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General Buddhism => General Buddhism => Topic started by: icy on April 19, 2014, 01:22:59 AM
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Please pray for this tragedy involving 457 passengers and crew in South Korea. There are 268 South Koreans yet to be rescued or recovered and these passengers are mainly teenagers.
(http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/images/attachement/jpg/site1/20140419/eca86bd9d54314bbf8ae01.jpg)
A Buddhist monk prays for missing passengers, including many schoolchildren, who were on the South Korean ferry Sewol, which sank off Jindo. The monk accompanied family members who gathered in Jindo on Friday. Issei Kato / Reuters
South Korea investigates vessel's crew members as weather worsens
A junior officer was steering a South Korean ferry when it capsized two days ago, investigators said on Friday, as rescuers battled strong tides and murky waters to search for hundreds of missing, many of them schoolchildren, feared trapped in the vessel.
Local media said the Sewol ferry may have made a sharp turn during its journey on Wednesday, which caused its cargo to shift and the boat to list sharply and begin to sink.
Investigators declined to comment on the reports.
Twenty-eight passengers are listed as dead, 179 have been rescued and 268 are missing, presumed trapped in the vessel, out of 475 passengers and crew. The ship was sailing from the port of Incheon to the holiday island of Jeju.
Many of the missing are teenagers from a school on the outskirts of Seoul, and hopes are fading that any will be found alive.
"We cannot even see the ship's white color. Our people are just touching the hull with their hands," Kim Chun-il, a diver from Undine Marine Industries, told relatives gathered near the site of the rescue effort in the port city of Jindo.
Kim said two divers had to return to the surface when an air pump stopped and said strong tides were impeding the rescue.
Rescuers have pumped air into the vessel, but divers have not yet entered areas of the ship where many of the missing are believed to be.
Coast Guard officials have said the investigation was focused on possible crew negligence, problems with cargo stowage and structural defects of the vessel, although the ship appears to have passed all of its safety and insurance checks.
The captain, Lee Joon-seok, faces criminal investigation, which is standard procedure in South Korea.
Lee, 69, and the company that owns the ship have apologized for the loss of life, although neither has admitted responsibility.
Investigators said Lee may not have been on the bridge at the time of the accident and the vessel was being steered by the third mate, although shipping crew said this was standard practice.
The ferry went down in calm conditions and was following a frequently traveled 400 km route. Although relatively close to shore, the area was free of rocks and reefs.
Captain, crew blamed
Parents of the missing schoolchildren blamed the ship's captain for the tragedy after he and shipping company officials made emotional apologies for the loss of life.
Some heckled South Korean President Park Geun-hye when she visited the site on Thursday.
Witnesses have said that the captain and some of the crew left the vessel while others instructed passengers to remain in place as it began to sink.
Relatives were in mourning overnight in a hospital in Mokpo, close to Jindo, which is acting as a rescue center. Some of them spoke bitterly of the captain.
"How could he tell those young kids to stay there and jump from the sinking ship himself?" said Ham Young-ho, grandfather of 17-year-old Lee Da-woon, who was confirmed dead.
The captain has not made any public statement on whether or why he may have left the vessel before many of the passengers.
Prosecutors and police said Friday they have asked a court to issue arrest warrants for the captain.
The ferry owner's record is also under investigation, and documents were removed from its headquarters in Incheon on Friday.
Chonghaejin Marine Co Ltd, the owner of the vessel, is an unlisted company that operates five ships. It reported an operating loss of 785 million won ($756,000) last year.
According to South Korea's Financial Supervisory Service, a government body, Chonghaejin is "indirectly" owned by two sons of the owner of a former shipping company called Semo Marine that went bankrupt in 1997.
Sewol is 20 years old and built in Japan and was acquired secondhand by the Korean operator.
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Om Mani Padem Hum
We are reminded every day that despite all the planning, advancement in science and engineering, the best of intentions, karma wins.
Let us not waste a day learning and embracing dharma.
I pray that all the passengers on the ferry will be close to dharma.
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Pray & hope that all will be safe and rescued in time. May Buddha bless them and hope the wheather will calm down to allow the rescue team to reach the survivors on board the ferry.Om Mani Padme Hum .
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Pray for all still lost at sea and may all who perished have a good and swift rebirth. Om mani pedme hung. Collective karma is very hard to understand, much more so at these times
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Such a tragic accident. I hope that the weather will be better to enable the rescue teams to search for the missing survivors. For those who perished in this accident, may they have a good rebirth and be near the dharma.
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Less than 40 days after 239 passengers and crews onboard MH370 went missing over the Indian Ocean, the world witnessed another tragedy involving 457 passengers and crews. Again, the vessel went down into the ocean. Life is uncertain, death is certain. May the victims take a swift rebirth. May the families of all affected heal and find closure in their prayer.
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What happened is tragic. As our guru always remind us that life is very fragile. We can past away anytime anywhere. Look at all the teenagers who are still in the ship? Their life is at stake. Who would have guessed that this unfortunate incident would happen putting so many lives at stake?
Let this be a reminder that practising the dharma now is very important for without the dharma, we are at the mercy of our own karma.
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The vice-principal of a South Korean high school who accompanied hundreds of pupils on a ferry that capsized has committed suicide. Kang Min-gyu, 52, had been missing since Thursday. He appeared to have hanged himself with his belt from a tree outside a gym in the port city of Jindo where relatives of the people missing on the ship, mostly children from the school, were gathered. He was one the those rescued from the ferry after it capsized. Such sad news !
Life is precious. Life is impermanent. Life is uncertain. Minds are deluded. When the negative karma opens there is no turning back. Hence before Karma takes on its full strength, practice Dharma, collect merits to help battle the bad times.
Let's pray all who have died in this tragedy will have a good and swift rebirth to be reborn close to the Dharma.
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This is a devastating and sad news. Let us hope and pray for the families and the victims of the ill-fated ferry.
Never question the power of prayers.
May the victims have a swift rebirth and condolence to the families healed and move on with their lives.
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Let's pray for the safety of the remaining of the missing people. For those who have passed on may they have a good and swift rebirth. This is indeed another tragedy after MH370.
OM MANI PADME HUM
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First it was MH370 tragedy and now this. Really sad to read about all the sufferings that people are going thru especially when they cant find those that are missing. I dedicate my merits to all sentient beings that are suffering and may we all be free of suffering in every life and be blessed by 3 jewels always...
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tragedy seems to be on the roll... recently missing plane of MH370 and now this... i hope everything is fine and going to be good. May everyone be safe _/\_
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How sad that he took his own life because he thought that it was his fault that the student's died in the tragic accident.
Kang, who was vice principal at Ansan's Danwon High School, was rescued from the sinking Sewol ferry.
Just two days after the accident, he was found dead after apparently hanging himself using a belt from a tree in the city of Jindo. In a note, he expressed regret he had survived while so many others had died.
On a chilly Monday, around 4:30 a.m., Kang's coffin was led out of a funeral hall in a long, black hearse. It was too early for any sunlight. There were no pallbearers carrying the coffin -- only a quick walking procession of his family members and what appeared to be about a hundred others dressed in black following the car through the parking lot.
No one spoke.
His family members -- one son, two daughters and his wife dressed in all-black traditional Korean wear followed the hearse. When they reached the end of the parking lot of the funeral home, they got into the car. The whole walk took less than five minutes before the mourners got in and drove in a line of cars headed to the crematorium.
Kang's body had been found Friday in one of the small mountains near the Jindo Gymnasium where bereaved families are taking shelter, according to local police. He had gone to Jindo with the school in an effort to support families, said one fellow educator.
"As the one in charge of the safety of the students, he was suffering from guilty feelings," another teacher had told Korean media. When some familes directed their anger at him, he became "brokenhearted."
Over 300 students from the school and their teachers were aboard the ferry. Some are confirmed dead and and hope is dwindling that any more survivors will be found. 174 were rescued. Hundreds remain missing.
Police have confirmed the contents of a note, which Kang left behind.
He wrote that it was his idea for the field trip and that the deaths of the students were his fault. He said he could not live not knowing where his students are.
He also wrote that he wonders whether he could still be their teacher on the other side, in death.
The note also expressed a request to be cremated and his ashes scattered where the Sewol had sank.
In Korean funerals, there are no ceremonies or eulogies -- they are a quiet, private affair.
People who wish to say farewell visit a funeral room and pay their respects to the deceased one's family. The family members receive guests for about three days.
During this period, several students from the high school came to the funeral home to pay their respects to Kang's family. Dressed in their school uniforms, they bowed to the family.
Outside the funeral hall, some of them spoke about Kang.
"He was an ethics teacher," said freshman Choi Yoo Jung. "I wonder if that's why it was hard for him. He was such a good person. He really liked students a lot."
Another student, Kim Hyun Soo, also a freshman, said she felt it was too harsh for Kang to be blamed for what happened on the ferry.
"The vice principal really liked students," she said. "It seems like he was really hard on himself. I don't think anyone should be blaming him."
His death elicited sorry and sympathy across South Korea. Messages of sympathy and grief have been outpouring on social media.
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This year started with so many tragedy, first the mystery of the missing plane which have 239 passengers on board and now the sinking ferry in South Korea and most likely will claim easily more than 400 life. OH MANI PADME HUNG may they be blessed. Life is full of uncertainties and we can only plan but our karma will determine it. So cherish our very little moments in this life by doing something beneficial which will help you to gain positive merits.
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Lately we hear of so many tragedies, people travelling to a location either for a holiday or to see family members end up not reaching their destination. Life really is short... and unpredictable, we can just die anytime. We don't even have to look so far to these tragedies with the ferry capsizing in Korea or MH370, people get into accidents all the time... some die, many end up not having full physical capabilities to do much anymore in this world. Whenever I think about this, it makes me want to practice more in my spiritual path... everything else is just fleeting away.
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In both the flight MH370 tragedy (which still remains largely a mystery) and this latest tragedy of the sinking of a South Korean ferry with 459 people on board and more than half feared dead, the cause has still not been established.In both instances, everyone of the passengers set out on that ill-fated day/ night expecting to arrive at their destinations at the scheduled times. But both sets of people didn't arrive at their destinations. Here we see so powerfully how karma controls us all and how our lives are so fragile when death and the manner of death are so uncertain.
While we pray that the Three Jewels continue to protect them all and their loved ones, we should never dismiss or trivialize the Dharma teaching that we have received.
The Vice Principal, who had committed suicide because he felt guilty and responsible for so many deaths from the tragedy, is himself a victim, so sadly, of his own misplaced sense of responsibility. To me this is the greatest tragedy of all. With Dharma, he would have known that it was karma at work, and he couldn't possibly have prevented that tragedy from happening. Out of ignorance(NOT KNOWING), he took his own life, which is a gross transgression, with heavy karmic consequences,though his motivation in wanting to 'express' his sense of responsibility may be mitigating in effect . Nonetheless, his complete disregard of his wife and children and of his needlessly causing them such suffering, cannot be set aside.
These tragedies make me more determined then ever that I must bring precious dharma to others for their benefit and ultimate peace.
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The Korean ferry tragedy hits me harder than the incident of MH370. It is because majority of the passengers were young, went on a school trip and were planning their college entry. So much hope for all of these young people who has bright futures.
It wakes me up and I questioned "what is life", ignorance and impermanence. "What is life" leads me to having a purpose and direction. Ignorance leads me to question whether we can acquire wisdom or knowledge beyond. Impermanence leads me to value lives and don't take things for granted.
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there are indeed so many tragic news lately.. first there is the MH370 (which until today still cannot be found), and then this ferry tragedy. actually, it is already a know fact that people will definitely die one day, and we also don't when a person will die. we need to accept this as a fact and nobody can escape this. therefore, when someone we know pass away, we should not be "surprise" because it is the samsara's nature.
while at the same time, we need to collect a lot of merits to before our time runs out.. and we will never know when our time runs out...
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It is very sad to read of this tragic accident involving so many lives. Truly the words of The Lord Buddha is so true when he said that this world is full of sufferings and death can come anytime. I pray that those who lost their life in the sinking would be guided by the light of Buddha, surely it must be such a sudden and frightful death. May the parents and family members of those involved be comforted by Buddha's words too.
Even though the captain and his crew were arrested and to be charged, this incident will surely torment them mentally.
May those who are still missing also be guided by Buddha's light and be miraculously safe.
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This is a tragic accidents with so many lives lost. It is lesson for us who are still alive and living to urgently practice in this life. There is no greater than observing the incident that happens as something won't happen to us and thus we feel safe although we feel pity for those who have lost their loved ones. This is truly tragic because with or without accident we can die anytime anywhere. There is no hard and fast rule that one can die here or there peacefully.
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It is heartwarming to read this article where many people from all walks of life came together to help in many different ways to those families who are mourning in this ferry tragedy.
Volunteers quietly help families of SKorean ferry's lost in manifold ways, from cabs to kebabs.
BY HYUNG-JIN KIM AND JUNG-YOON CHOI, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS APRIL 28, 2014
JINDO, South Korea - The mother, slightly drunk, sits on the edge of a windblown dock and wails. A Buddhist monk approaches and wipes the tears from her face as she pours out her grief and longing for her missing son. He leads her away from the dock's edge and, as she weeps, chants Buddhist scriptures and sounds a wooden gong in a prayer for her son's return.
"They are really suffering," said the monk, Bul Il, who came from the southeastern port city of Busan to help the families of the more than 100 still missing in the sunken South Korean ferry. "It's painful for me to watch their misery," he said, his face peeling and red from long chants on a platform facing the sea.
Bul Il is one member of an impromptu city that has sprung up at this normally sleepy port for the families of those lost in the disaster. The city runs on the kindness of strangers.
A sense of national mourning over a tragedy that will likely result in more than 300 deaths, most of them high school students, has prompted an outpouring of volunteers. More than 16,000 people — about half the island's normal population — have come to help.
They handle much of the care that relatives of the missing receive in Jindo as they wait for divers to retrieve the bodies of their loved ones from the wreckage of the ferry Sewol.
Some scrub toilets and bathroom floors at the gym where families sleep, keeping the amenities practically spotless. A man walks with a huge sign that says "I will wash clothes for you."
They cook huge pots of hot kimchi soup, distribute blankets, towels and toiletries, pick up trash and sweep the grounds. Turkish volunteers offer kebabs, turning on spits. One truck distributes homemade tofu, another pizza.
Cab drivers from Ansan, where the high school students who make up more than 80 per cent of the missing and dead were from, provide free rides to and from Jindo, a five-hour drive that would normally run up a fare of 280,000 won ($270).
"It's time to help those who are mourning. Giving up several days of work is nothing," driver Ahn Dae-soo said.
Lim Jang-young, a 58-year-old owner of a Japanese restaurant, came to Jindo from the southern city of Daejeon to cook traditional beef soup for family members, other volunteers and journalists. He temporarily closed his restaurant to come help because he said he can't focus on his business while he worries about the victims and their families.
A man who was eating his soup "showed me a picture of a girl, his daughter, and started crying. I couldn't resist crying with him," said Lim, a father of three.
Hundreds of people, many from aid groups, private companies, churches and other organizations, mostly wearing green and blue clothing, pack roads lined with white tents near Paengmok port and a gym on the island, offering soup, kimchi, rice, hamburgers, taxi services, cellphone battery charging, laundry services, medicine, energy drinks, psychiatric help and daily necessities like underwear, socks, nail clippers, cotton swabs and toothbrushes.
Park Seung-ki, a spokesman for the government task force, said Sunday that more than 16,200 people have come on their own or with nearly 730 organizations. About 690,000 aid items such as food, bottled water, blankets and clothes have also arrived in Jindo since the sinking, Park said.
Volunteers say they're asked to refrain from "provoking" family members and to avoid smiling, taking commemorative photos or starting conversations. Volunteers are also asked to be patient even if victims' relatives become angry, according to a civic organization tasked with handling volunteers.
Lee Sung-tae, secretary general for the civic organization, says people 23 or younger are often not allowed to volunteer because of worries they may remind family members, mostly parents of missing high school students, of their own children. Older volunteers who happen to look young are given work that keeps them away from the families of the missing students. Lee said his organization is now asking groups to stay away because there are already too many volunteers.
Kim Byung-jo, 52, and Kim Yong-su, 46, drove 2 1/2 hours from the southern city of Suncheon to clean toilets and shower rooms at a gym where the families, both men and women, sleep on mattresses under bright fluorescent lights.
"It's totally different from when I watched this on TV," said Kim Yong-su, a trailer driver. "I've become really solemn. I can't really express how I'm feeling."
There is a makeshift chapel and a makeshift Buddhist temple.
Donated materials in the gymnasium — peach and pink blankets, bright green jackets and blue vests — add colour to the scene, but it is still a place awash in grief and frustration.
Exhausted relatives sit with shell-shocked expressions, staring blankly at the ever growing list of bodies. In tents near the port, they sit on blankets and mattresses, watching TV news programs about search efforts. They eat at long tables and benches under tents in near total silence. The gymnasium holds hundreds of people but is mostly as quiet as a library. Sometimes there are howls of anger when a government official visits or cries of agony when a family identifies a body.
It does not matter to the volunteers that the families do not brim with gratefulness for their work. They want to do more to ease their pain.
Ahn, the cab driver, said the word "heavy-hearted" is not enough to describe what it's like to drive home parents who have just identified their child's body.
"In the five hours of driving there's a complete silence," he said. "Who can say anything in that situation?"
A well-known psychiatrist, Jung Hye-shin, came to Jindo to help counsel families, though she told her nearly 150,000 followers on Twitter that she hasn't talked to any because they're not ready for counselling. But she observed the volunteers in Jindo.
"The Catholic undertaker volunteers were wiping the fingers and toes of the kids, ever so gently and carefully, as if they were bathing a baby," she tweeted of the work to clean corpses. "In the end, the kids became pretty again. I'm glad they met adults that they could be thankful to before leaving this world."
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Since the airplane MH370 incident happened, followed by South Korea ferry tragedy and it continuous with other air planes issue even though it is able to avoid from any tragedy happened. Even myself also starts fobia with airplane travelling. Can't really sleep but to continuous pray along the journey. When the flight is not stable due to bad weather, the plane start up and down and you would start fear and think about recent tragedy happened.
When reading through the news about the ferry passengers leaving time to time text messages for family, it hits me real hard. You can really understand how the family especially parents feel. Heart pain and seeing the young one leaving them.
Pray for those leaving one having a good rebirth. Pray for MH370 crew and passengers be found and safe.
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it very sad to hear so many tragedies and disasters. In this degenerate age, humans' self-centredness has caused global warming, disasters, tragedies and outright sufferings. Global warming caused changes in weather patterns, and tsunami, floods and droughts. Human greed causes this particular ferry to keel over and sink, killing hundreds of people.
I pray for the people who caused this tragedy and for the victims. Om Mani Peme Hum!
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It is so sad to hear of tragedies around the world i.e. wars, earthquakes, plane crash, land slide, road accidents etc and the most recent heart wrenching one, the sinking of the South Korean’s ferry. What have this young and innocent teenagers done to be ended up in such a disastrous death? Life is indeed so unpredictable and fragile! We really have no idea when our day will come ? Thus, we have to constantly remind our self to do virtues to make our life meaningful . May all perished have a good and swift rebirth.
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In this Ferry disaster in South Koreo, we saw tragedies connected to this disaster, the indiction of 4 ferry crew for homicide, the resignation of South Korean Prime Minister, the vice-principal of South Korea school committed suicide and now the death of the billionaire ferry owner. OM MANI PADME HUNG.........
(http://www.bdlive.co.za/incoming/2014/04/21/south-korea-ferry-april-21-2014.jpg/ALTERNATES/crop_400x250/South+Korea+ferry+April+21+2014.jpg)
South Korean school girl Cho A-reum, far right, whose brother is one of the missing passengers onboard the ferry, looks at the sea as a Buddhist monk prays for missing passengers in Jindo in April. Picture: REUTERS
Body of fugitive ferry owner identified
BY SAM KIM, JULY 23 2014, 05:19
SEOUL — A tycoon and religious sect leader identified as the de facto owner of the South Korean ferry that sank in April, killing more than 300 people, has been found dead, police said on Tuesday.
The body of Yoo Byung Eun, 73, on the run since the disaster, was discovered in a field of plum trees in the southwestern city of Suncheon on June 12 and his identity was recently confirmed through DNA and fingerprint analysis, Woo Hyung Ho, chief of Suncheon Police Station, said at a televised briefing. The finding ended a months-long manhunt.
"The body was too decomposed to provide a hint at the cause of death," Mr Woo said. "So far there has been no evidence suggesting homicide."
Prosecutors blame Yoo for a lack of safety training and investment that could have prevented the April 16 sinking. The tragedy fuelled public anger across the country that brought President Park Geun Hye’s popularity to a record low.
Yoo and his family controlled Chonghaejin Marine, operator of the Sewol ferry, through a church group at the centre of a network of about 70 companies, authorities say. Prosecutors have indicted Chonghaejin executives with 15 crew members who escaped the ferry without evacuating passengers, most of whom were high school students on an excursion. Mr Park said the actions of the crew were "like murder".
Only 172 of the 476 people aboard the Sewol were rescued. Divers are still searching for 10 bodies after retrieving 294 from the ferry that capsized off the southwestern coast.
Bloomberg