Dharamsala
I've named some of the birds that wake me up in the morning. The shrill pulsating one is Sonny, for instance. I'm not sure why. But Sonny and his avian companions chirp among the bells ringing evil out of the Shiva Temple and it is a glorious thing.
I saw a quintessentially Indian thing today: the Bhutanese girls in front of me at HH the Dalai Lama's teachings have marked their spots with newspaper - and the newspaper contains the Indian personal ads! While I play with the position of my aching legs, I read the paper which declares, "25% off the price of your advertisement if your advertisement does not mention dowry, caste or other social things. Progressive thinking pays!"
Speaking of the teachings, the Tibetans have really got to improve their security screening. They screen people to death, but there are such obvious holes in the process that the process serves only to trouble people. I could easily have hidden a bazooka in the main monastery hall on the first day. But of the teachings themselves, I'm very impressed. We're closely following Shantideva's Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life, which is an ancient Sanskrit text revitalized by commentary from HH the Dalai Lama, whom I got to briefly meet two days ago in a hello - handshake - smile sort of way, thanks to the behind-the-scenes mechanizations of Roland. He exudes such raw power and compassion. Yesterday was Tibetan Freedom Day, and amid the demonstrations and hot-headedness of the younger Tibetans, his speech was resoundingly compassionate towards both Tibetans and Chinese. I'm learning alot about diplomacy here.
Basically a day in Dharamsala (McLeod Ganj, actually) looks like this: I wake up around 7, buy some banana bread and fruit and go to the morning teachings, break for lunch, attend afternoon teachings - walk back (it's a long walk to my hotel, actually, I'm 20 minutes outside of town) nap, read for awhile and pass the evenings away in cafes chatting and playing chess with largely random people. Cafes should not be understood in the European sense - you might be tempted to use the word 'hovel' actually in some cases. But I like how cafe life has brought out some of the extroverted qualities in me - in India it feels more or less okay to walk up to somebody and start making conversation, which leads onto meeting their friends and onward and onwards through the chains that connect us all.
I saw a quintessentially Indian thing today: the Bhutanese girls in front of me at HH the Dalai Lama's teachings have marked their spots with newspaper - and the newspaper contains the Indian personal ads! While I play with the position of my aching legs, I read the paper which declares, "25% off the price of your advertisement if your advertisement does not mention dowry, caste or other social things. Progressive thinking pays!"
Speaking of the teachings, the Tibetans have really got to improve their security screening. They screen people to death, but there are such obvious holes in the process that the process serves only to trouble people. I could easily have hidden a bazooka in the main monastery hall on the first day. But of the teachings themselves, I'm very impressed. We're closely following Shantideva's Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life, which is an ancient Sanskrit text revitalized by commentary from HH the Dalai Lama, whom I got to briefly meet two days ago in a hello - handshake - smile sort of way, thanks to the behind-the-scenes mechanizations of Roland. He exudes such raw power and compassion. Yesterday was Tibetan Freedom Day, and amid the demonstrations and hot-headedness of the younger Tibetans, his speech was resoundingly compassionate towards both Tibetans and Chinese. I'm learning alot about diplomacy here.
Basically a day in Dharamsala (McLeod Ganj, actually) looks like this: I wake up around 7, buy some banana bread and fruit and go to the morning teachings, break for lunch, attend afternoon teachings - walk back (it's a long walk to my hotel, actually, I'm 20 minutes outside of town) nap, read for awhile and pass the evenings away in cafes chatting and playing chess with largely random people. Cafes should not be understood in the European sense - you might be tempted to use the word 'hovel' actually in some cases. But I like how cafe life has brought out some of the extroverted qualities in me - in India it feels more or less okay to walk up to somebody and start making conversation, which leads onto meeting their friends and onward and onwards through the chains that connect us all.
posted by Steve C at 9:44 AM
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