IRAQ LETTER: The most treasured flowers
April 26th, 2008
in:
CPTnet
26 April 2008
IRAQ LETTER: The most treasured flowers
by Chichun Yuan
I rest my hand to where my heart is and then raise it to the sky, saying, "Choni? Bashi? ( How are you? Good?)" With this gesture, I send my best and warm regards to you, my dear friends. This greeting is what the team in Northern Iraq-Kurdistan has been receiving everyday from the Kurdish people. Think of it: we, the most fortunate people, are receiving sincere blessings from those suffering afflictions. Seeing the smiles on their faces and knowing their long-suffering history, I was reminded that the most treasured flowers are those that grow on the poorest land. Like the lotus, which grows only in the mud, and which Buddhists consider a valuable offering to Buddha, the people here struggle to blossom like a beautiful flower in spite of their terrible circumstances.
I realized one thing I can do now is to share these flowers with you.
Dear friends, I wish that one day you might come to visit these beautiful people. We can visit the prison museum in Suleimaniya together. We will hear the story of how "there was a time when some people were living in a man-made killing hell" while at the same time, I was living with the choice between hamburger and chicken for supper. And then, we might wish for a time that we will put our work together to make the world fair to everyone.
chihchun
in Suleimaniya
26 April 2008
IRAQ LETTER: The most treasured flowers
by Chichun Yuan
I rest my hand to where my heart is and then raise it to the sky, saying, "Choni? Bashi? ( How are you? Good?)" With this gesture, I send my best and warm regards to you, my dear friends. This greeting is what the team in Northern Iraq-Kurdistan has been receiving everyday from the Kurdish people. Think of it: we, the most fortunate people, are receiving sincere blessings from those suffering afflictions. Seeing the smiles on their faces and knowing their long-suffering history, I was reminded that the most treasured flowers are those that grow on the poorest land. Like the lotus, which grows only in the mud, and which Buddhists consider a valuable offering to Buddha, the people here struggle to blossom like a beautiful flower in spite of their terrible circumstances.
I realized one thing I can do now is to share these flowers with you.
Dear friends, I wish that one day you might come to visit these beautiful people. We can visit the prison museum in Suleimaniya together. We will hear the story of how "there was a time when some people were living in a man-made killing hell" while at the same time, I was living with the choice between hamburger and chicken for supper. And then, we might wish for a time that we will put our work together to make the world fair to everyone.
chihchun
in Suleimaniya