The Dog of the Buddhas Set Out

Venerable Josho Adrian (who called himself “The Dog of the Buddhas”) walked over one hundred kilometres on foot, in robes, through the roads, hills and mountains of our country, Romania; and he did it twofold, this time. Two pilgrimages in one. Two seemingly distinct reasons, one and the same heart.

The first pilgrimage was for a friend. The second, for a dog.

He had set out from Bucharest for Cluj with a statue of Kṣitigarbha in his luggage, wrapped with the kind of care only those who have once carried a Buddha in their hands can understand. The statue was meant to reach Silviu, a dear collaborator an FPMT colleague, an old Companion on the road of Dharma, a practitioner since 1995. The original plan had been for Josho to walk the ten kilometres between Cluj and Florești on foot, in robes, as a silent offering. Silviu, however, equally dedicated to his infant daughter’s schedule, proposed something simpler: a meeting at his workplace, in Cluj.

And Venerable Josho went.

🙏

He brought the statue, he brought the offerings from us, his FPMT colleagues (toys, books and some rice and gems from our Mandala); he sat and talked, he performed the service together with him right there, in the office where curious colleagues watched in wonder an Amidaji monk. He gave him advice as a Brother, not as a Saint; he encouraged him to come with the little girl to the stupa at Tranișu, to circumambulate it together. Because Silviu has FAITH, he has devotion to the Buddhas, he has heaps of accumulated merit, I am very sure this friendship will grow and benefit so many other sentient beings!

Silviu, a colleague with such a generous heart, gave him in return gifts only a practitioner can truly treasure: a small statue of Tara, containing Her Mantra and the four Dharmakāya relics; other small statues of Shakyamuni and Padmasambhava; mantras, images, tiny scrolls the size of a palm. And something else: DVDs with the entire Tibetan canon; Kangyur and Tengyur; a treasure Venerable Josho had been seeking for years, so he could place them in the stupa he will be building this year. He received the Vajra Cutter Sutra in a scroll so small it seems impossible an entire teaching on emptiness could have fit there; he received Mani pills; the Dharani Extremely Conquering from Bondage. We rejoice! The gift of Dharma is the supreme gift.

Then the first pilgrimage came to a close.

What followed was something else.

The next day, at six in the morning, Josho set out from Cluj in his robes, with the fifty-litre rucksack strapped to him, with water, with vitamins, with a small statue of green Tara in his pocket. Forty-two kilometres on the first day: the wilderness past Gârbău, the hills he calls “Bardo,” the village of Dumbrava, the E60 expressway with cars flying centimetres past him, the village of Inucu where he stopped with a tired face and an intact smile. The phone wouldn’t charge anymore. The vitamins did their work. At every spring, at every rock, at every place that asked for his attention, he stopped and recited prayers for the beings of that place.

We rejoice!

He met Nepalese and Sri Lankan workers.

Buddhists, far from home; far from any temple; far from any spiritual comfort in their own language. And Venerable Josho, who at his work receives no salary and who at his temple pays for everything from donations, stopped at the side of the road, recited Refuge prayers with them, gave them the contact details for our community, for Ven. Tenzin Gendun, for Ven. Migmar Dragpo Repa, for the stupa. Because the Buddha-Dharma knows no borders, and because a monk who is truly a monk never walks past a thirsty soul without giving water.

He reached his beloved guesthouse in Izvoru Crișului by evening. The Hungarian lady, who loves him the way only mothers learn to love, made him tomato soup and once again pressed a jar of yummy zacuscă into his hand. “The soup of the gods” – that’s what he called it. I told him that since the soup was red, it was perfect for my Kurukulle day; and I began reciting, in my Bucharest, five hundred Kurukulle mantras for him.

The next day, on the road through Sâncraiu and Huedin: offerings received from strangers, a pie from a driver who crossed the road specifically for him, cakes from passers-by, well-wishes from people who had never seen a Buddhist monk eating at the side of the road before.

He reached Tranișu on Saturday. The stupa.

And from there he went down.

That descent he made for the dog Mahakala – Floppy Mahakala – a dog he had known personally, a soul he had loved. Marius, our colleague and FPMT coordinator from Cluj, had told him the grave was nearby, walking distance, but there were no markers. Josho searched. He searched in warm weather, with his bald head burning in the sun, with his battery dying, with no signal. It would have been easy to turn his back and leave.

In the end he found the place.

Josho performed the service there. The whole of it. The Nembutsu Liturgy for the dog Mahakala; many other prayers; a list of people he mentioned by name, one by one, so they would receive the Merit. He even made an offering for me there, at the edge of a place without a name. He visualized the dog clearly, like a friend coming to meet you; and the dog’s friends – the great dogs of the area – passed by without barking. With respect. Animals always recognise the presence of those who have come to love.

He climbed back up to the E60, waved at cars without anyone stopping, sat in the shade at a bus stop near Drăgan and waited. At 16:36 he boarded a bus, dusty, sunburnt, fed up, “rugged” as he himself put it. “I am a dog, the dog of the Buddhas.”

I think it was something more than that.

I think a man who walks one hundred kilometres on foot for a statue he leaves in the hands of a friend, and then again for a dog he can no longer see except with the eyes of his mind, is someone who understands something the rest of us only fumble after. I think this pilgrimage was led by Mahakala himself; that’s what Josho told me at one point, on the road, and I felt the same. I think the blessings of Kṣitigarbha flowed through the hands that held the statue, over Silviu’s house, over his little girl, over everything we see and do not see.

And I think no one ever forgets a dog who loved them.

Thank you, Venerable Josho Adrian; my brother. For the road you walked. For the gifts you received and the gifts you gave. For all the beings who benefited and for those who will yet benefit. For Floppy Mahakala, who was the heart and the destination of this pilgrimage.

The Dog of the Buddhas set out for the glory of all the Buddhas and the welfare of all sentient beings.

And he arrived.