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Struck by Surprise
I visited India and Nepal for the first time on a Buddhist pilgrimage led by Shantum Seth in 2007. The following — which I wrote in a travel journal in Dharamshala, India — is from my 2008 trip.
During the taxi ride back to Cloud’s End, I sat in the back seat with Arturo and he told me about his experience at the Dalai Lama’s teaching this morning, in the courtyard his temple. When the Tibetans were moving into the center after the Dalai Lama passed through, people were trampling him and someone stepped on his hand. A beautifully-dressed Tibetan woman took his mat, held out both her hands to keep people out of the way, and turned to him, pointed at the mat, and said in English, “You sit here.”
When a monk came along with butter tea, Arturo said he didn’t want any tea because he didn’t have his cup with him. The Tibetan woman who had already helped him pulled out the only cup she had, meant for herself, a Styrofoam cup. This was after someone came by with bread and she said, “You have to eat this. It’s blessed by the Dalai Lama!” The tea was the same situation: it’s blessed by the Dalai Lama.
During our drive, I learned from Arturo that he’s also a solitary practitioner, though in Tibetan, not Insight Meditation. He lives in New Hampshire (although he has a Spanish accent) and the town has a local sangha, but he doesn’t like it; they’re mainly into…