Today visited the Jewish Museum. It has a striking design where the walls and floors are at angles representing a broken star of David. There is a holocaust memorial echoing the one we saw yesterday except with olive trees growing above it, and a silent tower space made from stone where only a slit of natural light is allowed in.

It disturbed me not only because of the history it represents but also the worsening situation in Bat Nha at Prajna Monastery where I blogged just over two years ago. Three hundred monks and nuns have been taken into custody by the Vietnamese Police and at least three senior monastics have disappeared. This monastery follows Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay) the exiled Vietnamese Zen Master whose teachings I follow. When I was in Saigon we visited a temple where five of his followers had been murdered- they suspect by the communists. They are represented by five pebbled mounds in the grounds.  If the world waits and takes no notice of this happening in Vietnam how will these 300 be remembered? Vietnam was taken off this list of regimes that repressed religions prior to it hosting APEC in 2006 when coincidentally they allowed Thich Nhat Hanh to return for a second time to hold Great Ceremonies of Mourning for all those who suffered and died during the American War.