Morning Daimoku #1,165 | A Truck With No Roof | Oubaitori.com — Soka Gakkai Buddhist Altar Specialist

Good morning. I hope you are well today. This is Shima, from Oubaitori.com. This is my record of chanting 10,000 daimoku each morning.

Yesterday, the customer who had ordered an altar wanted to come and collect it himself.

“It will not fit. Not a chance.”

At first he was coming in a minivan. I told him: it will not fit, not a chance. So it became a 3.5-ton truck.

I asked whether that truck had a roof over the bed. It did not. An open bed, then. That is a serious matter.

So: bring blankets, bring whatever you can find. And if it rains, we call it off. That was the arrangement. As it turned out, no rain.

He was coming from relatively nearby — Chiba. Three in the afternoon. We waited.

It arrived. Bigger than I had pictured.

It arrived. The truck was bigger than I had pictured.

He stepped out. A man of real warmth. “Hello, hello.” He pulled right up to the shop. Our lot is wide, so that is never a problem.

“Here it is.” First, photographs — I had him take them. Then I explained everything. How the mechanism works. A place where there might be a small scratch.

They are not in this trade, of course. So, one thing at a time. At the end, even how to set the altar up at home.

Newspaper, bubble wrap, cardboard — the work of packing

Then all of us packed it, and carried it. He hardly helped at all, to be honest.

Three of us, from our side. Over an hour in total. It takes that long. It really does.

Each altar implement wrapped thickly in newspaper, so that the vibration of the road cannot mark it. Cardboard dividers between them, so the metal pieces never rub. Then into boxes. Three boxes.

The flower stand, the incense box, the stand for the bell — all wooden, all large — bubble wrap for those as well, then cardboard around them. The altar itself comes apart into four: the roof, the main body, the middle base, the lower base. Each one bound tight with heavy bubble wrap and ribbon tape. And on the bed of the truck, large sheets of cardboard from our shop, laid down across it. Then we load.

More than half the bed of a 3.5-ton truck, filled with an altar lying on its side. That is the feel of it. And between every piece, cardboard. Sheet after sheet.

Two hours and thirty minutes, all told

We went through the setting up as well: taking it down together, lifting it, where to put your hands. The moment people mistake for a broken automatic door, and why it is not. The fuse, the switch, how to fit the connector. Two hours and thirty minutes, all told.

He was very satisfied. He asked to shake my hand. Then he climbed into the truck, waved, and drove home.

It had been a while since I looked after a customer this way. In the shape of what the customer hoped for — and then a step beyond it, proposing, and loading it together. That far, I was allowed to go.

Let’s Daimoku!

Customers are coming again this afternoon. Thank you.