of Rajagrha," replied Man Kuan.

On top of the mountain stands a rock that resembles a vulture. Here, the Buddha lectured for about twelve years on the Wonderful Lotus Sutra, Maha Prajnaparamita Sutra and Surangama Sutra.

Man Kuan happily imagined herself following the Buddha up a little trail to the lecture platform at the top of the mountain. Standing on the platform, she was moved to tears when she considered that that was the place where our Fundamental Teacher diligently lectured on all these important scriptures, which for the past 2,500 years have successfully inspired innumerable people to do good deeds and search for spiritual emancipation.

Before Man Kuan went to India, she was clearly informed about the poverty and lack of sanitation in this ancient land, but she was still shocked when she saw it for herself. What bothered her most were the swarms of beggars, dressed in tattered clothes, humbly begging for something from tourists or pilgrims. Among them were children and young mothers holding emaciated babies to their breasts. Man Kuan was especially saddened to see the forlorn, haggard looks on the beggars' faces. A generous, kind donation might, as the tour guide warned, end up in ruthless fistfights among the beggars, all desperate for a few pennies.

The impact of this was simply too strong for a group of spiritual cultivators, whose hearts were full of love and compassion, to bear. "What did you do next?" I asked her. "I lowered my head, pretended not to hear their pleas and walked quickly away in tears at the sad and ugly scenes of the human world," she said with a sigh. She bravely revealed to me how her mindset had changed from a strong sense of sympathy to an unspeakable sense of disgust. She admitted that she hated to see their dirty clothes, which were even filthier than our common rags, their dirty feet covered with mud and grime, their helpless but greedy eyes, and the karmic causes that hideously entangled all the living beings in that poor land. I could tell that the cause of her disgust and hatred was in fact an indescribable sense of grief and compassion. I guess I would probably have behaved just like her if I were suddenly surrounded by a huge swarm of beggars in a foreign country.

To make matters worse, on January 26, 2001, an earthquake measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale hit India, killing over thirty thousand and leaving over seventy thousand missing in the rubble. Tzu Chi is still keeping a close watch on the situation in India. As Master Cheng Yen, our founder, said, once we obtain a way to do rescue work, we will provide the victims the means to rehabilitate themselves.

I cannot help but ask why the people who live in the Buddha's home country have to suffer so much. Man Kuan and I have reached a conclusion: the Buddha must be providing us with a chance to pitch our spirituality against all the agony manifested in his home country. After seeing the misery and suffering in India, we may understand that they are caused by the greed, anger and delusion in people's minds. The only way to eliminate suffering is to accumulate our good fortune by doing good deeds. We should truly feel grateful for the Buddha's compassionate teachings.