I asked several people at my table, and nobody knew where Talin was. To tell the truth, what did it have to do with them whether a hospital was built in Talin or not? Still, they all came for great, selfless love.

"Master Cheng Yen from the Tzu Chi Foundation wants to build a hospital in a place named Talin or something, so I came here tonight for the fund-raising banquet."

This crowd of people, nearly ninety-eight percent of whom were Chinese, were marked by their black hair. The banquet was scheduled to start at 7 p.m., but when I arrived at the Adam's Mark Restaurant in Houston, the place was crowded with Chinese speaking in Mandarin with various accents. They all came for the reason stated above.

I shoved through the crowd, asking people out of curiosity, "Where on earth is Talin?" Most people scratched their heads and replied, "I don't know." Nonetheless, we all came, having prepaid US$100 to be entitled to elbow our way through the crowd.

A meal in any restaurant in any state in the United States seldom costs $100. People came here not for the food, nor for any show-we had seen enough in Taiwan or in the United States.

Some of the Chinese at the banquet had been in the United States for thirty years or so. Some had fled from mainland China to Taiwan to escape the communist purge, and later managed to establish themselves in the United States. With their Americanized children who do not speak Chinese, and without their ancestors' graves or any relatives in Taiwan, they will not move back to Taiwan when they are old. What does it matter to them whether a hospital is built in Talin ornot? But still they came. Why?

I talked to an American as we walked from the parking lot into the restaurant. He introduced himself as Charles Jones. He was not a Buddhist, but he admired the spirit of compassion manifested by Buddhism, and he came to answer the Master's call for compassionate charity.

I also talked to some Chinese youngsters who had grown up in the United States. A young man named Philip Chen told me that he was there on behalf of his family, because something had come up and his father could not come himself. Philip did not understand Buddhism, but he knew this was something great to do.

After the banquet started, I asked the gentleman sitting on my left if he had been to Talin. He told me frankly that he had lived in Taiwan for almost all his life, but he did not know where Talin was. So I asked several ladies at my table, but none of them had been to any place called Talin. And yet we all came to raise money for the Tzu Chi Hospital in Talin.

Later in the course of the program, we saw a film, and thereby we learned where Talin was located. We also learned more about the relief work Tzu Chi had done during the past thirty-some years. In any part of the world where disaster strikes, there are Tzu Chi people. They offer their money and energy in exchange for toil and hard work without complaint. They do all this with joy, taking it as the most significant thing in their life. Why?

When we look at what Tzu Chi has done in the last thirty-one years, we can say that if there are living bodhisattvas in the world, then Master Cheng Yen must be one of them. She defines the meaning of compassion and kindness through her actions, and she also practices what she has learned from the Buddha's teachings. Her great love guides us to follow her willingly, cheerfully and joyfully.