Sigrid Guzman:
I'd like to ask about technologies in environmental issues.
Satish Kumar:
Abdel Hamed:
I think that most of the people in the room agree with you about what you
say and find it so inspiring, and it's true but once we leave this room and
go outside very little of these beautiful things are around us, I mean,
distractions come from everywhere, the pressure comes from everyone and
everywhere, from inside and outside - it's true. And throughout history,
people who use to live that way were very few. It has been always the
privilige of the few to live this pure way, so do think that it's possilbe
to live universally with this world view. i mean no new light, sitting
under the tree and everybody loves each other and cares for each other.
doesn't that not sound so utopian for us. the development of human
civilisation, these days. Do you think human beings can do it? Just get rid
of all this???
Satish Kumar:
I am an optimist, and as an optimist I will say that even if the entire
world cannot be changed tommorow, even if we cannot bring about a very pure
society tommorow, it is better to make a small beginning. That's why at the
end of my talk I said "it is better to light a candle, than curse the
darkness." If you have a room full of darkness, and light one candle, there
is a little light. Inspired by your candle, someone else might light
another candle, and there would be a little more light. And another
candle. Each one of us in this room can light at least one candle. You don't
have to be a great heroic genius to light, to make a new light, and
enlighten the whole world. You all can light one candle. That's all I'm
asking. when you eat your food - that's a simple thing you are doing. You
are eating food. Just ask "what are you eating?" Simple candle. What are
you eating? Is it good food? Or bad food? That's all - simple. Is it
healthy food, or unhealthy food. that's all I'm asking. I'm not asking you
to change the whole world. I'm asking you to eat right food.That's all. Is
it too difficult for you?
You go out and buy Coca-Cola. Ask yourself "Am I drinking right drink?"
That's all. Is it a big heroic task is it? ?? "Oh it's too difficult! I
can't stop drinking Coca Cola. Oh, water drinking is too hard. Such a hard
thing to drink water." Do you know what Coca Cola is? You might be
thinking it's a harmless drink. I was reading the annual report of Coca
Cola.They are saying that in the world, in China, in Japan there are 48
billion drinks taken [each day] and drunk by ordinary people in the world.
So I think that these realistic people say that making the world a nice
place is too hard, that what I am saying is too hard. it is not too hard.
Eat good food. When you are eating, do you cook? Learn to cook. Simple.
Mahathma Gandhi said "if you want to change India, you want to make India
independent, start to spin the spinning wheel. You want to make India
independent, clean the streets with broom. The journey I made for two and a
half years around the world, to Moscow, Paris, London, Washington - 8000
miles, but the journey started with one step. Another step, another step
thats all. I must take only one step at a time. I was not thinking I'm
going to walk 8000 miles in one go. You cannot do it. But if you walk every
step, you can get there, in two and a half years. When you say "ah, walking
to Moscow is so far, walking to Washington is so far - 8000 miles - how can
I do it? Satish is asking me to do too much. It's too hard work. It's not
hard work. Human beings are potentially so much capable that we don't know
how capable we are. we think we are small and insignificant. We are all
Buddhas in our beings. we are Gandhis. We are. We are potentially great
beings, but our media, our education, our industry, has made us into
commodities, into units, into labour, into just an insignificant person in
their office. So think of the potential you have.
You are young now. at this moment you are not optimistic? At this moment
you are not ?? go out and walk the world? And then you think about this. So
don't allow yourself to be overcome by pessimism, at this stage in your
life. You can change your life. And by changing your life, you'll affect
your friends life, you'll be an example. You will be happy and free. Even
if the world did not change, you'll be eating good food. and you will be
drinking good water. And you will be wearing good clothes, and that's a
good beginning for us. never mind what it is you change. So let us not be
pessimistic. Let us be optimistic. Thank you.
Mayumi Hayashi:
(ommision) I really like the idea about time and I appreciate that. But
there are so many people who suffer there own death, like people who have
HIV or cancer. Can you still face that people who's time is coming. For
them losing time and death is coming. And if your answer is yes, could you
give me an example please?
Satish Kumar:
Yes. The most important thing, when you are faced with someone who is
suffering from AIDS, or cancer, or some terminal disease, or some great
difficulty. At the time, the most fundamental and important act for us is
to make that person feel that that person is not alone. That person has
friends. That person has someone who can care. At the moment we say "send
that person to hospital." Put them aside, shut them out. Then, for them,
time is a burden. But if you take the example of Mother Theresa, in
Calcutta. She saw this when she was a young novice ??, a young sister
Theresa, she saw this old man, dying in the street. She forgot she was a
sister. She was overcome by compassion. She lifted this person off the
rickshaw and said "lets take this person somewhere" and went to some
Catholic home, and this person was surprised to hear this.?? Sister Theresa
was coming, and coming with an old man in a rickshaw. She said "look, we
can't allow this old man to die like this. Dying, he had a bed of dignity??
Illness will always be there, but the ??? is the suffering - sometimes
heart disease, sometimes aids, sometimes cancer, sometimes something else,
and different ages we have different diseases. It's the solidarity of
humans, and caring for humans, and giving the feeling that "we love you,
and we are with you, and don't worry about your need, we will give you." If
we can create that feeling, there for that person, time is not a burden. At
the moment, we have become so busy, we have not time to care. Therefore we
leave it in the professionals hands, and professionals have no time,
because they have 20 people in the queue, so two-minutes here, two-minutes
there, five- minutes there, five minutes there. No time, and they are
waiting for time has become a burden. We are so many human beings who take
care. We are here, so let us create a new kind of system where caring can
be more important. And sharing can be more important. And giving time to
each other can be more important, than just "making money for myself."
(ommission)
Isusu Ishikawa:
What do you think of young people and education?
Satish Kumar:
You know young people need to learn how to read, and how to write. Our
governments are obsessed with just this much. They teach you how to read,
how to write, how to add, how to get a job. There is much more to
education. Education should be about life. And education has to be formal,
as well as informal. Tommorow when my friend Paul Leslie talks about his
work, you will hear about informal education. I started a school in my
Bud: 53.48
I would like to ask you about knowledge that you built to understand that
respect and trust through (ommission) nations that has different cultural
background. I order to build through understanding and respect and trust
among the nations which has a different cultural background. What are we
supposed to do?
Satish Kumar:
Um, Particularly since this is a young audience, and I'm not addressing
politicians, not addressing military people, and not addressing the media,
and they are not here, so I'll address this question to the young. And for
young people, like you are here from Mongolia, it is important to travel,
to understand other cultures, and to travel is very different from being a
tourist. Don't confuse tourism with travel. Tourism is oppressive, and
tourism is distructive, and creates to much ecological problems, and social
problems. But travel light. Travel without demands. Travel to learn about
other cultures. When you are a tourist you want that country to provide you
with facilities like nightclubs, good hotels, good food and booze,this,
that and the other. But if you are a traveller you go through very lightly,
and learn how their culture is, how they live. And you moderate ?? your
Brian Nikon (Canada):
Myo Min Htut(Burma):
I would like to ask what's of the daring. Daring is as I understand -
fearless, to (ommission) act belief. Not daring (ommission) we are to face
to fight for our democracy movement. Everybody was daring to fight, but
mentally it isn't enough, physically it is not enough (ommission). This
daring is based upon the fearless. We must be freedom from fear. How to be
brought up to be freedom from fear. (ommission)
Satish Kumar:
In Burma, your democracy movement is a great example for the world. It is a
great inspiration to all the people who are struggling, and how your
movement is setting a great example, and therefore I would like to
congratulate you, and through you, the entire movement in Burma for being
such courageous leaders. (applause)I would like to say that being daring is
a journey, being free from fear is a journey, it is a quest, it is a
pilgrimage. It is not something that is there already.You have to make a
journey, and if sometimes you fail, then you succeed. Don't be even afraid
of failure. We are auite often afraid to fail. Failure is a springboard for
success. Failure is a compost in which the beautiful flowers glow. If you
are a afraid of compost, how can you love flowers. So failure is a compost.
Failure is a springboard. So don't be afraid of failure. The second is
don't be afraid of difficulties. Difficulties and obstacles are part of
life. Without difficulties and obstacles life would be too boring. Too
boring. Too smooth. For example I said about travel, and tourism. Tourism
is without adventure. Your airplane is booked, your hotel is booked, your
taxi's are booked, your guidebooks are there, your guides are waiting for
you, when you arrive at the airport there is somebody holding a name for (applause)
The question of technology is very important, and technology is good if it
is used by humans, to enhance their work. But if the technology becomes the
dominant power, and human beings are controlled by that technology, that
technology becomes oppressive. At the moment, our technology has become
oppressive. We, human beings, human societies, are very much controlled,
and dominated, and guided by technology. Therefore, my answer would be to
use technology sparingly. use technology only when it is really necessary.
And keep technology under your control. Technology is for humans; humans
are not for technology. And this body is a great technology. Use your body
more, use your hands more, and legs more, and brains more, rather than
become dependent on technology. But where technology helps you, use it. So
I'm not against technology, but I'm against domination by technology. We
should not be dominated by technology.
Do you know what the share of Coca Cola is? Only one billion. So they say
one billion down, 47 billion to go. That's there motto - to conquer the
world. Lets forget about green tea, ocha and mugi cha, and ma cha, and
drink Coca Cola. Mcdonalds, they advertise on how many millions of
hamburgers they are selling every day, and opening in China, in Moscow, in
every street in Kyoto. I am asking you a very simple thing. I am asking you
to make nice orange juice in your house, and drink it, and don't drink Coca
Cola. Is it very hard?
village in Hartlet ?? in England. And I said "everybody needs to eat." Our
schools don't teach children how to grow food, how to cook food, how to
serve food, they don't teach it. They just teach you books - reading,
writing. In my school, we will start to teach children how to grow food in
the garden, and how to cook food every day. So for the last sixteen years
in my school, every day, lunch has been prepared by the children - the
soup, the bread, the rice, the wonderful vegetables - freshly cooked every
day. Children get a good lunch. And you know, if you want good eduction,
you must give children a good lunch. You cannot get good education on bad
lunch. On bento. Is it bento? Good Bento! Oishi bento! In the same way,
children should learn other skills of life. And they should learn values in
education. You can teach them to read and write, but if they read rubbish,
it is better to be illiterate, than to learn reading and writing and read
something rubbish. So children need to learn to discriminate between good
reading and bad reading. And children need to learn to use their hands.
They need to learn to respect handiwork. Cleaning a floor, washing the
dishes, washing the clothes, is not a dirty job. Mahatma Gandhi was
cleaning the toilets. Adam was telling you, in his center, they clean the
toilets. In my college, we started ?? Schumacher College. I am there,
director of Programs, I teach there, but also I cook every week, and I do
washing up dishes. It's respectable, dignified work. In eduction, we should
teach children to respect work. Work is a sacred activity. Work is
something to express yourself. So I would say, in education we should teach
life skills. At Schumacher College, I have some literature outside about
Shumacher College, where we are bring about education to adults as well,
because education is not just in the school, and when you are sixteen,
education finishes, or when you are 21 finishing your university, education
finishes. Education is a life-long process. When you are too old to learn,
you are too old to live. So at Schumacher College, you get the literature
about it, we are teaching only three hours of intellectual work. Every day
we begin the day with period of meditation, and then we all go out work.
Somebody cooking, somebody cleaning, somebody working the garden, somebody
is doing something else. Physical manual labour - bread labour. Mahatma
Gandhi was very keen on it. And then 10 o'clock, when you have done your
cooking, when you have done your cleaning, when you have prepared the lunch
- then you come into the classroom. And you have lectures. And we have
lectures from James Lovelock, from Tesho Kapra ??, from Hazel Henderson,
from Henry Lovins ?? from wonderful teachers. We live there, we work there
with the students. And then in the afternoon, we go out in Nature, and
learn from Nature, not just from Tesho Kapra, and James Helman, and all the
great teachers like James Lovelock and Hazel Henderson. And Bandanashiva ??
We learn from the trees, learn from the rivers,learn from the mountains. So
learning from nature is also increment, in the afternoon. Children should
be taken out in the open. If you cannot have children going out, and only
in the classroom, that is not good education. Good education must have
formal, and informal. Indoor and outdoor education. Then, in the evening,
you can share the other students - you will not only learn from the
teachers, the masters - they have good wisdom, you can learn from them -
but you learn from each other, and teach other. In our small school in
Hartland, the older children teach younger children. So they're already
learning how to take care of young people. Even when they are fifteen, they
are learning how to take care of nine, ten, eleven year olds. So this way,
making education more holistic. You know the word holistic? In Japanese you
have the word "holistic." Which means not specialised, but you learn
everything. Everything is connected. Evrything is inter-related. So
education should be holistic - meaning whole, complete, life education, and
not just education of the mind, education of the brain, education of the
intellect. So our education at the moment has become too specialised, and
we need to liberate it, and make it more holistic. Thank you.
needs according to their hospitality - what they are prepared to offer. So
hospitality is very different from consumer tourism. So young people I
would say, should travel. Travel with light-footedness, light-heartedness,
light-touch, so that you will not create any problem to anybody. And you
learn. You live in people's hopes. Exchange. Exchange. And this way you
will see that like a garden, you have a thousand flowers. And that garden
looks more beautiful becuase it has many colours, it has many birds, it has
many creatures. In the same way the world is a garden. And this garden will
be a very poor garden - you have only one race, one English language, one
kind ?? of education, dictated by Harvard, or Oxford, or Cambridge, or
University of Kyoto. So you need to have many languages, many cultures,
many customs, many kinds of food, and that variety, diversity needs to be
respected. Cultural diversity, like biodiversity, so when you learn through
your travel, you will learn to respect, and you will learn as I did. People
are everywhere compassionate and kind. People are everywhere generous. I
walked for two-and-a-half years without a single yen in my pocket. Without
a single yen. For two-and-a-half years. And I survived. Just imagine, if
you go for two-and-a-half years around the world, how much money you need.
I took not a single yen. I found Russians - the communists, the Americans -
the Capitalists, the Muslims in Iran and Afghanistan, the Jews, the Bahais,
the Buddhists, in Japan, and Shinto, and Daoist; all religions, all
political systems, I found people just people. If you had in your mind "Oh
you're going to be Buddhist, and you are a Hindu, you are going to be a
Christian, you are a Buddhist, you are going to be a Muslim, you are a Jew,
you have lost the case ?? You have to go to understand the diversity, the
variety, the differences, and yet you say there is a common humanity
everywhere. So that is how you appreciate the cultures that are different,
and realise and respect them - deeply and profoundly.
Thank you Satish, and I'd just like to say firstly that I'm really inspired
by the things that you say, and my comment is that there is one main
obstacle, and it has to do with your third word "daring." And the problem
is everyone here, and I think any reasonable person would like to make
those changes in their lives - to go on such a walk - but, the problem is
that you feel alone, or you feel fear, and you feel that if you make that
first step, that you will be alone, and that no-one will support you, and
so it's that fear behind you that is holding all these people back, so I
think that what we have to do, is conquer that fear first (ommission) and
let these people know that they will be supported if they take the first step.
you, and taxi's waiting. That's too boring! Too boring! When you go
travelling you have a book called Lonely Planet Guide and you go to the
same hotel that everybody goes, and stay in the say Ryokan where everybody
else stays. If you really want to go travelling, leave your Lonely Planet
guide behind. So difficulties should be embraced. And uncertainty should be
embraced and welcomed. If you have uncertainty, and difficulty and problems
- that's the challenge. Will you rise to the challenge? Now you have
difficulty - that is when you have to ask somebody - that is when you
communicate, like our Mongolian friend asked me, "how do you communicate
with other people?" If you have your guides in English, and all your
guidebooks, and all your hotels booked, you don't have to ask any local
person "where is a nice hotel, or where is a nice restaurant, or where
should I go and which is the best temple to visit?" You don't ask anybody.
When you ask them they usually are so kind, and so waiting for everybody to
tell you. Give you information. But if you don't ask, how do you get
information ?? I wanted to make a telephone call from Osaka to my friend
Bob, and I didn't have a 100 yen coin, and this woman, she was young and
she spoke English, she said, "oh yes, I'll find for you." And she took me
and went somewhere, and brought five 100yen pieces. So helpful. If you
don't ask somebody, how can you (ommission) So, never be afraid of failure,
never be afraid of difficulties, and problems, becuase that is the human
ingenuity, that you can use your creative imagination. You can use. If you
have difficulty, you have problems, if you have hardship, and struggle, and
conflict. They are allcompost, to grow good flowers, and that is the way to
be free from fear, because if you go into the fear, and find out what it is
to be afraid - I went into Pakistan, and I found that they are human
beings. Then your fear is gone, but if you just stay in India and say "oh
the Pakistani's. I read in my newspaper they are all Muslims, and they
don't like Hindu's. I'll never go to Pakistan." That is where fear is. So,
when I was leaving India, I said to my friends, "if I don't return back
home, please don't worry.If I die in this journey, without food or somebody
kills me or animals kill me or something, please don;t worry. Don't be
afraid of death. If you are afraid of death, you cannot love life. If you
don't life, don't appreciate life, you should be free of fear from death. I
went on to say ?? "if I don't come back home. It doesn't matter - I have to
die one day. If I die walking for peace what a great ?? way to die. So
don't be afraid of death, and you are not afraid of death, what else? All
other fears are gone, if you are not afraid of death.The biggest fear which
is in our subconcious, in our hearts, is fear of death. I might die,
therefore I won't do anything. we are so concerned that we don't enjoy
life. We don't celebrate life. We don't take any risks and adventure, and
go anywhere. So don't be afraid of failure. Don't be afraid of death, and
don't be afraid of (ommission). That's the way to be free from fear. Thank
you very much!