It all started when I began to read the Autobiography of a Yogi by the famous Yogi—Paramahamsa Yogananda. It was the only book found in Steve Jobs’ iPad as he was gone, and hundreds of copies of the book were also given away during his memorial service. It was also the favourite book of Beatles member George Harrison, who freely gave away a copy to others from a large stock in his home. It gives you an idea how much these two men valued the book.
Yogananda preaches the “science of religion”—or a methodical way of people to become union with God. Among other things, it is mostly done through regular meditation. He founded the Self Realisation Fellowship (SRF) to get his message to every part of the world. Now SRF has local centres in many countries in the world, and it happens to have one in Hong Kong as well.
One week before Christmas, I found the website of SRFHK and sent them an email to see if I can visit them. A woman replied that they have Sunday meditation sessions which welcome me to join. It is from half nine to half eleven, in a private location in Discovery Bay. She said, if I was interested, she would wait for me near the Discovery Bay Pier and walk me there.
I decided to visit them on the Sunday just before Christmas. I woke up quite early to get to Central Pier Three and took the ferry to Discovery Bay. Meeting there was a brown woman, and I immediately knew that it was the respondent of my email. She is from Malaysia, and is a law professor in a local university. We walked for about five to ten minutes, along with a discussion of Hong Kong’s policies of data protection, before arriving at a small house near the pier.
We entered the cellar of the house. Inside it was decorated like a meditation centre. Pictures of the saints were seen on the altar at the front, and seating pillows were arranged row by row. Sandy explained that the rent in Hong Kong is expensive, so they have to use the home of a member for their weekly practice. To protect the owner’s privacy, this is why they do not disclose the location on their website.
In silence we waited for other members to arrive, and the group eventually got six people. The host of the session (though not the owner of the house) was a Spanish bloke in his early thirties. When it finally began, the session alternate between chanting, prayer and meditation. The structure roughly looks like this:
— Starting prayer and chanting (5 minutes)
— Meditation (10 minutes)
— Chanting (5 minutes)
— Meditation (30 minutes)
— Chanting (5 minutes)
— Meditation (60 minutes)
— Closing prayer (5 minutes)
One remarkable thing is that some of the chanting was done in Sanskrit. They do provide me a booklet with the English pronunciation of the words so that I could hum along. Below each line of the pronunciation, there is also translation of the meaning as well, so at least I have got some idea what I was chanting about.
I think this structure makes a lot of sense, especially for newcomers like me. The duration of the meditation increases progressively from ten minutes to one hour, with short intervals of chanting in-between, which are effectively resting periods. It slowly prepares people to get into the mental state for quietly sitting a long time.
Even though I am not completely new to meditation, it is the first time I did it for such a long period. While there are short resting intervals, I found it an isometric exercise of the strength of my inner thigh and lower back. I would not recommend it to those who are new to meditation and just want to “try it out” for the first time. I would also have reservation for those who are not open to alternative spiritual or religious practice. However, if you are into meditation and spiritualism, with considerable experience of doing it on your own, then this could be a pretty good experience for you.
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