Tea with the Tulku

Boudha Stupa, Boudha

October 16

Where to even begin the story of these last few weeks in this incredible valley in the heart of Nepal??? This city is shrouded in thousand-year old legends and mystical traditions, all still very much alive in the present day. After a sleepless night fending off a big old roach in my room, the first to be seen, I woke up this morning tired but itching for our field trip to the ancient city of Patan. We had been there once before, but this time we were journeying with our Buddhist Art History professor, Yoona. His charming British accent and great sense of humor, Yoona is our young friend and Tibetan Art scholar, filled abrim with so much knowledge about the art and architecture spanning the lengths of India, Nepal, Tibet, and far into the Eastern Orient. After a long bumpy ride through the hot breeze of Boudha streets, we arrived in Old Patan and toured around with Yoona as our guide. We went to a few Newari Buddhist Temples, intricately adorned with statues and stupas, woodwork and stonework, wrathful and benevolent deities. The Buddhas were boundless. You looked up, and there was Avalokitesvara, the Bodhisattva embodiment of Compassion. You looked to your left, and inside the small stone carved stupa (a monument meant to hold the relics of a Buddha) was Sakyamuni, the historical Buddha we see in all of the trendy New York City restaurants and zen boutiques. On your right you would see a carved dancing Shiva or Vishnu with their female consorts, many of the great Hindu deities that had been adopted by the Buddhist tradition around the seventh century. There were thousands of years of history within a few hundred feet.

These temples are part of the living tradition of the Nepalese and very much influence their everyday lives. The monks still come to these sacred sanctums to have their heads shaven for initiation into the monastic community. Tantric rituals are still performed on the second floor of these temples, where foreigners are usually forbidden to enter. Today, however, we got very lucky. Our Buddhist art class tip-toed up the narrow wooden staircase creaking under our footsteps to see several sets of brown eyes, watching us dubiously as we headed into the shrine room of the Vajrayogini, one of the most esoteric goddesses of the Tantric tradition. We had entered a small room with cold marble tile floors stained with age and centuries of being a sacred grounds for tantric ritual. The ceilings were low and the air a bit stuffy. The smell of incense and lit butter lamp candles blended quaintly with the smell of esoteric energy. This place was special, not only because it was forbidden to most (foreigners and Newars alike), but because there was a subtle wafting aura about the whole place, silent and invisible, but felt so tangible and real. The mysticism and ambivalence about Tantric Buddhism, rituals that trace its way to the yogic practices of ancient India, have caused a lot of debate and skepticism. Tantra has long been popularized as part of a wild wisdom tradition of rogue yogis and yoginis engaging in sexual practices and other unorthodox rituals aspiring to transcend the body’s limitations by using it as a vehicle to achieve union with the divine. It is often condoned for being a shortcut to buddhahood, bypassing the rigor of the monastic institutions and the more disciplined path toward enlightenment. After sprinkling a few hard grains of white rice on the Vajrayogini statue, as a puja offering, we headed off to a few more museums in Durbar Square, home to one of three Kumaris in the Kathmandu region. There are three Kumaris in the Kathmandu Valley, representing what would have been three governing principalities in the Old Kingdom of the valley. They are young girls chosen through a selective process and worshipped as a living goddess until they reach puberty, at which time there is a new Kumari chosen. Durbar Square is dotted with century-old pagoda temples and huge shrine statues, making it one of my favorite places to walk around in Nepal. You can sip the sweetest chia on the steps of one of these pagodas for hours and watch people flow through the piaza.

This afternoon felt nothing short of a dream. The Buddhists say our whole waking reality is nothing more than an illusory dream, that our everyday experience is a mere projection of our mind and culturally conditioned concepts. I definitely felt that way during Dolpo Tulku Rinpoche’s teaching at the Pranamaya yoga studio. We had arrived a bit late, early for Nepali standards, but had just power-walked from Limi, a Tibetan restaurant where we wolfed down our delicious but still-sizzling plates of veggie chow mein, eggs, and porridge. The teaching began promptly at 2pm, or so we thought. We arrived at the studio with only one minute to spare, it was 1:59pm and we were afraid to walk in on the formal greeting and prostrations held for the Rinpoche upon his arrival. But in typical Nepali fashion, the Rinpoche (which translates in Tibetan as ‘Precious One’) was running late, and we walked in to see a room full of eager friendly faces from around the world. There was Daniel, the Elemental yoga teacher, with his two sons. A few young couples travelling through Nepal, tasting Buddhist teachings and Himalayan views on their trekking excursions. There were young women with glistening smiles, and older women whose anxiety and thirst for Buddhist teachings on compassion read on the wrinkles between their brows. There were some attractive young men who seemed eager for answers, and then there was us. Patty, Andrew, and I, who still smelled of chow mein and smelly spices from last night’s dinner dose of tharcurry (curried vegetables). We found round cushions in the front row, surprisingly vacant and welcoming. The room filled with chatter and an energy that made it hard for me to sit still in my nearly perfected lotus (cross legged-pretzel position). “He’s here,” we heard whispered around the room like a game of telephone, causing a hush to wash over the echoing sound waves of friendly conversation. I turned my head to the right, and watched with wide eyes as this very small Tibetan man mazed about seated bodies with his Khenpo (teacher) sidekick, both of whom were wearing their robes and fit the part perfectly. The shaven heads, monk robes, and wise Asian visage endow all Tibetans with a head start on the enlightened-being-look, whatever that may be.

The Rinpoche from Dolpa, a remote area in Northern Nepal, was young, younger than any Tibetan tulku I had ever heard give teachings before. But there was a knowing ambiance about him that was undeniable. These Rinpoches and tulkus amaze me—they are part of a two-thousand year old lineage of reincarnated lamas (since Buddhism first migrated to Tibet around the 7th century) and are recognized as such at a young age. When a young boy is recognized by the community as being a reincarnation of a past teacher (many are able to recall their past lives), the young soul is sent to the monastery to study and learn the dharma. They are believed to be enlightened realized beings, and are revered as embodying the physical presence of the Buddha. The Rinpoche made a quick joke about getting lost and not being able to find the yoga studio, his lightheartedness filled the room with humming laughter. Before he began his teaching on the nature of happiness and suffering, he glanced over and smiled a big toothy smile, right at me. We made eye contact, mainly with our dentures. I felt a nervous surge, the same feeling I get during the Saturday morning teachings with our Rinpoche, Chokyi Nima, when we make eye contact with our smiles from across the meditation hall. Maybe I just smile too much, or maybe these enlightened beings sense those who smile, but even a moment of direct contact with these all-knowing teachers has a warmth about it that really is indescribable. They have such a calm disposition about them, unphased, yet teach about developing the qualities of an altruistic mind—by developing Wisdom, they say, compassion and love for all sentient beings naturally arises. You see their own wisdom in their soft eyes and spontaneous giggling. It was hard for me to believe at first—the whole clairvoyance omniscient thing these guys have going on, but just go to a Dalai Lama teaching or come here to Nepal, and see the way Chokyi Nima fills a room and the energy they radiate. From what I’ve seen, these great Tibetan teachers have a certain knowing about the reality we inhabit and the nature of things as they truly are, a realization that manifests in their teachings on compassion, kindness, wisdom, and emptiness. They laugh at themselves, make funny jokes like when Chokyi Nima told us how Tibetans wanted to ‘drink his pee pee’ because he is such a holy figure. Or how Tulku Rinpoche spoke of the need to see similarities and not differences with the ‘long legged-ones,’ his personal term for Europeans. I felt at peace, a deep sense of calmness listening to the Rinpoche speak about what humans really need for happiness and all that we mistakenly grasp and become attached to, often at a subconscious level. The stillness of this moment reminded me of those few painful nights I had about two and a half weeks ago…

It was 12:30am, hours past the usual Nepali curfew. I first felt the stabbing earlier that day after a typical lunch of rice and curried vegetables, but shrugged it off as a little post-binging gurgling. My insides were now being haunted by the fried rice patty, a strange dark colored donut with sesame speckles. Rashmi had given me the treat after dinner and I inhaled it without thinking twice about its origins. We had been warned not to indulge in any street food, mostly fruits. I had broken this cardinal rule, not wanting to offend my family only now to regret those few sweet bites. The pain was paralyzing. I couldn’t move or gulp in any oxygen because my heart burned every time I tried to satiate my lungs. There was a ceaseless stabbing coming from my lower abdomen. My stomach was furious. The growls of a lioness protecting her cubs stemmed from my insides, roaring in perfect harmony with the orchestra of street dogs hunting outside. I gripped my stomach, not realizing the loud birthing moans were coming from me. I tried my usual remedies for belly pain… curling up in fetal position, trying child’s pose with a pillow pressed against my stomach… but to no avail. In the next five hours, I became intimately acquainted with every porcelain tile and crawling critter in my bathroom. A few hours in the bathroom followed by a few minutes of painless bliss in fetal position on my hard embracing bed, only to be woken up to the angry stabs again. This went on until about the time the sun was rising. I was too tired to fight the pain, and dozed off until 7:30am when I arose once more to a quick trip to the bathroom and a little mental reassurance that this bug would soon be out of my system.

At breakfast, Rashmi gave me a guilty concerned apology knowing only now that my stomach was not probably not equipped to handle the fried rice patty. I apologized profusely to her, after mere habit, assuring her it was not her fault, only my weak stomach to blame. Those morning stabs seemed to quiver and settle in the face of Rashmi’s motherly compassion. I had texted my mom during the whole fiasco, sending her enough details so that she could envision each and every porcelain tile and crawling spider in the bathroom. But, my mom was worlds away, and this is Nepal, everybody gets sick eventually. Rashmi always reminds me that I am a part of their family now, a sentiment that warms all the pangs of loneliness that inevitably seep into the deep silent voids of the night. Bua told me again this morning that his house was my house too, and I should feel very much at home. Rashmi and Ama worked together to make this steaming concoction of mint leaves, saffron colored turmeric powder, and other medicinal herbs to help cleanse the bacterial guests setting up camping tents in my digestive track. I’m not one to complain, I rather internalize whatever painful sensations as they arise and try to breathe into those painful spaces, knowing they are temporary states of discomfort. But my yogi breathing was not really doing the trick, the pain was still hounding relentlessly. I walked to school praying that class would distract me. I saw my friends that morning in our Tibetan Buddhism history class and burst out laughing. All I managed to squeal out was ‘waak waak laagyo,’ a handy Nepali phrase that means exactly what it sounds like. Waak waak had become our favorite phrase—its phonetics sent me into a raging tailspin of laughter every time we mouthed it to one another randomly throughout class. Our days had become routine, something I normally veer away from, but was happy to have gotten into a steady pace with my Nepali life. Setting my alarm for 6:47am and snoozing until 7:23, scurrying to the bathroom in my pjay shorts armed with my water bottle to brush my teeth, rushing up one flight of stairs to greet Rashmi, Sabhya, Subham, Ama, and Bua with a morning Namaste and ‘subha pravat.’ They always giggle at my late awakenings, because they are just about to have lunch at the early hour of 9am when I am still in a morning daze.

Rashmi tells me she wakes up every morning at 5am, to tend to chores and get Sabhya and Subham ready at 9:30am, when Nabin takes them to school on the back of his motorcycle. Nabin promises to take me one day for a ride around the valley to visit his favorite places, and I always respond with an apprehensive nod of excitement. Almost every local here rides a motorbike, it’s definitely the most convenient way to weave through the congestion of Kathmandu traffic. After dunking a few coconut biscuits into boiling hot masala chia, I dart off to the Shedra, a close four minute walk from my house on Mahankhal street. We usually have two or three classes on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, but Tuesdays and Fridays are long nine hour days of class. This Friday seemed especially long after a sleepless night. While Philippe, our Canadian professor lectured us about the migration of Indian Buddhism along the Silk Routes into China and Tibet, I suddenly felt the weight of the purple bags under my eyes. After class, we rushed out of the room, our backs burning from sitting on the floor for so long, slid on our shoes, and darted off to RYI’s restaurant where sweet Asha prepares school meals for the Shedra students. I asked Asha for my usual breakfast of masala scrambled eggs and ginger tea with lemon and honey, hoping my stomach would accept the small offering. Wolfing down my eggs and gulping down the hot chia, I ran to catch up with Andrew and Patty as they headed off to our next class, The Way of the Bodhisattva, taught by a Tibetan Buddhist Lopon and translated by a humble American, Miguel. The class is always full of wide-eyed international faces—some from Nepal, India, or Bengal, others from Brazil, Germany, Denmark, or Kentucky. The Chinese monk from Hong Kong and the African American monk from Indiana, both of whose names are Lobsong, always sit in the first row of cushions. Behind the two Lobsongs sits Kinga, the eager youngster from Bhutan, and Sagnik, the inspiring dark young man from Calcutta who told me recently about how he fled into the mountains on the night before taking his university graduation exams to search and find himself.

My limited life experience seems so dwarfed compared to this international and culturally diverse group of people. At lunch, I hear Prabha’s story. She is from Patagonia and is one of the most confident woman I have ever met. She’s been studying Buddhism for twice my lifespan and has made many retreats to Buddhist centers around the world and was telling me about six months she spent at a desolate and remote retreat in India, working intensively on her practice. At the next table over, Maitri feeds Andrew’s passionate ears for music with a story from a summer in his past life as a Californian hippie renunciate. I overheard bits and pieces of Maitri’s unbelievable tale, hitchhiking for days to the Black Rock deserts of Nevada to reach Burning Man, a performing arts festival that is completely out of this world—often described as what life on Mars would be like if infested by human aliens in strange spacesuits. I peer around, smiling over at Ellen, the Ashtanga yoga teacher from Norway. Ellen is a pioneer and nomad whose life revolves around yoga as her Northern star. She studied yoga in Mysore with the great Patabhi Jois, founder of Ashtanga yoga practice. Inspired, Ellen opened up the first Ashtanga yoga studio in Norway. Wow!!! I go to Ellen’s classes about three or four times a week. Sweaty and intensive both physically and mentally, Ellen’s classes focus on finding stillness in the dynamism of the physical asanas, poses that are becoming more and more pretzel-like. With prana (translates as breath), the energy source of yoga practice, we find a sense of ease in the challenging and rigorous poses. Her classes teach discipline and also how to surrender to the flow of our breath, with the breath as our guide, we engage our bandhas, or locks of energy in the subtle body—similar to the chakras, or energy centers along the spinal axis of our bodies. We use different breathing techniques, mainly the ujjai breath, or ocean’s breath, to flow through the pain and ease of the asana sequence.

A few weekends ago, I went to a full-day yoga retreat hosted at the Vajra Hotel, a majestic oasis hidden in the back alleys of Swayambuh. Ellen was teaching an ashtanga class in the morning, followed by a meditation class led by Jharna, a beautiful Nepali woman who had recently won Nepal’s national beauty pageant. As I walked under the archway embraced in green vines, I entered the quiet courtyard of the oriental brick palace. The stillness of this haven instantly put me at ease. I could not believe I was at a yoga retreat in Nepal—the sentence and thought itself was too much for me to handle!! I walked up several flights of stairs past beautifully carved wooden doorways, to meet friendly yoginis, most of whom were women both traveling through and living in Nepal. I met Leah before class began. She had just biked her way from China to Vietnam with her boyfriend and was now spending her last two weeks trekking in the Himalayas before returning home to Switzerland. Kafya came and sat down next to us. She was a few years younger than me, in her second year of highschool, and full of so much energy. She told me she was here with her father, a cardiovascular surgeon, and that she was following in his footsteps by studying medicine. Ellen beckoned us all inside. We placed our yoga mats and cushions on the hardwood floors of the beautiful Tibetan decorated terrace. The view was incredible, we overlooked the whole Kathmandu valley—a colorful and smoggy crescent.

Every now and then, we would hear some strange noises coming from the balcony outside the meditation room. I looked up to see a rather large monkey perched on the dark wooden railing. From the open windows, we could see the Swayambuh temple overhead on the hill envelopped in ancient legend and historical myth. Manjushri, the Buddhist deity of compassion, had created the Kathmandu valley thousands of years ago from his perch on top of this hill. As the story recounts, the Kathmandu valley was once filled with water. Only one small island floated in the vast expanse of a Himalayan glacial ocean. Manjushri was recorded to have been sitting and meditating at the base of this island, a place now marked by strands of Tibetan prayer flags. He saw a lotus flower at the lake’s center and slashed a gorge through the rolling mountains to allow the great body of water to drain, and thus the valley we know today as Kathmandu was created. Each place is like that here. Every stone and mountain pass bares some mythological importance to the Nepalese people and is etched in national epics dating thousands of years. With every inhale during the ashtanga workshop, I meditated on the preciousness of each moment in time—of all the karmic forces that had brought me here, to my yoga mat in Swayambuh, Nepal.

More to come,

xoxo Julia