3rd Seven day

I observed a vegetarian diet on thursday, my personal vow to dad for every 7 days till 49 days. During the ritual, I read through the entire diamond sutra about 100 pages long, following the Sangha's chant, not daring to miss anything. I hope my concentration and sincerity can help dad in any way.

I am thankful that dad and mom send me to a chinese centric primary school Pei chun primary. Unfortunately i did not learn enough about filial piety but that is another story to tell.

With my strong chinese background I was able to recite and make sense of many parts - although not all- of the sutra. the ceremony took 38 mins - which also includes the heart sutra. Beside my dad's altar was another family, it appears that the entire family and relatives are here, on the contrary I am the only one around, my sis has to work, my mom has to take care of my kids and we are a small family thus I am the only one who can come. My boss is a kind man and when i told him i need to do this he was very supportive and gave me time off, blessings be upon him.

I donated around 100 sutra recital machines(SRM) on behalf of dad, using his money to the Amitabha society and the kind gentleman from the amitabha society specially had the goods delivered to the buddhist lodge on the same day for distribution. the 'machines' are MP3 player sized players and they have an internal memory which uses MP3 format for the recitals. He told me that I should recite the following when i am there:

以此捐赠之各式念佛机之功德，回向极乐国民徐玉和，莲品上增

I took one of the SRM for my mom, the staff asked if i want to take another one with different sutra, i thought that it would be good to leave to be distributed to others for their good karma.

I passed the SRM to my mom and showed her how to use it, i will try to get the books on the sutra so she can read and listen at the same time, most importantly is for her to understand the sutras as it has been said:

念经不如识经，识经不如行经

before i sleep, I recited quietly the heart sutra to dad, again hopefully to do him good.