Housekeeping -"Philosophy of the Broom" -H&H Ship Service.

What I learned about myself having worked at H&H Ship and Environmental Services was th at if I were to put my mind  to it, I was capable of the job done. Nothing was impossible so long as I was performing for the benefit of the whole and less about myself. I was responsible for the safety and well being of those who worked under me in a volatile line of work that had caused a fatal accident and the whole company was under scrutiny by the various government of the state of California for a possible shut down. I was moved by the fact that most of the employees involved in this hazardous work were illiterate and had families to go home to. Most it seemed were oblivious to the fact that they were breathing toxic fumes and their bodies were literally covered by hazardous materials that came out of the Underground Storage Tanks that they were cleaning and they leave for home at the end of the day barely cleaned from their work day carrying with them the residue of the oil and sludge on their physical bodies if not on their cloths and most would probably play with their children and grandchildren once they got home. It was my duty to find the remedy for this at whatever cost.

My first impression of the yard itself was one of a mess with black oil and sludge splattered all over the ground around the work area and there was a shack that had a filthy refrigerator in it where the 'yard boys' would hung out to rest. When i walked around this shack it smelled of urine as there was no restrooms nearby. The ground was covered with greenish algae and muddy when stepped into as there was no proper drainage to talk of; in short it was simply filthy and we were located not three kilometers from downtown area of Market Street, San Francisco. I made up my mine then and there to clean up as my priority and clean i did by practically flipping the whole yard upside down. I made a pact with Will Harris Jr. that if he were to change his bad habits of booze and cocaine addiction, I would help him turn the company around and he did. He spent sometime at a rehab center and later returned to run the company as its president. Together we set about upgrading the facility and i was invited for my opinion what was needed to be done before a group of engineers in Will's office. Will Jr. or better known as 'Little Foot' among the employees went on to become the Entrepreneur of the Year for the City of San Francisco in less than two years. 

Bill as I called him was a high school Quarterback and highly intelligent and energetic in his younger days with a bright future being the only son of a millionaire father. Then he lost his wife and son in a auto accident and his life took a downward curve into drinking and drug use. He was in a very bad shape when I first encountered him, however he recovered and took control of himself and the company like he was meant to be and even his physical appearance transformed into a clean cut business man. One of his brainchild for the company was to set up the Emergency Response Team for toxic and hazardous waste discharge, (HAZMAT) in and around the Bay Area. I lived in the basement at his home in Oakland for a brief period of time while he was away on the drug rehab retreat and it was fun as it had a Jacuzzi right at the front entrance, there was a drum set and an large electronic organ in the room that had a waterbed. This was the house that I was supposed to have cleaned the yard in the first place when I applied for the job at H&H.

A whole lot of drama happened as I jumped from being a sweeper to the Yard Boss which included having a man punched and a knife put to my neck. There were a whole lot envy and discontent as everyone wanted to become the boss and I was new and the most unlikely character for it; I was also not a White Man and most of the truck drivers were not too keen to take orders from an Asian. But I had the backing of my boss and that of the lowest ranking employees most of whom saw what i was doing for their benefit. Most of them were African Americans and Latin Americans, including a 72 year old Native American and his grandson, two or three Filipinos a couple of Cubans and a Vietnamese. I had to learn to communicate with all these mixed group of people to get things moving and most were not highly educated if educated at all. Some carry guns in the trunk of the cars while others were either half drunk or stone and never dared to question. But i told them as it was when getting a job done and kept reminding them of the consequences that had happened with the former supervisor who was blown up sky high due to taking things for granted.

I called my work approach as " The Broom Philosophy ", because i focused mostly on keeping a clean house no matter what else happens. Housekeeping became the key principle in the yard. It all boils down to keeping a clean work environment to ensure safety for one and all.
#USTD, # work safety, #HAZMAT team.# ship services.

My Job at H&H in a nutshell.

How I got the job at H&H Ship Services was a unique story in itself and has written a few times in the past in this Blog. The gist of it was that I had been asked by my friend Joshua B. who lived then on the corner of Haight and Ashbury in the basement garage of  a building which was converted into a single room apartment. I was on the verge of being homeless after being asked to leave Green Gulch Zen community for my less than good conduct, perhaps one of the few students to be kicked out of a Zen monastery. Can't say that I blame them for I brought it upon myself through my old bad habits especially when it came to women. After a week of sleeping on the floor and under the kitchen table of his home, Josh arranged for me to work at his friend's home in Oakland, cleaning the yard. I was to meet Will Harris Jr. at his office on the water front of downtown San Francisco. The office was located on Third Street and China Basin which today has been turned into a Baseball Field for the SF Giants,
# USTD facility. Hazardous Waste Management. H&H Ship and Environmental Services.

I arrived at the office at seven in the morning and met with an African American gentleman, bald headed and had blue coveralls on. Later I learned the  Mr. Cleveland Valrey was the dispatcher for the company. There was no one  else except for the President of the company Mr. William Harris who was in his office. Upon explaining my purpose of being there i was introduced to Bill senior or late known to me as Big Foot. Big Foot told me that his son would be in perhaps in the afternoon if he does made it to work. However upon having heard my intention, he offered me a job to clean his yard instead which was the company's yard. I accepted and started my work the following morning. My job was simply as a sweeper and everything else that goes with. It was an easy job for me as I had spent almost two years doing exactly just that in a monastery and was not getting paid a dime for it. I did my job happily and within a year became the Yard Superintendent answerable to the president. In one year my salary was doubled and I was given the use of the company's pickup truck.

My promotion to become the 'Yard Boss' put me in charge of the Underground Tank Disposal operation which was at the time I was the sweeper, was going through a litigation involving the death of the supervisor due to an explosion of a six thousand gallon fuel tank that he was suppose to cut. This incident placed the operation under tag and lock by the Coast Guard Authorities and I learned about this a week into my  employment with the company. I observed and learned about what was going on and later decided to take it upon myself to run the yard myself as it all seemed simple yet being turn into a mess due to negligence and what was known as a 'fly by night operation', attitude of the management.

It so happened that one morning I noticed a Chinese gentleman approaching the front office and I intercepted him and upon inquiry learned that he was an official from the Department of Health,(DOH) about to shut down the USTD operation for good. I practically begged him to give me a chance to make things right no matter what it took and somehow he agreed to give me the chance to proof myself and left without going up to the office. He told me that if I needed his help in any way all I had to do was to call him. I told very few of my fellow employees of this incident and vowed to carry out my promise to this  Chines gentleman.

    
In less than a year I was able to make sure that everyone working in the yard had seven pairs of coveralls to wear along with fresh gloves and breathing respirators when handling hazardous waste. The company started employing a lab for testing toxic waste that came through the facility and that all employees went through a rigorous Health ans Safety Training carried out by various agencies such as DOSH, EPA, The Fire Dept. and even the Dept. of Transportation. The following year the company made a profit of two million dollars and the rest was history. H&H was the sole company that handled the USTD facility in almost the whole of the Western seaboard of the United States. It was the longest time i spent on any single job in my life; six years total. 
    

H&H Ship and Environmental Services - What have become of them?

Oddel Edwards, Don't worry Sam I got an eye on your back! "That's what I am worried about Oddel!"

No spills there please! Hermano.

The 'Tank Muckers' -a nasty job of cleaning the inside of Underground fuel tanks after they were being cut, for disposal.

Herman!

The H&H boys and girls.

Can;t remember his name, the truck driver and 

the mechanic.

The 'Tank Farm, to the right where all the bilge water frome the battle ships were collected and recycled.

Mr. Cleveland Valrey, Dispatcher and everything else that makes the company run. Aka known as Mr. Tibs.

Sydney Forster, asst. engineer ( or so we call called him)

Reflections of Alaska.

There is no sense in talking if you are doing the walking, whatever I read, listen to, witness first hand, I put to the test, I put it to practice for no matter how short of long it may be. Albeit meditation, Hatha Yoga or the yoga of postures, or Raja Yoga or the Yoga of the mind, sending sound waves through my head like i am doing at this moment, controlling my breath while I am feeling like I am about to have a stroke, you name it I do it. I have slept in the jungle and deserted temples, I have sat in grave yards and sketched and i have commercial fished in the Aleutian Chain, or the Bering Sea. I hiked through Colombia and Ecuador and even managed to smuggle a bag of Colombian Gold, (Marijuana),through the Miami Airport, just to test my guts if not stupidity. I once sat on top of a rock formation that stood tall like a column out a few yards from the shore in Alaska and was carried away that i found myself stranded when the tide had risen and had to practically swim back to shore in the cold frigid waters. Fortunately there were no witnesses to laugh at my stupidity.

When I reached my destination in Sandpoint, Alaska, a small Aleut fishing community, that the fishermen called, the One Horse Town, I had no money and no place to stay. It was a harsh place with only eight tress growing and the rest being a Tundra type of landscape. I was not scared but as a matter of fact was resigned to die having accomplished what I had set out to do; go fishing in Alaska. I ended up living among the folks of Sandpoint better off than most of the fishermen who went there to fish, those that had came from the 'Lower 48s'. Not only did I have a good bed and good food to eat, I was also able to fly from island to island making deliveries of food and liquor to the natives courtesy of my Bush pilot friend who asked me along for company. I flew and saw the bird's eye view of snow covered mountains and even around a volcano that was spewing our muddy clouds of smoke into the sky, views one only sees in documentary movies and often while stoned or drunk at that. Not even the native boys had this opportunity my friend Dwight Blackburn the Cessna pilot once told me, but I was good company he admitted. My one regret is that i did not have a good camera with me or failed to carry one along. 

My fishing trip in the Bering seas was short but full of fantastic and often scary experiences which I can never forget for as long as I live. I saw things and scenes that can only be describe as out of this world. Every so often I would reflect upon the fact that there I was a kid who grew up in a mangrove swamp of Kampung Selut, (Muddy Village), having the time of my life and few to share it with and who among my childhood friends or family would believe me and it cost me next to nothing except for the food and fares of getting there. In essence, I bought me a one way ticket to Alaska and survived the raw deal. I had one of the most beautiful lady for my companion  and she ran the only restaurant in town and what more could a man want. I made good money selling my artworks than fishing and at the end of the first year was able to vacation in Hong Kong, Thailand and Malaysia together with my partner.

One lesson I learned from my journey was that, you never look back and as the saying goes, you burn your bridges behind you. You overcome your fears of the unknown or what lies ahead and that the worse that can happen is that you die and no one in your family back home will know about it. In short thee was nothing to loose but life itself. In all the years that I had lived in the United States I had made one phone call to my home in Malaysia and talked to my father who talked me out of my despair and ending my life by suicide. This happened when I was living in Green Bay, Wisconsin. I also received one letter from my eldest brother to inform me that my father had passed away later on when I was living in San Francisco. I had relocated to Malaysia in 1998 after having lived in Japan for three years with my late wife and two children. What I have gathered from my wanderings in the past has now become a fading memory, However thanks to my art journals and collection of pictures and notes, most of these memories still lay fresh in my mind. It is said that most artists have photographic memories, I think I am among those lucky ones.
# Aleutian Chains,# Bering Sea,# San Francisco, #UWGB,#Alaska     

I spent Two years of my life in the Aleutians.

# The Aleutians.

Who are We? - Why Bother?

Sri Ramana Maharshi, the great Sage of India, said that the teachings of the Bible is contained in two statements, "I Am That I Am, and Be still and know that I Am God."

"Atma Vichara - Self inquiry - Dyana, Meditation consist in the fervent contemplation of the Self as Sat Chit Ananda, Being, Consciousness, Bliss."

The Great Minds of India has through their own personal self sacrifices have imparted to us knowledge and wisdom of the ancient from thousands of years ago and thanks to the Internet and such in our modern day and age we who seek the truth to whatever is able to share these knowledge in order to transcend our own personal ignorance. For the true seeker, the one who holds the burning charcoal in the palm of his hands till it becomes ashes before if ever giving up in looking for the truth, answers to questions and ways and means to allay doubts from the mind, these knowledge handed down from generation to generation has become the elixir of spiritual life. For the awakened ones, those who have attained some form of realization that there is much more to life than simply existence, the  understanding of these knowledge leads to the liberation of the spirit from the bondage of the mind created illusory world. In this day and age of beginning of the end of days, the Dharma ending age, the age of dissolution and destruction, it is imperative that the true seekers of the truth in whatever manner or form it may be, make the fervent effort towards untangling or unraveling the entanglement of ignorance that has kept the mind in control of one's fate if not destiny as a human being.

We as human are being place here on this planet merely as passive observers but given a vital role to play in the course of our destiny and to protect and preserve what we inherit from those that have left us to become custodians of this Planet we call our home. To do this we have to come to a thorough understanding of who or what we are capable of as humans. We have to look way beyond our mental and physical perceptions, our needs and desires, our sense of merely to survive this that we call life. We have to accept the fact that we are Creators and not merely curators or spectators, we make it happen, we design it to become perfection and not destruction. We have to transcend our identities as merely entities that has evolved to become just another specie among other sentient beings occupying time and space on this Planet like parasites the eats off its host in order that its specie alone will survive while killing off the rest of other species. To awaken to this realization is our primary goal in life, that we are who we are because we have been endowed with the body, mind and spirit and the Grace of the Universal Soul that governs all, call it by whatever Name you may. 

We are the still a part of the first creature that had crawled out of the waters of stillness, of Creation itself and evolved over the millions of years to become who we today are, at least on this physical plane if not spiritual. Sadly enough we have become enamored by our ignorance and evolved to become the predatory creatures bound and determined to bring an end to ourselves if not the very Planet itself. Somewhere along the line of our genetic evolution we have accumulated a sense of an exclusive identity we understand as who we are and we call it the ego. Along with the evolution of this  perception of a discriminating personality we are affected by the three illnesses that is   the cause of our present day miseries; Greed, Hate and Ignorance. I, Me and Mine, is how we identify ourselves as we struggle for our own self survival and we accept it as living life. We build walls and fences, we go to wars and domination over others, we collect and accumulate much more than what we need for this survival. We build edifices that reaches the skies to claim our sense of superiority over others and create massive temples of worship to claim that our faith and religion is above others, that our God or Gods is the One true God and yet these temples are often empty of devotees except on Fridays and Sundays in most cases. We are willing to kill and die for our faith, our systems and doctrines and worse of all we kill simply because
we enjoy it as it has become a part of our genetic code.

The tranquil waters that our first ancestor had crawled out of is today a quagmire of filth and garbage of our own making, we have become blinded by insatiable needs and desires that we lay waste behind us polluting even the oceans that life itself depends on. In short we are defecating over the very table we sit to eat. This is the realization that has prompted many among us to take a closer look at who or what we are and to take measures towards a healing process that can and will turn our fate as humans around for our sake if not the rest of Planet and its inhabitants; who are we? The wisdom of the ancient has foreseen where we are headed towards and has laid down the course for us to pursue, but we have deviated from this course and claim ourselves as an enlightened civilization, the perfect man created in the image of the Creator Himself. Will we ever learn? Can we ever transcend our ego and see ourselves in the Collective Spirit of the Universal Consciousness.

  

Time Out!

Why Zazen -2

Meditation has always been one of my favorite field of studies and I meditate at least twice a day everyday sometimes more like when I have to sit at the bus stand or wait for the dentist or stuck in an airport, I meditate. Often with my eyes close most around me would assume that I had fallen asleep especially when listening to a talk or a lecture. Every now and then the speaker would insinuate that I had no interest or simply should not have been there if I were to take a nap while event was in progress and yes it would sometimes be embarrassing or even awkward to be picked upon out of the presenter's self assuming and ignorance, like one should be sitting up with eyes wide open and focused on the speaker. There was an episode when I was rudely challenged by the speaker and i retaliated by asking if the speaker would like me to repeat every word that had been spoken, it did not end too well.

When in a deep state of meditative awareness, which happens rarely in public one becomes fully conscious of what goes on all around you including that which were not immediately related to what or where you are  are at. The mind listens or is conscious beyond the periphery of the environment and the sense views things from a wider angle lenses. You do not only listen to the other talking but is also aware of the other listening or reacting to what is being said in your conscious mind and off course you do not do this through effort but it happens sometimes even you are not aware that it is happening, like listening to an orchestra through your whole being, aware of the background as well as the main instrument and feeling the vibes of the whole audience as well as the resonance of the entire hall; one becomes the music. When absorbed in such states, this is meditation in action. The beauty of the sunrise or sunset emanates throughout your being with no thought arising to describe or capture the moment on camera, one is simply there at one with the moment.  

I have tried many forms of meditation in the past including Yogic, and Muslim Sufi tradition, but I find Zazen to be the best for me as it involves simply sitting and the longer you sit the better you get. There is no goals to achieve or no state heightened consciousness to think of, one just sits and watch the breath and through it watch the mind; just watch and nothing more. Meditation should be encouraged in schools especially the primary schools where children should be trained to calm their minds before actual school activities. Just like the playful kitten full of energy, it takes a nap when tired or worn out. There is no doctrine or religious activities involve, just the act of proper breathing and slowly quiet the mind to the point of falling asleep. My children spent three years of their childhood in a Japanese kindergarten and I used to sit and watch them do this. It was an amazing thing to watch how they settled down into a peaceful state after a strenuous activity;this is Zazen.
#Zen, Zazen, 

Zazen - sitting with the frogs.

As I set in Zazen at one corner of the Zendo at Green Gulch Farm a spot I have been sitting at for almost two years of my practice period I would find myself visiting times and places of my past like in a dream. Although this was not the aim of Zazen or sitting meditation in the Zen Buddhist tradition. I was not strong enough to bliss myself out into a single pointedness of no thought as many of my fellow students were able to. My mind was and perhaps still is addicted to 'daydreaming', to entertaining past memories and the  fantasizing into the future and rarely did i fell into absolute silence where no thoughts arose, unless I had doze off to sleep. On few rare occasions I felt the bliss of effortless presence and the lightness of being where the physical form seems to disappear and along with it all the aches and pains, the sore lower back, the runny nose and so forth. Sometimes i felt tears running down my cheeks uninvited and sometimes I would feel like sitting in a vacuum where no sound or feeling, touches me until the feeling of being alone manifest itself in the form of melancholy and then I would let out a heave of heavy sigh and fall back to earth. Back to the aches and pains and the sneezing and runny nose and the wish that the bell would be hit to end the sitting.

The last sitting of the day was my favorite time for sitting Zazen as it was the time when I would sit and listen to owls and the frogs as they were going their own chanting outside of the Zendo. It would be getting dark and as silence fell outside, inside i felt myself drifting into my own quietude and my body would settle down into restful state much more readily after a long day of working in the fields. There was actually nothing special about sitting Zazen, at least to me other than the fact that it was like an unwinding of the mind and body after a day of hard work, it was like watching your body and mind, being put to alignment and stashed away for the next day. The first sitting for the day was more of a challenge as it started before sunrise and one is sore from sleep in the cold on hard floor of the what was once used to be cowsheds or stalls for cattle that was raised on the farm; Green Gulch was originally a cattle ranch. The aches and pains all over the body and the runny nose from the cold made sitting a misery especially in winter. Yet it was still an awesome feeling to be able to sit among twenty to thirty people all facing the white wall and not moving a muscle for forty five minutes a session.

What was there to do when you are in that state not being able to move or even breath too loud lest you keep your close by neighbors from falling asleep. Off course there was the practice teacher who moves soundlessly behind you holding a stick in his or her hand keeping an eye on those taking a nap while in sitting meditation and especially those likely to snore while at it. If an when you feel a light tap on your shoulder, you know you've been spotted and you give 'gasho', that is placing your palms together and lean forward to receive the whack that was forthcoming. There were teachers who liked you and those who don't and you can tell by the manner in which they enjoy delivering the stick on to your back. It sounds much louder than it hurts, thank the Buddhas for the thick robes and layers of thermal under wears you had on. Such was Zazen that I encountered at the Green Gulch Farm or aka Green Dragon Zen Center, in Sausalito, Marin County, California.

#Zen, Zazen. Green Gulch Farm, Green Dragon Zen Monastery.



    

Still getting to know Me.

In his most recent Satsang Mooji Baba talked about how problems are perceived and relationship of the one who perceives and the problem itself. On listening to the video I had a deeper understanding of what i was going through as I had just walked into the house from having failed to pick up my daughter from work. Long story, but the gist of it was that i I failed to locate her new office in the dark and rainy evening. I can blame it on my getting worse night vision or my failure to stay focus or whatever but eh fact remained that I was on the verge of loosing it on the wet and dark road  to a point where I found myself driving into an oncoming traffic on a one way street. I ended up calling her and told her to take a Grab home. I stopped by the roadside and took a breather before i started on my way home which was about a five minutes drive away; Yes! Shit definitely happens to the best of us. Even the best of Yogis sometime, someday, somewhere, steps on his own crap. But this stepping on one's own crap with a sense of realization at what is happening, one starts to see through the problem and on seeing through the nature of its origin or the cause of it, one moves on into a more positive mode of dealing with it, like shifting on to a lower gear and slowing down.

Though a minor and boring an episode that happens to crop up like every other minor and boring episodes in the past, it was none the less a vert valuable lesson to be learned. I came home after my ordeal and immediately decided to listen to someone hoping to calm myself down out of some wise words and the first video that attracted my attention was Mooji Baba's Satsang talk and from it I found myself learning my lesson for the evening and prepared a good dinner for my daughter and I. Nothing was mentioned about how of why I got lost until this morning when i apologized to my daughter about not being able to pick her up and she just shrugged it off as something not to worry about. I relate this simply because in the past my reaction would have been worse than my loosing my way in the rain. I realize that it is a minor step towards learning something so trivial about myself and hardly worth making a note about it, however, this trivial episode brought me to listen to one of the best talks given by Mooji Baba as it hits me right on target, it resonates right into the core of my  being, like a Zen wake up call, the stick that hacks the monk on his back to keep him from falling asleep.

Anyone foolish enough to have been following this Blog since the beginning over ten years ago would realize a long time ago that I have issue and one of the most critical of which is anger management. I have been dubbed by my family, relatives and friends as having a rage in me or as the Malay would call it 'panas baran'. I explode and have done damage to relationships and properties, I have incurred numerous frowning from others due to my temper and recklessness. I vowed to expel this weakness I have through understanding in the Buddha's way of dealing with life and this Blog is my  notes to myself of my progress or regress as the case may be; at seventy, I am still crawling in the my own crap in order to discover the truth about my own Buddha Nature. Hence it is for me, not a small matter if and when you have learned a lesson through having experienced getting lost while trying to pick up your daughter whose office is about five minutes away from your home and live to write about it. 

My daughter is now cycling to work and is enjoying it, that's how close her work place is to our home, but here I am not being able to locate her place of work after having driven there twice in the day time; such is! One of my excuses for having failed in my mission was because I was and perhaps still am going through a mental block, whatever that entails. I am not  able to paint as freely as I wish, like a creative block. Then I have adopted a kitten in addition to our Furby, the cat that survived a twelve floors fall and is going through her sexual need time of the month where she would howl like a sick dog looking for a male. Keeps me pretty much in tension  and not good on focusing my attention in order to create or even meditate. Then, these are just my lame excuses of which I have to look at more closely and find the cause and cure in time. Mooji's Satsang talk helped in pointing to the direction of the cause in no small way and for this I am very grateful. The Video is entitled, "I will not start with your problem, I will start with you."  # Mooji,   

Places I've hung out at to gain inspirations from.

A

Choose your mask well!

After taking short break from putting my thoughts down I have decided to let my mind wander a bit an see what gives. Nope i have no idea what to actually write about and it doe not really matter as i miss letting my mind and fingers enjoy playing the key board on the lap top. I have a white kitten sleeping in my lap snugged in the folds of my sarong and so I cannot move freely even as my lower back is begging to be released from the tension on my present position. So I will try to be as productive as i could while she sleeps in my lap.

I am a man of a thousand faces someone once said f me and i agree, even as i understand what he meant was  more of my moods and character that changes every moment in time. I  wear so much roles and and habits in my life that i have lost touch with who I truly am.

Hence there came a time earlier in my life when i decided to do a little research as to who or what I truly am while existing on this plane of my corporeal existence. 

I decided that I have to shed my veils and unmask myself, like the peeling of the onion layer by layer until I reach the center or last peel.

The masks is just one aspect of my personality, one form or image of who I am and itself comes in myriads of form, sorrow, anger, happy, jubilation. dejected, and a host of other psycho emotional traits that a single face can wear..

It comes in all shapes and colors, of beauty and ugliness,  of  of Love and hate, the masks reflects my inner being, projecting my mental formations into the external world.

The masks i wore and still do are like a protective visor that riot police uses to keep from being splashed with an acid bath or the Ray Ban sunglasses that Highway Patrol police officers wear to keep their victims from detecting their emotions and intentions , like what lies behind those dark shades!  

Wearing Masks is an art that takes some practice to become the character that you have assumed and it may not always be the good character.

Choose your mask well !