ZENGO

The first spring I was living at Kopan, Lama Zopa Rimpoche gave his first meditation course. His teaching style was very formal, slow, and with many repetitions. It was not easy to keep my attention alive, but even so, the discipline and the energy of many people meditating together was a good experience.
Right after the course the Lamas left for Dharamsala, but Zina, who was always eager to attract people to the center, had met a Japanese monk, Zengo, and invited him to give a course at Kopan. Zengo was young and smooth and very self-confident and came with a group of disciples. Many of the Lamas followers also took his course, but his style was very different from Lama Zopa’s and did not always please those who were accustomed to the Tibetan way. When he repeated the Zen saying: "If you meet the Buddha, kill him!" Claudio, an Italian student of Lama Yeshe's, was so offended that he picked up his stuff, and left the course.
Zina also picked up a blond American yogi who was into power-breathing. He challenged Zengo, who was into the power aspect of meditation, and they had a snorting match sitting in front of each other in lotus position on the lawn. Really, the scene was quite crazy that summer! Zengo's disciples mixed acid in his morning cereal one day when they were going on an outing with him. When he started tripping, he felt that the ultimate enlightenment had come upon him and he let his people know that he was Maitreya, the Buddha of the future whose coming is predicted in the scriptures. Knowing that he was tripping, the cruel disciples did not take him seriously and, having lost their belief in him, they all left.
There were now only a few people remaining at Kopan, among them Sylvia and Cynthia, two lesbian Americans. Zengo told Sylvia that for a master sex was not a problem and invited her to become his mistress, but she declined and openly let him know that she preferred Cynthia. Desperate to regain his position as teacher he decided to give another meditation course, but when he announced it to the girls they just laughed at him.
In the end he left all alone. I heard later that under the name of His Holiness Maitreya Buddha he got a new group of followers in England.