I love rain very much. When it’s raining and you stay in your house with some warm heating. And you eat some vegan pancakes. And you look out in the garden when the rain is coming down, (Yes.) like singing and dancing in front of you, then you feel you are the most lucky person.
Hallo, saints. (Hallo, Master.) Hallo. (Hi, Master.) (Hallo, Master.) (Hi, Master.) Hallo, saints. I pretend that you are saints. I hope you are. (Hopefully.) (We hope so too.) Though there are many grades of saints. You know that. (Yes, Master.) What grade are you? You think? (Hopefully, the good grade.) Good grade. You hope. (We hope.) How is the weather? How is everybody? How’s the weather over there? (It’s a little bit rainy. But we like the rain.) Rainy is good. (Yes, it is.) Yeah. I like too. (Yes, Master.) Oh, you say it’s raining where you are? (Yes, Master.) Really? (Drizzling a little bit.) (Light. It’s light rain.)
Oh. Is it Tuesday? (Is it… No, it’s Friday.) We have kind of Friday pancake stuff? You’d like some vegan pancakes? (Yes, Master.) Wow. Would be nice. (Yes, Master.) But if I was with you, I would cook some vegan pancakes for you. Truly. (Aww.) (Thank You, Master.) I love to cook for people. (Thank You.) (We should be cooking for You, Master.) It doesn’t matter. But I also can wash salad. We can draw straws to see who can cook. (Yes.) Or we do stone, scissors and… (Paper.) It’s raining? That’s one condition we need for vegan pancakes. But it’s not Tuesday. Sorry. (Oh, dear.)
And you don’t have (vegan) pancakes. If I were with you, I would cook for you. Actually, (Oh, thank You.) it’s very easy to cook vegan pancakes nowadays. Especially in America, you just go out and buy many boxes. Ready-made pancakes. They make it very thick. I saw it. (Yes, Master.) Even one inch thick. (Wow!) And many of them are piling on top of each other. I saw it in an advertisement or something. (Yes.) Right? (Yes, Master. With syrup and everything.) Who can eat so much? A big, tall pile of pancakes. And each one of them about two inches or one inch, at least, thick. It’s so easy to cook vegan pancakes in America. (Yes, Master.) And they have some maple syrup? (Maple. Yes, Master.)
Is it syrup or syrup? (Syrup.) Some people say syrup, some people say syrup. I don’t know anymore. And some people say… (And whipped cream.) I always have been saying privacy, until I heard somebody from, I don’t know whatever the mainstream TV host is, in America, she said privacy. (Oh.) Since then I don’t know if my English is OK or not. And some say water, and the other says water. (Yes.) Potato, potato, potato.
Actually, so we don’t have any vegan pancakes. (Oh. We miss out again.) You miss out again. I didn’t know what day it is today. I thought maybe it’s Tuesday, but it’s not. (Not Tuesday. No, Master.) So, you have the rain and I thought it was Tuesday, so, we have two conditions. But the vegan pancakes are not there. The main ingredient is not there at all. Never mind.
(We actually have the main ingredient, that’s Master’s voice. That’s the best.) Of course, you will say that. If you cannot have grapes, you would say grapes are sour. Listen, I never make vegan pancakes so thick, so if you’re from America, I don’t think you would like my vegan pancakes. I made it very thin, (Oh.) like French crepe. (Oh, yes. It’s good.) But doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter. (Those are nice, because you can have a lot more.) Actually, you can make it thick, you can also. You don’t have to buy it. Just have some mold, put in the pan. And you pour (Batter. The batter.) the batter into it. (Yes.) And then it will be thick, as thick as you want.
If you put the whole bamboo, the hollow part of it. Bamboo has many hollow parts. If we have one of the hollow parts, so tall like that, you put in the pan, then you probably have ten inches or twenty inches pancakes. (Record height.) Then you don’t have to make many piling up together. Just put inside the bamboo, the hollow part of it. (Yes.) One part of the bamboo and then you just put it on your plate. (Wow.) Voilà! Bon appétit. Yum yum. You can imagine. (Wow.) (How to even open the mouth to get it in.)
Well, you have forks and knives. (Oh, yes.) And you have hands. (That’s true.) Oh, man, this guy. He’s so picky, man. So lazy, my God, give him a (vegan) pancake so tall like that and he doesn’t know how to eat. Even have to ask me that question. And we have not even come to the question section yet. We don’t give him any vegan pancakes. (He has to make them.) We don’t have any anyway. So it doesn’t matter. But, all of you can imagine, except him. We don’t allow him to even imagine that he has such a tall vegan pancake. Serves him right. Doesn’t even know how to eat pancakes.
Must be joking. He must be from England. Is that the English guy, who asked the question? Who was it? (Yes, yes.) No wonder. The English, they make pancakes very thin. (That’s right.) The way I made it. (Yes.) Thin, like crepes in France. (Yes.) Like bánh xèo of Âu Lạc (Vietnam). (Yes.) But the English, they eat it with lemon and sugar. Oh, never mind. We talk about that and everybody drools and cannot hear what I talk. (And cinnamon.) And maybe I can’t even talk from drooling.
It’s raining over there? (Yes, Master.) Rain big or small, or middle? (Small.) (Just a little bit.) (I think we can hear it on the roof.) Good, good. Can you hear me still with all the rain? (Yes, Master.) Very good. Very good. I like spontaneity. I don’t like to prepare too much. If I wait for the rain to stop, then maybe next year. (Yes.)
I love rain very much. When it’s raining and you stay in your house with some warm heating. And you eat some vegan pancakes. And you look out in the garden when the rain is coming down, (Yes.) like singing and dancing in front of you, then you feel you are the most lucky person. The luckiest person on the planet. (Yes, Master.) And you will be very happy. (Yes.)
In the Himalayas, when I lived in that small mud house, if it rained, I would make chapatti inside. (Oh. Nice.) Can do, can do in the corner. You open the door. It doesn’t have any window, just the door. Life is simple. Even the house is simple. (Yes.) Room is simple. But I do miss that part very much. Felt just so carefree. (Yes, Master.) If I could, I would go immediately.
How about you guys? What kind of life do you want? One by one, tell me. I mean honestly, don’t copy me, huh? That’s mine with copyright, OK? Ching Hai lifestyle. Copyright.
(A quiet, peaceful life that I could sleep all day.) Oh, wow. That’s easy. We just fire you and you go. You go and sleep anywhere you want. I’m sorry, before we had a little bit more people, and you can take a rest a little bit. Nowadays, Master calls anytime. Don’t know when and, just before you bite the vegan pancake, you just open your mouth and the pancake has to drop back onto the plate. Because the pancake has to wait. (Yes.) When Master calls, you can’t even… and if you bite the pancake already, wow, then it’s good luck to you if you can swallow it. Or you might have to spit it out. Oh, what a life we have nowadays. Yeah, sometimes it’s challenging. (Yes, Master.) For me also, for me a lot. A lot.
(But we are lucky we can serve the world and help.) Yeah, yeah. (We are blessed.) That’s what I have to say to myself. (We are blessed we can do this work, Master.) Yeah. (We really are.) But we would be better if the world is perfect. (That’s true, Master.) Then we can hang a hammock somewhere, and eat (vegan) pancakes all day long and eat and sleep. Sleep for him, vegan pancakes for us. Yeah, because he says he can sleep all day, so we can eat. You know? Yeah. You don’t have to call him, because he’s sleeping. Oh man, what a party, huh?
Before I became more famous, we had that almost every weekend with the residents. (Oh, wow.) When I was younger. Thirty-some. Life was rosy, full of roses and sleeping on a jasmine flowerbed. (Oh, wow.) Oh, just joking. Who has? But we had barbeque. (Yes.) Or we had snacks, like vegan ice cream, or mochi, you know those sticky rice cakes? (Oh, yes.) And tea. Hot tea. (Oh, nice.) Or coffee. But mostly just tea. And I made some special tea and special wine without alcohol. And it was all delicious. (Oh, very nice.)
Nowadays, it is all like a dream. Luxury dream. (Yes.) But at least before, many years we had that. (Yes, Master.) Every weekend after we got rid of all the disciples from the forest hall, where all the trees grow down there? (Yes, Master.) After we got rid of them, we would go up and make our own group meditation on tea. (Wow.) We meditated on tea, on vegan ice cream, or whatever. (Oh.) Whatever we had that day. Also barbeque or whatever, and we also had stinky tofu. (Oh.) All good, all good. Nothing bad at all in those times, when we were younger, (Yes, Master.) and things were good, life was good.
