In Exile From the Land of Snows (4 page)

T
IBET
’
S STORY IS
that of an ancient nation hurled into the twentieth century by the loss of its sovereignty, yet given a slim chance to regain its freedom and remake its identity. I came to write it as the result of a personal involvement growing over a period of eleven years. In the summer of 1973 I undertook my first trip to Asia. On arriving in New Delhi I toured a Tibetan refugee camp and afterwards visited Tibet House, a library and museum in which blown-up photos of Tibet’s great monasteries, the largest in the world, covered the walls. A week later I sat with thousands of Tibetans around an open tent on the outskirts of Katmandu, Nepal, watching a birthday celebration for their leader, the Dalai Lama. But it was not until I trekked up to the geographical, if no longer political, border of Tibet that I began to fully appreciate the country’s present-day condition. The landscape was wild, the adjacent peaks of Annapurna and Dhaulagari loomed on either hand and down the narrow trail came an equally formidable middle-aged man, a long knife hanging from his belt and a heavy rifle slung over his back. Waving like an old friend, he stopped and within a few minutes of exchanged gestures revealed that he was a Tibetan guerrilla, whose headquarters, located less than two hours north in the principality of Mustang, was still waging a fierce fight for Tibet’s freedom. Lifting his shirt, he pointed proudly to a long bayonet scar hewn across his belly and repeatedly said “Norbulingka.” Thereafter he enacted the devastating massacre which had befallen soldiers of the Tibetan resistance fighting Chinese occupation troops at the Dalai Lama’s summer
palace outside of Lhasa. His barracks lay just across the seething brown waters of the Kali Gandaki river and it was clear from his spirit that despite Tibet’s present fortunes, its people by no means considered the fate of their nation sealed.

Six years later Tenzin Gyatso, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama of Tibet, visited the United States. For much of his first American trip I accompanied the Tibetan leader to conduct a series of interviews. Following his departure I traveled to Asia once more, where I engaged in an extensive tour of the Tibetan communities in India. On a third journey, pursued over the winter of 1980–81, I continued to work with the Dalai Lama while living in the capital of the Tibetan diaspora and seat of the Tibetan government-in-exile, Dharamsala.

Research for this book was conducted primarily during the latter stay. In it, I have attempted to tell Tibet’s tale through the lives of those who have both defined and been governed by the major developments of recent history. To further illuminate the narrative, I have added a section depicting some measure of Tibetan civilization, the spiritual underpinnings of which permeate every facet of the country’s political life. Tibet’s entry into the modern world has been unsought, painful and prolonged, but in many ways inspiring as well. It is my hope that the principles of faith and forbearance that have sustained the Tibetan people through their most difficult time will convey them to a new and self-determined era in the not too distant future.

John F. Avedon
New York City

1933–1950

I
N
A
UGUST
of 1932, the Thirteenth Dalai Lama gazed out over the gardens of his summer palace, the Norbulingka or Jewel Park, and began to write his final testament to the Tibetan people. “It may happen,” he warned, “that here, in the center of Tibet, religion and government will be attacked both from without and from within. Unless we can guard our own country, it will now happen that the Dalai and Panchen Lamas, the Father and the Son, and all the revered holders of the Faith, will disappear and become nameless. Monks and their monasteries will be destroyed. The rule of law will be weakened. The lands and property of government officials will be seized. They themselves will be forced to serve their enemies or wander the country like beggars. All beings will be sunk in great hardship and overpowering fear; the days and nights will drag on slowly in suffering.” Though the Dalai Lama refrained from noting just who would inflict this devastating fate upon his country, the message was clear: Tibet, aloof and at peace for most of its 2,100 years, stood on the brink of disaster.

A year after his last words were circulated throughout the land, the Dalai Lama died. According to custom, his body was embalmed, dressed in gold brocade robes, placed in the lotus position and seated facing south—the direction of long life—on a throne in the Norbulingka. The golden rooftops of his winter palace, the Potala, and the Tsuglakhang or Central Cathedral in the heart of Lhasa, were draped in black banners. Prayer flags were lowered and butter lamps lit in the windows and on the roofs of every
house in the capital. Stunned by their loss, the population of Lhasa filed in mourning past the deceased ruler’s corpse, offering white scarves in the traditional gesture of respect. But even before government couriers could convey the news across the country, omens predicting the whereabouts of Thubten Gyatso’s successor—believed to be the beloved leader himself returned in a new body—were occurring.

Checking the Dalai Lama’s corpse one morning, attendant monks entered its sealed chamber, opened the salt-lined box in which it lay and found that the head had moved. No longer facing south, it had turned toward the northeast. Repositioned, it was again discovered facing east a short time later. In the ensuing months further signs appeared. The three state oracles turned eastward in trance and presented scarves; a patch of snapdragons sprouted from the east end of the platform used for public sermons in Lhasa’s main square; overnight a giant star-shaped fungus grew on the east side of the northeast pillar of the shrine in the Potala where the Dalai Lama’s jewel-inlaid tomb was under construction. And in one of the most time-honored occurrences marking the death of a high incarnate lama, the people of Lhasa beheld auspicious cloud formations, now and again pierced by rainbows, rising over the barren wall of mountains ringing the northeast end of the city.

In the spring of 1935, Tibet’s newly appointed Regent, Reting Rinpoché,
^*
joined by a senior minister of the old ruler’s Cabinet, journeyed to the sacred lake of Lhamo Lhatso, seeking a vision. Located ninety miles southeast of Lhasa, Lhamo Lhatso was believed to be the foremost of Tibet’s visionary lakes, bodies of water in which the future—individual as well as collective—could be seen. Oval-shaped and less than a mile in circumference, the lake lay at 17,000 feet in a basin surrounded by massive peaks, around which the weather was continually changing, from sun to rain, to hail and snow. The Thirteenth Dalai Lama himself had been discovered by means of a dramatic vision of his birthplace, seen by hundreds and lasting for a week, in the center of its waters. Now, more than half a century later, Reting Rinpoché had hopes for no less vivid a sign.

After spending some days in prayer at nearby Chokhorgyal Monastery, the Regent’s party rode their ponies to the base of the rocky slope overlooking the lake. Proceeding upward on foot, they reached the top of a sheer ridge, whereupon they dispersed in different directions, each to seek his own vision. Alone among the group, Reting Rinpoché witnessed a remarkable sight. On staring at the clear alpine waters, he discerned three letters from the Tibetan alphabet float into view: Ah, Ka and Ma. The image of a great three-storied monastery, capped by gold and jade rooftops,
followed. A white road led east from the monastery to a house before a small hill, its roof strikingly fringed in turquoise-colored tiles, a brown and white spotted dog in the courtyard. Later, the Regent dreamt of the same humble farmer’s home, this time with oddly shaped gutter pipes emerging from the roof and a small boy standing in the yard.

Soon after the Regent’s report was submitted to the National Assembly in Lhasa three search parties were dispatched across eastern Tibet, one southeast to Dakpo, another to Chamdo, capital of the eastern province of Kham, the last to the northeastern region of Amdo. The latter, departing in the autumn of 1936, consisted of forty members under the direction of one Kewtsang Rinpoché, a high lama of Sera Monastery. Riding over a thousand miles northeast, it chose as the center of its search Kumbum, the most important monastery in Amdo. Fifteen miles south of Xining, China’s westernmost city, Kumbum had been built three and one half centuries before by the Third Dalai Lama to commemorate the birthplace of Tsongkhapa, founder of Tibet’s largest sect, the Gelugpas or Followers of the Virtuous Way. As it came into view, set in low cedar-covered hills overlooking a fertile valley, the delegation saw that, just like the cloister in the vision, Kumbum’s central temples were surmounted by brilliant gold and jade rooftops.

The party divided into four groups and proceeded to search the area for extraordinary children. A number of candidates were examined, all unsatisfactory. Six months into their stay, however, Kewtsang Rinpoché personally ventured forth to investigate the situation of a young boy living in a small farming village called Takster, two days east of Kumbum. The boy’s existence had been brought to his attention by the Seventh Panchen Lama, Tibet’s second-highest incarnation. While en route to Amdo, the delegation had encountered the Panchen Lama, then residing in Kham, and received from him a list—a product of his own inquiries—of three potential candidates for the Dalai Lama’s rebirth. The boy in Takster was the last to be tested.

Early in the winter of 1937, Kewtsang Rinpoché, accompanied by a government official named Lobsang Tsewang and two attendants, set out for Takster. To avoid detection they disguised themselves as merchants on a business trip: Kewtsang Rinpoché donned an old sheepskin robe to play the role of servant; Lobsang Tsewang acted as the leader. Approaching Takster on the afternoon of the second day, they saw before them a typical Tibetan village: thirty or so stone farmhouses grouped together on a hillside, surrounded by lush fields of barley giving way to the foothills of spectacular snow-capped peaks, the most prominent, rising south of the village, called Kyeri. Covered with poplars and conifers, Kyeri’s lower
slopes were also home to two small monasteries, the upper, smaller one of which, Karma Shartsong Hermitage, had an especially renowned past. Perched atop a 500-foot sheer cliff face, its temples hewn from solid rock, Shartsong Hermitage was the very monastery in which Tsongkhapa had joined the company of monks and later taken novice vows. None of this was lost on the delegation as they rode up to a group of three flat-roofed buildings, each constructed around a central courtyard, occupying a spot somewhat up the hill from the rest of the village. Among them stood the house they sought, its single heavy wooden door, at the center of the windowless eastern wall, draped with a decorative cotton canopy above which rose a ten-foot-tall white prayer flag emblazoned with thousands of Buddhist mantras fluttering in the wind.

As the party dismounted, a brown and white spotted mastiff, chained to the entranceway, started to bark. The woman of the house emerged and Lobsang Tsewang, identifying himself as a trader, requested the use of her kitchen to make tea—a common practice of Tibetan travelers. While he was shown to the better rooms in the north wing, the others were directed to the kitchen which lay adjacent to the gate. Passing through the courtyard, Kewtsang Rinpoché noticed that the roof was fringed with turquoise tiles pierced by twisted waterspouts fashioned of gnarled juniper wood. Inside the kitchen he was directed to a wooden seating platform before a brick stove. A boy approached. Just two and a half, he had a bright, handsome face and was dressed in heavy Tibetan boots and wool overalls. Climbing into Kewtsang Rinpoché’s lap, the child began playing with a rosary that had belonged to the Thirteenth Dalai Lama but now hung around the visitor’s neck. According to the account of Amdo Kesang, the actual servant to the party, the little boy, whose name was Lhamo Dhondrub, suddenly became agitated. Claiming that the rosary was his, he demanded that it be given to him immediately. “I’ll give it to you,” replied Kewtsang Rinpoché, “if you can guess who I am.” “You are a lama of Sera,” the boy said matter-of-factly. He then identified Lobsang Tsewang, to whom he had not been introduced, by his proper name and went on to mark the other visitors as having come from Sera monastery as well. Most astounding of all, Lhamo Dhondrub addressed the men in the dialect of Central Tibet, virtually unknown in his district.

Their interest roused, the delegation stayed the night, planning to leave unnoticed before dawn the next day. The following morning Lhamo Dhondrub had risen before them, and on seeing their preparations to depart pleaded in tears to be taken along. They succeeded in calming him down only by promising to return. When they did, it was to subject the boy to a battery of tests to determine if, in fact, this was the Dalai Lama.

When the party came again to Takster the monks offered gifts to the family and asked to be left alone with its smallest member. As night fell, they adjourned to the master bedroom at the center of the house, placed a low table on the
kang
or platform bed and arranged on it a series of articles some having belonged to the Thirteenth Dalai Lama, others, carefully crafted duplicates. The objects included the Dalai Lama’s spectacles, silver pencil and eating bowl, as well as four items which the Oracle of Samye had ordered this delegation in particular to bring with it. They were a black rosary, a yellow rosary, two walking sticks and a small ivory hand drum used in religious devotions. The first stage of the examination centered on these.