What force allowed the seeds of Tzu Chi to slowly take root in a Muslim country in the Middle East? It was love. In October 1998, I accompanied Huang Szu-hsien, director of Tzu Chi's Department of Religion, and his assistant Hsieh Chin-kuei, on a visit to the Tzu Chi liaison office in Jordan. When I saw the familiar figures in their "blue-sky-and-white-clouds" uniforms in such a faraway place, I felt a thrill in my heart that is difficult to describe.

A single seed

Located in the northwestern part of the Arabian peninsula, the Kingdom of Jordan lies close to the Fertile Crescent, the cradle of the great Middle Eastern civilization. It is bordered on the west by Israel, on the north by militant Syria, on the northeast by Iraq, the most ambitious country in the Persian Gulf, and on the east and south by oil-rich Saudi Arabia. With a population of about four million, Jordan struggles to exist in its narrow space. Most of its people are Muslim Arabs.

Jordan is the only country in the Middle East that does not produce oil. Because of the Israeli-Arab conflict, the worldwide economic depression, poverty, high unemployment, and nearly four hundred thousand disabled and mentally retarded people, Jordan faces total economic collapse.

More than a year ago, Lin Hui-cheng, a Tzu Chi member in Indonesia, moved to Jordan with her husband, Chang Tien-neng, who now heads the Taipei Trade Office in Jordan. When she moved, Hui-cheng took a seed of Tzu Chi love with her.

It is not easy to adjust to life in another country. It is even more difficult to practice Buddhism in a Muslim country. Following Master Cheng Yen's concept of "getting it locally and spending it locally," Tzu Chi members in Jordan raise about US$930 in local funds each month. From presenting initial reports to inspection tours to decision-making on implementing relief missions, everything is done in the same manner as in Taiwan.

Besides making periodic visits to a children's home and to the Meningitis Association to express their love and concern, Tzu Chi members also go to a refugee camp in Balqa to distribute relief supplies. Within the camp, they have selected twenty-two families with very old people or women or children who need special care to whom they give extended help.

Visiting the poor and the suffering

The long-term hostilities between Israel and the Arab countries have forced hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to flee to Jordan. At present, Palestinians account for about sixty percent of the country's population.

In the refugee camps, people live in small huts that are put together with metal sheets. They have neither water nor electricity. When visiting one family, we noticed in their kitchen a pan of dirty water in which they were soaking some half-rotten fruit. We feared for their health, but lacking sufficient food, what could they do?

There are five or six refugee camps like this in Jordan. Tzu Chi members have been visiting the one at Balqa since early 1998. In March and August, they distributed rice, cooking oil and detergent to some five hundred families. Another large-scale distribution took place in December 1998.

Local Tzu Chi members in Jordan guided us to a home for abandoned children which was run by Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity. We were told that Arabs believe it is Allah's wish that they have many offspring. The average family, therefore, tends to have seven or eight children. Because marriages between close relatives are common, a high number of children are born mentally retarded. Unable to care for them, the parents often abandon these children.

The home we visited houses over twenty children. Most of them are mentally or physically handicapped. When Tzu Chi members first visited them, the nuns insisted that they didn't need any material support, but they needed manpower and love to look after these abandoned children. Therefore, Tzu Chi members now visit that home once every two weeks. They feed the children, talk to them, or take them outside for a little sunshine.

Behind the ordinary

Out of the thirty Chinese families in Jordan, twenty-six have joined the Tzu Chi Foundation. They joked that in Jordan the percentage of Tzu Chi members among overseas Chinese was the highest in the world. Although most of them know very little about the foundation, they just want to be like other Tzu Chi members and do some good.