Let me tell you to clear all these misunderstandings, otherwise all of you will misunderstand the contact person as well. […] And we worked day and night. I was always on the phone, and I sent disciples here and there. I signed a check, I sent the money, I called to send the money. We spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and manpower, hundreds of people, to pack the presents – day and night. And I had to maneuver all these things over my health. […] And then, you know what? And that was just after my surgery. I had to have an operation, even a small one, but it made my whole body paralyzed. I couldn’t even walk. I couldn’t even take a bath. I couldn’t eat for two days. But the second day, I had to go for the Veterans Memorial.
But even before I went, I had to take charge of all these arrangements, all these changes, make all these decisions. My attendant could not do it. I had to do everything. They helped me to call on the telephone, but everything had to be made by me. Even when I lie in bed with all the compressors, I still had to dictate many things to do. And I had to take the telephone in bed. I couldn’t even rest after the operation. I had to work immediately. The first minute when I got home after the anesthetic wore out, I had to take the telephone already. So don’t blame me, please. I don’t tell you all this to let you know that I work very hard, but because you misunderstand too much because of this. […]
And then after the ceremony in the morning, I was so cold and chilly just after the operation, I couldn’t even walk. They had to carry me to the car, and carry me to the airplane, carry me up to the staircase and down and up. Because I couldn’t walk, the leg just didn’t move. I took medicine but it takes time, and the anesthetic makes people “crazy.” And it hurt! Wow! It hurt me like every time I coughed, it’s like somebody was stabbing a knife in my stomach and my chest. Because I just had an operation, and when I coughed, it was really suffering. And all that I carried with me to the airplane, to the Veterans party and to you, to last night’s opera. I was fainting at the opera, nobody knew. I had to cover my face so that nobody could see how bad I looked. But I looked glamorous, but inside I felt very, very “rotten.” Nobody knew. Because I don’t want to make you worry, but since today my cousin, he complained, I don’t want him to misunderstand the contact person, because she truly doesn’t know, because sometimes we cannot get in contact so quickly because of the telephone. Because we are on the road, we are not in our headquarters, so we don’t have ten telephones or five telephone lines. We have only whatever we have at that disciple’s house – one telephone and another cellular telephone which doesn’t work sometimes.
And you know what it’s like with cellular phones, I don’t know why it doesn’t work. It’s very expensive for nothing. And sometimes the telephone burns out because too many faxes and telephone [calls] together, and it burns. Really, it burns. And then we had to stay there and tell people to come and fix it for two, three hours, or sometimes had to let it rest for one hour to cool down. It had a fever. You don’t know all these things. I don’t want to tell you, but otherwise you misunderstand a great deal about how I work, how I lead my life. I truly don’t have time. Even just to arrange for tickets, it takes a lot of time; and when you change it, well, it takes more time and more money, all the time. Every time you change tickets, you have to pay more money. And that doesn’t even make them happy, because you make a mess for their work. They’d rather have it smoothly, and you change it three, four times for 11 persons, three ships (planes), they don’t like it. So anyhow, that’s that. And the telephone burned out many times in L.A.
And there are many other things. Sometimes, I wanted to rest, and then the disciples kept sneaking in like I keep secrets from them. They just sneak from the back door, from the garage door, just make an excuse to look at me, and then just make many problems. I can never have time to recharge. Sometimes, I’m so tired that I want to recharge. People never know what’s enough. I give you all the things I have. Everything that I can give, I give already. But some of you always demand more. I don’t know why. If you truly have faith in me, you must know. You must know I will arrange it to see you when it’s time. And I’ll give you how much you need.
You don’t always demand of me too much; especially this guy. He wants to put me in his pocket all the time and take care of (And never lets You go.) and never let go. And then I have to take care of his daughter and his whatever. I thank you for your love, but you must know, we should share it with everybody. You see how I sacrifice my family members. They didn’t see me for some years. My cousin didn’t see me for two years! (More than two years. Two and a half years.) Two and a half years? Really? Wow, I’m sorry, it took so long. And many more cousins didn’t have time to see me either. And some of my cousins wanted to come to Taiwan (Formosa) to see me. I said, “Please, don’t come, truly. Don’t be angry, but don’t come, because I don’t know the next day whether I’m still here. And you take all this money and time to come to see me and if I’m not here, you’ll be very sad. Just wait, maybe I’ll come to your country and then you come to see me. It is surer.”
Truly! Many of my cousins or brothers, sisters – you know, cousin-brothers and -sisters wanted to see me everywhere. I said, “No, no, don’t come, just don’t come.” Because I don’t know what I will do next. Sometimes, with the refugees’ program, something’s calling, or some promises in some other country, then I have to fly. Or sometimes there’s a disaster somewhere, or something just comes up. So, I don’t really have time. My parents came to see me. I don’t even come see them. They came to see me for two weeks, and every day I had about two, three hours for them. That’s it. And my sisters cried going home and didn’t have enough of me going back to Âu Lạc (Vietnam), but that’s all I can give.
So actually, I give you more than I give my family. Or at least I give you as much as I can as if you were my family. And you don’t complain anymore. Alright? Truly I neglect my family when it comes to that. You would come to see your friends and your relatives and your cousins, all that. I don’t have time to come and see them and they have to fly all over places to see me. My sister, she flies, whenever I’m in the United States; she flew already four or five times to see me, from different states. And she flew to Hong Kong to see me. They really love me. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have wasted all her time always flying around like that. And she’s smaller than me even, and she doesn’t like flying that much, but she loves me. We grew up together. But even then, I just have to think of the whole world and forget my personal affection. So you know now.
Please don’t blame them. It is all from the tight schedule. Even they only knew that I would be coming here the day before. Because first we already had a schedule arranged that I’d come in the morning even, and then afterwards because of Veterans Day... They invited me at the last minute, so I had to come there and make a speech. And they carried me to the car, and then they wheeled me on the wheelchair to go to the podium to make a speech, and then they wheeled me back on the wheelchair like an invalid, to the wheelchair and then we go to the car, and then they had to carry me to the airplane and carry me anywhere because I couldn’t walk that day. Can you imagine? Just right after the operation, you couldn’t walk, not stably. Sometimes, you can, but it depends on the anesthetic how much they give you. They gave me too much that the whole body was just paralyzed, and after it wore off, it was sore, it ached all over. It’s like all my bones are broken everywhere, and everything hurt. Even when I breathed, it hurt. I talked, it hurt. I coughed, it hurt. But I didn’t want to tell you this. I don’t want to bother you, make you worry.
I’m OK now. I’m better today. I can walk. And sometimes a little dizzy, but I’m better than the first day when I came to see you. They had to carry me everywhere. Truly carried like a baby. If you looked at me, you would feel, “My God, what kind of Master? How come [You] have people carry You?” But I couldn’t walk. I couldn’t walk. And I could walk a few steps with some people carrying me. Otherwise, especially with the staircase and all that, I couldn’t walk. But when I came to Dallas, it’s better. But then that’s why all the programs were just… I couldn’t even change it despite my health. People after operations, they would rest, no? But I didn’t change it anymore because I thought I couldn’t change anymore. I changed three times already. If I don’t come, I’m sure you’ll be very upset. So, even at the last minute, we changed all the air tickets and then we came. We came in two groups. We could only change five tickets. So five people came with me and seven people came before. It’s a topsy-turvy situation. So you had to go and fetch two times from our group. This caused also inconveniences for you.
And then you know what? Carried me on the airplane and then what? Carried me out of the airplane, carried me to the limousine, and I had to dress up right away because before that I was in the cemetery ceremony in the morning, I wore black. And when I went to the opera, I had to look better. So, I had to change in the limousine to make me look suitable for the opera. The two occasions are exactly opposite. One is for the dead people and you can’t wear beautiful things. So, I looked as black as possible – black hat, black dress, everything. So when I went to the opera, I couldn’t go like that. So, I had to change into an evening gown.
And so, as invalid as I was, I had to put on all the dress and all the makeup in the car, and then made myself become a princess the way you saw, with hair and everything. But you didn’t know how much I suffered then. I just looked good! I looked good for you. And then I felt so much pain that I’m sorry I missed some of your singing because I kind of fainted over there. I feel very embarrassed. And I kept ice to keep me awake, but still the drugs make you drowsy. Anyhow, we made it. We made it. I made it so nobody knew anything. And they carried me at the last minute to the opera. Because we changed the schedule for the third time, then I had no more time. Just rushed from the house to the cemetery of the veterans, and then rushed from the cemetery to the airport, and rushed from the airport right to your opera. No time to eat.
I ate nothing from that morning except a few pieces of toast. I had to take some toast and some things to keep me fit. Otherwise, what could I do in your opera? So, I ate only the toast and something, and I took all the medicine that kept me going. And that’s it. And then I ran from six o’clock that morning until that night. And... (And still going after that.) Yeah, still going after that. You see, there were other things going on. You see that? I had no time to even eat that day. And one thing comes after another. You have a bad stomach, you have nothing inside, you have no energy, you just have anesthetics. You need a lot to eat and drink. You need ice, you need things, and then you have nothing! Nothing at all, even food. So, you know what I mean, how much I sacrifice for you.
Now, if you complain, tell me. If you have anything more to complain, just tell me. (Next time tell us when You’re sick, please.) I told you! I think I didn’t tell you, but the friend told you, no? (No one.) When they phoned you, they told you. (Not about the operation. Nobody said You had an operation.) But I think I told you. (We could put that off, way off.) But I think I told you when I first came, also. (Only when You got off the plane.) Yeah. But still, you still demand me for breakfast, for your daughter, for your mother, for anything; still, after you knew. Nobody is sensitive enough (Oh, no. You insisted, next day...) to bother.
I insisted it? (You wouldn’t stop.) Yes, I promised, so I would come. But not nine, eight o’clock in the morning. It’s not necessary to have extra-long hours for me. That’s what it is. So you don’t give this guy anything. You give him a banana, he wants an apple. That’s it. You must know him by now, or not? (Yes.) But that’s good. That’s good. You know what you want. You know what you want. (I’m happy You’re here.) OK. (I’m happy You’re here.) And then you get what you want. That’s very good for business. But you have to turn that strategy to work for outside people, not to catch me, “to catch the fish.” (Look at all these beautiful “fish” You caught.) But that’s what I caught, not you. (You caught. Here.) Next time, you use that strategy to catch “fish.” Not to catch me. You catch the wrong “fish.”
Photo Caption: Looking Toward the Bright Side
