so you have every right to consider me crazy, but I say that it’s not the event per se that matters but what we make of it. And the only thing we can agree on is the quality of your commitment to your practice. So I have a gift in honor of your commitment.” “Don’t try and confuse us,” the woman said. “We don’t need your gift,” the tall one added. “I would venture that in the spirit of the world congress everyone on this flight has a gift as well, perhaps one of their meditation aids, to remind us that it’s all one practice, no matter how much we get caught up in ideas to the contrary.” “Why should we accept your gifts?” beard asked. “Something given freely in the spirit of honoring your commitment may mean more to your teacher than something stolen, which could bring him trouble with the law. Landing a hijacked plane on his island could result in problems with airline officials. They like to get their jets back. Why not let us fly you over the island and then you can parachute out? This way you prove your devotion to your teacher, your good will to us and— since you’re not stealing anything, bringing only yourselves and the gifts we’ve given you—your skill in testing the limits of your teacher’s sincerity as well?” The Contra-Tantras thought this over and agreed. So it came to pass that the three jumped out of the sky somewhere west of the Cayman Islands in the Greater Antilles, their parachutes blossoming white above their teacher’s palm tree-lined island. The passengers de-planed in Vera Cruz to great fanfare as cameras hunted Ganga. Hailed by the bandaged captain as the heroine of Flight 164, Ganga was awarded a cash gift by the airline and her story made the evening news in the United States. Although she managed to keep the Just So Society a secret in all the interviews, she’d blown her cover. Her ability to spy on the world congress was compromised, so she decided not to board the flight the next day. She told the press that last night she had fallen in love with the musicians singing songs of such longing that it reminded her of the Bauls of Bengal. She decided to ride the music province by province in Mexico, making her way to San Francisco slowly. In response the government gave her a visa and a free rental car.
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