Hello family and friends!
It’s hard to believe it’s been a month since I last blogged about Darjeeling, but it’s true. Even harder to swallow is that we only have three weeks left in this beautiful country, so we are trying to savor every moment and learn as much as possible.Currently, we are staying at Deer Park Institute in Bir. We arrived here on the 16th and have immensely enjoyed every day. We begin each day at the institute with a delicious 7:30 AM breakfast of fruit and some sort of vegetable mash. This is accompanied by homemade toast (some of the group can eat 4 or 5 pieces!) which they set barberry jam out for, a jam and a berry I have never heard of. Next on our usually busy schedule is meeting with Melitas, one of the nicest organizers we have met. She is originally from Japan, has lived in Oregon, and has been in India the past five years. We have a topic of discussion, usually connected to Buddhism, and we exchange ideas. We have also had poetry workshops on Haiku (and some of us on Tanka), watched speeches and lectures on specific aspects on Buddhism and other more abstract ideas.
The institute itself used to be a monastery before it became too small for the over 400 monks that flocked to it. The institute has a wonderful library on Buddhism and the people staying here are all so great! Three rescued street dogs roam around the campus looking adorable and making us miss our own animals at home. The temple is centered within the institute as the focal point. There are also other places of worship such as a stupa in the garden and a meeting hall with a female Bodi Safa statue that is a large as the entire wall! Our meetings are held in the temple on the second floor, the most wonderful meeting area. It’s lovely to sit upon cushions and soak in the nag champa incense as you try to not get distracted by the beautiful and vibrant Tibetan monastrian artwork. The institute is nestled in the mountains surrounded with prayer flags and tiered fields. If you walk further up the hillside you come upon farms and an Indian colony. Even further up is a Shiva temple and a magnificent waterfall that some of the group spent an afternoon adventuring to. The entire area is lovely for exploration, just remember tashi delek, the Tibetan greeting- as you’ll be saying this a lot!
Much of the past week has been a philosophical windfall. As a group we have been reflecting on the differences between Indian and American cultures, as well as processing what we have seen and how it will be when we return. The environment we are in and the time in the trip seem to correspond well for us to begin digesting some of the differences and also appreciating the similarities. The entire group has our minds melted I could say by the introduction of a woman named Tenzin Palmo. Jetsunma Palmo is a female monk (referred to as a nun) who came to India from England in the early 60s and is well-known for her 12 years retreat in a cave in the Himalayas. Upon returning, she became vocal about the inequality present in Buddhism and began a nunnery for girls and women to study Buddhism. Our group had the opportunity to not only travel to her nunnery in Himachal Pradesh, but sit down with her and ask her questions relating to our lives and futures. We all walked away with huge appreciation for our lives, and specifically for our lovely and loving mothers! It was a fantastic experience.
We also attended a transmission, which is a sort of dharma talk or lecture by a rinpoche (a reincarnate of a high ordained person in Buddhism). It was in Tibetan but we were able to hear the English translation on headsets. The transmission was for 750 Buddhist monks and 250 laypeople (only a handful of whom were Westerners). After the transmission, we were fed by the monastery, yum! We then stood outside and waited to have a moment (awkward moment!) with the rinpoche. It was a lovely time at a massive monastery. The Buddha statue on the inside, also, was about twenty feet high and surrounded by 108 smaller Buddhas (representing the 108 mala beads on a necklace for chanting).
We are now moving on to our last scheduled stop in the program (how strange to think!) which is McLeodganj. Here we will each be placed with a homestay family and will also have the opportunity to do internships, similar to what we did in Varanasi. We can choose from Hindi, Tibetan, massage, reiki, jewelry making or cooking. We are all so excited to learn more about Tibetan culture and also have a chance to work with newly arrived Tibetan refugees and teach them English.
As it is right after Thanksgiving, it is only fitting that I (on behalf of the group) say how grateful we are to all of you for helping us get to this point and experience this! For Thanksgiving Dan trekked across Bir to a small town in search of chicken for us. He managed to bring back tandoori chicken and Appy Fizz as a surprise for our Thanksgiving feast! We then held a game of secret pilgrim to celebrate the giving season and it went smashingly on account of Kaila’s great idea that we act out the person who we got our gift for, so funny! We thoroughly enjoyed our Thanksgiving, even if it was away from the people we would love to be with as well.
We truly appreciate our families and loved ones!-Tully