burning tibet

Raise the warrior’s sword, my fellow Tibetans

2012-03-11T23:58:00.005-07:00

By Theurang or Tashi Rabten*
Translated from Tibetan by Bhuchung D. Sonam

Our courage is fading amidst stacks of religious texts
Our self-confidence is weakening under foreign occupation
My fellow Tibetans of the same blood and flesh
You are being drowned in tears of sorrow
And being bundle up in pain of agony

Today
Crossing the spine of history I enter into your chest
Staring at you, I write these words I want to convey

At a time when this generation, trapped in the leaves of heavy scripture
Is growing old chanting the six syllable mantra over and over again
When each of our ancient forts and ancestral pillars
Shake from inside amidst the growing whirlwinds

When you think about the lice and nits that suck your blood
Sunbathing on the slopes of Marpori
And this ancient land is turned restless and unlivable
Will this soil become a proud new Tibet or
A place where red hands shamelessly strike at their whim?

My fellow Tibetans, who are drowning in my teardrops,
Today a sharp thread is constricting your blood vessels
A book of crooked words is being thrust into your history
A red hand is digging into your chest
A black tongue is buying up your people
Buying them with sweets lies
Buying them with brute force

At a time
When our land is churned inside out in the name of development
When everything is being ordered from top down
When everything is subsumed in rules and regulations
Isn’t this the time
To exercise your fundamental rights
To assert control over your own life
Your consciousness
Your courage
Your wisdom

Utsangpa, your bones no longer have the smell of tsampa
Khampa, your minds are starved of any new thoughts
Amdowa, you are constantly busy in mutual disputes

Now is the time
To call upon the courage of our conquering ancestors
To raise their warriors’ swords
To invoke their martial spirit
To revisit their tombs and pillars

Now is the time
To rise up from the pool of pain
To raise the Snow Lion flag
Now is the time
For each warrior to stand tall
Like torrents of a waterfall
Like flames of fire
Now is the time for each of us
To do anything anytime anywhere

One year, ten years, one hundred years
After many years
From the Potala Square we hear tunes of Tsangyang Gyatso’s songs
We remember the courage of heroes dead from enemy bullets
We evoke the spirits of our lost mountains, lakes and grasslands
We recall those words written in blood
Again and again from the depth of our souls

Hatred, bitterness, pain, shackles,
From the abyss of flesh and bones
Two heavy words are asking a question
They demand an immediate answer
Like …
The US Declaration of Independence
The Hind Swaraj of India
The end of apartheid in South Africa

Courage, heroism, slavery, oppression.
Raise the warriors’ swords, my fellow Tibetans

***

* Theurang, author of Written in Blood and editor of Shar Dungri or Eastern Snow Mountain (a magazine banned by China), was sentenced to four years in prison on 2 June 2011 by the Chinese authorities in Ngaba, Amdo, northeastern Tibet.

Notes:
Marpori – literally ‘Red Hill’ on which the Potala Palace was built
Utsangpa – people from Central Tibet
Khampa – people from Kham, Eastern Tibet
Amdowa – people from Amdo, Northeastern Tibet
Tsampa – roasted barley flour, which is Tibet’s staple food
Hind Swaraj – self-rule in India

༄༅། །བཙན་པོའི་རལ་གྲི་ཐོགས་དང་བདག་གི་གདོང་དམར་པ།

བཀའ་བསྟན་གྱི་གླེགས་བམ་བར་ན་བཙན་པོའི་སྙིང་སྟོབས་བོར་ཞིང་

གཞན་དབང་གི་ལྕགས་སྒྲོག་བར་ན་ཁེར་ཚུགས་ཀྱི་སྤོབས་པ་ཞ་བའི་

སུས་ཀྱང་མིག་ཟུང་གི་མཆི་མར་བཤམས་པའི

ཀུན་གྱིས་ན་ཟུག་གི་གོང་བུར་བསྒྲིལ་བའི

བདག་གི་ཁ་བ་ཅན ཤ་དར་ཁྲག་དར་གྱི་མི་རྣམས་ཡ

དེ་རིང་ ང་ལོ་རྒྱུས་ཀྱི་སྒལ་ཚིགས་སུ་བུད་དེ་ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་བྲང་ཁོག་སྔོག་གིན་ཡོད

དེ་རིང་ ང་ཁྱེད་ལ་ཅེར་ནས་བླ་སྲོག་གི་སྐད་ཆ་རེ་རེ་ཡེ་གེར་ཕབ་ཀྱིན་ཡོད

གླེགས་བམ་གྱི་ཚི་དྲེག་ཁུར་བའི་མི་རབས་ཤིག

ཡིག་དྲུག་གི་ཟློས་བརྗོད་བར་ན་གོ་མེད་ཚོར་མེད་དུ་རྒས་ལ་ཉེ་བའི་དུས་འདིར

གནའ་བོའི་ཕོ་བྲང་དང་མེས་པོའི་རྡོ་རིང་རེ་རེའང་

ནང་ལོག་ནས་ལྡིང་བའི་རླུང་འཚུབ་ཀྱིས་སྒུལ་གིན་པའི་དུས་འདིར

ཁྱེད་ལ་ཟ་འཁྲིག་སློང་གིན་པའི ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་ཟུངས་ཁྲག་འཇིབས་ཀྱིན་ཤིག་དང་སྲོ་མང་གི་ཚོགས་ཀྱང་

དམར་པོ་རིའི་ཐུ་འོག་ན་ཉི་མར་ལྡེས་འདུག་པར་བསམ་ན

ན་ཆུང་མའི་བྲང་གཞུང་འདྲ་བའི་འདོད་སྲེད་མི་འཇགས་པའི་ཕ་ས་འདི

གཏན་དུ ཐུ་བྷོད་ཅེས་པའི་གསར་བུ་ཞིག་གི་ང་རྒྱལ་གྱི་མགོ་བོ་འཇོག་ས་ཡིན་ནམ

ཡང་ན་ལག་པ་དམར་པོ་ཞིག་གི་ཧམ་སེམས་བསྲིངས་ས་ཡིན།

བདག་གི་མིག་ཆུའི་ཀློང་ན་སྐྱོམས་པའི་ཁ་བ་ཅན་གྱི་མྱི་རྣམས་ཡ

ད་ལྟ རྣོ་ལྕགས་ཀྱི་སྐུད་པ་ཞིག་ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་ཁྲག་རྩའི་སྦུབས་སུ་འཐེན་ཡོད

འཁྱོག་གཟུགས་ཀྱི་ཉིན་ཐོ་ཞིག་ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་ལོ་རྒྱུས་ཁྲོད་དུ་སྤར་ཡོད

ལག་པ་དམར་པོ་ཞིག་གིས་ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་བྲང་ཁོག་ལ་སྙབས་ཀྱིན་འདུག

ཁ་ལྕེ་ནག་པོ་ཞིག་གིས་ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་མི་སེར་ཚོ་བསླུ་བཞིན་འདུག

དབང་ཤེད་ཀྱིས་བསླུ་བཞིན་འདུག

གཡོ་ཟོལ་གྱིས་བསླུ་བཞིན་འདུག

ག་ས་གང་ན་འཛུགས་སྐྲུན་རྫུན་མས་འཚང་ཁ་རྒྱག་གིན་པའི་དུས་འདིར

ཐམས་ཅད་མྱི་ལག་གི་འཆར་གཞིར་གྱུར་ནས་ཡོད་པའི་དུས་འདིར

ཡོད་ཚད་ཁྲིམས་ལུགས་ཀྱིས་བཟོ་བཀོད་གནང་བའི་དུས་འདིར

དུས་འདིར ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་བླ་སྲོག་དང་རྣམ་ཤེས དཔའ་སྟོབས་དང་ཤེས་རབ་ཁོ་ན

ཁྱེད་གཅིག་པུར་དབང་ཆོག་ཆོག་གི་མཐའ་མཇུག་གི་གདམ་ཀ་མ་ཡིན་ནམ

རུས་རྐང་དུ་རྩམ་དྲི་བོར་བའི་དབུས་གཙང་པ་ཚོ

བསམ་བློར་མུ་གེ་ཐེབས་པའི་ཁམས་པ་བ་ཚོ

ཤན་འདན་ནང་འཁྲུག་གི་གཏམ་རྒྱུད་གྱེར་བའི་མདོ་སྨད་པ་རྣམས

ད་ནི རྟུལ་ཕོད་ཀྱི་དཔའ་དང་སྤོབས་པས་རྒྱལ་ཁམས་གནོན་པའི་རང་ཅག་གི་མེས་པོ་ཚོ

མེ་པོ་ཚོའི་རང་གྲིང་དང་དཔའ་སྙིང་ བང་སོ་དང་རྡོ་རིང་

རེ་རེ་བཞིན་དཔའ་སྤོབས་ཀྱིས་ཡར་ལ་བསླངས་རན་རེད

ད་ནི ན་ཟུག་གི་དུད་དུ་འཕག་འཚག་དང་

ཤ་འཁོན་གྱི་ཕྱིར་དུ་དར་ཆ་འཆང་རན་རེད

ད་ནི མི་སྐྱེས་དཔའ་བོའི་ཚོགས་དག་རེ་རེ་བཞིན

རྦབ་ཆུ་ལྟར མེ་འཔུང་ལྟར་འཕྱོ་རན་རེད།

ད་ནི ཅི་ཞིག་ནུས་ན་ཅི་ཡང་བྱེད་རན་ནོ

ལོ་གཅིག ལོ་བཅུ ལོ་བརྒྱ

ལོ་ཟླ་མང་པོ་ཞིག་གི་རྗེས་སུ

པོ་ཏ་ལའི་ཐང་ཆེན་ནས་ཚངས་དབྱངས་རྒྱ་མཚོའི་འགྲུལ་བཞུད་དྲན་གྱིན

ཤོར་ཟིན་པའི་རི་ཆུ་ནགས་གསུམ་གྱི་སྙིང་བཅུད་དྲན་གྱིན

ན་ཟུག་གིས་ཡང་ནས་ཡང་དུ་བཀླགས་མྱོང་བའི

ཁྲག་དམར་གྱིས་དུས་དང་དུས་སུ་བྲིས་མྱོང་བའི་ཡོག་འབྲུ་གཉིས་དྲན་འོང་

ཚེ་སྲོག་གི་གཏིང་མཐའ་ནས་དྲན་འོང

ཞེ་སྡང ཤ་འཁོན ན་ཟུག ལྕགས་སྒྲོག

བདག་གི་ཤ་གསེང་རུས་རྐང་ན

ལྗིད་ཏིག་ཏིག་གི་ཡིག་འབྲུ་གཉིས་ཀྱིས་ཚ་འདྲི་སློང་གིན་འདུག

ཨ་རིའི་རང་བཙན་བསྒྲགས་གཏམ་འདྲ་བའི

ཧིན་རྡིའི་རང་སྲིད་རང་སྐྱོང་ལྟ་བུའི

ད་དུང་ཧྥེ་གླིང་གི་མི་ནག་བཅིངས་གྲོལ་ལྟ་བུའི

ཡིག་འབྲུ་གཉིས་ཀྱིས་ཚ་འདྲི་སློང་གིན་འདུག

རྟུལ་ཕོད དཔའ་མཛངས བྲན་གཡོག གཉའ་གནོན

ཀྱེ་ཀྱེ བཙན་པོའི་རལ་གྲི་ཐོགས་དང་བདག་གི་གདོང་དམར་བ།

Reports from Serta

2012-02-02T23:52:00.001-08:00

Serta Dzong in Kham, Eastern Tibet, has been a centre of Tibetan resistance since 2008. Peaceful protests have escalated in recent months amidst the Chinese authorities tightening control and increasingly violent crackdown. The events in late January testify that the Tibetan people’s struggle for freedom and dignity will go on even when faced with such brutal crackdown and systematic denial of the basic rights.

Following is a direct translation of reports received by an exile Tibetan based in Dharamsala, the seat of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile.

[[On 16 January 2012, two monks – Tepa and Nyinang – from Shorok village in Serta Dzong peacefully protested in the street by raising slogans and throwing pamphlets. Tepa is 16 years old and Nyinang is around 21. They marched on the large playground in Serta shouting Lha Gyalo (Victory to the God!) and Long Live His Holiness the Dalai Lama. They also threw large number of paper prayer-flags in the air.

Immediately, the Chinese security personnel arrested them. However, the local people managed to get hold of the two young monks from the police van. Since then the number of police as well as armed security personnel have increased everywhere and the people’s freedom has been limited.

On 18 January, paper prayer-flags with Tibetan national flag at the back and various messages such as Long Live His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Victory to Tibet etc. were scattered all over Phu’u Yul in Serta Dzong. Yesterday was the day the Chinese people greeted the New Year with full smile and yet the suffering is increasing day-by-day for the Tibetan people.

On 22 January Dhonyoe Nyima from Upper Shol and Gendun Nyima from Lower Shol peacefully marched nearby the big playground in Serta shouting Bod Gyalo. Immediately they were arrested and tortured by the police. Dhonyo Nyima’s right hand was broken. Here is the photograph to prove the torture.

Likewise, in a street in Serta, an unknown youth has thrown a large number of pamphlets. Here is a copy of the leaflet.

On 23 a large number of Tibetans in Serta gathered on the large ground to protest against failed Chinese policies. A short video footage of the protest will be sent separately. It cannot be sent like the photos.

At around noon on Tuesday, 24 January, two people were shot dead in Serta Dzong. One was Popo and the other’s name cannot be confirmed. Popo was around 35-years-old. His mother’s name is Gedon and his elder son’s name is Kunsang.

Popo died immediately and the other person, who hailed from Serwa Yango, was seriously injured and may die any time. Another person from Sholthal village was shot six times and is seriously injured. Kunga from Kou-tsa was shot on the shoulder and another woman was shot through the thigh.

Under the command of head of security personnel in Serta, the armed police have so far arrested over 40 people and others are banned even from going out of their houses.

Furthermore, another three Tibetans were shot dead in the afternoon of 24. Some say that this was not true. Others strongly confirm that two were shot dead before noon and three more in the afternoon. Another was shot dead in the evening. There were blood in the street corners from dead and wounded, and walls were poke marked with bullets. Those who witness the scene thought that many might have died.

The main slogans being raised in Tibet these days are ‘Long Live Dalai Lama’ and ‘There is No Freedom in Tibet.’

On 23 January, one person was shot dead, another was seriously injured and 32 others were injured. Many more may have been injured but they remain unknown due to severe restriction imposed by the Chinese authorities.

On the third day of the brutal Chinese crackdown on Serta by the Chinese security forces, I have been trying to call as many friends and acquaintances as possible in Serta, but in vain. Throughout the day, I tried to call both Serta and Drago, but could not get any one on line. I am aware that Tibetan activists and Tibet supporters are waiting for news, but there is nothing other than worry and anxiety.

However, it is not that one cannot get anyone. You can call the police station, government offices and other Chinese officials. Their lines were not cut off. I checked and called a couple government officials and they came on the line. But I put down the phone immediately and did not talk to them.

The phone lines of everyone else’s were cut and the hotels and restaurants were also ordered to be shut down.]]

Serta is now virtually cut off from the outside world. The arrests, torture and imprisonment are likely to follow in large numbers.

Lonely Trees in Dharamsala

2012-01-01T08:13:00.000-08:00

Dharamsala these days is pretty much like bare trees in its cold December air. Shops are closed. Streets are empty - momo-sellers, no laphing-wallahs and even the regular beggars have disappeared.

Everyone has gone to Bodh Gaya for the Kalachakra 2012.

I found these tree...terribly lonely. The leaves have runaway with wind, hopefully not to Bodh Gaya.

(I took all the photos today.)

Leafless tree near Dept of Information and Intnl. Relations "It's cold. It's December and it's lonely," it said.

Bare trees in the Tsuglakhang courtyard waiting for His Holiness' return

Weeping willow in Gamru Village lopped of its branches

Everyone has left town including the leaves of this tree in Nechung Hostel, where only a few of us are left.

Hu’s menacing dogs are they?

2011-12-19T05:40:00.000-08:00

In 2009, Kunga Tsayang — the imprisoned writer and environmentalist — wrote a bold essay titled Who are the Real Separatists? “China Television, Lhasa TV and others, while ignoring the truth, have excessively branded all Tibetans as separatists. This has caused an incurable communal rift between the Chinese brothers and sisters and Tibetans, leading to the Chinese disliking the Tibetans…” was Tsayang’s prescient analysis. This has proved to be true many times over, the latest case being the unprovoked attack on Tibetan students in Chengdu, the capital of China’s Sichuan province.

Destroyed classroom

According to reports in China Digital Times, Qzone and Woeser’s blog, on 14 December over 3000 Chinese students from three large hostels of Chengdu’s Railroad Engineering School surrounded the 200 Tibetan students’ quarters and went on the attack. In the assault lasting the entire night, the Tibetans' dormitory and classrooms were destroyed. Many Tibetan students were seriously injured and taken to hospitals.

After the police failed to control the situation, over a thousand riot police armed with teargas were sent in to disperse the students. The incensed Chinese students even attacked and smashed the police vans and teachers’ cars.

No one is absolutely certain why the attack took place. But judging by the slogans that the Chinese students raised such as ‘Beat the Tibetans! Get more credit!’ a familiar pattern seems to be surfacing.

During the Cultural Revolution Mao let millions of students go berserk by commanding them to ‘Bombard the Headquarters!’, resulting in a decade of destruction and social disorder that nearly destroyed China as a nation. Years later China’s paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, chanted ‘To Get Rich is Glorious’ and the masses followed Deng’s catchphrase leading to over thirty years of unbridled economic growth causing irreparable environmental damage and creating an unequal society in which the rich dine on multi-course banquets while the poor labour long hard for their daily bread. The orders of Mao and Deng were followed by more meaningless clichés such as Jiang Zemin’s ‘Three Represents’ and Hu Jintao’s ‘Harmonious Society’.

Over the last sixty years the Chinese people have been bombarded with barrage of daily dictates which regimented every aspect of their lives. Furthermore, official propaganda and misinformation —generally about China’s past in tune with communist ideals, and particularly on Tibet and the Tibetans — were fed to the masses. Consequently, Kunga Tsayang wrote that “... an image is built in the minds of both the Chinese people and Tibetan brothers and sisters of the 'other side' as someone who is to be scared of and to have hatred.” It is hence not surprising that Tibetans have been harassed and refused hotels when visiting China, especially after the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

The recent attack on Tibetan students at the Railroad Engineering School is the latest case in point. The driving force behind all this confrontational behaviours is Beijing’s policies to fuel ultra-nationalism devoid of history, culture and the lack of a larger global perspective. The creation of such intense but baseless nationalism is dangerous as it reinforces, writes Fran Dikotter, author of Mao's Great Famine, 'the portrayal of frontier countries, from Taiwan to Tibet, as "organic" parts of the sacred territory of the descendants of the Yellow Emperor [Huangdi or the Yellow Emperor is a mythical figure who is hailed as the first ancestor of Han Chinese] that should be defended by military power if necessary.' However, Tibetans are certainly not the only ones to be at the receiving end of this Han chauvinistic nationalism.

The Flowers of War

Every now and then, Beijing has let the people to vent their anger against Japan for its past actions. A new film, The Flowers of War, about the Japanese occupation of Nanjing in 1937, starring Hollywood actor Christian Bale is also a part of this dubious exercise. Critics say that the film, in which Beijing invested large sums of money, is little more than a calculated anti-Japanese propaganda film portraying them, according to The Wall Street Journal, ‘as monochrome monsters’.

Five years earlier, in 2007, an official communiqué after the 17^th National Congress of the Communist Party of China stated that Hu Jintao had instructed all leading officials and party cadres to place ‘building a harmonious society’ at the top of their agenda. But China today is not only an inharmonious country but also a terribly low-trust society, where the rich are fleeing to the West and the poor are openly revolting against Beijing as illustrated by the on-going Wukan uprising in Guangdong province.

It is clear that neither the promoting of ultra-nationalism, nor doling out of yuan as is being done to Tibetan monks in Tibet, can sustain this unjust rule. Kelley Currie, a China specialist at the Project 2049 Institute, told The Diplomat that the present system has dug a hole for itself and that political reform is the only way out.

This bleak scenario, perhaps, is an opportunity for the Tibetans to renew their passion, recalibrate their strategies and be even more focussed in their struggle for a free Tibet. After all the Lebanese poet and painter Kahlil Gibran so movingly wrote ‘Your reason and your passion are the rudder and the sails of your seafaring soul.'

Youth, Power, Vision

2011-12-13T22:35:00.000-08:00

When I was in school, ma’ong sontsa rey ta (you are the future seeds) was one of the most frequently used phrases by our teachers when students misbehaved or didn’t study hard. As a result, I often had dreams of big fruits growing out of me some day.

As a grown up now working in the Tibetan community, I realize that my teachers were, perhaps, right at least on this account about us being seeds of future Tibet. Looking around Gangchen Kyishong, seat of the Central Tibetan Administration or popularly the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, I see young people everywhere – young men in smart suits and young women in beautiful chupas. Seeds have sprouted into healthy shoots.

Every time I witness this young crowd, I see power. I observe creativity. I feel energy and restlessness. They are like a gang of wild yaks wanting to climb Mount Everest. They are like a troop of stallions wanting to gallop across the wide expanse of the Tibetan Plateau. They are a nucleus of energy ready to be unleashed.

The average age of the Tibetan civil servants began to grow younger since the early 1990s when a large number of exiles started moving to the West. However, the administration has not been fully able to utilize the potential of its young workforce.

The struggle for freedom is not regular office work. Nor it is a source of livelihood. There is a grave danger of working for the exile government is being seen as a comfortable 9-to-5 exercise. Consequently, there is an urgent need for the young staff to be given a sense of purpose, a clear direction and the freedom to exercise their creativity. In this mission, the senior officials in the administration become essential. Their decades of experience and accumulated knowledge can guide the youth – to make them realize that Tibet is politically undergoing a life-and-death struggle, and that Tibetan language, culture and history are being systematically destroyed in Tibet. The elders who are culturally rooted, spiritually matured and historically aware about the past have the ability to link the younger generation to the struggle and inspire them an urgency in their work.

For inspiration, we do not have to look far. Students for a Free Tibet is an extraordinary driving force both in campaigning for a free Tibet and providing crucial training in activism and communication to emerging leaders. SFT has managed to do so because of its young leadership and their ability to harness youth power by providing platforms which are in tune with changing times, global circumstances and technology. If an NGO such as SFT – with its limited resources – can do such marvellous work, the Tibetan government certainly can.

The exile administration now has a new popularly-elected and highly modern-educated Prime Minister, who has unique historical responsibilities and equally unique opportunities to lead Tibet’s struggle towards freedom. Given the fact that the overwhelming majority of the people working for the exile administration are also young, modern-educated and speak multiple-languages, there are unlimited possibilities to achieve our goal. However, this can and must be achieved with the senior members of the administration providing the necessary bridge between the vision of the new Kashag and the creative power of the young and fresh minds.

At times it appears that the vastly experienced and selflessly dedicated senior administrators operate with strategies inherited from another time and circumstances. Hanging onto obsolete tools and accepted wisdom divorced from today’s reality are useless. This prevents us from taking advantage of new opportunities in the ever-changing global scenario.

Young public servants are motivated, technologically advanced and skilled in communication. Yet, I once heard someone remark, ‘Layjey sar pa detso computer la du tso mang po tro lak tang gi duk‘ (These young people waste so much time on their computers.) The world is increasing getting smaller and wireless with information flowing all the time. A failure to know of an event taking place in Tibet instantly can make a huge difference in our struggle. The world must be on our fingertips. And for a diaspora which is as disparate as ours, staying connected is imperative. A laptop is hence no longer a luxury. It is as essential as our kitchenware.

How nice it would be if the secretary of a department shares SMS jokes with young colleagues or goes out for a cup of tea with them after office to catch up with happenings on the ground.

Knowledge is power. So is communication. Creativity is an asset and youth the strength. The popular people’s revolution in the Middle East this year, which forced out one dictator after the other, took place because knowledge was powered by communication, which was driven by creativity, which in turn was engineered by the youth. Their principle medium was the social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube etc. The sheer number of young people and their quest for freedom turned the tide in favour of democracy, rule of law and justice to the oppressed.

India, Brazil and Indonesia are shining bright because their young populations. The exile Tibetan administration, with its overwhelming large number of young people, has a capacity to shine even brighter. Under the dynamic leadership of its young Prime Minister, supported by the experienced senior bureaucrats and the energy of the youthful workforce, there is no doubt that our struggle will be taken to the next level.

When this happens, my dream of big fruits growing out of my head for being one of the ma’ong sontsa will have been realized.

(Originally written for and published on the official blog of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile: http://tibet.net/ctablog/)

THINK ...

2011-12-08T21:56:00.000-08:00

Think ...... pause ...... a long pause

Think ..... pause ...... a long pause .......... a very long pause

Think ..... Think ....Think

until you are enveloped in black shadows
until all your knowledge disappears
until nothing is left your old self

until you see a white blank space

on which you can

rewrite ......... reinvest ........ recalculate
recalibrate ... rearrange .... reset
...

all

your

strategies

... comfort is a cancer that kills activism and creativity ...

ལྷག་དཀར་གྱི་གཞས་གསུམ། Three Lhakar Songs

2011-12-06T08:06:00.000-08:00

There are many Tibets today – the occupied Tibet, the Tibet in exile, the Tibet in our hearts, the Tibet in transition and the online Tibet. All these Tibets are with us everyday. But it is the online Tibet, where everything converges - our thoughts, images, words and music. In this virtual world we talk, chat, debate, discuss, argue, sing, cry, shout, boast, snitch, pretend, upload, download, like and dislike.

This is a limitless world. Last night, I nearly got lost enjoying one song after another, until my eyes went red and spines hurt. I just had to stop but not before I found these three essential Lhakar songs, which talk about being Tibetan, speaking Tibetan and being aware about the past glory and future path.

This first song is by beautiful Tsewang Lhamo, a member (?) of the famous Acha Tsendep band. Lhamo these days increasingly sings incredible solo Tibetan songs such as the one below with deep message.

If you are in New York, Tsewang Lhamo will be performing at Columbia University. The concert will take place on the World Human Rights Day, 10 December 2011, as a part of the Third International Tibetan Language conference. (All lyrics in English are my rough translation.)

Soul of the Tibetans བོད་མིའི་བླ་སྲོག

Song by Tsewang Lhamo

Snow mountains are my soul

Blue rivers is my lifeline,

My name is the Land of Snow

I am Tibetan. I speak Tibetan.

I love Tibet’s spiritual inheritance

I love Tibet’s art and culture

My name is the Land of Dharma

I am Tibetan. I study Tibetan.

My name is the Tibetan Plateau

I am a Tibetan girl. I love Tibet.

My ancestors were a monkey and an ogress

I am Tibetan. I speak Tibetan.

This second song by Choephel, who hails from Meldro Gongkar a small town near Tibet’s capital Lhasa, is about the importance of speaking in pure Tibetan. The song has very strong lyrics, which speak directly to you. ཀ་ཁ་ག་ང་ས། - Ka Kha Ga Nga / the essence of my being / the survival of our people sings Choephel.

Reminder དྲན་སྐུལ།

Song by Choephel

I have a source of livelihood inherited from by ancestors

I have a path to follow shown by my ancestors

I have a pledge to keep from my ancestors

I have a hope placed on me by my people –

Tibetan is my language
The unchanging sound of my tongue

ཀ་ཁ་ག་ང་ས། (Ka Kha Ga Nga)

Is the essence of my being

The survival of our people –

let us speak in Tibetan

Speak in unmixed Tibetan

You may know many other languages

But when speaking to another Tibetan

Please speak in Tibetan

Speak in unmixed Tibetan.
We have a rich language

But this disease of mixing other languages

Is spreading like a plague.

My dear people from the Land of Snow

Know that

The very survival of our race

Depend on our language.

The last song is by Choegon or popularly known as Little Kunga because he is the most well known student of the famous singer Kunga. This 15-year-old singing sensation, my friend Jigdal tells me, is also called the Tibetan Justin Bieber. On closer, you will see that Choegon looks far smarter than Bieber. I can definitely say: Bye Bieber! Hello Choegon!

Listen - ᫳མᨋ᪱ᩚᨕᨵᨋᩖ᪄

Song by Choegon or Little Kunga

This great path of the non-violence is

Shown by our great septuagenarian grandfather,

Thus, if you are your father’s son

Listen! Do not ever forget this path from your heart.

This growing youth of the Tibetan language

If you realize its importance,

Listen! Please do not ever mix other languages with it.

This sixteen code of the moral conduct is

The legacy of our great forefathers

If you are a descendent of our great ancestors,

Listen! Do not ever forget these ethics.

If you are a Tibetan

Protect, promote and advance

Our language, culture and spiritual traditions.

Now that you have heard three incredible songs about being Tibetan, speaking Tibetan and feeling Tibetan, make sure to speak proper Tibetan to your friends, and please avoid CRAZY sentences like these:

ཁ་སེང་འཇིགས་མེད་ཀྱིས་cheese cakeའཁྱེར་སླེབས་སོང་། ་དཔེ་tasty་འདུག
ང་ཚོ་busགཞོན་ནས་Bazaar ལ་འགྲོ་དང་།
བློ་བཟང་table set བྱས་ནས་ TV onགྱིས་དང་།
རིག་གྲོལ་དང་པདྨ་coupleརེད། ཁོ་གཉིས་love marriage བྱས་པ་རེད།
document འདི་copyབྱས་ནས་ཁྱེར་ཤོག་དང་།

Tackling the Thuggish Beijing

2011-11-28T20:23:00.000-08:00

Hollywood actor and musician, Johnny Depp, was bullied everyday in school by a big fat boy. "Punch him in the face once and he will not bother you any more!" said his mother one day. Depp did just that and the rest, as he told a group of student at The Actor's Studio, was history.

International politics is incredibly more complex. But there may be a lesson to be learned from Johnny Depp's story, especially when dealing with the People's Republic of China.

Due to its lack of self-assuredness and multiple domestic crises, Beijing outwardly needs to act tough. This thuggish behaviour is currently being propped up by China's financial 'strength' — resulting from decades of unbridled economic growth — and is fuelled by the current global economic debacle. However, since the China's apparent tough outlook does not stem from inner strength, it actually may be far easier to face it head-on than many think.

Earlier this month, Beijing vehemently opposed and pressured Mongolia over its decision to invite the Dalai Lama to visit its capital city Ulan Bator. The small land-locked country, perhaps remembering its ancestral warriors, did not bow to China, which is its biggest trading partner. Mongolia even allowed the Nobel laureate to go ahead with his public talk at the 4000-seat Buyant-Ukhaa sports stadium built with Chinese money.

On 26 November, India refused Beijing's demand to stop a planned speech by the Dalai Lama at the World Buddhist Congregation in New Delhi on 30th of this month. "We have always opposed any country providing a platform for the Dalai Lama to engage in activities to split China in any form," said Hong Lei, the Chinese spokesperson, to a regular press conference. Enraged by India's decision, the Chinese have called off the 15th round of the talks between Special Representatives. The Communist Party, in the throes of a leadership transition, seems particularly nervous to have its State Councillor, Dai Bangguo, in Indian capital for the border talk at the same time as the Dalai Lama.

The Indian decision not only reflects its new-found confidence but also a calculated strategic step keeping its long-term interest in heart. "Beijing is upping the assertiveness towards all its neighbours. The Chinese are carefully testing the waters to see how far they can go," said G. Parthasarathy, a former Indian foreign secretary, to the Guardian newspaper. India is closely watching China's inroads into Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Burma, and recognizes the importance of standing up to China. In this battle of Asian supremacy and geopolitical influence, India has the advantages of having strong democratic institutions such as the free media, an independent judiciary and the growing economy with strong fundamentals.

Mongolia's decision on the Dalai Lama's visit and the Indian resolution to let the Tibetan spiritual leader "to pursue his activities" — and the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's strong message to the Chinese Premier, Wen Jiabao, to keep off from South China Sea at the recently-concluded Asia-Pacific Conference — show the world that capitulation to Beijing is not the only way.

However, China is relentless in its mission to restrict Tibet's spiritual leader. A few years ago, many attempts were made for the Dalai Lama to visit Indonesia. Nothing materialized. Later, it was learned that Beijing was funneling as much as a billion dollar into Indonesia to prevent the Nobel Laureate from obtaining a visa. This is no stray case.

In 2007, China demanded Belgium to cancel the Dalai Lama's long-planned visit to Brussels. In exchange, Beijing said that it would allow the Belgian trade mission headed by the crown prince into China. Belgium acquiesced. The Dalai Lama issued a statement: "The Belgian government shared with me their predicament on account of pressure from the People's Republic of China," and that he had "decided not to visit Brussels this time."

In fact, according to a study by Andreas Fuchs and Nils-Hendrik Klann, countries whose top leadership met with the Dalai Lama, have incurred an average 8.1 percent loss in exports to China in the two years following the meeting. Called the "Dalai Lama Effect," the study by the University of Gottingen in Germany found the negative impact on exports began when Hu Jintao took office in 2002.

If true, this is indeed a huge economic loss. But there are equal losses for China as well, which the one party rule does not allow the world to see. Moreover, temporary financial gains can and must not influence national policy and sovereign matters. Beijing may have already peaked its economic cycle and within a decade its financial train may run out of stream. In such an eventuality, any compromise on national policy now will have gone wasted.

Finally, from all accounts it seems that the Chinese leaders are pretty much like bad, angry and vulnerable dogs, the more you run away the more they are likely to bark and chase you.

Things Happen Here

2011-11-19T02:44:00.000-08:00

“Oh! You are still here,” said a monk, who I knew from my school days. “So good to see old Dharamshala faces who are still around.” He has come back for a short visit from the US, after twenty years. He fished out a five hundred-rupee note from his wallet, slipped it into my pocket and said, “Thi’i solja choe rog nang.”

This made realize that I am now a pukka-Dharamshala-wallah or the ‘real Dharamsala resident’. Even the garbage can knows me, I fear.

Over the years, I have noticed, this place gets busier, restless and more energetic — hotels get bigger, food more varied, more tourists come and more things happen.

Materially almost everything is available here, including relatively good wine (very expensive though!), top-quality Manchester United soccer jersey and third-class Made in China nylon socks (if you wear these socks for three consecutive days, your feet will stink worse than over-flowing public toilet!) Today, I saw a new comer from Tibet selling yaksha kampo or dried yak meat and tea bricks, which he claims came all the way from Dhartsedo, a Tibetan trading town bordering China.

But what about some events to balance out the onslaughts of material progress?

This October/November Dharamsala experienced some of the most interesting creative events in the exile community.

‘Our Land, Our People’: a site-specific art exhibition

New York-based Tibetan artist, Tenzing Rigdol, clandestinely managed to bring out over 20,000 kg of soil from Tibet, which was exhibited at the Tibetan Children Village School for three days on a raised stage, larger than a basketball court.

Tenzing Rigdol putting final touch to the exhibit

Soil or dirt is intimately linked with the fate of humanity since the time immemorial. If there is no dirt there will be no human beings as our bodies are made up of the same five basic elements that the earth is made of. For a dispossessed people this link is even closer and more sacred. After all, who are we without the land and the dirt that we belong to?

Rigdol’s father died as a refugee in New York City without fulfilling his dream of going back to Tibet once, just once. This inspired the young artist to embark on this nearly impossible task, which took him seventeen months and countless headaches to complete.

kids playing with soil from Tibet

“We have to dream big,” Rigdol said. His dream has enabled over six thousand people in Dharamsala to play, touch, feel, step, roll on, eat and take away soil from our land. Old ones cried, the young ones were awestruck and the kids played with the soil all day long.

Though Rigdol’s art examines the plight of Tibetans in exile, it has a wider resonance, exploring the notion of nostalgia, the idea of homeland and how art is intertwined with the political and the social. "It also demonstrates the transgressive power of art as an act of defiance," Rigdol's press advisory said.

First Tibetan National Poetry Recitation Contest

When I was in Tibet, an old woman told epics of King Gesar and the stories lasted for two to three nights depending on the episode. I later learned that she could neither read nor write. Gesar’s epics are mostly written in verse, very grand and magnificent. Similarly, farmers and nomads sing endless songs on fields and in the mountains. The words of these songs are often lyrical and very poetic. From these, I came to the conclusion, that we are a very poetic people.

But it took the exile community over fifty years to organize this first Tibetan national poetry recitation contest. Shingtsa Rinpoche and Wokar website made this happen, which took them nearly a half year. Over 200 poets participated in the preliminary contests held at various Tibetan settlements in India.

The final competition, amongst the top eight poets, was held at the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts.

If dislocation, desperation, loneliness, love, longing and the endless struggle of being driven into exile can be boiled down to one single peak point, this was the summit. I think the fifty-year wait was worth my entire self in solid gold. Each poet recited his/her poem perfectly to the last teardrop, audience clapped, laughed and many cried.

The poems include calls for long-separated mothers, invocations for freedom, remembering a grandma’s last words or a sharp cry for a lover who refuses to answer. Words were rich, lines were tight and the emotions Himalaya high.

The prizes too were worth fighting for — first prize = Rs.60,000 ($1400), second prize = Rs.40,000 ($900) and the third prize = Rs.20,000 ($450).

When it was over, everyone was drunk, drunk with poetry.

The Tibetan Film Festival

We had film festivals here before, but this one was different. The festival, jointly organized by SFT-India and Filming for Tibet, only screened Tibetan-made films. This was fantastic. After all, if we don’t promote our creative artists, who will?

The festival screened as many nine super-short films made by amateur filmmakers. The audience participations involved voting for the viewer’s choice, which carried $200 prize money, as well as discussions on films and its impact on the community. Young filmmaker, Geleck Palsang, won both the viewer’s choice and the critique’s awards.

The festival peaked with screening of Sonthar Gyal’s award-winning film The Sun-Beaten Path. Read review here: http://phayul.com/news/article.aspx?c=8&t=1&id=30278&article=Under+the+Grey+Veil+-+The+Sun-Beaten+Path

The other interesting events took place here includes SFT–Camp, Mind and Life Conference with His Holiness the Dalai Lama and 100,000 Poets for Change. SFT camp is a training young activist in non-violent strategies and online security speaking of which Tibet Action Institute's website and videos are must: https://tibetaction.net/2011/11/17/safetravels-https/

These are some of the major ones. Of course, other things keep happening here, which I won’t mention here less you get jealous.

So, if you are struck in New York the whole year round travelling in the subway and not seeing the sky, or if you are in California basking in the sun all the time or in London experiencing rain most of the time, take a break and come to Dharamsala in October and November. Roads are bad but the sky blue, we don't have central heating but there are enough Tibetan sights, sounds and smells to keep you engaged. If you have enough time, we will try to have more of the historic events that I mentioned above.

News of Deaths from Far Away (a short story)

2011-11-10T22:01:00.000-08:00

I sat down below the waterfall to read the letter, and sensed that a tragedy had taken place. I only needed to know how my brother had arranged the words to measure its gravity. Water keep hitting the rock. Stray drops fall on the pebbles and dry. A black-billed magpie flies by showing off its tail. The sunrays trickle on the waterfall producing a mini rainbow. Everything is transitory, I thought.

I was a frail but intelligent child. Once when I was climbing a tiny hill with brother and a few other boys. When we reached the half way up, I could not walk any more. I was tired, hungry and angry with myself. “You are shit useless. You are like a girl. Next time don’t come with us stay at home and do the knitting,” my brother said. Echo still rings in my head.

“He is a boy who knows but never speaks” was my father’s assessment of me. At the age of ten I was smuggled out of Tibet and sent away to a refugee school in India so that I could obtain a decent education. My parents as subsistence farmers under Chinese occupation struggled to feed six children.

The roaring of the water vaguely echoed in his ears and pictures momentarily flashed and faded. Years… how the years go swiftly passing by elapsing into decades. “I am a man now,” he thought, “and soon, perhaps, death will come.”

This was not the first time that he heard about death in the family from whom he had been away for so long. News of one death and then another made, over the years, made him to think about death often. Death is a step, a change of form or simply a new appointment. Death, however, seldom sends advance notice. It sneaks in quietly.

The rhythmic flow of the waterfall and the stray drops falling and drying on the pebbles. His mind sharpened and pondered deeper about the final stage – the cessation of life.

At the time of death the five elements with which human body is made up of dissolve into each other, a physician once told him. Dissolution of earth element into water hinders movement and forces the eyes to lose their vision. Breakdown of water element into fire triggers drying up of bodily fluid and loss of hearing. Fire element dissolves into wind and diminishes physical warmth and sense of smell. Finally the dissolution of wind element into consciousness causes inability to breathe and loss of the sense of touch. By the time the internal breathing ceases we begin our step into bardo, or the intermediate between the death and rebirth. Finality of death, he imagined, may be better than the endless pangs of dislocation.

Clutching the folded letter tightly, he took a long breath. Death made him feel small, while an ant crawling on his arm made him feel big. Life is a series of contradictions. Everything ends in death, which is a beginning of another journey. He put the folded letter into his pocket and reclined on a smooth rock. Enormity of the clear blue sky brought memories of another death.

A letter had arrived on a warm summer’s day, exactly ten years ago. A thick brown envelope wrapped in transparent polythene. His aunt, a nun living a life of a hermit, had already opened the letter. There was no trace of misfortune on the envelope as she had absorbed the shock, the sadness and angst of opening it. She navigated through the assembled words and calamity crowded into her face.

When she recounted the news of his father’s death, tears abundantly rolled down his cheeks. It was neither the intensity of sadness nor the piquancy of her narration that prompted his eyes to flood. The tears were for his father’s youthfulness – he was a forty-two years old man, the head of a family, and a father of six children. He was an ordinary human being liable to all the vices of the world. Yet, there were no wrinkles on his face and no one had suspected that his final appointment would come so soon. The clock fast forwarded its hands.

His aunt told him that she knew his father as a child. She was fond of him. Shaking her shaved nun’s head she sighed, heaved her shoulders and said, “Why didn’t you take me instead?” But death cannot be exchanged nor can one conjure magic and play tricks on it. Death is perfectly serious. It announces only when the time is up, PG thinks.

Back in the boys’ hostel he hid the letter in his trunk between a neatly folded uniform and his spare bed sheet. The rigidity of the school curriculum forced him to banish memories of his father to the far borders of his mind. He was a good student, who did well in the class. Every now and then he asked double-edged questions that prompted one of his teachers to remark that PG was a subterranean fire. He did this to see not so much as find answers to his questions, but to find out if the answers that he had in his mind corresponded to the ones the teachers gave.

Over the following years the letter shifted its residences first into a plastic folder, where clippings from newspapers were stored, then into a leather briefcase and eventually into a photo album. A few days before he left school, he burnt the letter along with used notebooks and a bunch of assorted papers including photos of football stars, movie actors and skimpily clad models. Papers crackled in the fire and blue smoke curled into the sky. As words bent in agony under the heat, the other news in the letter about his sister’s marriage disappeared into blackened ashes. Death overwhelmed everything else.

His cheeks are wet. Perhaps, stray drops from the waterfall landed on his face. The blue sky, the gushing waterfall, the news of death and the memories of his father added fuel. He shifts his butts on the smooth rock, stretches his legs and stares at his almost worn-out hiking shoes. The shoes eventually blur from his vision and his thought runs into the labyrinth of his recollection. Memories don’t die. They just remain dormant and then pop up when time is ripe.

One winter, exactly twenty years ago, he learned that his grandfather had passed away. It was strange, almost ethereal. He was ten years old. In his world of curiosity and innocence, where comics and catapults meant more, death was beyond his imagining.

He used to dream of his grandfather, a white-haired towering giant sometimes bombarding him with commands and at others showering him with stories. His dreams often ended up him wide awake searching for a human voice. Darkness of stinking boys’ hostel never spoke. It made his nights longer.

When in class, Phurta Gyal measured time keeping his grandfather as the yardstick, considering him the oldest, older than the hills, rivers and trees. How could a child know that time is an infinite illusion. Its immensity and fluidity dries up the rivers and dwindles down the mountains. It was time that eroded his towering grandfather.

His aunt told him that his grandfather had died. Misfortune when not enveloped in words seemed lighter. Printed words made everything more solemn. She spoke as casually as possible fearing a child’s outburst. She did not need to fear. He saw his grandfather in his dreams. He did not shed tears nor did he feel the heavy air of death hanging around him.

Since his grandfather’s death, he had learned to see everything in a new light, a new perspective, a new time frame. The old wall had fallen and from the debris of his scanty memories he laid a fresh foundation. He needed a new wall to lean on.

The black-billed magpie landed on a nearby rock and cawed, waking Phurta Gyal from his layered thoughts. Cloud resembling woolly-sheep has formed in the north and the breeze from the river has turned chilly. He gets up and drives away the traces of thoughts from his mind.

As he walks down the stony path, he eyes at the magpie and says, “Are you my brother-in-law?”

One can be free neither from death nor from its consequences.

A little later he folded the letter and with it the memory of his brother-in-law.

Under the Grey Veil

2011-10-31T04:04:00.000-07:00

Review of The Sun-Beaten Path directed by Sonthar Gyal

Sonthar Gyal’s (a young Tibetan filmmaker in Tibet) film The Sun-Beaten Path — which won 2011 Dragons and Tigers Awards at the Vancouver International Film Festival — is in many ways a trenchant criticism of today’s Tibet, where individual Tibetans battle against not only their tragic personal life but also against the overwhelming encroachment on their collective way of life and the wholesale eradication of their ancient culture. Gyal’s picture reminded me of actor-director Sean Penn’s Hollywood film Into the Wild, which combines two popular genres – the road trip and the struggle of man versus nature. It tells to tell about Chris McCandless, a disillusioned young man who discards his comfortable life so he can make his way into the wilderness of Alaska in search of untamed solitude.

Gyal’s film, however, tells the fate of a grieving and guilt-ridden young farmer on his way back from a pilgrimage to Lhasa after he had killed his mother in a tragic road accident. Nyima, the protagonist, having grown up under a new and sterilized social system, isn’t sufficiently rooted in his culture to give him the strength and fortitude to bear the heartbreaking events he’s facing. This culture is personified in the film by an old man Nyima encounters on the way; the stranger’s funny yet wisdom-laden stories gradually salve his emotional pain. The old man’s genuine compassion, and insistence on helping, finally enables Nyima to return home along the same dirt road where his small tractor killed his mother.

The young Tibetan director’s brilliance lies in locating the film on the harsh, barren and unforgiving landscape cut across by an endless road. The inexorable backdrop magnifies Nyima’s guilt and self-reproach by manifold. The sparse dialogue further enhances the guilt and the sorrow. The dishevelled, stone-faced loner — exceptionally acted by Yeshi Lhadruk — who walks along tarred road, rejects every offer of free ride by the fast-travelling vehicles. “Buses travel too fast,” he says to the old man. “I forget my troubles when I walk.”

two lead actors

Perhaps there's something seductive about the idea of turning one's back on civilization and all its baggage, especially in a world that is fast turning into a culvert, where everyone chases their dreams driven by the endless run for money and yet more money. In this sense, Sean Penn’s Into the Wild is an incisive criticism of the contemporary world — its endless rat race, complicated system and fast pace — which drives peace, fulfilment and inner satisfaction to the furthest corners of people’s lives. In the same way, The Sun-Beaten Path subtly focuses on a culture where a stranger (in this case, the old man) goes out of his way to help others (Nyima, in the film) as opposed to utter disregard for fellow human beings as happened in Guangzhou in China recently. As many as eighteen people ignored a two-year-old child being crushed by two cars in a hit-and-run case. The kid later died in the hospital.

Without using any clichés and stereotypical images of Tibet, which could necessarily mean monks and monasteries, prayer-flags and prayer wheels or forever-smiling farmers and green pastures, Gyal has clearly managed to get the message of Tibet today across.

Lines of trucks endlessly pass by on the sun-beaten metalled road, but they do not have the power to ease Nyima’s inner problems. When everything turns upside down — and the world becomes an endless grey veil — the only salvation comes from the ancient wisdom that flows from the old man’s mouth.

This, perhaps, is the strongest message that anyone can convey in any creative work. Sonthar Gyal has done this perfectly without overstating or undermining anything.

_____

The Sun-Beaten Path directed by Sonthar Gyal was premiered on 30 October 2011 at the Tibet Film Festival jointly organized by Swiss-based Filming for Tibet and the India Chapter of the Students for a Free Tibet.

Fight of the Warrior Monks

2011-10-20T21:15:00.000-07:00

At around 1 pm on 17 October, 20-year-old nun Tenzin Wangmo has set herself on fire while shouting ‘Free Tibet!” She is from the Mamae Dechen Choekhorling Nunnery in Ngaba in Amdo, North-eastern Tibet. Wangmo, who has died from burns, was the first nun and the latest case of self-immolation.

Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch, writes that China’s “security measures designed to curtail the right to free expression, association, and religious belief in Tibetan monasteries are not legitimate.” Additionally, these measures have ratcheted up tensions as we are seeing in Ngaba. To date nine youths have set themselves on fire and more are most likely in line.

Eight of the nine youths who set themselves on fire

Buddhists believe that the possibility of being born as a human is as rare as a sea turtle sticking its head out of a lone tyre tube floating on a vast ocean. Furthermore, Tibetans also believe that if one takes ones own life, then it would take five hundred rebirths before being reborn in the human realm. If these beliefs are true, then why do Buddhist monks — who are trained in the fundamental teaching of compassion and respect for all sentient life — douse themselves in kerosene and set fire?

The answer lies in Beijing’s failure to understand that the Tibetan people’s aspiration is not for more roads, railways or airports — merely to bring in more Chinese migrants and to transport resources from Tibet to China — but for freedom. Tibetans crave the freedom to practice our religion, speak in our own language and most of all the freedom to decide our future in their own space without being poked and prodded with bayonets.

This fundamental Tibetan aspiration is clearly articulated by 19-year-old Norbu Damdul, who set himself on fire at around noon on 15 October while shouting “Complete Independence for Tibet!” and “Return of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to Tibet!” Damdul is the seventh case of self-immolation to protest against the People’s Republic’s repressive rule over Tibet.

The situation in Ngaba, where most of the self-immolations are taking place, has now reached a very critical state with Beijing’s increased spending on security leading to monastery blockades, the mass detention of monks and making it mandatory for monks to obtain official permits even to go out of their monastic compound. Earlier this year, Kirti Monastery’s water supply and electricity were cut off and visitors, including the monk’s relatives, were banned from entering into the monastic compound.

Panoramic View of Ngaba with Kirti Monastery at the left

The authorities have now stationed an armed garrison of People’s Armed Police at each of the three main gates leading to Kirti Monastery and another armed contingent has occupied a 20-room section within the monastery. Moreover, the monastery is today carved up into five sections; these are divided into fifty smaller divisions, which are further divided into smaller units for easier security control and to subject the monks to ‘Patriotic Education’ and ‘Strike Hard’ campaigns. This virtual imprisonment, confining them to their rooms, involves intense ideological ‘education’ requiring the roughly 2500 monks to repeatedly recite, ‘I oppose the Dalai clique’, ‘I will not follow splittism’, ‘I love the Communist Party’ and ‘I recognize the Party’s great kindness’. The monks are thus being denied basic fundamental human rights such as freedom of expression, freedom of movement, freedom of thoughts, freedom of religion and above all the freedom to decide their future.

The demand for these freedoms by the monks of Kirti Monastery, and Beijing’s denial and consequent crackdown on the desperate monks, symbolizes the core of Tibet’s China problem. Beijing’s heavy-handed responses — whether it was in 1989 when their own students protested on Tiananmen Square or to the 2008 popular protests in East Turkestan (Ch. Xinjiang) or the current military repression in Ngaba — only provide temporary solution. The root causes of these demonstrations are not being addressed. Without a solution being reached, the protests in Ngaba will continue and the number of Tibetans wanting to die for the struggle is almost certain to escalate.

Aerial view of Kirti Monaetery

China must realize that the increased armed security deployments in Tibet, and particularly in Ngaba, have been a major factor in mounting tensions that have led to continuing peaceful protests in which monks and former monks — as their ultimate form of non-violent action — are setting themselves on fire.

As in the cases on 7 October of 20-year-old Khaying and 18-year-old Choephel, who set themselves on fire (both have since died from injuries and possible torture) the Chinese security personnel first put out the fire and then started beating Damdul before removing from the scene. No information is available on his medical condition or whereabouts.

Tapey, a young monk in his twenties, who set himself on fire in February 2009, was the first-ever case of self-immolation by monks in Tibet. Since then eight youths have set themselves on fire. Their average age is barely twenty. And so it seems that Tibet’s struggle for freedom is now firmly in the hands of a new proactive generation.

When freedom-of-movement was severely curtailed in Ngaba, Tibetan farmers and householders strung their goats with papers bearing slogans such as Free Tibet. This reveals the extraordinary national resolve when cornered and driven to a state of utter desperation, to remain committed to non-violence and find creative ways to fight back against the occupation. Such peaceful creative resistance will continue until Beijing allows the Tibetan people their legal right to self-determination.

To Whom It May Concern:

2011-09-29T22:32:00.000-07:00

This is to certify that this man is

A half-backed nut flew off

From a disused frying pen,

A black pebble shot forth

From an un-owned sling,

A broken eggshell

Fallen off from an abandoned nest.

He is equipped with claws

Horns, tails, hoofs and hunger.

He is an anti-anti-social element

Constantly throwing up words

Into the degradable social garbage.

This is to certify that his twisted mind

Sees vulture picking on his eyeballs

Dead donkeys smiling with absolute satisfaction

A woman dragging her husband with a single strand of hair

And a headless man digging nine layers of holes singing

‘From the ashes of bombed words

May arise a future planted on an open book.’

This is to further certify that this man

Is indeed a white crow with a black hat.

He may be a danger to himself

And all those who may touch and feel him.

Let everyone be warned that this character

Had to be released from our claws

Since we failed to control his contagious views

That has already infected some of our good brothers.

A day before he was let off, he scribbled –

‘I see a wingless vulture fly and

A five-legged rabbit dig through a boulder.

A dead man staring into the horizon

To count the stars winking at him.

A poet with a shovel in his hands

Digging for frozen earthworms

A monk who lost his robes says

‘Order is chaos. Chaos is order.’

To a five-star general who is being

Thrown into the nine-layered hole.

And a headless man ecstatically sings,

‘From the debris of hung-up hopes

May arise a future hooked on a pen.’

This is to conclude that this character has no place

In our harmonized, sanitised, categorised and advertised world.

Our suggestion – Shun him, pun him, mock him, dock him

And if possible banish him.

ལྷག་དཀར་ཉིན་ཀློག་རྒྱུའི་སྙན་དེབ་ཁག

2011-09-06T11:13:00.000-07:00

Sungchuk Kyi

Sungchuk Kyi was born in Amdo, Northeastern Tibet. She is, perhaps, one of the most accomplished exile Tibetan women poets writing in Tibetan. Her poetry books include Tomb, Corals' Fate and Cry of the Earth, a collection of short stories.

She escaped from Tibet in 2002 after a renewed crackdown on Tibetan literature and intellectuals by the Chinese authorities. Kyi's new book collection of poems is ready for publication.

Lachap Jinpa

Lhachap Jinpa was born in a small village near Labrang in Amdo, Northeastern Tibet. In 2002, Jinpa escaped into exile after he distributed political literature, including pamphlets about self-immolation of Pawo Thupten Ngodup.

His poems were published in various Tibetan literary journals, including Drangchar (Drizzle) and Bod Kyi Tsom Rig Gyutsal (Tibetan Arts and Literature). His new collection of poems is ready for publication.

Yangkho Gyal

Yangkho Gyal was born in Amdo, Northeastern Tibet. In 2002, he escaped into exile. Gyal has published seventy poems and essays in various Tibetan literary magazines both in Tibet and in exile.
Gyal is currently one of the two Election Commissioners of the Tibetan Government in Exile. His new book of poems is ready for publication

༄༅། །དཔའ་བོ་ཚེ་དབང་ནོར་བུ་ལགས།

2011-08-16T09:15:00.000-07:00

ཁ་ས་རྒྱ་གར་རང་བཙན་གྱི་ཉིན་མོར།
ཆར་སིམ་སིམ་རྒྱུན་ཆད་མེད་བབས་ཀྱང་།
དགའ་སྤྲོའི་ངང་གཞས་ཞབས་བྲོར་རོལ།
དེ་རྗེས་འདམ་རྫབ་ཀྱི་ཁེངས་བའི་གསང་ལམ་དུ།
ལག་ན་ཉི་གདུགས་ཐོགས་ནས་འགྲོ་སྐབས།
ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་རང་ལུས་མེར་བསྲེག་བཏང་བའི་གནས་ཚུལ་ཐོས།
ཆར་ཐིག་ཡིན་ནམ་མིག་ཆུ་ཡིན།
ངའི་མཁུར་ཚོས་ཀྱི་རི་སྒང་ཉུལ་ནས།
ངའི་སེམས་ཀྱི་གཤོག་པ་རླན།
ངའི་ཡིད་ལ་སྨུག་པས་གོས་གཡོགས།

དཔའ་བོ་ཚེ་དབང་ནོར་བུ་ལགས།
ཁྱེད་ཀྱིས།
རང་དབང་གི་མེ་ཙག་མཁའ་ལ་ཁྱབ།
འཇིགས་བྲལ་གྱི་འབོད་སྒྲས་ས་གཞི་བསྐང་།
བཙན་གནོན་གྱི་ཆུ་རྙོག་སྟེང་ནས་དཀྲུགས།
ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་ཡོད་ཚད་སྦྱིན་ནས།
ཐོབ་ཤོར་ཀྱི་བསམ་བློ་གཅིག་ཀྱང་མེད་པར།
འབར་བཞིན་པའི་མེ་ལྕེར་གཞོན་ནས།
འཇིག་རྟེན་ཕ་རོལ་ན་གཤེགས།
ཁྱེད་ལ་གཙང་ཆབ་སྔོན་མོ་མཆོད།
ཁྱེད་ལ་ཁ་བས་ལམ་སྣ་འདྲེན།

ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་ལྷག་བསམ་གྱི་རྩམ་པའི་རོ་བཅུད་དེ།
གངས་ཅན་པའི་བླ་སྲོག་གི་གཏེར་སྙིང་ཡིན།
ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་བདེན་པའི་མེ་ཙག་དེ།
ང་ཚོས་སྟོབས་ཤུགས་ཡོད་ཚད་ཀྱིས་གསོ།
ཁྱེད་ཀྱི་འཆི་གསོན་གྱི་སྐུལ་མ་དེ།
ང་ཚོས་ནུས་པ་ཡོད་ཚད་བསྡུས་ནས་འབོད།
ཁྱེད་ཀྱིས་རྐང་རྗེས་ཁྲ་ལམ་ལམ་དེ་དེད་ནས།
ངེད་ཅག་རང་དབང་གི་གོ་འཕང་ཐོབ་ལ་སྙེག

འ་ཙི་བུ་མོ་ལགས།

2011-08-09T21:50:00.000-07:00

ང་ཡི་ཡིད་དབང་ཁྱེད་ཀྱིས་འཕྲོག

ཁྱེད་ཀྱིས་ང་ལ་མིག་མི་བལྟ།

ད་ནི་བྱེད་ཐབས་གཞན་མི་འདུག

ཆང་རག་མ་འཐུང་རང་འཐུང་རེད།

ཤེལ་དམ་གཅིག་གིས་ར་མ་ཟི།

ཤེལ་དམ་གཉིས་པས་ར་མ་ཟི།

ཤེལ་དམ་གསུམ་པ་འཐུང་པས་ན།

སྐྱུགས་པ་གཡས་དང་གཡོན་ལ་ཤོར།

སང་ཉིན་ཞོགས་པ་ཡར་ལང་དུས།

ཡང་བསྐྱར་ཁྱེད་རང་སེམས་ལ་འཁོར།

བུ་ངའི་སྙིང་རླུང་སྟོད་ལ་འཚང་།

ང་དང་ཨ་རག་གྲོགས་སུ་གྱུར།

ཉིན་མཚན་རྟག་ཏུ་དྲན་རྒྱུ་གཅིག

བུ་ངའི་སྙིང་གི་ཟེའུ་འབྲུ་ཁྱེད།

འོ་ཙི་འོ་ཙི་སྙིང་སྡུག་ལགས།

ཐེང་གཅིག་ང་ལ་གཟིགས་རོགས་གནང།

Legitimacy Beyond Dispute

2011-08-08T10:54:00.000-07:00

As the clock struck 09:09 on the morning of 08.08.2011 at the Dalai Lama’s temple in Dharamsala, the new Prime Minister, Dr. Lobsang Sangay took oath of office from the Chief Justice Commissioner. A few minutes later, the outgoing Prime Minister, Samdhong Rinpoche, handed over the seal of the office to Sangay. The seal, first issued by the Seventh Dalai Lama in 1751, signifies the legitimacy of the Kashag or the cabinet of ministers.

The timing of the handing-over has much significance as the great Indian teacher Padmasambhava, who was instrumental in bringing Buddhism into Tibet in the seventh century, was born on the same day. Eight is also considered as an auspicious number by the Chinese. It should, however, be noted that Mao died on 09.09 in 1976 after murdering over seventy million people during his twenty-seven-year rule according to his biographers, Jung Chang and Jon Halliday.

In his final speech, Samdhong Rinpoche stated that this “transition is from an older generation who lack modern education to a new excellent educated generation.” Sangay was born to a refugee family in India in 1968, and later won a Fulbright scholarship to Harvard where he earned a doctorate in law. During the election for prime minister, Sangay outperformed two seasoned candidates, both of whom were former ministers in the exile government.

It is apt that the Tibetans celebrate this new era of people’s empowerment with a new prime minister who has a very humble background, who will have far more power than any of his predecessors and who has contested his way to the top with the impressive articulation and a genuine desire to do something new and fresh. With this we can, perhaps, hope that the ‘era of the old monks is over’, as Rinpoche once described it to the London-based Guardian newspaper. With this new constitutional beginning, the Tibetans have shown to the world — and more importantly to China — that the issue of Tibet has never been personal to the Dalai Lama. With a democratically-elected leader, who is young, energetic and modern-educated, the Tibetans have reaffirmed and re-stated that the issue of Tibet involves the welfare of the six million Tibetans and their absolute right to self-determination.

Sangay’s ascent to the apogee of Tibetan politics through a genuine democratic process firmly asserts that the exile administration is the legitimate and sole representative of the Tibetans both in and outside Tibet. The Fourteenth Dalai Lama has now devolved all his political authority that dates back to the founding of the Ganden Phodrang Government in 1642. Though the Dalai Lama will always remain as the national leader in the hearts of every Tibetan, Sangay today is the highest elected leader and clearly has His Holiness' blessings and complete trust. Therefore, the new Prime Minister inherits the legitimacy to lead all the Tibetans in their struggle.

However, China intentionally looks at this through a different prism. Immediately after Sangay was elected as the future Prime Minister of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile in April 2011, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) said that Sangay’s “appointment” is just another “political show by the Dalai Lama.” A report in the state-run Global Times stated that the “Dalai Lama moved one step closer to retirement when his self-declared government-in- exile picked a new ‘leader’ – a Harvard graduate who has never been to Tibet.” Beijing went further branding Dr. Sangay a ‘terrorist’ in a report in the People’s Daily, soon after the preliminary election in March.

Why does Beijing spend so much time, space and energy maligning the new Prime Minister of the exile Tibetan administration? The answer lies in China’s lack of legitimacy to continue its rule in Tibet. After more than half a century of occupation, the Chinese administrators have failed to win the hearts, minds and trust of the Tibetan people. Instead they look across the Himalayan Mountains to the exile Tibetan Government based in India as their true representative.

This is clear from appeals such as this one — dispatched from Tibet by a group of university students during the election for the exile prime minister taking grave risk to their lives.

They wrote: “The election for the prime minister of the exile Tibetan Government, which represents the six million Tibetans, is a crucial event at a time when the exile Tibetan community has been enjoying democracy and freedom resulting in more political awareness, desire for change and marching on the path of freedom struggle…[We] appeal to the exile Tibetans to elect a prime minister who is bold and reform-minded, who has a strong sense of survival, with political vision and the ability to maintain the unity of our people.”

An overwhelming majority of the disenfranchised Tibetans inside Tibet put their faith and trust in the exile Tibetan government by giving it the legitimacy and the moral authority to speak on their behalf and to fight for Tibet's freedom. This therefore poses the greatest threat to Beijing’s rule over Tibet. And this is why the Chinese authorities relentlessly try to destroy Tibet's unity, including devising strategies to create discord among the exile Tibetans and to discredit the global Tibet support networks. This was made clear from the content of recently-leaked official Chinese documents.

But no matter how hard Beijing imposes its increasingly harsh rule over Tibet, or arm-twists weak nations to disassociate themselves from the exile Tibetan government, the Chinese leaders will never have the legitimacy that Dharamsala enjoys. Just as Zhang Qingli — the much-despised Beijing-appointed Tibet's party boss in Lhasa — spews out bizarre invectives including calling Tibet's Nobel Laureate 'a wolf in monk's robes, a devil with a human face but the heart of a beast', Sangay steps with confidence into his five-year term as exile Tibet's popularly-elected leader. The fight from now on, as it has always been, is between credibility and dissembling, between democracy and dictatorship, between occupation and the struggle for freedom. If truth is to triumph, then the victor is already in ascendance. After all, "I pledge to you ... to strengthen and sustain our movement until freedom is restored in Tibet,” stated Sangay in his acceptance speech.

An Indian Daylight

2011-08-02T01:52:00.000-07:00

The morning has arrived

From behind the dark shadows

To find sunflowers still dozing

Crows on the garbage cans

My eyelids drooping with thoughts

The sun in all its glory said,

“If the morning does not charm you,

close your eyes and open your mind.”

Under the old willow profoundly heavy

I sat down eyes closed.

The air brushed by me.

The squirrels danced.

The leaves pushed one another.

“How can I open my mind when my

eyes are heavy and the heart’s in tatter?”

Then I heard Milarepa sing,

“When the sky rides on vultures' wings

The wind will pick up your thoughts.

When your mind rests in the ground,

Come to me at the Mount Kailash.”

I opened my eyes.

The world was the same.

The sun shone.

The squirrels danced.

But my eyes no longer hurt.

And all of a sudden

I missed my grandmother’s bread.

Milarepa meditating in the Himalayas

'Thank you Communist Party of China'

2011-07-27T22:38:00.000-07:00

As a kid growing up in Tibet under China, the first song that I learned was The East Is Red. It was one of the most popular ‘red songs’ praising Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party (the CCP). This was adapted — like most Communist propaganda songs — from a traditional farming folk song from China’s Shaanxi province. My father, who could read Tibetan, taught the words to my mother so that she could recite them when the commune leader made random checks to test if the villagers had memorised the lyrics.

Mao - the 'new sun'

‘The east is red, the sun is rising.

China has brought forth a Mao Zedong.

He has brought happiness to the people.

Hurrah, He is the people’s great saviour!’

An old woman in the nearby village had once casually sung a traditional song with the lyrics: ‘O White hill in the west, Move aside so that the sun won’t set too soon.’ She was accused of singing a ‘reactionary song’ in praise of Western imperialism and was treated to a thamzing or ‘struggle’ session, during which the accused were publicly humiliated and often beaten.

From its earliest years, when the CCP was waging underground battles against the ruling Nationalists, the Party recognized the effectiveness of music as a means to inspire fervour, patriotism and sway people’s social and political attitudes.

When the People’s Liberation Army first marched into Tibet in 1949-1950, the newly-victorious CCP had already perfected propaganda songs as a means to educate the masses on the virtues of its version of socialism, and to legitimize its occupation of Tibet. Music could overcome the language barrier and had the power to instantly convey a political message. Taking a cue from Lenin, who said that literature and art are “a screw in the whole machine’’, the Chinese Communists have employed music as a core component of state propaganda to great effect.

One of the first ‘red songs’ specifically composed for Tibet to celebrate its ‘liberation’ from feudal serfdom and ‘imperialists’ was The Laundry Song. Like all other propaganda songs, The Laundry Song was performed at mass gatherings throughout Tibet and blared incessantly through loudspeakers installed in strategic public places. A 1964 music video of this song was widely shown and distributed.

These massive public song-and-dance campaigns were held to disseminate political ideology through lyrics and to convince the people of the supposed benefits the CCP had brought. Dance troupes — mostly composed of young Tibetans taken to China and trained to sing in Chinese operatic style — were formed in all Tibetan districts, and these troupes travelled to the remotest Tibetan villages and nomadic camps to stage highly-sinicized versions of traditional music. They were (and still are) dressed in hybrid costumes masquerading as traditional Tibetan dress.

I remember a dance troupe coming to our village in Central Tibet. Everyone was made to assemble in the village square, where the troupe performed a number of very theatrical songs with a lot of high-pitched singing accompanied by loud gongs and cymbals. One of the songs they performed featured a white-haired old Tibetan man and a few young people who sang to him:

“The sun has shone on the snow mountains

And a New China has arisen

Grandpa, Come fast, Come fast”

In response, the old man went:

“Oh yes! Yes!

A new China has risen

How good!

How good!”

After my nearly three decades in exile, I still remember the lyrics of this song at public performances — the only entertainment we had during those times of terrible hardship. This was the most insidious assault on Tibetan identity. It imprinted unconsciously on Tibetan minds the idea of a New and Better China under the benevolent leadership of the CCP through repetitive, simplistic songs.

During Mao’s Cultural Revolution (1966-‘76), every aspect of Tibetan culture came to a standstill. The traditional performing arts were completely banned. Even dance troupes were ordered to sing only Communist songs approved by Beijing. It was during this time that I remember my mother loudly memorizing the lyrics of The East Is Red.

Like my mother, generations of Tibetans have grown up singing these songs without ever knowing what the lyrics meant. But through continuous singing and attending daily political meetings after each day’s work, they were made to find meaning in these words.

Artistes wearing sinocised dresses dance in Lhasa

While their own traditional songs and music were being wiped out, Tibetans have unconsciously been programmed to find meaning in this barrage of propaganda songs they learned to sing in Chinese. It is this inculcated habit of finding meaning in meaninglessness that now poses the gravest danger to Tibetan identity.

The impact is particularly insidious for the new generation of Tibetans who have not experienced the terror of China’s invasion and occupation of Tibet in the 1950s nor the daily horrors of the Cultural Revolution. Still they are continuously bombarded with the Party’s version of history. They see Mao as a benevolent leader who united China and ‘liberated’ Tibet from the ‘feudal lords’. I have had some painful and heated debates with friends who have recently escaped from Tibet. They blame the Tibetan aristocrats and the monastic community for presiding over a social order so corrupt and oppressive that it somehow warranted a military ‘Liberation’ by a foreign power.

Ever-growing List

In today’s globalized and networked world, the CCP still daily dictates to Tibetans which songs they are allowed to listen to and which songs they may not sing. While blatantly promoting ‘patriotic’ singers — such as Tseten Dolma, the veteran Communist nightingale, and Sonam Wangmo, a hip and stylish new-generation Tibetan mascot for the PLA — the CCP leaves no stone unturned in curtailing, persecuting and imprisoning those who fail to reinforce its message.

In January 2010, the authorities sentenced the singer Tashi Dhondup to 15 months’ ‘reform through labour’ for his music album, Torture Without Trace. Dhondup was released in February 2011. Earlier, in March 2008, another young Tibetan singer, Dolma Kyi from Golog in Eastern Tibet, was arrested for composing and singing ‘reactionary songs’. Dozens of performers have been arrested since 2008 on such charges. In May 2010, 27 popular Tibetan-language songs were listed as banned in Tibet — whether in audio or videodisk format, or as digital media files on cell phones. “Anyone possessing illegal music or videos will be severely dealt with,” the authorities warned.

Like the list of words blocked on the internet in China, the list of songs banned in Tibet gets longer each year. As of this year, it includes Shabalep, banned by China’s State Council Information Office on 2 April, and The Sound of Unity. Tibetans are prohibited from playing these songs or storing them in any electronic device.

Shabalep, a You-Tube rap sensation in praise of a popular snack, (Shabalep also means ‘spank on the bottom’) seems as harmless an expression of Tibetan identity as one could wish for, while The Sounds of Unity by Sherten, a well-known musician from Amdo in Eastern Tibet, calls on all Tibetans to unite. “If you care about the future of our people/All three provinces should unite…” Sherten sings.

The battlegrounds for the CCP to try to control Tibetan people’s thoughts — and to make them believe in the legitimacy in its control over Tibet — have shifted down to this micro-management level of representation and symbolism. Beijing brands assertion of any unique identity that goes against Marxist-Leninist-Mao Zedong thoughts as ‘reactionary’ and ‘counter revolutionary’. To this effect Beijing has cracked down on Tibetan Buddhism, Falun Gong and spends enormous amount of its energy and resources to re-write the entire Tibetan and the Chinese history to fit in the Communist ‘ideals’. Moreover, in its quest to become a global leader on par with the US and Russia, the CCP does not tolerate any challenge to its official narrative and image.

The Chinese leadership’s reactions to songs such as Shabalep — and the extend to which they are ready to go to stamp out any Tibetan voice and collective representation, however muffled — indicates Beijing’s paranoia and ridiculous nervousness that is unbecoming of an aspiring superpower. This approach also makes itself surprisingly vulnerable to subversion and ridicule at this level.

As the CCP celebrated its 90^th birthday on 1 July, the entire apparatus of the propaganda department is in action to repackage and bring those ‘red songs’ from the early 1950s and from the era of the Cultural Revolution back to life. These songs are re-mastered and mostly re-sung by a new generation of state-approved Chinese and Tibetan singers.

The re-launching of these ‘red songs’ on a massive scale and making Tibetans at all levels of society memorize the lyrics by playing them ad nauseum, is still Beijing’s preferred and perfected propaganda method in the digital age. Like my mother, who memorized the words of The East Is Red without understanding what the words meant, a new generation of Tibetans are being pushed to do the same. In effect, this is another Cultural Revolution. My niece and nephews, who live in the same village where I was born over three decades ago, still sing The Laundry Song at school.

‘Hey!

Who is going to help us harvest barley?

Who is going to help us build new houses?

It’s the dear PLA

The saving star of the Communist Party…

Thank you, life-saving Communist Party’

Without the freedom to know their culture and access their rich yet fast-disappearing traditional music, children in Tibet today are left lurching in a ‘New Tibet’ dominated by ‘the New Majority’.

Chinese tourists in fake Tibetan dresses in front of the Potala Palace

The struggle for freedom is a struggle for representation, identity and the culture that coalesces a people together. In this sense music is a prime factor uniting people to resist against occupation. There is real danger that a generation or two from now, youth in Tibet may no longer hear songs about Tibet’s mountains, rivers and astounding landscape in their own language.

That is why Tibetans, both in and outside Tibet, need to now compose, sing, share and distribute as widely as possible the songs of freedom and resistance, songs about the snow-capped mountains, blue rivers and the high plateau. We need to sing more songs that not only enrage the CCP but also put its entire propaganda machinery on alert to block word after word and phrase after phrase and its entire security apparatus up in arms trying to ban song after song after song.

When that day comes, Tibetans will be speaking in a language that Beijing can and will not understand and sing songs that the CCP will never comprehend.

Tibetan Viagra

2011-06-30T01:31:00.000-07:00

The year before I was smuggled out of Tibet in 1984, my brother and his friends were talking about going to pick up yartsa gunbu in the hills near our village. They refused to take me with them saying that I could not climb up the hill. When I threatened to tell on them to my grandfather, they allowed me to tag a long.

We climbed up the hill, negotiated the ruins of the monastery destroyed during the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) and reached Gyalpo Ri or the King’s Peak. It was winter and the earth was frozen. We did not find a single yartsa gunbu. At the time, I did not know how the thing even looked like.

this is what the precious fungus looks like!

Yartsa Gunbu meaning Summer Grass Winter Worm is popularly known as caterpillar fungus/grass. This fungus, which is found in wild on the Tibetan Plateau, takes over the bodies of caterpillar larvae then shoots up like finger-size blades of grass out of the dead insects' heads.

The nutty-tasting caterpillar fungus is highly valued for its supposedly extraordinary curative powers such as a treatment for cancer, anti-aging and as a libido booster. This Tibetan aphrodisiac is widely used in traditional Chinese medicine and is particularly coveted by the nouveau riche in China today. As a result, demand for the exotic fungus has sky-rocketed in far away booming cities like Beijing and Shanghai. By one account, the value of caterpillar fungus has shot up by 900 percent since the late 1990s.

Nomads scouring the hills for Yartsa Gunbu

As a result, Tibetan nomads, who are being made to abandon their livestock and forced into state-built barracks, scour hills to pick as many caterpillar funguses as possible. With no other source of income or skills to find alternate jobs, collecting Yartsa Gunbu is their only mean of surviving.

In Kyegudo in Eastern Tibet, which was hit by a devastating earthquake in April 2010, almost the entire population hunts for Yartsa Gunbu. Jonathan Watts, the author of When a Billion Chinese Jump, writes that the Chinese middlemen buy the fungus for about 30 Yuans a piece from Tibetan collectors and then sell them in Chinese cities for twice its weight in gold.

Packaged for maximum profit

However, soaring demands and intense harvesting of caterpillar fungus on the Tibetan Plateau is damaging the hillsides and leading to violent land disputes, cultural degradation and communal conflicts. The local party cadres sell out licenses which allow the local Tibetans to hunt for Yartsa Gunbu. The Tibetan collectors then have to sell the fungus to the cadres or their agents, who make exorbitant profit in the process.

In the peak collection time in the summer, the Chinese middlemen organize video nights in the hills for the root collectors during which adult films are shown and cheap alcohol is sold. There were also a few cases of violent clashes between Tibetans over collection areas. In July 2007 eight people were shot to death and 50 wounded in one area in Eastern Tibet over Yartsa Gunbu.

My first taste of this highland Viagra was in the summer of 2009 in New York City. My friend Tendor, the executive director of the Students for a Free Tibet, was gifted a few caterpillar fungus by a friend. Tendor had the fungus soaked in a glass and one morning, he asked me to have a sip.

“This is Yartsa Gunbu and it will make you strong,” he said somewhat mischievously.

I carefully looked into the glass to find a few floating things which looked like enlarged and discoloured-earthworms. I took a couple of large sips and waited for the magical fungus to take effect. I was disappointed that nothing happened. Perhaps, the famous Tibetan aphrodisiac doesn’t work for me.

Irrespective of its potential medicinal values, the caterpillar fungus is wrecking havoc on the Tibetan Plateau largely fuelled by Chinese people’s demand for it and the Chinese government policy to drive over 2.5 million Tibetan nomads into permanent settlement, which is destroying over nine thousand years of Tibet’s mobile civilization.

**

2011-06-26T22:43:00.000-07:00

Yunri Pon's Daughter

For Lhadon Tethong

And then I saw Lhadon Tethong

coming from afar

with a golden sceptre in her hand ─

thunder flashed, sky blackened

fog covered my mind

fear shook my heart

tears stained my eyes

For a moment I thought

She was going to strike me to fragmentation

My useless self splattered to ten directions

I pinched myself

I punched myself

I kicked myself

I was looking for a runaway exit

But the Great Wall of China stood behind me ─

I was locked, shocked

There was nothing I could do.

So in desperation I faced her

She was still coming towards me

Now holding a bouquet of white roses

Seeing me she raised her hand

And the roses disappeared

Petals danced in the sky

Thorns rained down ─

thud thud thud heavy heavy heavy

I gaped my mouth

And my heart pounded like a

blacksmith's hammer

The sun shone in the sky

Light streamed in my head

I wanted to jump, shout, cry, pounce

Oh me!

illusion...delusion...hallucination...

I banged my head against the wall

Focused my eyes straight forward

And saw Lhadon

Now dashing towards me

Locks of hair waving in the wind

Drum beats of her feet pounding the dry earth

Puffs of dust flying in the air

She was like a wild yak in the Himalayas

Blood streamed in her veins like the raging Yarlung

I stared into the sky and prayed

Prayed to a million gods and goddesses that I knew

Chenrezig Khyenno! Jampel Yang Khyenno!

Jetsun Dolma Khyenno! Milarepa Khyenno!

Gonpo Ludrup Khyenno! Arya Deva Khyenno!

When I finished chanting the last name

Of the last Bodhisattvas thinking that this

Was my last day on this earth...

Silence occupied the universe

The world went into a deep coma

The sun stopped

The wall behind faded

And there in front of me was Lhadon

fisted-hand stretched towards me

I was speechless...

I did not know what to say...

Do I have to say something? Do I?

And then

And then...

She slowly opened her hands and in her palms

were the broken fragments of the yellow stars

that she plucked from the wall of People's Hall

My head started reeling with excitement

My heart started striking against my chest

From somewhere deep inside

I found my voice...

Ah! Lhadon-la, I said

This is what I’ve always wanted to see

The broken fragments of those yellow stars

That covered my mother's snow

and darkened my father’s sky

Those yellow stars

That blocked my grandfather's rivers

and pierced my grandmother's tent

Those yellow stars that fractured my dreams.

I looked around

And realized that all along

There were people around me

All along there were voices

Voices chanting

Ah! Lhadon-la

You are Songtsen Gampo's niece

You are Yunri Pon's daughter

You are Thupten Ngodup's sister

I am Lang Darma’s grandson

And Dhondup Gyal’s cousin

You and I travel the same road.

At the end of this road is the land

Where we came from.

Note: Yunri Pon Sonam Wangyal was a warrior from Lithang. He was inside the Lithang Monastery when the PLA soldiers started shelling it. Yunri and his man killed as many Chinese soldiers as they could and finally he decided to surrender but only to the Chinese General Ga-lag. When General Ga-lag met Yunri Pon outside the monastery, Yunri pumped six rounds into the general. Immediately, the PLA soldiers fired on Yunri Pon. He was about twenty-five at the time.

Will Xi Talk to Dharamsala?

2011-06-10T01:56:00.000-07:00

His Father's Son?
In 1954/55, when His Holiness the Dalai Lama visited China, he is said to have gifted a Rolex watch to Xi Zhongzun, the then vice premier of China. In 1980s when Tibetan fact-finding delegations from Dharamsala went to China and Tibet, Xi was the Chinese official interlocutor and was known to carry a photo of His Holiness in his pocket.

Xi was close to the 10th Panchen Lama, who submitted the historic 70,000 Character Petition to the Chinese government stating that Tibetans suffered more under Beijing's rule then they have benefited. His association with the Panchen Lama was one of the reasons why Mao purged him three times. Xi also supported Hu Yaobang’s political reform and denounced the use of military force in Tiananmen Square in 1989, after which he disappeared from public.

By all account, Xi Zhongxun, was a liberal communist, who is known for his integrity and forthrightness. Xi’s son Xi Jinping will takeover the communist throne in Zhongnanhai from the current Chinese boss, Hu Jintao, in 2012.

Unlike Hu, Xi can smile at least

Xi junior was born in 1953 and later witnessed Mao purge his father during the Cultural Revolution. His climb up the Communist ladder has been slow and un-dramatic. Xi joined the Chinese Youth League in 1971 and the Communist Party in 1974. After nearly three decades later, he took senior Party position in Zhejiang, one of the rich Chinese provinces and was made the Party chief of Shanghai in 2007. In October of the same year, Xi was inducted into the Politburo Standing Committee, a nine-member all-powerful group that decides the fate of world’s most populous nation.

Mrs. Xi in Tibetan finery

Xi has an engineering degree from Tsinghua University and is married to Peng Liyuan, a famous Chinese folk singer. Their daughter is enrolled at Harvard University. Over the last few years, he has attracted a number of international admirers for his ‘openness and pragmatism’, including former US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who said that Xi is "the kind of guy who knows how to get things over the goal line.” However, Xi’s personal political views remain foggy, which will likely to remain so until he takes office the next year and consolidates his power.

Dharamsala’s Hope

There is a curious optimism and lilting hope among the senior Tibetan leadership in Dharamsala that light may shine from Beijing soon. During his campaigns for the exile Tibetan prime minister, Lobsang Sangay, (he is now the prime minister-elect), said on numerous occasions that things might change for Tibet in 2012 when a new leadership headed by Xi Jinping take power in China. Similarly, the current Prime Minister Samdhong Rinpoche, during his final speech to the first session of the 15^th Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, said that changes are taking place all over the world especially in the Middle East and that within the next few years ‘changes are likely to take place in the People’s Republic of China.’

Exile Tibetan Prime Minister Samdhong Rinpoche

There is an assumption that we are dealing with China that is self-sure, responsible and rational power that has come of age with dignity backed up by economic strength. This has led to oft mentioned and now almost a cliché statement that Tibet will benefit economically if it remains with China. However, this assumption reverses reality. China today is a brooding nation with a highly unequal social order. Its paranoid leaders are constantly worried, as Minxin Pei writes, about getting overthrown by its own people.

When Xi takes over from Hu the next year, he will inherit an empire, whose unbridle economic growth and hunger for more resources have led to irreparable environmental damages; a brittle society with more than 100,000 mass protests each year apart from uprisings in Tibet, East Turkestan and lately in Inner Mongolia; and an economy that needs massive adjustments to make the growth more sustainable. These will leave Xi’s hands so full that the political reforms will be the last of his priorities.

Dharamsala’s optimism and hope are based on the hope that there will be political reforms in China which will have trickle-down effect on the Sino-Tibetan talks, which in turn will bring a new and positive development for the issue of Tibet. In fact, the Chinese leaders have talked about political reform for over three decades but have done nothing about it. Premier Wen Jiabao famously called for ‘political reform’ and the need to have term limit for senior Communist leaders. Wen said, "[China] must advance political, economic and judicial reforms, so that our superstructure [politics] will keep abreast with the development of our economic foundation."

But such liberal voices have no real impact, as was clear from the weighty 4,600-character communiqué after the fifth party congress in October 2010, which affirmed the ‘political advantages of China’s socialist system’. Under such an overwhelming opposition to any political reform, Xi junior is very likely to maintain the status quo, which will mean that Dharamsala’s hopes remain worryingly misplaced.

Will Xi lead a rising Dragon?

According to official statistics Beijing spent over $100 million on ‘domestic stability maintenance operations’ in 2010, which was more than China’s national defence budget. For a nation vying to be the next superpower, this does not augur well. In order to keep its people under control, Chinese government manoeuvres massive internal security system that involves approximately a million paramilitary personnel and an unknown number of secret police and informers. These people are often lowly paid and their other source of income is corruption, which for the time being seems to make the political system more efficient. However, endemic corruption rots the system from within. Besides in the long run China’s global ambition will be severely limited by its domestic security pressure.

polluted river, dead fishes

Lustre is also pealing off from China’s hot economic engine. Decades of freewheeling developments have led to catastrophic impact on the environment. Experts say that the net economic growth, after the cost of reviving the environment, makes China very unattractive for foreign investors. Adding to this is a new worrying trend, writes Gordon Chang, author The Coming Collapse of China and a respected blogger in Forbes online, that “almost 60% of China’s ‘high net worth individuals,’ defined as those possessing more than 10 million Yuan in investable assets” are leaving China. “We have been working hard to develop the economy in the past 30 years, but now these elite members of society are fleeing with the majority of the wealth,” said economic analyst Zhong Dajun to the Global Times, the Communist Party-run newspaper.

Moreover, Beijing’s appetite for resources and unilateral control of major Asian rivers, originating from Tibet, are leading to head-on confrontations with India, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, which are likely to produce unexpected hurdles in her global ambitions. Aggressive Chinese takeover of resources in Africa by bringing in cheap labour and cheaper Chinese products flooding their markets are being met with firm resistance from affected local population and loss of face for China in international forums.

Tibetan monks in protest

Xi will have to lead China with all these multiple problems, some of which are as big the nation itself for which Xi and his coteries will find no easy solutions. As of now China is heavily cracking down peaceful protestors in Inner Mongolia and Kirti Monastery in Amdo Ngaba, Eastern Tibet. Within the last couple of years, the Chinese authorities have also cracked down and arrested unaccounted number of its people, including renowned artist, Ai Wei Wei. Beijing is visibly nervous. When nervous Beijing always mindlessly flexes its muscles.

This leads a few questions — Is China really rising? Or is it a large impressive structure from outside but without anything of substance inside much like the newly renovated National Museum of China? Will Xi impress this elite group of nine people to lead a quarter of humanity into a democratic society led by rule of law?

Going by the China’s records for the last sixty years, the answers are not even blowing in the wind.

My Tibet

2011-06-06T01:15:00.000-07:00

Chinese authorities sentenced influential Tibetan writer Tashi Rabten, popularly known as Theurang, to a 4-year jail term in Eastern Tibet.

Theurang is the author of Written in Blood and one of the editors of banned literary magazine 'Shar Dungri' (Eastern Snow Mountain).

He was arrested from the Northwest Nationalities University in Lanzhou on 6 April 2010.

Following poem (translated into English by Bhuchung D. Sonam) is from his book Written in Blood.

My Tibet

by Theurang*

Is it you, the flame that burns in the middle of a storm?

Is it you, the boat that rocks in the sea?

Is it also you, who offers the torch of life in the darkness of night?

Is it you, where there is no freedom?

Is it also you, who is chained and shackled?

Is it you, who writes her history in blood?

Are you a warrior?

Where are your battlefield and the weapons?

Are you a prisoner?

What crimes have you committed?

Is it your sky that the sun shies away from?

Is it your vow to let yourself be silent?

Are these your border guards, the long guns surrounding you?

Freedom is different from restrictions

Because of which you move,

Because of which they tie and bind you, isn't it?

Isn't it you who is being murdered?

Isn't it you who is being jailed?

Isn't it you who is being tortured?

Why is it that you still want to move?

Do you want to move amidst shadows of guns?

No.

Isn't it you who can never be cowed down?

Isn't it you who fiercely burns with passion?

Isn't it you who marches ahead into history?

Don't you need to move even more?

Don't you need to move till the time runs out and the life ends?

It’s Not Over Yet

2011-05-26T22:52:00.000-07:00

The Second Tibetan National General Meeting concluded on 24 May amidst thunderous applause. The participants took sighs of relief, patted their friends’ backs and shook hands with others. There was a general air of satisfaction and positive energy.

All Tibetan meetings generally end with Tsog du gyal khai ngang jug dril wa yin meaning ‘this meeting has concluded in a victorious note’. We love things to be auspicious and conduct most events in our lives with lot of symbolic gestures. As a result, the leader of the Group-10 (participants were divided into ten groups for better discussions) had his group’s summary presentation done by two people so that there were eleven presentations on the final day. Any number that ends in zero is inauspicious. This group leader had some sense of humour. Even the generally sombre Kalon Tripa chuckled.

The Tibetan National General Meeting was, perhaps, one of the most important landmarks in Tibetan history since the founding of Ganden Phodrang Government of Tibet by the Fifth Dalai Lama in 1642 and the declaration of Tibet’s independence by the Thirteenth Dalai Lama in 1912. The meeting was called on by the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, and representatives from Tibetans living in as many as thirty countries came to discuss crucial issues in the proposed amendment in the Charter for the Exile-Tibetans. The amendments were mostly regarding the devolution of His Holiness' political authorities to the elected Tibetan leadership.

After two days of intense and vigorous discussions, the Tibetan people, through their representatives in the meeting, clearly voiced their concerns, aspirations and desires. Many of the key issues such as using Tsenjol Bod Zhung for the exile administration got overwhelming support.

Both the current members and members-elect of the exile parliament took part in the convention. They were fully aware of the people aspiration and wish. As a result they will most likely take decisions on the proposed amendments in the on-going special session of the parliament.


some very big people at the meet

While doing so, they must bear in mind the wish of the Tibetan people, the long-term struggle for Tibet’s freedom and must be keenly aware about any indication or subtle signs of political manoeuvring to sway individual’s decision.

At this critically important time in our history, various factors are in play. Some are not visible on the surface and others reflected through different prisms. Therefore, it is vital to watch out for a tiny modification in a name, switch of a few terms here and there or a different use of a word in the Charter, which will have drastic implications for Tibet and Tibetans and in our ongoing struggle for freedom.

Issues Regarding Amendments in the Charter for Tibetans-in-Exile

2011-05-20T02:13:00.000-07:00

Since His Holiness the Dalai Lama initiated the democratization process in exile Tibet fifty years ago, our democratic institutions have achieved a high level of maturity. In a statement issued to the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile on 14 March 2011, His Holiness announced his decision to devolve all his political authority. In response, the exile parliament unanimously appealed His Holiness to reconsider his decision. However, His Holiness not only refused but also explained in detail the background of his decision to the general public during the Monlam Chenmo in Dharamsala. Judging by all these developments, it has become very clear that His Holiness is firm on his decision.

As a result, the parliament passed a unanimous resolution to form an ad hoc committee to draft necessary amendments in the Charter. The members of the Committee included the Speaker and Deputy Speaker of the parliament, Kalon Tripa, Kalon for the Department of Education and Pema Jungney, a member of parliament. This Committee has made public the proposed amendments to the Charter.

Taking our democratic responsibilities, we, the members of Youth for Better Democracy would like to point out following elements in the proposed amendments that we disagree with.

1) In the Charter, the term Tsenjol Bod Zhung (lit. Tibetan Government-in-Exile) is replaced with Tsenjol Bod Mei Zhung Gi Drik Tsuk (lit. Institution/Organization of the Government of Tibetan People in Exile). A government or an institution of and solely by the exile Tibetans cannot represent the six million Tibetans. Tsenjol Bod Zhung, though based in exile, is globally understood to be the legitimate political government of the entire Tibetan people. If the proposed name change takes place, this will undermine the issue of Tibet and our struggle in the long run. Hence, there is no way that we can support any proposal to change the name from Tsenjol Bod Zhung to Tsenjol Bod Mei Zhung Gi Drik Tsuk.

2) Article 19, under the Executive Power, there were three points such as “the administrative responsibility and powers lie with the Kalon Tripa”. In the proposed amendment there is only one addition i.e. “Awards in recognition of achievements and giving titles”. The rests are same like before as mentioned in Article 29. This makes the Kalon Tripa having the administrative power and responsibilities only in name with no real power. We feel that this must be given due consideration and importance.

3) In Article 21, “Kalon Tripa and his/her eligibility” all clauses from A to F maintained as before. However, clause G has been withdrawn. This clause states that a Kalon should be someone who has not served for two consecutive terms. By removing this clause, the Charter allows the Kalon Tripa to stay in power for as long as he/she wants since there is no term limit. This also applies for other Kalons.

If the executive head can remain in power for a long period of time, there is a danger that it will create many problems and threats. Therefore, like other democratic societies where there are set term limits for presidents and prime ministers, we also need to retain this clause to enforce term limits on Kalon Tripa and other Kalons.

4) Article 22, regarding “Appointment of Other Kalons,” it states that the Kalon Tripa shall form his cabinet by appointing up to seven Kalons.

Furthermore, the amendment allows the Kalon Tripa to appoint other Kalons without the approval of the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile. We are opposed to this undemocratic change. Such a system will not only create nepotism but also increase the possibility of corruption. Even from the perspective of the Kalons, they would be more empowered to exercise greater mandate and legitimacy if they had the approval of the Parliament besides the support of the Kalon Tripa.

5) In article 36, “Powers of the Legislation,” it states, “All legislative powers lie with the Parliament of the Tibetan people. In order to pass the bills into law, the signature of the Speaker of the Parliament is necessary.” This is contradictory to the dominant practice in other democracies, which have checks and balances. Amendment instead should state, “For the bills to be passed into law, they require the signature by the Kalon Tripa.” This would conform to the practices of advanced democratic societies.

Likewise, it is important to adapt Articles 5, and clauses 1 and 2 of Article 111.

These are some of the elements in the proposed amendments in the Charter that we do not and cannot agree with. In order to avoid confusion and to maintain clarity we have left out other articles, which we agree with.

We strongly believe that the Charter Amendment Drafting Committee’s main responsibility was to address those articles directly related to His Holiness’ power, and not to draft amendments affecting the entire the Charter such as the ones that we have mentioned above.

An important point that is not reflected in the draft Amendments but has been mentioned in the media by some members of the Drafting Committee is the issue of creating a new position called Mirig Genzin. We do not support this proposal.

In his statement to the exile parliament, His Holiness stated that “In order for our process of democratization to be complete, the time has come for me to devolve my formal authority to such an elected leadership.” It is hence impossible to follow a path that is contradictory to His Holiness’ vision. Therefore, there is no need to create a position of Mirig Genzin over and above the elected leadership by the people. This constitutes taking steps backward in our democratization process.

Hence, we appeal to all the Tibetans who are taking part in the general meeting, and particularly the members of the exile parliament to take these suggestions into consideration to safeguard the legitimacy of Tsenjol Bod Zhung and maintain our struggle for Tibet’s just cause in the long run.

Members of the Youth for Better Democracy

Daughters of Mountain Ogress

2011-05-09T02:24:00.000-07:00

A woman can say more in a sigh then a man can in a sermon. – Arnold Haultain

The history of modern Tibet has produced many amazing women whose tenacity, courage, indomitable spirits and patriotism have been crucial in keeping Tibet’s struggle for freedom alive to this day. They came from many walks of live and from all over Tibet — nuns, nomads, aristocrats, farmers and hermits.

Following are some of the Tibetan warrior women, who were gentle, forgiving and compassionate, but who did not hesitate to take arms when their way of life was threatened and when their land was trampled upon by marching boots of the occupying army. They have inspired a generation of Tibetan women, yet many of them remain unknown, as Virginia Wolf said, ‘for most of history, Anonymous was a woman’. Nevertheless, they were true daughters of ma dag sinmo, the mountain ogress, who according Tibetan legend married a male monkey — their six offspring were the first Tibetans. These women held up more than their share of Tibet’s blue sky.

Kundeling Kunsang was one of the leaders of the March Uprising in 1959 against the occupying Chinese forces, in which thousands of Tibetan women gathered in front of the Potala Palace shouting, ‘From today Tibet is Independent’. After the Dalai Lama escaped into exile disguised as a regular soldiers on 17 March 1959, the Chinese brutally suppressed the popular Tibetan people’s resistance. Tens of thousands were killed, and hundreds were jailed and tortured.

In 1969, after 10 years in prison Kundeling Kunsang led her prison mates in protest against Mao’s notoriously destructive campaign of the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). The protest resulted in the execution of Kunsang and thirty other Tibetan women by firing squad, which took place near Sera Monastery, one of the largest and most prestigious monastic institutions in Tibet.

In her book Sorrow Mountain, Ani Pachen, a fellow prisoner writes that ‘Kunsang stood still; her swollen face wore an expression of calm. She didn’t flinch when her hands were tied, nor when the two soldiers came to drag her across the stage toward the waiting truck. She kept her head lifted, her expression defiant.’ Kunsang was almost nine months pregnant when the revolt took place and gave birth to her last child in the prison. Ven. Palden Gyatso, who spend over three decades in Chinese gulag, called her ‘heroine of the Tibetan Uprising of 1959.’

In the same year, the Chinese executed Kunsang and others, a young nun named Trinley Choedon led hundreds of horsemen with primitive weapons and attacked a Chinese military headquarter in Drakor district of Nyemo, Central Tibet. Trinley Chodron, was the medium of a legendary deity and during a trance she urged the Tibetan fighters to ‘kill the people with yellow and blue uniforms.’ On 3 June, her group killed 22 Chinese soldiers and cadres. The PLA soldiers eventually overpowered the fighters. Trinley and fifteen of her followers were captured and brought to Lhasa for public execution.

Gyari Dorjee Yudon

The resistance by Tibetan women against the Communist Chinese in the preceding years was equally daring.

In March 1956, Gyari Dorje Yudon, the second wife of Gyari Nyima, the chieftain of Nyarong in Kham, eastern Tibet, led the resistance forces’ attack on the Drugmo Dzong (Fort of the Female Dragon), where the PLA’s Eighteenth Army left a reduced number of troops on their way to capture Chamdo. The siege lasted for about the month and the Chinese suffered great losses. When Yudon and her fighters were outnumbered by fifteen thousand soldiers of the Eighteenth Army, they retreated into the hills and continued guerrilla campaigns against the Chinese.

Ama Adhe

Around the same time, Ama Adhe, whose first husband was poisoned by the Chinese for planning an armed resistance against the Chinese army in 1956, organized an underground women’s movement that arranged communications and provided supplies to the resistance fighters operating in the mountains. However, in 1957 one of the captured fighters broke down under Chinese torture and revealed Adhe as a courier for his group. She was arrested on 16 October 1958 and was jailed for twenty-seven years. At the time of her arrest, Adhe’s son was three-years-old and the daughter only a year old. ‘As they tied me,’ writes Adhe in her book The Voice that Remembers ‘my little daughter, now awake, laughed happily as she sat on the bed. She must have thought that we were playing a game.’

That year, Ani Pachen, Tibet’s Warrior Nun, also fell into the Chinese hands. Pachen, the only child of Pomda Gonor, the Chief of Lemdha clan in Gonjo in Kham, Eastern Tibet, had to come back from her reclusive life as a nun to take the leadership, after her father died in 1958.

Ani Pachen

Soon Pachen led a guerrilla campaign of six hundred fighters on horseback against the Chinese army. They struck at supply caravans, camps, and whatever targets the Red army offered. Inevitably though, the sheer weight of resources and manpower that the Chinese were able to bring smothered the resistance. Many were killed, and many more were captured, as they struggled, half starved, towards the relative safety of Lhasa. Ani Pachen la was among those who were captured and was jailed for twenty-one years.

In the 1980s, a new batch of young women took the mantle of freedom struggle when the Tibetan people peacefully took to the streets demanding independence. This wasn’t a total change of leadership since old warriors such as Ani Pachen, soon after her release from prison, also joined the protests. But the demographic of the protestors shifted to young people — some barely in their teens.

Ngawang Sangdrol

Ngawang Sangdrol, born to a family of active patriot, was detained at the age of thirteen for taking part in a peaceful demonstration. In 1992, she was rearrested and jailed in the notorious Drapchi Prison. Sangdrol and other nuns in defiance of the endless torture, interrogations and constant watch, covertly recorded patriotic songs and smuggled the tapes out of prison. As a result this group of brave nuns, popularly known as Drapchi-14, were given extended prison terms. Sangdrol got a combined sentence of 23 years. Yet, they remain, both in and outside the prison, irrepressible champions of freedom and non-violence on the face brutal Chinese occupation.

Woeser

While Sangdrol and others were being incarcerated in their prison cells, Woeser, one of Tibet’s foremost public intellectuals and author, was using her pen to challenge the Communist rule in Tibet. In January 2003, Woeser published her book Notes on Tibet, a compilation of thirty-eight short stories, in Guangzhou, China. Nine months later the Chinese authorities banned her book. The official indictment accused Woeser of "stepping into the wrong political terrain" and "praising the Dalai Lama and the Karmapa, encouraging belief in religion" and generally "having the wrong political stance".

Woeser was forced out of her job as the editor Lhasa-based Chinese language journal Tibetan Literature in 2004. The Chinese authorities ordered that all her working hours to be devoted to political re-education. International PEN stated that Woeser has suffered repeated and sustained harassment, including brief detentions, periods of house arrest, travel restrictions, loss of work, denial of access to information and communications, heavy surveillance and censorship. She lives in exile in Beijing, where Woeser feels that she is “sitting on the edge of a cliff and I could fall down any moment.”

Jamyang Kyi

Woeser’s friend Jamyang Kyi, writer and singer, was arrested in 2008 on her way to work. She was accused of sending messages to friends about the 2008 protests in Tibet and was incarcerated during which she was interrogated and tortured. In her book Stages of Torture: Diary of Interrogations, she recounts her days under the Chinese custody. She writes that the guards took turns to go to toilet or to wash their faces and all she could do inside that tiny room was ‘to look out of the window at a scene of flalling sleets. The solitary willow tree was covered in snow, its branches slightly drooping under the weight. The sleet moistened my heart for an instant and seeped into me.’

In exile, away from the harsh and intense Tibetan Plateau, away from the lush green pasture and sky-high snow mountains, Tibetan women are marching forward in equal stride as predecessors. From the busy forever-on-the-run streets of New York to pavements of London to the crooked pathways of Dharamshala, smart, educated and articulate group of Tibetan women is leading the struggle with their firmly on their shoulders. The battlefield has changed so have the weapons but the fundamental demand is same i.e. independence for Tibet.

Lhadon Tethong

At the forefront of this gang of women that China fears so much is Lhadon Tethong, the super-activist, who headed Students for a Free Tibet for many years. She is now the director of Tibet Action Institute. Lhadon was born and grew up in the West and from early on she realized that all is not well in her homeland, where her father was born. Driven by fierce urgency of now, Lhadon along with a band of like-minded activists made Students for a Free Tibet a household name.

One of her defying moments was in August 2007, in the week preceding the one-year countdown to the Beijing Olympics. Lhadon traveled to Beijing where she launched ‘Beijing Wide Open’ her blog to report on the Olympic preparations and China’s political usage of the Games to legitimize the occupation of Tibet. She openly traveled around the China’s capital, speaking to journalists, calling the International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogges from Tiananmen Square, and representing SFT activists who hung a protest banner on the Great Wall of China on the eve of the one-year countdown. Lhadon is the representation of the 21^st century Tibetan women — fiercely independent, intensely articulate and undoubtedly brave.

While Lhadon leads the powerful youth movement for Tibet, Dolma Gyari, former Joint Secretary of the Tibetan Youth Congress and the long-time Deputy Speaker of the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, has been working within the exile Tibetan establishment to fight the case of Tibet. Since her election to the exile parliament in 1991, Dolma has been working for those who are less privileged. Perhaps, her greatest strength is her ability to reach out to ordinary people and the politicians with seemingly effortless charm. Dolma was also the first-ever Tibetan woman candidate in the election for the exile Tibetan Prime Minister in 2011.

Dechen Pemba

Unlike Gyari Dolma, Dechen Pemba, who was born in the United Kingdom, is a quiet rebel. As the editor of popular website High Peaks Pure Earth, Dechen monitors Tibetan websites in Tibetan, Chinese and English languages to observe social trends and for signs of change in and outside Tibet. Her website offers a unique and in many cases the united voice of Tibetan blogsphere, where an increasingly large number of the growing up youth spend their time. For those who live in the occupied Tibet, asserting their voices and expressing their aspirations in blogs by averting China’s Great Firewall offers them the hope to sustain their lives under the brutal regime. By examining these blogs and presenting them in a language that is understood globally, Dechen steadfastly counters Beijing’s propagandas and cover-ups. Her presentation of Woeser’s blog entries is particularly important for the outside world to understand the life inside Tibet today.

Tenzin Seldon

In sunny California far away from Dechen’s often-rainy London, Tenzin Seldon, a brilliant student at the Stanford University and an activist for the Students for a Free Tibet overwhelms Beijing. In early 2010, Seldon’s computer was hacked from China. Seldon remarked, “The fact that the Chinese government is intimidated by a 20-year-old is kind of sad.” But her action speaks louder. In 2011, she won the prestigious Harry S. Truman scholarship for her academic performance and leadership skill, which is bound to further enhance Seldon as a leader for the global Tibetan movement. It is thus little wonder that Beijing is scared and paranoid.

Tibetan women winning prestigious scholarship are not a stray case. Kunchok Dolma, a former student of Honors College at Lehman, City University of New York, US, has won a Clarendon Scholarship to pursue graduate studies at Oxford University, England. Kunchok will be pursuing her M.Phil in International Relations at Oxford University.

Likewise, Tashi Lhamo, who was born to a nomadic family in Tibet and later escaped into exile, has won 2011 Gates scholarship from Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which will pay all her expenses to a doctorate degree. Lhamo graduates this year near the top of her class.

Dhardon Sharling

In an entirely different field, another young Tibetan woman has excelled. Dhardon Sharling, an activist for the Tibetan Women’s Association, is elected for the exile parliament. Sharling outshone some of the veteran politicians in the election. Along with a few other new faces, change may dawn for the legislative branch of the Tibetan democracy.

This next generation of Tibetan women leaders is confident, competitive and compassionate, but they will not compromise in their resolve to fight for Tibet. They are well poised follow the footsteps of our warrior women such as Kundeling Kunsang, Trinley Choedon, Ama Adhe and Ani Pachen, who sacrificed so much for Tibet under such terrible circumstances.

All I can say then is — CCP beware Tibetan women are coming.

Survivor

2011-05-01T21:14:00.000-07:00

(a super short story)

They brought the carcass of a dead donkey into the kitchen and ate it, including the hoofs.

It was the summer of 1968. All the prisoners, including my grandfather, were transported from the dreaded Powo Tramo labour camp to a desert near Samye Monastery, where they were forced to work for six months to turn it into a farm to grow cabbage for the Chinese army. But the wind swept the sands back into its place. Each day they began the labour anew.

Desert near Samye, the oldest monastic institution in Tibet

Prisoners were given a bowl of thin watery porridge and a mug of water a day. The whistle blew at dawn to begin the labour and blew again at dusk to end the day. The hunger was constantly intense. They found neither insects nor wild plants in the dry sands to eat. The only comfort was to go to toilet, which gave their tired body a chance to rest and to wait for worms to crawl out of their shits.

A father and son, who formerly owned an estate near Lhasa, collected worms in a small tin can, which they ate sparingly. They were among the few who survived, and after their release they started a small but successful canned food business.

My grandfather was a tall man with a wisp of white hair. When he was in good mood, he liked to tell about his years in prison. I couldn’t ask him too many questions, which reminded him, he said, of the interrogation sessions. But sometimes, he didn’t mind.

“How did you survive? Did you wait for worms to crawl out of your shit?”

“No worms came out of my faeces,” he said.

“One day, I got terribly dizzy from hunger and walked past the desert. In the ruins of a temple, I found a piece of leather from a destroyed prayer-wheel. I hid it behind a rock and ate a small piece each day. It was the most delicious thing in the world.”

“What about the carcass of a donkey?” I asked.

“Tsewang Dhonden, a former chant master from Shelkar Monastery, one day went looking for insects and found it. No one knew how the donkey got there and died.”

By then the winter had set in and half the inmates died from starvation. The remaining prisoners gathered and decided not to report the dead donkey to the Chinese overseers. They also did not tell about it to Choeden, who was called hurtson chenpa or the ‘diligent one’ by the Chinese for his willingness to reform his thoughts. Everyone suspected that he was an informer.

In collusion with the prison cook, the seventy inmates cooked the donkey and ate it. However, they could not bite off its penis. It was very rubbery and tough. They cooked it a few times.

“Never in my life did I come across something so hard to cook.” My grandfather stared into the blue autumn sky. The yellowing leaves of the giant polar tree near house rustled.

“But that donkey saved our lives and that is important,” he said and went on kneading his rosaries.

You Wait for Me with Dust - by Liu Xiaobo

2011-04-07T20:36:00.000-07:00

for my wife, who waits every day

Nothing remains in your name, nothing
but wait for me, together with the dust of our home
these layers
amassed, overflowing, in every corner
you're unwilling to pull apart the curtains
and let the light disturb their stillness

over the bookshelf, the handwritten label is covered in dust
on the carpet the pattern inhales the dust
when you are writing a letter to me
and love that the nib's tipped with dust
my eyes are stabbed with pain
you sit there all day long
not daring to move
for fear that your footsteps will trample the dust
you try to control your breathing
using silence to write a story.
At times like this
the suffocating dust
offers the only loyalty

your vision, breath and time
permeates the dust
in the depth of your soul
the tomb inch by inch is
piled up from the feet
reaching the chest
reaching the throat

you know that the tomb
is your best resting place
waiting for me there
with no source of fear or alarm
this is why you prefer dust
in the dark, in calm suffocation
waiting, waiting for me
you wait for me with dust
refusing the sunlight and movement of air
just let the dust bury you altogether
just let yourself fall asleep in the dust
until I return
and you come awake
wiping the dust from your skin and your soul.

What a miracle - back from the dead.

You Know Me Well, Actually

2011-03-21T20:59:00.000-07:00

I am a cockroach.

I always crawl back into spaces where I am not wanted.

Each morning I wake up dreading myself completely.

By evening I am sane enough to creep into the garbage can.

Every night the dream is the same —

Fire burning, burning, burning

To scorch my useless self.

I am so full of black currents, churning inside,

The only thing that comes out is sludge of decaying words.

I have no future, though my path is clear.

I am a reliable servant mostly,

Sometimes I ask questions

To which Big Boss would say,

"Just do! Don't think!"

My name is Bad Sonam. I am a loyal dog.

The sun has set. The moon is not up.

I am an eyeless fly — buzzing darkness.

The Dalai Lama Will Retire

2011-03-15T03:53:00.000-07:00

Yeshi Tsomo is 74-years-old. When asked about His Holiness the Dalai Lama's retirement from Tibetan politics her face melts into a pool of tears. This is the fundamental problem. Emotions of the Tibetan people, both in and outside Tibet, become so elevated on this issue that the possibility of any logical analysis and factual decision dies. We must, as Bob Dylan sang, “take the rag away from [y]our face/Now ain't the time for [y]our tears.”

Retirement Conundrum

Misunderstandings regarding the Dalai Lama’s wish to retire are widespread among the Tibetans and also in the media, some of which reported that the Dalai Lama is “retiring from being the Dalai Lama”. His Holiness states his powers should be devolved and that the involvement of the institution of the Dalai Lama in the Tibetan Government must now cease. But, as one among six million Tibetans, the Dalai Lama will continue to serve the cause of Tibet. This is a historic decision and the culmination of the democratization process that His Holiness started since coming into exile in April 1959.

This decision stems from his belief that “the essence of a democratic system is, in short, the assumption of political responsibility by elected leaders for the popular good.” In 2001, the Tibetans in exile directly elected their prime minister for the first time and on 20 March this year, the exile community will vote both for the prime minister and members of the Tibetan Parliament in Exile. Over the past ten years the Kashag (cabinet) headed by the prime minister has been taking the day-to-day administrative responsibilities and the Dalai Lama’s role has dramatically reduced. However, in order for the Tibetan democratization process to be complete, His Holiness states that “the time has come for me to devolve my formal authority to such an elected leadership.”

This is a pragmatic political decision involving the long-term interests of the Tibetan struggle and the survival of Tibet as a nation without having to depend on one person. There is no space for emotional outbursts and counterfactual arguments. Healthy debates, especially among the younger generation, have already started in social networks. This must continue, informed by full understanding of His Holiness’ decision and with full knowledge of its impacts.

The Impacts

In 1642, the Fifth Dalai Lama founded the Ganden Phodrang Government of Tibet. Since then the successive Dalai Lamas have provided leadership for nearly four centuries. Few governments in the world today can trace their institutional and legal origins so far back in history. Hence the institution of the Dalai Lama has great historical legitimacy. Additionally, because of his tireless work for Tibet, the 14th Dalai Lama is universally recognized by Tibetans in and outside Tibet as their undisputed leader. Today the issue of Tibet is synonymous with the Dalai Lama.

Immediately after coming into exile, the Dalai Lama established the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, officially known as the Central Tibetan Administration of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Since then, the exile government under the Dalai Lama set up as many as 12 foreign missions all under the auspices of His Holiness’ name. These missions and other establishments are essential to bring the issue of Tibet to their respective countries and to to assert the just cause of Tibet in international forums.

How will the offices of Tibet continue to operate under the Dalai Lama’s name if the institution of the Dalai Lama is delinked from the Tibetan government? In fact, how will the entire exile establishment function and survive without the Dalai Lama?

The question can be also raised regarding the roles of the Dalai Lama’s special envoys through which talks with China are held. Since world leaders, including Barack Obama, urge the Chinese leadership to talk with the Dalai Lama and his envoys, how an elected Tibetan leadership can impress upon the international audience — and more importantly leaders of the free world — to pressure China to talk with them? How can a Tibetan government not led by the Dalai Lama command legitimacy and the loyalty of Tibetans in and outside of Tibet.

These are absolutely difficult and crucially important questions without easy solutions. But delaying these eventualities will make things worse. Having experienced occupation, exile, traveling the world and meeting with numerous leaders, His Holiness understands the complex global political situation and its impact on Tibet better than any other Tibetan. Thus, His Holiness states that the Tibetan must implement a system of governance while he “… will still be able to help resolve problems if called upon to do so”.

This is a testament to his enduring and tireless work for Tibet. This is reassurance enough for the Tibetan people to bury their emotions, wipe their tears and work to establish a democratic system based on informed and mature decisions.

The Challenges

As I write this, the 11^th session of the 14^th Tibetan Parliament in Exile is discussing the Dalai Lama’s decision to devolve his powers to the elected leadership. In the annals of Tibetan history, the decisions that come out of this session will be crucial.

Yesterday, when the Speaker read His Holiness’ statement many members of parliament were in tears. Later, when the media interviewed some of them, they found it hard to control their emotions. This is understandable. Tibetans inside Tibet must feel even worse. The issue is not only about the Dalai Lama’s devolution of powers but also changing the title of the Ganden Phodrang Government headed by the Dalai Lamas for nearly four centuries.

But soaking handkerchiefs and banging chests does not help. Decisions must not be taken in heightened emotional states, which often turn out to be counterfactual, incorrect and damaging in the long run. The test before the parliament is to find a viable legal solution, in which His Holiness is freed from all the ceremonial and administrative responsibilities but, perhaps, still remains the head of state. This is important because the Dalai Lama has historical legitimacy and complete trust of the Tibetan populace. Besides, any elected leadership in exile may find it hard to maintain the offices of Tibet and other vital democratic institutions without the legitimacy of the Dalai Lama’s name and global reach.

However, this is not the solution that His Holiness desires, which is to simply be one among the six million Tibetans and serve Tibet accordingly. More importantly, His Holiness wants to separate the institution of Dalai Lama from that of the Tibetan government. If members of the parliament are to fulfil this, they must be bold enough to use their political vision and acumen to make amendments in the Charter for Tibetans-in-exile so that a functioning system of governance can be instituted in exile without the Dalai Lama. “Now, a decision on this important matter should be delayed no longer,” wrote His Holiness in his statement.

The Positive Outcomes

The genius of the legislative body will lie in instituting a democratic system so that a complete transformational operation on the structure of the exile government does not have to be performed immediately, but at the same time fulfils the Dalai Lama’s wishes. If such a system is in place, then there will be a clear demarcation between the political issue of the six million Tibetans and that of the person of the Dalai Lama. This is crucial since the Chinese authorities make the issue of Tibet synonymous with that of the Dalai Lama’s personal status. Besides, the Dalai Lama working for the Tibetan cause as an individual — “as one among the six million Tibetans” — will be more legitimate, more democratic and more long-term.

A democratic system sans the Dalai Lama will also make it easier for the Middle Way Policy to be reviewed, re-analyzed and amended if necessary. Currently, any challenge to this policy and discussions on other strategies such as Rangzen are affected by emotions. On one online forum a Rangzen advocate was branded as ‘against’ His Holiness. Additionally, if a time comes when Rangzen becomes the official policy, then the Chinese authorities won’t be able to call the Dalai Lama a ‘separatist’ engaged in ‘activities splitting China’.

Whatever solutions the exile parliament may come to, they must bear in mind that His Holiness’ decision is for the long-term benefit of the Tibetans — that a democratic system led by a popularly elected leadership becomes more stable, longer lasting and is more in tune with changing times than depending on one person. Fear of temporary shake-ups must not prevent them from paving ways for the future.

The Tibetan people, in and outside Tibet, need to realize that His Holiness the Dalai Lama has tirelessly served Tibet since the age of sixteen. He turns 76 this year. The least that Tibetans can do is to be less selfish and carry out our duties to give him some time and personal freedom. His Holiness does not say that he is going into a cave nor is shirking any responsibilities. His Holiness simply wants to be one among the Tibetans and “as long as Tibetans place their trust and faith in me,” he says, “I will continue to serve the cause of Tibet.”

So stop soaking your handkerchiefs and start carrying out your duties.

Dharamsala's Gorshey and XZTV's Asinine Programs

2011-03-08T23:34:00.000-08:00

A woman in 'Sinicised' Tibetan dress

A scantily clad woman in colourful see-through silk attire danced seductively. In front of her is a thangka of Buddha - beatific and calm. A khata hangs across Buddha’s face lazily. Sharp beams of light darted on the floor and across the hall. Then the woman raised her left leg in the air far above the Buddha's head. This was one of many terribly produced and totally vulgar programs on Xizang TV (XZTV), the official TV channel of the so-called Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) on the eve of Losar.

On the evening of the first day of Losar, I was at the Gorshey Night, organized by a group of friends in Dharamsala. Gorshey is one of the easiest and most enjoyable traditional Tibetan performing arts. Anyone can join the circle and just move along and within a few minutes you are a master Gorshey dancer. The best thing, however, is the communal feeling and joy Gorshey creates. Unlike singing, which only a few can do, any Tenzin, Tashi and Sonam can do Gorshey. The feeling one gets after the 'Tashi Shapto Chik Nyi Sum!' is pure elation.

Gorshey on TIPA's Ground in Dharamsal

Gorshey Night was probably the first-ever of its kind in exile. The organizers charged a small entry fee to cover for "a simple Tibetan dinner" and a few other miscellaneous expenses. But, of course, like any other Tibetan gathering, they served endless changkhol (boiled barley beer with dried cheese), butter tea and khabsey.

When our own Spice Girls (a group of elderly Tibetan ladies known for their incredible dances) started Gorshey, it felt like a real Tibetan Losar. Everyone joined the circle dance, including the small kid as young as 4-years old.

This event was particularly important after seeing the asinine programs on XZTV the night before. It was clear from the way the programs were choreographed that there was a definite intention by the Chinese authorities to Sinicise Tibetan performing arts and the language. Apart from a series of neither-Tibetan-nor-Chinese performances, the entire event was conducted in Mandarin Chinese. A carefully slected people from villages were called on the stage and interviewed in Chinese to prove how educated the 'backward Tibetans' are now under the Communist occupation.

However, in exile, we are seeing a resurgence in Tibetan culture and language. The internet and the social networks have reinvigorated debates and interests among the youth about the importance of our language and culture. Recently Dharamsala chapter of the Students for a Free Tibet initiated a poster campaign urging the Tibetans to replace words like 'cup', 'bucket', 'TV', 'joke' etc. which have become common use our daily lives with their corresponding Tibet words such as 'phorba, 'chusom', 'nyentrin' and 'goedro'.

The Gorshey Night was a wonderful way to introduce Tibetan culture and the performing arts to the younger generation in a very communal and informal atmosphere. Children loved "this cool dance" as one kid said. Members of our Spice Girls were overjoyed too to realize that "ngatsoi shaptro di lagsa rang ma rey" (our dance will not disappear after all.)

So, next time you are thinking of dancing to Lady Gaga or Justin Bieber, don't forget that we have our own Spice Girls who can take you to an even higher realm than Bieber and Gaga. Tashi Shaptro Chik Nyi Sum! has roots deeper than a Bodhi tree and peak higher than the Mt. Everest.

Good bye Lady Gaga. Welcome Gorshey dance.

The Great Fall of China — 1

2011-02-22T01:33:00.000-08:00

On 28 January 2011, the State Council Information Office and Bureau of the Ministry of Public Security of China issued the following notice to its people:

"For the disturbances in Egypt, media across the nation must use copy circulated from Xinhua. Websites are to strengthen [monitoring] of posts, forums, blogs, and particularly posts on microblogs. Our bureaus will forcibly shut down websites that are lax in monitoring."

This was soon after the Jasmine Revolution ousted Ben Ali in Tunisia and the Egyptians were flowing into Tahrir Square, which ultimately led to the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak. People's protests are now infiltrating the streets of Beijing and other major Chinese cities, giving the Communist Party of China led by Hu Jintao splitting headaches almost to a point of nervous breakdowns. The harmony of the Party's absolute rule may be in danger.

This is underscored by the disproportionate response from security forces to the protestors who, unlike the massive crowds in Egypt and Tunisia, numbered only a hundred or so. Many large cities in China now have heavy armed police presence since the Chinese version of Tunisia's Jasmine Revolution surfaced.

In a further sign of the Chinese authorities' growing nervousness, the Party boss Hu Jintao summoned top leaders to a special 'study session' on last Saturday and commanded them to address growing social problems before they became threats to stability.

In almost Orwellian doublespeak, Hu told the top ruling elites that “...the overall requirements for enhancing and innovating social management are to stimulate vitality in the society and increase harmonious elements to the greatest extent, while reducing inharmonious factors to the minimum.”

Hu's 'inharmonious factors' are people who demand a fair share in their lives, like the old woman whose land was grabbed by a well-connected property dealer, and others who want a greater say in their future, like a young displaced factory worker.

In the case of Tibet, Hu's ‘inharmonious factors' can mean anything from singing Tibetan songs to downloading a 'reactionary' tune into your mobile phone or refusing to sell your livestock to State-operated slaughterhouses. The thuggish Chinese security apparatus can fabricate anything and arrest any Tibetan anytime anywhere. Since 2008 over 80 well-known Tibetan intellectuals have been arrested and incarcerated. The number of ordinary people detained or disappeared may never be known.

The reason why Hu and the gang go to such an extent to hammer down any dissenting voices is because they know that one voice leads to another and soon the sounds of popular people’s chants can topple Zhongnanhai. They also understand that the system they are juggling has many weak tangents.

The corruption is rampant and reaches the highest echelons of power. A number of China experts believe that corruption has become indispensable as it makes the political system more stable. Party cadres, who run the system, are lowly paid and their only option is to earn in any 'unofficial' way they can. If corruption is stamped out there is a possibility that millions of cadres will simply discard their allegiance to the Party.

The Chinese economic miracle, that is widely talked, discussed and analyzed, is fundamentally not as sound as it appears. According to the 7 January issue of The Guardian Weekly, the cost of China's environmental degradation was a whopping $197 billion in 2008, which is 3.9 percent of the GDP. The cost of pollution spills and the other eco-disasters rose by more than 74% in the last five years.

Unbridled 'development' and the get-rich-at-any-cost ethos have done massive and lasting damage to China's water systems, forests and soil. This is doubly worse in Tibet, where the glaciers are melting faster than elsewhere and the excessive mining is damaging the fragile eco-system beyond repair. However, the economic machine cannot be slowed down since the Party's legitimacy and authority to rule is derived solely from economic growth. The Party assumes that as long as the Chinese people enjoy economic development everything else in their lives can be co-opted.

However, the gap between rich and poor is at its greatest in history. While some have accumulated enormous wealth, millions still live in abject poverty. Moreover, in today's China it is critical to have guanxi, or personal connections, for getting ahead in life. the poor, and recent migrants from the countryside or graduates with degrees from second-tier universities, lack such connections. Yet they witness the rich and the children of high Party cadres achieve everything through guanxi. The disaffection felt then multiplies by millions.

The political system under which these angst develop is deeply flawed. The Party is the government. The Party is the judiciary. The Party is the media. The Party is the law enforcement. It is a baffling system where the 'Party trumps all else.' Since only less than 5 percent of 1.3 billion Chinese are members of the Party, that makes 95 percent outsiders. Hu's 'inharmonious factors' stem from this great majority in the form of riots numbering over 75,000 a year. The balance is one day bound to tip over in favour of this majority.

These are the Party's great dilemmas. These are the reasons why Hu called in key decision-makers for a special 'study session' to discuss ways to quell any public protest to prevent this house of cards from collapsing.

We Tibetans must realize that the conditions for popular people's uprisings are as ripe today in China as we have seen in Egypt, Tunisia and elsewhere. The fact that impromptu gatherings over the last few days in a few major Chinese cities almost coalesced into a Chinese Jasmine Revolution is a potent sign. Since popular uprisings against authoritarian rule in China are bound to continue, we must prepare for our own Yak Revolution and for any other eventualities.

When that happens unlike the protestors in China who were urged to shout "We want food, We want work, We want housing, We want fairness," our chant will be: "Freedom! Freedom! Freedom!"

I am Fake

2011-02-06T21:03:00.000-08:00

I am humiliated by my pen

That refuses to write.

Thinking that it is out of ink

I dip into the ink well

And out it comes

Dry as a book on a bookshelf

Its nib clean as a new doormat.

“If you refuse to drink ink

Then drink water!” I said

And dropped the barrel,

cap, nib and all into

A cup of hot water.

While the pen emits

Emaciated wisp of ink

In the hot water,

I thought about what to write.

“Pen is unrulier than a pencil.

And the ink is less dependable than lead.”

Then I put the pen together

Dip it again into the ink well

It still refuses to write.

“Why don’t you write?” I blurted.

“It is not that I do not write,” the pen cried.

“It is that you do not have

Anything to say …

Your thoughts are dry

Your ideas stale and

Your words overused.

It is not you who is humiliated,

But rather it is me who is humiliated.

I am torn apart by your emptiness

Your creative deficits

Your frigid pathless path

Your unbalanced sentences

Your fractured thought.

I am the one who is humiliated.

I don’t want to be your pen

I don’t want blue ink

I don’t want red ink

I don’t want green ink

Just fill me with black ink

So that I can disappear into

The blackness of your numbed mind.”

The Karmapa Is Not…

2011-02-03T01:43:00.000-08:00

On 26 January two Indians were arrested with a large amount of cash, which led to the raid on the room of Karmapa’s monk accountant in Gyuto near Dharamsala. Gyalwa Karmapa, Ugyen Trinley Dorjee, the 17^th Gyalwa Karmapa and the spiritual leader of the Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism. The police seized foreign currencies, including a large amount of Indian rupees, which has become a feast of sorts for the Indian media. Instead of presenting well-researched news, various media channels sought comfort in eye-catching headlines and unsubstantiated allegations. Some of the headlines read:

Tibetan Karmapa a Chinese Agent in Himachal

Foreign money seized at Dalai Lama heir’s home

Karmapa may be Chinese agent

11 lakh yuan link: Karmapa may be a Chinese plant

Journalism, in general, has become rampant and trite in recent years: in India this disease has percolated throughout the media. The fundamental principle of balanced, intelligent and analytical reporting is being overshadowed by lurid, headline-grabbing and too often irresponsible news presentation. This is a dangerous development in a democracy, where the media has the key role to play.

It is a complex issue, and to some extent an eye-catching controversy — a young, charismatic religious leader and the seizure of a large amount of currencies. However, it requires a proper understanding of the nature and culture of guru-chela relationships. None of the media outlets conducted background researches or interviewed the concerned people to find out what the problems were. The line between reporting facts and expressing opinions blurred — and the facts were wrongly presented. For example, a reporter of a reputed news channel said, “The third highest spiritual leader, the 17^th Karmapa, has been caught with illegal currencies worth 3 crores rupees...[and] that Karmapa could well be a Chinese spy.”

The issue of the high Tibetan lamas’ moral authority and their roles as unofficial community leaders and initiators in India’s border regions, has been totally ignored all journalists. Buddhists in the Himalayan belt automatically turn to the lamas for help and advice on both religious and secular matters. Their wisdom and spiritual advice provides communal harmony and stability. This is, perhaps, worth more for India’s national security than posting thousands of soldiers. The media has also ignored the importance of Tibet in India’s long-term geopolitical interests.

In their struggle for survival in the cut-throat market to enhance TRP and attract advertisements, the media has opted for overblown sensationalism. The derogatory for this “yellow journalism.” The basic ethics of news reporting is lost in the process. In the present context, the story presented may be of financial irregularity, lack of transparency or possession of foreign currencies by the management of Karmapa’s transit refuge, in which case the law will take its course. As the Dalai Lama commented, 'Better now that a through investigation happens. Such inquiry is good.''

However, the media — instead of providing unbiased and objective news — has libeled the Gyalwa Karmapa to create sensations and exaggerate the case. This has forced even the Home Minister, P. Chidambaram, to remark, "Investigations are underway in Karmapa case. No conclusion drawn whether he is a Chinese agent or not."

Incidentally, the media’s blowing up a situation is not without precedent. During the November 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, the terrorists and their deadly assaults were treated like a reality show, each channel competing to dramatize the situation. The intelligence opportunities the live coverage provided to the attackers, the obstruction created to the security personnel, and the impact on victims’ relatives were ignored by the media.

The most important point that today’s journalism misses is: Who provides more threat to India’s national security — the Karmapa or China? Since his escape from Tibet, during which he dodged spies, army checkpoints and travelled by foot, car and horseback, Karmapa has been engaging in spiritual affairs and in his study. He has stayed clear of politics and his every movement is overseen by the Indian government. However, on the other hand, the Chinese military have made numerous incursions into Indian border regions and are reportedly building roads. Beijing also provides covert support and arms to major insurgent groups in India’s Northeast and the Maoist belt. The mainstream media reports on these bullish Chinese actions are scanty, non-investigative and inconclusive, to say the least.

Tibetan refugees have always placed enormous faith in the Indian democracy and the free press. In fact, it can be said that the survival of Tibetan issue and the exile community depends much on India’s democratic institutions — including the media. Hence, while reporting on any infringement of the Indian law by individual Tibetans, the media must uphold its ethics and act as the Fourth Pillar of the biggest democratic country in the world.

But for now, the media’s portrayal of this current issue has made the young Gyalwa Karmapa, who is a spiritual guru to millions of Indians in the Himalayan region and devotees around the world, a persona non grata in India. The negative collateral impact may be felt for years to come.

Vital Lessons from Urgent Times

2011-01-30T06:38:00.000-08:00

As I write this the long and apparently tech-savvy hands of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) are busy making sure that no news of the great mass uprisings taking place around the world gets through the Great Firewall.

In the first weeks of 2011 a grassroots revolution in Tunisia [Tunisians prefer calling it the Jasmine Revolution] led to the overthrow of Ben Ali, the dictatorial president who ruled the country for 23 years. Not satisfied with a hastily-formed transitional government, people are demanding a completely new administration free from any trace of autocracy. In the same continent, hundreds of thousands of protesters are taking to the streets in Cairo, Egypt, demanding Hosni Mubarak to step down. Mubarak has been ruling the country with an iron-fist for over 30 years.

Just across the Red Sea from Egypt, another uprising is taking place in Yemen. The opposition leaders and students have joined the activists to rally against their corrupt president, Ali Abdullah Saleh. Saleh has been ruling Yemen dictatorially since 1978.

Demonstrations are taking place in Algeria, where the public anger is against rising food prices, corruption and state oppression, and Jordan, where thousands of people have taken to the streets demanding the prime minister step down and the government curb rising prices, inflation and unemployment. The king, Abdullah, is forced to call on the military to surround cities.

None of these popular people’s movements are seen, heard, viewed or read about by the populace inside China and Tibet. This is because the media — which is elsewhere termed the Fourth Pillar of Democracy, is the main tool in the hands of the CCP to prolong its rule. The “interest of the ruling party [is] above everything,” said Chinese writer, Qin Geng, in Time magazine.

While the people of China and Tibet are kept in the dark about these global shifts, the CCP is keenly watching these developments, which are an extremely sensitive issue for the ruling communist elites. They realise that the circumstances under which these global revolutions are taking place also prevail in China — the dictatorial rule, extreme inequality between poor and rich, rising food prices, massive social discontent and the occupation of Tibet. Kindling is dry and any spark from within or outside can set the Communist house on fire.

The dilemma that Hu Jintao and his gang face is that they can neither co-opt nor suppress these international events, however much they wish. All they can do is to blackout these dramatic happenings from reaching the Chinese and Tibetans. The party has already blocked the word "Egypt'' from the China’s popular Twitter-like service. Apart from such automatic knee-jerk reaction, I am sure the party is already perfecting its system to curb and crackdown should anything resembling these events erupt in China.

What we — as Tibetans living in and outside Tibet — can and must do is to watch these events with all the power of the senses we are endowed with. These are urgent times and there are vital lessons to be learned. The success of our freedom struggle in the long run depends largely on how we view, learn and apply in our struggle the tactics learned from these public protests.

The conditions have also long been fulfilled in Tibet for uprisings such as these to blow up. In fact a series of past protests took place in the late 1980s and then came the overwhelmingly peaceful protests throughout Tibet in 2008, the biggest since the national uprising of 1959.

However, C. Custer writes in ChinaGeeks, “China is not Egypt.” Hence, using its military might and resources, the CCP successfully put down every Tibetan protest and the 1989 Chinese students’ demonstration in Tiananmen Square. Yet, Custer further writes, “…the spin machine is still running.”

Protests are happening in Albania, Peru, Chile and Bolivia against unjust policies and rising food prices. All of a sudden, the downtrodden and oppressed around the world seem to have risen to a new tune of global awakening — the need to fight for their rights. All of a sudden, Bob Marley’s message “Get Up! Stand Up for Your Rights!” is heard long after he left this world.

As we chant this catchphrase, Tibetans need to look for, pick up and learn subtle lessons and messages that these current global awakenings throw at us. What worked in Tunisia may not work for us. The struggle for freedom may be same everywhere, but we are facing a vastly different adversary. Thus we need to fine-tune our strategy accordingly.

Han Han, the Chinese popular blogger and author, said, “The Communist Party puts keeping their political position first above everything.” Towards this end the party is ready to take any measure including torture, execution, mass arrest, imprisonment, crackdown on intellectuals, and arm twist weaker nations and use business to force stronger countries to bend rules in its favour. The party lives under constant fear of losing its power and legitimacy. At this point of time, the CCP is on the edge of a nervous breakdown witnessing these global grassroots revolutions.

We have a vital lesson to learn here as well. In The Party: The Secret World of China’s Communist Party, Richard McGregor writes that “the party wants to control not just the government and the society of China. For sound political reasons, it needs to manage the narrative of China as well because if this narrative unravels it could devour them all.” This is the party’s weak point. Using the technological tools that we have at our disposal, we can unravel the false narrative. This compounded by sustained creative grassroots actions, can create great strides in our struggle.

However, the biggest lesson we can learn from witnessing these furious global uprisings for justice and equality is for us to have an organized resistance that can provide a clear vision and strategic direction. Having a clear goal, which in our case is freedom from occupation, will help channel the united strength towards achieving tangible victory in the struggle.

Personally, for me, the overthrow of Ben Ali in Tunisia’s Jasmine Revolution made me realise even more clearly that oppression too is impermanent.