Tibetan National Library

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.

Wood blocks for printing traditional books at the Sera Monastery publisher in Tibet

We parted with the prime minister and entered a different part of the same building, the Tibetan National Library. It’s an exiled Tibetan National Library, since this is Dharamshala, India.

Interview with a senior monk (maybe Geshe Lhakdor?)

(I added my own comments in brackets.)

When I was in Mumbai, my organizers tried to make a pilgrimage to meet with Shantum. I am happy you are informal, I am happy to be informal.

Q: Do you figure you’ve gotten most of the manuscripts out of Tibet?

A: No, most of the manuscripts have been lost.

Many are in the original Sanskrit — all completely put to fire. There are hardly one hundred left, out of those six hundred monasteries. What was inside those temples — much sacredness, not just in terms of the art’s quality. Many things were lost [when the Chinese invaded Tibet in 1959, and/or during the Cultural Revolution shortly afterwards].

We used to be so careful about those publications, carved wooden blocks, and if the printer made any mistake, they were thrown out. It was better than using…