More than 20 orphans from Africa sang Taiwanese folk songs and performed Chinese Shaolin kungfu routines at Kaohsiung City Hall yesterday, captivating an audience that included Mayor Chen Chu (陳菊).
The performers, whose parents all died from AIDS, live at a shelter founded by a Taiwanese Buddhist monk, Master Hui Li (慧禮法師), in Malawi.
They began a 21-day tour on Monday to express their gratitude to sponsors in Taiwan.
PHOTO: CHANG CHUNG-YI, TAIPEI TIMES
Impressed by the Malawian children’s proficiency in singing in Hoklo (commonly known as Taiwanese) and performing martial arts, Chen pledged to donate NT$10,000 a month to the organization.
Chen praised Hui Li for not only volunteering to promote Buddhist doctrines in remote and underdeveloped villages in Africa, but also for building shelters for children whose survival was threatened by hunger and disease.
Hui Li founded the Amitofo Care Center in Malawi in 2001 to offer shelter, care and education for AIDS orphans. Since then, it has sheltered more than 2,000 Malawian children.
At City Hall, the monk expressed his gratitude to the mayor for taking the time to meet him and the children and for her support.
Such support inspired the group to launch the tour of Taiwan that will also take it to Taichung, Tainan and Taipei, the monk said.
Hui Li, who became a monk at the age of 23, is a disciple of Master Hsing Yun (星雲法師), founder of the Fo Guang Shan Monastery in Kaohsiung County.
He traveled to South Africa in 1992 to build Fo Guang Shan’s Nanhua Monastery, the group’s first foothold — and the first Buddhist hub — in South Africa.
Hui Li left Fo Guang Shan in the late 1990s to start his own religious career in Africa, where Buddhism is often condemned as heresy.
He has since dedicated himself to helping African AIDS children, traveling around many African countries, including Malawi, Swaziland, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Cameroon. He has also built Amitofo care centers in Zimbabwe and Lesotho.
Hui Li has been quoted as saying that he hopes to be buried in Africa and be reincarnated five times as an African monk.
Over the past 16 years, he has adopted or provided care and shelter for nearly 10,000 African AIDS orphans, earning the sobriquet “African monk,” while many children call him “daddy sent by Buddha.”
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