Hand In Hand With The Dalai Lama

In the lotus-strewn wake of the Dalai Lama's recent North American tour, anybody who is a somebody (and frankly, these days who isn't?) will have a how-I-met-the-Dalai-Lama story to tell. At the slightest instigation or with none at all, Catholic, Jew, atheist, they'll regale you with the encounter, eyes misting over. Often these turn out to be 30-second meetings in an elevator or hotel lobby. Even the shortest exchange takes on Greater Meaning. Such is the profundity of his presence and his ability to be so present with whomever he meets.

I listen politely to such stories. Then I struggle with my ego: should I trump theirs and tell mine? My ego usually wins, as it will here, because my meeting with his holiness was so touching and revealing.

I had scored a one-on-one 90-minute interview with the 14th Dalai Lama, largely – okay, solely – because I was writing about the growing popularity of Buddhism for one of his favorite magazines, National Geographic.

I was to meet him in Dharamsala, India, headquarters of the Tibet Government in Exile since 1959. His secretary recommended I ask questions that were not the run-of-the-mill sort he has fielded for some 50 years and who knows how many lifetimes. In preparation, I read his autobiography, My Land and My People. It begins: "I was born in a small village called Taktser, in the northeast of Tibet, on the fifth day of the fifth month of the Wood Hog Year of the Tibetan calendar – that is, the year 1935."
I stopped reading after the first paragraph, fixated on that village of his birth. This would be my unique angle. I convinced National Geographic to send me to Taktser, so that I could open the conversation with something like, "So I just happened to be in your old neighborhood, Holiness..." It might have been the most expensive icebreaker in National Geographic history. The village, it turns out, is one of the most humble I have ever seen. Dirt paths, tiny mud houses set against a cliff, not a Starbucks in sight.

At the top of a hill, I found the house where Lhamo Dhondrub was born and from which he was taken at age four to begin his life as a future Dalai Lama. Rebuilt in 1986 as a monastery, the structure is now administered by the Chinese Government, a superficial gesture to make Tibetans believe the Chinese actually care about them and their leader. The Chinese government's clear discomfort (to put it mildly) with the attention showered on him in the United States two weeks ago more accurately reflects their position.

Inside, I met the Dalai Lama's nephew, Gongbu Tashi, a man of 58 who the Chinese government pays to maintain the monastery. He told me more and more Westerners make the long pilgrimage to this now historic site. After he showed me around, we stood outside the monastery, overlooking the magnificent rolling green mountains of the Kunlun Range. My tape recorder running, I suggested he send his uncle a message that I promised to deliver personally. "What would you tell him right now?" I asked, putting the recorder to his mouth. He started: "Uncle, every day we are waiting and hoping and expecting you. You are my uncle and you are getting older and it's time for you to come home."

It was such a poignant moment because it was such a futile and implausible hope.

Mongolian Buddhists attending classes with Dalai Lama

Source: Mongolia Web News
Some 250 Mongolian Buddhists are currently attending classes in India being conducted by the Dalai Lama.

The five days of learning with the Dalai Lama will end on December 27, when the students from the Gandan Thegchenling Monastery in Ulaanbaatur will return to Mongolia.


Students are studying Buddhist texts and immersing themselves in prayer, while in India.


Besides the students from Mongolia, Buddhists from Tibet, Korea and China are attending the classes

Dalai Lama to attend RomeCinemaFest

By Eric J. Lyman
source: The Hollywod Reporter
Dec 20, 2007

ROME -- The Dalai Lama is set to attend the third RomeCinemaFest in 2008, adding a new kind of star power to a young festival that has already attracted scores of top-shelf Hollywood names over its first two editions.

According to Goffredo Bettini, president of the Rome Cinema Foundation, the central figure of Tibetan Buddhism has accepted the invitation to attend.

It is understood that the Dalai Lama will attend the festival to take part in a special sidebar dedicated to the people of Tibet, including documentaries and films about the region. The Dalai Lama will join a list of internationally recognized celebrities to have been associated with the Rome festival that already includes Sophia Loren, Sean Connery, Harrison Ford, Robert Redford, Tom Cruise, Francis Ford Coppola, and Martin Scorsese.

The third edition of the Rome festival is scheduled to take place in October 2008.

Dalai Lama to teach leadership at IIM-A

Source: Sify.com
New Delhi: After Railway Minister Lalu Prasad, it's now the turn of Buddhist spiritual leader the Dalai Lama to teach management and leadership qualities at the premier Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A).

The Tibetan Buddhist leader will take a couple of classes at IIM-A in January 2008. The exact date is to be finalised soon.

"I think, he will be the first spiritual leader to give lectures to our students. Both the faculty and the students are eagerly waiting to hear the Dalai Lama," IIM-A chief communication officer Ashok Shah told.

"His commitment to promotion of human values such as compassion, tolerance, contentment and self-discipline are worth emulation and analysis. These are leadership traits and the spiritual leader will help us in becoming leaders," he explained.

Shah said the Dalai Lama, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, would "help us learn new frontiers in leadership".

For over four decades, the 72-year-old leader has been living in Himachal Pradesh's Dharamsala town, the seat of the Tibetan government-in-exile.

"In a management set-up like IIM-A, we strive to give students and faculty fresh inputs to lead in their own area of interest. The success story of leaders, their perseverance and their approach are a learning lesson for us.

"This is part of our holistic teaching method and efforts at making our students think differently and ably before entering the tough world of management," he said.

Shah, who was recently in the capital to meet people close to the Dalai Lama, said: "I have interacted with people close to the spiritual leader and the final date for the lecture will be finalised soon."

According to the Dalai Lama's website, since 1959 "His Holiness has received over 84 awards, honorary doctorates, prizes, etc (including the Nobel Peace Prize and Magsaysay awards), in recognition of his message of peace, non-violence, inter-religious understanding, universal responsibility and compassion".

He has also authored more than 72 books, including "My Tibet", "Kindness, Clarity and Insight" and "The Union of Bliss & Emptiness".

Last year, impressed with Railway Minister Lalu Prasad's managerial acumen, the institute had roped him in for guest lectures at their campus.

Dalai Lama accuses China of 'cultural genocide'

Source: Hindustantimes.com
The Dalai Lama has accused China of "cultural genocide" in Tibet, in an interview published on Tuesday in the online edition of the German political magazine Cicero.

Lhasa was being turned into a Chinese city "under the pretext of modernity", said the Tibetan leader, who left the capital to go into Indian exile in 1959.

Referring to the disruption in German-Chinese relations following his September meeting with Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Dalai Lama said he regretted the "unpleasantness" caused.

And he noted what he called an "interesting phenomenon" among world politicians: they tended to meet him as long as they did not hold government responsibility, but avoided him once they took office so as not to annoy Beijing.

The Dalai Lama said that while he had not been to Tibet in years, indications from refugees crossing the border to India were that Chinese ways were taking over in his country and that many Tibetans were even losing the language of their birth.

"Whether the Chinese authorities acknowledge it or not, at the moment there is a kind of cultural genocide in progress, even if Tibet is currently very fashionable in the People's Republic," he said.

"Tibet's cultural heritage is under serious threat," he said, with farmers being pushed into "model villages" in the name of modernisation.

The Dalai Lama repeated his call for autonomy for Tibet. Current contacts with Beijing were not showing any real progress in this regard, he said.

Dalai Lama appeals for support at end of private visit to Italy

Source: AFp
TURIN, Italy (AFP) — The Dalai Lama on Sunday wrapped up a private 11-day visit to Italy during which he met fellow Nobel peace prize laureates and appealed for continued support for Tibet's bid for autonomy.

"Tibetans have a very resistant spirit, but ultimately they begin to get irritated," the exiled Tibetan Buddhist leader told regional lawmakers in northern Turin, according to the ANSA news agency.

"For this reason it is extremely important that your support continue," he said. "Ours is a just cause... (Tibetan) culture should be preserved not just for the Tibetan people but for the entire international community because it is a culture of peace, compassion and non-violence," he added.

The Dalai Lama made a similar appeal last Thursday in Rome, urging lawmakers to offer both concrete help as well as moral support.

The Tibetan Buddhist leader spoke in the parliament building but not in the assembly chamber as some lawmakers had wanted.

"We do not want independence for Tibet, but only to preserve our cultural traditions, which enrich even those of China," the Dalai Lama said.

China made clear its disapproval of the trip to the Italian foreign ministry.

Beijing has complained to the Italian foreign ministry over the visit, which took the Dalai Lama to Rome, Milan and Turin.

Recent meetings between the Dalai Lama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel and US President George W. Bush have angered Beijing.

Also last Thursday, the 1989 Nobel peace prize winner met other Nobel laureates including former Russian and Polish presidents Mikhail Gorbachev and Lech Walesa at an annual summit in Rome.

In Milan, the Dalai Lama led a three-day conference attended by some 8,000 people.

The Dalai Lama and the pope met in October 2006, but an initially scheduled meeting during the current visit was cancelled, in a decision that Italian media reports said facilitated the recent ordination of a new bishop in Guangdong, southern China, with the Vatican's approval.

China sent troops into Tibet in 1950 and officially "liberated" it the following year. The Dalai Lama, who fled Tibet following a failed uprising in the region in 1959, now travels the world seeking support for his calls for Tibetan autonomy.

Report: Development Harming Tibet

Tuesday December 11, 2007 3:01 AM


By MATTHEW ROSENBERG

Associated Press Writer

NEW DELHI (AP) - China's push to develop Tibet is leaving Tibetans behind and threatening the fragile environment of the plateau, the source of rivers that serve hundreds of millions of people in Asia, Tibet's government-in-exile said in a report released Monday.

The report says Beijing should stop dictating the future of the region and give Tibetans a say in how the plateau is developed.

``Many past mistakes can avoid being repeated if Tibetans are treated as equal partners,'' the report said, echoing demands by the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, that China give the region full autonomy.

Despite the report's often confrontational content - it says China is responsible for Tibet's abysmal 48 percent literacy rate, for example - its authors insist they are not looking to assign blame.

Rather, they say their aim is to work with Beijing to improve conditions in Tibet.

The report ``will make the Chinese understand that the development taking place in Tibet does not help the Tibetan people,'' said Kalon Tempa Tsering of the Central Tibetan Administration, the India-based exile government led by the Dalai Lama.

Whether Beijing will listen is another matter. Beijing has long insisted it helped Tibetans by ending the Dalai Lama's rule - which Chinese officials often deride as ``feudal'' - and that its efforts to develop and industrialize the region will result in a modern, thriving Tibet.

Tibet's exiled government says otherwise, and the report catalogs numerous problems created by Chinese rule - from the from the erosion of Tibetan culture to threats to the plateau's fragile environment.

In Beijing, a Chinese Foreign Ministry official who would not give his name said the ministry was aware of the report but had no immediate comment.

A central issue is a new railroad linked Beijing to Tibet's capital, Lhasa. Tibetans fear that an influx of China's Han majority, which has grown since the train began running last year, will overwhelm the region's Buddhist culture.

The train is also bringing tourists - some 2.45 million in 2006, a 36 percent jump over the previous year, the report said.

``Such a drastic increase in tourism will surely overwhelm this destination, which is considered to be a place of spiritual power, mental purification and transformation,'' it said.

The railway is also making it easier for Beijing to mine the plateau rich in iron, copper, zinc and other minerals, and speed construction of numerous dams that will provide hydroelectric power needed to fuel China's growing economy.

Tibet, the world's highest plateau, is the source of rivers that serve hundreds of millions of people and such projects could ``seriously decrease the water supplies'' across South and Southeast Asia, the report said.

Chinese communist troops occupied Tibet in 1951 and Beijing continues to rule the region with a heavy hand. Beijing enforces strict controls on religious institutions and routinely vilifies the 71-year-old Dalai Lama, who fled to India in 1959 amid an aborted uprising against Chinese rule.

China says it has ruled Tibet for centuries, although many Tibetans say their homeland was essentially an independent state for most of that time.

EDITORIAL: China's failed Tibet propaganda

Source: Taipei Times
Sunday, Dec 09, 2007, Page 8
In the past few months, several heads of state have received the Dalai Lama and indirect exchanges between Beijing and the religious leader have focused more attention on Tibet than it has seen for years. The [for Beijing] unwelcome attention has incensed Chinese authorities and sparked a nonstop flow of propagandist denunciations and threats that have done little more than erode the country's credibility abroad at a time when everything from child labor money-making schemes at public schools to toys laced with lead have severely tarnished its reputation.

China's invective against a man who has won the Nobel Peace Prize and advocates peaceful dialogue can only fail miserably, but Beijing has displayed a distinct lack of strategic deftness in handling the matter, doing itself the disservice of repeatedly stirring up the issue.

On Nov. 28, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶) indicated Germany and China could maintain their friendship only if German Chancellor Angela Merkel admitted that meeting the Dalai Lama in September was a mistake -- strong words more likely to increase sympathies for the Dalai Lama in the West and publicize Beijing's iron grip over its population than to draw an apology.

Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman Liu Jianchao (劉建超), meanwhile, lashed out at the Dalai Lama for remarks last month that he might choose his successor before he dies. Liu said Beijing could never accept the idea because it violated "religious rituals and historical conventions." This from the same government that kidnapped the Panchen Lama at the age of six in 1995 and installed a replacement.

Again, China would have been better off keeping quiet. Its comment only highlighted blatant contradictions in its actions and again landed its "Measures on the Management of the Reincarnation of the Living Buddhas of Tibetan Buddhism" in international news. The measures, passed this summer, stipulate that the Chinese government has sole authority in selecting the reincarnations that are central to the religion.

A week later, the Dalai Lama proposed holding a referendum -- including Tibetans in China -- over the issue of his next incarnation. But China, which calls itself "the people's democratic dictatorship" in its Constitution, quickly made it clear it would never allow a plebiscite.

Beijing has yet to understand that its rhetoric doesn't have the same effect in democratic countries as it does with Chinese who have been force-fed a skewed view of reality from grade school on. Instead, Beijing is fueling a public opinion abroad that is a mirror opposite of the image it wants to promote.

But perhaps China believes its rhetoric to be effective. After all, many people in the West incorrectly believe the Dalai Lama demands independence for Tibet -- a claim China repeatedly makes. That widespread misunderstanding, however, probably has less to do with the efficacy of Beijing's propaganda overseas and more to do with the frequent news of abuses in Tibet. Only two weeks ago, hundreds of Tibetans clashed with authorities after police reportedly brutally beat three young monks, one of whom, a 14-year-old, was caught wearing a photo of the Dalai Lama around his neck. For those of us who value democracy and human rights, it is hard to believe Tibetans would want anything less than full independence.

China 'forced Miss Tibet to quit'

Source: BBC

The Tibetan entrant in an international beauty pageant in Malaysia has blamed China for her expulsion from the event.
Tsering Chungtak said that China pressured the competition organisers to replace her "Miss Tibet" sash with one reading "Miss Tibet-China".

When she refused, she claims, she was told she would have to leave the Miss Tourism Queen 2007 competition.

China governs Tibet as an autonomous region and swiftly clamps down on any suggestion of Tibetan nationalism.

Miss Chungtak, who is an ethnic Tibetan living in Delhi, said that to take part in the competition wearing the sash would be have been "unacceptable".

China is in control of Tibet, and there is no freedom in Tibet

"I was really shocked," the 22-year-old student said. "This is a pageant, it's not anything related to politics."

But in a statement on the Miss Tibet website she said: "China is in control of Tibet, and there is no freedom in Tibet."

China has not yet commented officially on the case.

This is the second time that a Tibetan pageant entrant has claimed Chinese influence on the competition.

In 2005 Tashi Yangchen also left the contest after the Chinese authorities said she would have to enter as Miss Tibet-China

The beauty pageant to find Miss Tourism Queen 2007 will end on Friday.

China troops invaded Tibet in 1950, claiming a centuries-old sovereignty over the Himalayan region.

But the allegiances of many Tibetans lie with the exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.

Dalai Lama says successor could be a woman

Source: Telegraph
By Richard Spencer in Beijing
Last Updated: 2:53am GMT 07/12/2007

The next Dalai Lama could be a woman, it emerged yesterday.
Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th and current Dalai Lama

Although there are female lamas, - or living Buddhas - men are predominant and it is rare for reincarnated lamas not to share the sex of their predecessors.

However, at the start of a 10-day visit to Italy, Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th and current Dalai Lama, said: "If a woman reveals herself as more useful the lama could very well be reincarnated in this form." The comment follows his surprising remarks last week that he might choose his successor before his death, or even hold a referendum on whether he should be reborn at all.

"If people feel that the institution of the Dalai Lama is still necessary, it will continue," he said.

Traditionally, the Dalai's successor is chosen by a committee of monks who find a young child born after his death, who is supposed to show a spark of the dead leader's spirit. The question of his succession is of increasing importance to the Dalai, who is 72.

There is a growing determination among the Chinese authorities to exert their control over Tibetan Buddhism.

The Chinese will want to oversee the appointment of his successor, aware that he is a figurehead for Tibetan aspirations for greater autonomy or even independence.

In the summer, they demanded that all reincarnations of lamas had to win prior approval from the government's religious affairs bureau before being reborn. This is in line with the principle that all religions must operate within a framework controlled by the Communist Party.

It had been expected that the Dalai Lama would meet the Pope during his Italian visit, as he did last year.

But after it became clear that this would not happen, he said: "I'm sorry I won't meet him. Given that I'm here, I would like to have seen him."

There has been speculation that this was linked to the ordination last week in Guangzhou, southern China, of a bishop who was first approved by the state.

The Holy See is recognised by China only as the spiritual head of the Catholic Church, and Beijing asserts the right to appoint all bishops.

Asked by Sky Italia TV if his presence in Italy appeared to be causing embarrassment, the Dalai Lama insisted his visit was not political. "I'm only a visitor," he said.

Yesterday, Qin Gang, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said: "Wherever the Dalai Lama goes, or in what name, the issue is not personal or religious.

"He represents a clique trying to split the country and seeking Tibetan independence, to which the Chinese government and people are firmly opposed."

In response, Tsering Tashi, a spokesman for the Tibetan government in exile, said the Dalai wanted to give more freedom to people to choose, adding. "He's saying it's up to the Tibetan people."

Riot, arrests reported in Tibet

'The local social order is stable,' the official New China News Agency says. It's unclear whether incidents of unrest are on the rise.
By John M. Glionna, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
December 4, 2007
BEIJING -- Protesters in Chinese-controlled Tibet were arrested during a riot that erupted after two Buddhist monks were taken into police custody, according to the government's news agency.

The monks were arrested after a dispute with a shopkeeper, and the subsequent unrest triggered a crackdown, according to the New China News Agency.

The incident occurred in mid-November but was only recently reported in China. The news agency gave no reason for the delay but stressed that "the local social order is stable," citing statements by local government officials.

Activists say the incident signals an upsurge in protests by the Tibetan majority against the Chinese military's presence in the Himalayan region.

"It doesn't take much to spark things right now," said Brad Adams, the Asia director for Human Rights Watch. "There's a sense that the Chinese are being heavy-handed on a whole range of issues."

Adams said it was unclear whether there was an increase in civil disobedience in Tibet or whether efforts to get news of such events to the outside world were more successful. "Even the people who know the most about Tibet aren't sure," he said.

Tibetans in exile with ties to the Dalai Lama say China is trying to keep Tibet under tight control in the months leading up to the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

"If they want to improve their image for the Olympics, they can allow free media access," said Tsering Tashi, a London-based representative of the Dalai Lama at the Office of Tibet, a group that considers itself the government in exile.

A group called Friends of Tibet said the Chinese had recently restricted travel among Tibetans in response to the protests.

"The Chinese government is restraining travel because they fear Tibetans will spread the message of these protests to different places," said Tenzin Tsundue, a Tibetan writer and member of Friends of Tibet who lives in India.

Tibetans have demanded more human rights as well as the return of the Dalai Lama, their spiritual leader, who fled into exile 48 years ago after a failed uprising against Chinese rule.

Tibet had de facto independence from the fall of the Qing dynasty in 1911 until the arrival of Chinese communist troops in 1951.

A Tibetan exile in India with family near the remote village of Paingar -- pronounced Palkar by Tibetans -- said that the two monks, both about 16, quarreled with the Chinese shopkeeper Nov. 19 and were beaten by the merchant. They were later arrested.

Neither the exile nor the news agency described the nature of the quarrel, which seemed to suggest tensions between ethnic Tibetans and ethnic Chinese.

The exile, who is a member of Friends of Tibet, said that more than 1,000 people showed up at police headquarters the next day and demanded the monks' release.

Troops dispatched from Lhasa, 190 miles away, used force to disband the protesters, said the exile, who asked that his name not be used.

According to the New China News Agency, 200 people, including some monks, "destroyed shops and government facilities."

The news agency said five people were arrested for "fanning the riot."

Crowds were "persuaded" to return home as authorities sought a third monk for questioning, the news agency said.

Activists said the riots followed other incidents deemed politically sensitive by the Chinese government that had received attention in the Western media.

In February, more than 30 Tibetans were sent to a labor camp after their attempt to flee their homeland across the Himalayas failed. Chinese border guards fired on and killed several members of the unarmed group, according to a survivor.

In August, a nomad named Runggye Adak walked onstage at a horse-racing festival in a Tibetan area of Sichuan province and, as dumbfounded Chinese dignitaries looked on, led the Tibetan crowd in chants calling for the return of the Dalai Lama.

He was arrested after a series of riots and sentenced to eight years in prison, according to Chinese news services.

The protests also have spread outside Tibet. In October, two dozen Tibetan activists living in exile in India broke through the gates of the Chinese Embassy and painted "Free Tibet" on the building walls before being arrested.

Activists say Tibetans also have turned to an unusual strategy: In October, when the Dalai Lama was honored by Congress in Washington, Tibetans lighted firecrackers and burned incense in celebration as monks whitewashed the walls of several monasteries in honor of the Nobel Peace Prize winner.

"People are performing simple cultural gestures without making political statements," Tsundue said. "The Chinese have responded by trying to stop all fires, even garbage-burning. It's paranoia."

Tashi said the Chinese acknowledged the Paingar riots only because of fears the outside world would learn the news anyway.

"Protests are always suppressed, but the word gets out from tourists or others who escape Tibet," he said. "The outside world comes to know. Then the Chinese are forced to make a comment."

Merkel rejects criticism from China over meeting with Dalai Lama

BERLIN: German Chancellor Angela Merkel brushed off criticism from China over having received the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, in an interview with German radio broadcast on Sunday.

"I receive who I think should be received," Merkel told Deutschlandfunk radio.

Beijing reacted angrily to the September meeting, calling on Berlin to acknowledge it had made a mistake.

"Germany and its government are partisans of a united China, there is no question about it. The Dalai Lama (only) wants cultural independence ... which is why it in no way calls China into question," said Merkel.

Berlin wants friendly relations with China, but it should be possible for there to be differing opinions within a friendly relationship, she added.

On Wednesday, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said that Germany and China could remain friends as long as Berlin recognises that it had committed an error.

Merkel had a private meeting with the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama at the end of September despite warnings from Beijing.

German industry criticised her decision to hold the meeting because the damage it would do to commercial relations with China.

German news magazine Der Spiegel became the latest casualty from the chill in Sino-German relations.

It announced Friday that it was pulling out of a week of cultural events in which it was to have participated in China due to what it called official "censorship".