How do I sum up the time that has passed? Once again, it's been quite some time and so much has happened.
The long weekend I spent at Tso Pema (Riwaltzar) was amazing. I took the bus with my friend Emily and we rocked, rolled, and swerved our way through the mountains on narrow dirt roads, dodging elbows the whole way. We switched buses in Manali, and the crowd in the second bus actually going to the lake was much more subdued and friendly. There were very few seats and I ended up holding onto this old woman next to me for the two hours of that bus ride so she didn't tumble over every time we made a right-hand turn. Someone in the front handed out biscuits. We got there and were blown away in our delirious state at the view of a gorgeous small lake being circumambulated by an assortment of people with a HUGE statue of Padmasambhava perched on the hill and reflected in the water. Our roommates soon attacked us with hugs and walked us to the monastery where they had a room already set up for us. We basically spent three days meeting people that Chhunit knows from her village in Spiti and her nunnery, Drolma Ling. We spent the days circumambulating the lake with the rest of the people there. Chhunit and Bhuti pointed out which people were Nepalese, Spitian, Ladakhi, or Tibetan--either from Kham or Amdo etc. You can tell mostly from the traditional dress of the women. The hair, scarves, and chupas are different. Chhunit's best friend was there whose name is also Chhunit, lol. She also has an aunt who lives in a house on the hill (up a mountain of stairs!) who I visited twice. The first time I went with Chhunit for an afternoon. She hiked up all those steps with her four year old niece on her back (who had refused to leave her side. She's the favorite of all small children she meets, I've noticed). I couldn't really talk to her Aunts and relatives since their dialect isn't the Tibetan I'm learning but the Spitian dialect, but we made due with broken English and they insisted on feeding me lots of tea and tsampa before dinner (which I proceeded to make a mess of, of course, since tsampa-eating is a skill I have not mastered). They all kept saying I was "so pretty, like actress" and insisted on taking pictures of me. I never felt more looked at in my life! There I was unshowered and towering above all these little women. It was adorable. The second time I went to the house Emily and Bhuti came as well. We ate some toasted barley while the women knit on the floor and the nuns were in and out of the little room preparing for dinner. I was in the middle of writing a card when Chhunit called my name and beckoned me into the kitchen. I walked around the corner to the tiny room where her tiny self was making dinner on a tiny stove. I had mentioned to her that I wanted her to teach me how she cooked when I went to Spiti, so she decided to start now. She showed me how to make the veggie, potato, noodle dish she was making. I asked her when she started cooking. She said when she was ten years old. That's how old she was when her Dad died, see, so she had to cook for her younger sisters while her older sister and her mother worked in the fields. She would also cook the rice and dal in the morning that she and her sisters would race home from school at lunch to eat. She said "we only have t'irty minutes for lunch every day. So we run run run up the hill and eat very fast. Sometimes my sisters are not coming fast enough, so I am in trouble when I go back to school and my teacher..." *she made a hitting motion above her hands*. "He beat your hands?" I asked. "Yes, he beat my hands. And one day, I am so naughty, he puts stick on my hand and I.." *she closed her hand*
"You grabbed the stick?"
"Yes, he is so small but very mean. So I am grab the stick and I" *she scrunches up her face and pulls at an imaginary stick* "everybody says to me 'Chhunit, what you do???' But I don't care. But then he take me to principal and...then I am caring." We both laughed, she at the memory and me at the thought of an even smaller Chhunit making that face at her teacher. She's full of fire, that's for sure. No one can mess with her.
Many Bollywood TV shows, cups of chai, dinners in Indian and Tibetan resturaunts, circumambulations, and 5:30 am mornings later (the later due to the songs that come from the Hindu temples and the chants that come from the monastery before the sun can break the horizon), we headed back to Sarah. We had one week left on campus. In that time, we had regular classes, tried to spend extra time with our room mates before taking off, and somehow managed to pull off performing a huge 3 hour long talent show for the Sarah students. They put one on for us when we came, see, so since our group turned out to be super creative, we decided to return the favor. We did an a Capella rendition of "Always be my baby" with a 4 parts on top of the main singer, performed a skit making fun of ourselves entering the monasteries for the first time (doing mock-confused prostrations and such), and many other fun acts. It was a blast, and I ended up bringing my Jimbe to the canteen afterward where a big group of us took turns playing while a bunch of us sang and danced.
I'm really going to miss the Sarah campus. Not only am I obviously super close with my roommate, I had also gotten really comfortable there. Oh, well. On to the next adventure I suppose.
We came up yesterday (Monday) to McLeod Ganj and moved in with our home stays. My hostess, Dechen, is a housewife with two kids, one of which is in boarding school and one of which is at home: Tsoma. She also lives with her father, Geshe Pempa Dorje, who actually used to teach Tibetan and co-teach Philosophy for my program in years past, and his mother who is very sweet and quite old. She fills the room with a warm presence and thus far I've only really observed her sitting, spinning her prayer-wheel and thumbing her mala. Geshe Pempa Dorje speaks very eloquent English, though I'm trying not to take advantage of that. Dechen is super friendly and makes great Thukpa, and Tsoma is a ball of energy who can't hold still and is always dancing and buzzing around. The fact that I have a drum and know Disney songs has already won me some points with her. I sleep in the living room which is beautiful and sunny (and unfortunately where the TV lives, but oh well). There's an AMAZING view (that makes up for the maze of steep stairwells that I will be climbing every time I go home) from the balcony where the dog lives--he's a cutie himself. We met our hosts over tea and then went off to our houses, only to return to the Lodge where our program has set up camp a few hours later for a talk with the president of the Students for a Free Tibet organization. That was SUCH A REFRESHING TALK. We're so used to receiving frustrating answers from people who don't really understand our questions. This guy is from India but lives in New York now, and really spoke to soooo many of our curiosities. One of the most interesting he said was in response to the way that many elders have scolded the younger generations' hopes for independence as being disrespectful of the Dalai Lama's simply seeking autonomy. He said that in fact, he feels that his generation is much closer to His Holiness than his parents' could ever dream of being. They tried to see him at least once in their life and would go on pilgrimage to Lhasa to catch a glimpse during a teaching if possible. On the other hand, the children in exile had a lot of access to him. They had many talks with him and saw him frequently. He said that much of the youth feel that he is like their father. They feel so intimate with him, in fact, that they are comfortable disagreeing with him. Just like when a child disagrees with a parent, he said, it doesn't compromise their respect.
Afterwards, we finally went to our new homes to rest. Last night I was way too tired and had a head ache, so I didn't have the most positive experience ever, but I could tell that I was in a great household nonetheless. Plus, Chhunit ended up staying there as well so she could be at McLeod early for Uprising Day which is...
TODAY! I went around 9 to the Dalai Lama's speech at the monastery. I went with my friend Jessica and her host mother, seeing as mine was busy taking care of her daughter and father. It was super crowded and I actually ended up sitting with two children and half a woman in my lap, reaching up from time to time to make sure this woman next to me kept her balance in the shifting, sardine-tight crowd. I couldn't hear a word of what was said, but a bunch of brochures were handed out with the statement that the Dalai Lama was making written inside. Very interesting speech, and nothing super new to report. He's very good at being compassionate while expressing his frustration. He expressed gratitude to all of those who have helped the Tibetan community in exile for the last fifty years and explained the history of his middle-way approach of seeking Autonomy.
Afterwards, there was a massive march from McLeod down to lower Dharamsala. Tibetan flags were everywhere, and the crowd zig-zagged for hours down the mountain roads. The call-responses were generally "Long live...Dalai Lama!" "China China China...out out out!" "Stop the killing....In Tibet!" "Tibet belongs to...Tibetans!"
I met a cool traveler named Julia afterwards, and she shared a cab with us back up to town where we all had lunch on a rooftop restaurant. She's from Austin and we're planning on going to yoga tomorrow with my friend Genny. Now I'm just killing some time before dinner with my family and maybe some more chill-time with Chhunit. Tomorrow there's a big long teaching from His Holiness which we're all really excited about.
Until next time
