Puerto Rico and the Bahamas

In August of Golden Year 3 (2006), eight initiates from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Missouri, and Illinois Centers formed a team to distribute Alternative Living flyers in the Caribbean Islands, where this precious message from Master had not yet been widely distributed. We were very eager to start our journey across the two islands of Puerto Rico and the Bahamas.

Upon arriving in Puerto Rico on August 11, we were touched by the warm welcome of the local initiates, who also provided us with accommodation, transportation and loving support. Even though we had been traveling all day, we were energized and immediately went with the local initiates to downtown Ponce, the second largest city located in southwest Puerto Rico. United by Master’s love, we all worked together as one even though it was the first we ever met each other.

Puerto Ricans are very friendly. Seeing initiates distribute flyers on the street, they stopped their cars to accept the flyers. Even the police officers opened their windows to get flyers. That night, we literally stopped the traffic on the street! Two police officers riding motorbikes to patrol that part of the city simply smiled at us every time they passed by. The following day, we continued to distribute flyers in Ponce. One Puerto Rican told an initiate that earlier he had gotten an Alternative Living flyer on his motorcycle and said, “It must have come from God.”

On Sunday, August 13, we traveled on to San Juan, the largest city and capital of Puerto Rico. In the morning, we went to distribute flyers at the historical Old San Juan, a walled district on a hill very nearby the beautiful Caribbean Sea.  In the afternoon, a local initiate took us to a big shopping mall to hand out flyers. There, we were delighted to find that the shopping mall was packed with people. As a policy, shopping malls generally do not allow people to pass out flyers inside. However, with Master’s blessing, we were able to distribute over 5000 flyers within just one hour.

The following day, we went to the west coast of Puerto Rico in the vicinity of Cabo Rojo and San German to distribute flyers and help the local initiates organize a seminar. The seminar was held in a vegetarian restaurant whose owners were friends of a local initiate. Before the seminar, there was a sudden downpour, with the rain making the temperature cooler and the air refreshing. During the seminar, we felt Master’s blessings in the sincerity and calmness of the people who came.

Our last stop in Puerto Rico was Camuy, a city located in its north central region. We focused our efforts at two universities, where we not only distributed flyers on the campus, we also went to department buildings to put flyers in the professor’s mail boxes as well as in classrooms, computer labs and even registration offices where students were waiting to register for classes. After reading the flyer, one professor told an initiate he really appreciated receiving it because it contained such comprehensive information on the nutritional facts and the benefits of vegetarian food.

Leaving Puerto Rico on the early morning of August 17, we flew to Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas. Local people in the Bahamas were predominantly “chocolate,” or black. They were warm and kind, and 99 % of the local people took our flyers with a smile. The bus drivers even allowed initiates to board their buses to distribute flyers to the passengers, with many bus drivers asking for the flyers themselves. After getting the flyers, some asked for additional copies for their friends and relatives, and some read the flyer out loud word by word.  Many people asked questions such as where to buy vegetarian food, how to identify tofu and gluten (since some of the local people had never heard of these things before) and what organization we represented. We told them it was our Master who made everything possible. Some inquired about meditation and received sample booklets.

On the second day in Nassau, initiates found out that the quickest way to distribute flyers was to stand at the crowded intersections of major driving roads. In the commercial areas especially, there were very long lines of cars driving slowly because of heavy traffic, and we had a chance to hand the flyers to the drivers. Although the traffic slowed a little bit due to our flyer distribution, no one seemed to mind. In fact, almost every driver took the flyer that initiates handed to them. Upon seeing the initiates handing out flyers, many drivers in the back of the long line of traffic even rolled down their windows in advance to prepare to take the flyers. It was very touching to see people were so eager to receive God’s loving message.

Although initiates had to stand under the scorching sun to distribute the flyers most of the time during the trip, everyone was happy and full of energy because of the blessing and love from Master and the love from the people who received the flyers. In fact, the acceptance rate was so high that it went well beyond our expectation, and we had to order additional flyers in the middle of trip. Altogether, we distributed 31,000 Spanish flyers in Puerto Rico and 8,000 English flyers in the Bahamas.

People’s responses to Master’s compassionate message of vegetarianism on these two islands were as warm as the Caribbean Sea! In both places, the vast majority of people gladly accepted the flyers we offered them. From this trip, we felt that more and more people wish to become more noble beings. The Alternative Living flyer, full of God’s love, is giving them the inspiration, support and assurance to make the change.

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