Dalai Lama and Diwali
Upper Dharamsala was bustling with activity last week as local Tibetans and international tourists gathered to welcome His Holiness the Dalai Lama home from his latest travels. Thanks to some holidays on the Indian calendar, I had a couple days off from volunteering and was able to attend a few of the Dalai Lama’s public teachings. On the days of the teachings, my friends and I went to the temple in the morning and waded through rows of seat cushions until we found a few unclaimed spots on the floor. We added our cushions to the mix and tuned our FM radios to the station providing English translation. Our neighbors included an assortment of Tibetan laypeople, monks and nuns, and fellow tourists. The energy in the air was almost tangible, especially among the locals. I could tell they were looking so forward to having His Holiness back home for a brief while.
Shortly after the Dalai Lama began teaching, monks made their way through the audience with metal pails full of Tibetan bread, which they distributed among everyone in attendance. Other monks carrying large teapots followed behind them and served us butter tea in cups we brought from home. During each two-hour session, the Dalai Lama read passages from various Buddhist texts and then discussed their meanings in detail. The teachings were difficult to follow since the texts were unfamiliar and the subject matter was tailored for a scholarly Buddhist audience, but the experience as a whole was entirely worthwhile.
Diwali, one of the biggest festivals in India, also fell during the time of the Dalai Lama’s teachings, making for a busy but exciting weekend. Diwali is known as a festival of lights, and strands of lights hanging from everyone’s homes illuminated the neighborhood in the evenings leading up to the holiday. People repainted their houses and splurged on new household and clothing items from the market. On the morning of the festival, the Cross-Cultural Solutions staff and volunteers decorated our house with strings of marigolds and designs made of colored sand. That night, we joined the rest of the town in setting off fireworks. Almost every house was having its own fireworks show, and I could hear the noise continue late into the night and start up again early the next morning.
The weekend before Diwali, I spent Saturday morning with the women’s group in Khaniyara village. One of the other Cross-Cultural Solutions volunteers came to give a presentation on women’s health and hygiene, and about fifteen women from the village attended. Since it was a success, we plan to host a follow-up presentation to discuss other concerns related to women’s health, which is an under-addressed topic throughout the country.
The next day, I met one of my Tibetan friends in upper Dharamsala, and from there we took a rickshaw to the Tibetan Children’s Village, where her son and niece live. She had packed a picnic lunch of momos (a popular Tibetan dish) and fruit for all of us to share. We spread out a blanket on the grass and enjoyed the meal, then ordered some tea from the cafeteria. Sundays are holidays from class, so some of the children were watching television in their dormitories when we arrived, and others were playing basketball or visiting with their parents. We stayed for nearly three hours before walking back down, and I learned a lot through our casual conversation. On our way back to Mcleod, we passed a monk who my friend knew and found out that he was going in the same direction I was. I wasn’t familiar with the bus routes that far up the mountain, so I followed the monk to a nearby village, where we took a jeep to the Dharamsala market and a bus from there to our destination. Though the monk’s English was as basic as my Tibetan, and our conversation was hopelessly broken, I said goodbye that afternoon feeling like I had made a new friend.
I came to Dharamsala hoping to get to know the town and the people, and I feel like I have accomplished that. Coming to a place far from home and knowing no one makes branching out and meeting people both necessary and natural. I am still amazed at how much I learn by simply being open to people’s stories and making time to listen.
