The Buddha Smile

The director of research, who is second to the deputy oil minister of a certain country, has been following up on our project recently. The current director has just been installed, temporarily. He is an interim officer, trying to prove his worth to keep his position permanent. Thus, he meddles with the project more often. Though he has the right to do it since this is their [government] project and they paid a huge amount for it, the way he handles the development is terrible and irrational or better yet, simply stupid [in an earthly, egoistic sense of the word – please forgive the labelling. :) ] .

Consider these:

• Since we are setting up a pilot plant inside one of their country’s huge petrochemical zones, he wants our company to pay for the insurance of all the buildings, plants, and complexes surrounding our unit.

Well, he can probably just ask us to insure the whole nation then. We are not even working on any nuclear device. We just simply want to produce a monomer, which of course they wanted us to do. He probably expects that if something goes wrong, it will cause the total annihilation of their country or at least the whole city.

• He wants our company to pay for the salaries of all the complex’s employees.

According to him, they only have one research project as of the moment, which is [unfortunately] the one we are working on. Thus, all the employees inside the complex, including the drivers, security guards, janitors, and the like are now only ‘working’ for us and we should be billed for their salaries while we are busy with the commissioning of our unit.

• Even during meetings, he throws senseless and other illogical points which make you wonder why he became a director.

There was even one time when I was representing my boss in a meeting with him and I was taking the minutes, he looked straight at me and said, “Tell your doctor [referring to my PhD boss] that if he wants his money, he has to come here [referring to his country] and CRY for it!”. Well, I just looked at him with a smirk on my face and responded, “Don’t worry I will surely put that on record!”. He was quite surprised with my answer. Perhaps he thought it would scare me a bit.  He tried to take it back explaining that it was really difficult for them to obtain the budget, and that they have to literally cry for it. However, I already know that what he was saying was full of crap. I know that the budget has long been approved by their congress / legislation and that the money is just sitting in the bank waiting for us. Thus, whatever he said to take it back did not matter anymore. Unfortunately for him, I really wrote it down in the meeting minutes. My boss attached it to his letter to the director and copied to everyone including the director’s superior. Funny thing is, the director then sent a reply and explained that he was misquoted. He meant TRY instead of CRY. For an average English speaker like him, I still can not figure out the grammar behind his statement if I will replace CRY with TRY. Our colleague who happens to be a native of their country who was also in the meeting told me that the director even translated it into their own language. And to make the letter more interesting, the director then noted, “Due to the confidentiality of the information, only send your correspondences directly to me without copying other personnel.”

There was also one meeting that our lead engineer was already furious with the director. Though we can not imagine our lead engineer being mad since he is very patient and even if he is angry, he still is very soft and smiles. The director keeps on pushing about safety at work [safety helmets, shoes, and stuff] and us not following the safety procedure. Their safety team really keeps a good eye on us and immediately reports to the management even if, just for an instance, we forgot to wear a helmet. Though I agree, that safety is  really important, what is interesting is, their employees are not even doing it. And what’s worse, when the director comes to the site, he is accompanied with several managers who are not even wearing their helmets. And in the meeting, our lead engineer got so irritated that he told the director, “You keep on insisting that we have to follow the safety measures which we really do. But your employees are not even complying. I even have pictures of you and your team inside the pilot plant without safety helmets!”. Perhaps, the director got really scared that after the meeting, he instructed the security guards to confiscate the camera of our lead engineer. And of course, our lead engineer did not give in.

And after doing and saying all these things, he really finds time to talk you out of it telling you, ”it was never meant to be like that” – and other kinds of sh*t!

Aside from what I have mentioned above, there are already several instances and encounters which will really make you perhaps conclude why their country is at it’s current state --- it is because they have such ‘interesting’ leaders. 

And why am I telling you this?

I came to a point that I decided to be cold at them, especially to the director. Even if he comes to our control room and greets me and shakes my hand, I just simply greet him too and take his hand then turn my back and continue with my work. Even if we meet inside the complex, along the corridors or in the lobby, I just nod at him with a poker face. I keep on telling myself that I am not feeding my ego with this because I am simply being cold. I am not mad and I am not even retaliating, or am I?

In spite of this, something within, perhaps my AWARENESS, is telling me that I am still nourishing my ego. I can feel a sense of satisfaction every time I ignore him. I can even see that ‘evil’ grin on my face every time I turn my back. Yet, it was yesterday when the director shook my hand again to greet that I realized that there was something which doesn’t seem right. My CONSCIOUSNESS was AWARE that my EGO was at work. From then on, I decided to stop acting cold for even if I did not react furiously of his actions, my coldness was simply an act of retaliation, a revenge orchestrated by my EGO --- signifying that it still does exist and reside in me.

With this, I have come to understand why an enlightened soul, a being devoid of ego, only smiles even if, from our earthly and egoistic perspective, his pride, dignity has been stepped upon. I have come to comprehend that even if someone slaps his cheek, he offers the other side; even if the people stones him to death, he still continues to wear that Buddha Smile.

By understanding this I may have acquired the knowledge yet it is in doing that we may gain the wisdom of the wise. I still have a long journey to take.

Namaste.