Monday, February 12, 2007

Klostret i Sendomir

The apartment intercom sounds yesterday evening. My wife picks up the handset, puts it down again and talks to the visitor through the door:

"Hello?"
"Excuse me." says a woman's voice.
"Who's there?"
"Excuse me."
"Who's there?"
"Excuse me. I came out to visit you."
"For what matter?"
"I came out to visit you"
"For what matter?"
"I've been meditating at a place nearby. I want to give you advice".
"No thank you."
"Please let me in to give you advice".
"No thank you."
"Please hear me out."

She took the hint at the resulting silence and moved on to the next apartment. This is now the third such visitor we've had in the space of a week. In fact, there was an even earlier incident which in retrospect I'm beginning to think might have been similar type of visitation and not about spoons at all but it's impossible to know. But I'm no longer sure whether these are Buddhists, Christians, beggars, scammers, or just ordinary sociopaths. The first visitor in the last week said they had come from a temple, but the second - a woman - said she had just come from a '수도원' (sudowon) which literally translated means monastery - implying Christianity. Both the second visitor and yesterday's said that they were leading a
'수도원 생활' (sudowon senghwal) which translates as a 'monastic life'.

The fact that these people are using the same terminology seems to suggest that they are emanating from the same place, even if they can't quite decide what religion they are.

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