Around the Wet Kathmandu Valley with the Passage Students

In Boudhanath, Kathmandu:

Rice transplanting underway in my neighborhood Boudha on the east side of Kathmandu. Before the monsoon, rice is planting in tight bunches in a small section of the field, and when they reach about 10 inches are transplanted into rows in the flooded field. As you can see, new residential construction is rapidly replacing the rice paddy in the Kathmandu Valley.

Local women carrying hay from the community-owned forest in the hills north of Kathmandu. This is the method that 95% of Nepalis transport goods, and usually women collect fodder to bring back for the animals.

Nyungnay (Simple Living) Retreat at Nagi Gompa:

A nun walking around the inside of the lhakhang (chapel) at Nagi Gompa during the Nyungnay fasting retreat in May. I attended two sets of two-day fasting retreats, which include one meal only on the first day. During the retreat, the practitioners begin chanting prayers and making prostrations at 4am, until 6pm. In this fasting practice, no one is allowed to speak, drink water or even swallow their spit, as well as observing the 8 vows (no killing, no stealing, no lying, no sex, no intoxicants, no purfume/jewelry, no eating while fasting, and no sitting on high seats).

Here Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche is ordaining two Nepali young women (one Tamang, one Newar) to be novice nuns, at Nagi Gompa, on May 31, 2007.

My friend the Newari (Maharjan) monk, Lama Monlam. Lama Monlam has been a monk since he was 14 (56 years ago) at Nagi Gompa, on the northern slope of the Kathmandu Valley rim. He has spent many years in solitary meditation retreat, and now has his own small gompa (monastery) near Swayambhu on the west side of Kathmandu.

Passage Project for International Education, Summer tour:

I brought our Passage students to see Lama Tsering Wangdu, a realized master of meditation and ritual. He threw dice to divine the most karmically appropriate Tibetan name for each student. Lama Wangdu will be traveling to the United States in about a month for a few months, see if you can catch him in New York, Boston, Portland, Seattle or one of the other cities he'll visit!

A semi-traditional Newari wedding scene, with each the bride's and bridegroom's families' brahmin priests standing by to conduct their parts of the ritual union. Our Passage students attended this wedding (and I think a few may have gone to the after party...) as a culturally enriching experience.

The very beautiful Newari bride (Yanik Srestha's cousin for those who know him) in all her finery, trying not to cry. I've noticed that many South Asian brides shed tears at their weddings. I don't think it's an indictment of the men, but rather the sadness of moving away from the joint-family home of their parents into that of their husbands.

A traditional folk band at the wedding.

An amazing collection of traditional wooden Newari hookha. Newar men have been fond of the sheesha for many generations.


Chapgaon Monastery:

One of the many beautiful trees that grow in Nepal, next to the unpainted gateway of the monastery in Chapagaon.

Some village women chanting prayers together in the monastery in Chapagaon. They meet every morning, and nowadays since the weather is pleasant there are about fifteen that assemble. It is interesting to me that they they chant devotional prayers in Tibetan (Guru Rinpoche, Amitabha), some dharani and mantra in Sanskrit, and then sing devotional hymns in Newari language.

July's Cute Monk Photo:

Our Newar monk Ngedun Gyatsho (Ocean of True Meaning) playing a game on one of our youngest, Rangjung Dorje (Naturally Arisen Diamond).

Happy Nepali New Year! Nepalko Nayabarsha Subhakamana!

I've been in Chapagaon at the monastery there for most of the last two weeks. My schedule has been pretty ideal, except that I sleep a little too much I guess. I've been teaching English every morning to the 3rd grade monks, and attending the 2nd grade Tibetan class with them as a student. I'm thinking I can skip up to the 3rd grade class after a few weeks. Back into Kathmandu for the day, for the internet, some lemonade and a few international phone calls, all luxuries unavailable in the village.

Last week brought us the Nepali New Year, welcome to year 2064 of the Bikram Samvat Calandar! I saw it in with some Patan friends with a short pilgrimage:

Actual New Year was spent in Patan, hanging out with some monks friends:

An old temple, in the Shikara style (I think) on a busy street corner. Children play all over it, the motorcycles zip by, and every morning early, before we're out for school or work, neighborhood devotees will come by for some quiet puja to greet the day.

Even in the middle of a city, busy and crowded, dusty and noisy, sometimes if you remember you can look up and catch an awesome display of cloud psychedelia over the skyline.

From the City to the Cheap Showiness of Nature:

After getting up at 5:30am at the Gompa in Patan (south of Kathmandu) to make ritual offerings (ganacakra) to the liberator-ess Arya Tara Bodhisattva, we caught a bus to the base of Shivapuri, the forested mountain north of Kathmandu and hiked up to Nagi Gompa, a nunnery I have blogged about before. The next morning we rose at 4am (not my idea) to head up the mountain to try to again make ritual offerings to the Buddhas and Bodhisatvas in the holy site Baghdwar.

At the peak of the Shivapuri mountain, one of the 4 holy mountains that surround the Nepal Mandala (the Kathmandu Valley perceived as a abode of the Bodhisatva...), with a monk from Nangchen, who now lives at the White Monastery in Boudha. For an amazing glimpse into the land of Nangchen in Kham, Tibet, one of the strongholds of the BuddhaDharma in Tibet for hundreds of years, the birthplace of Tulku Orgyen Rinpoche, one of many realized masters of the last century from Nangchen, check out the book Blazing Splendor. This is the best book about Buddhism I've read this year.

BAGDWAR, THE SOURCE OF THE HOLY BAGMATI:

The source of the Bagmati river, after the New Year festival which saw thousands of pilgrims and holiday pleasure seekers (what's the difference, sometimes?).

Offering light to the water spout at Bagdwar.

A local Buddhist tantric practitioner (ngagpa) cleaning out the accumulated offerings of flowers, rice, incense and candles from the Bagdwar spout, the source of the holy Bagmati river in Kathmandu. In South Asia, rivers are very holy for their function of purification, so their sources are even holier, often conceived of as the actual abodes of gods, goddesses and Bodhisatvas.

Second ritual feast offering in two days performed with the Newar friends from Patan, Jyatha Bahal, the sangha at the Padmavarna Mahayana Mahabihar. This group is one of the focuses of my research, because they have completely integrated Tibetan teachings into their traditional style of Newari Buddhism, and they are dedicated practitioners, especially of the SIX PERFECTIONS in daily life.

The main image of the historical Buddha of our age, the Buddha Sakyamuni, in the old hermitage at Bagdwar, near the Shivapuri peak.

Typical offerings to the above statue of Buddha Sakyamuni. Obviously devotees don't actually believe that the statue is going to spend the money or eat the food in a physical sense, but some things are considered auspicious to offer (because they are useful to us, they please the five senses, they are valuable), so by giving them up to the representation of enlightenment it both creates an enormous amount of merit and plants the future seed of enlightenment in our mindstream. The money will be used for the benefit of the hermitage.

THE SELF ARISEN TARA:

We took a side hike from the Bagdwar hermitage near the peak of Shivapuri mountain to have darshan (holy viewing) of Tara. The Newar Dharma brothers and sisters are here straining to see the image of Tara that is naturally emergent from the rock. This site, the confluence of two streams, is the site where Tara first revealed herself and her practice in Kathmandu. See Todd Lewis' Popular Buddhist Texts from Nepal for the story.

A photo from below of the "rangjung drolma" or "swayambhu tara," which means "self-arisen Tara." According to tradition, there is an image of Tara on this face of this rock overhang which emerged naturally.

Can you see her now that I've circled the head? Tara is the female Buddha, whose compassionate action is liberation from negative circumstances. For this reason her practice is associated with removing obstacles, specifically those to long-life.

A more traditional portrait of the Bodhisatva the Noble Tara.

A more modern, sexy version of Tara... yeah...

MONKS:

My close monk friend Sakya trying one of the many suitable meditation caves on the Shivapuri mountainside out for a minute.

And finally, your cute monk picture of the week! Oh, the age old game of grab-ass is certainly universal.

More nuns: Khari Gompa and Nagi Gompa

A photo of the Khari nuns at the Lawudo Gompa (Lama Zopa Rinpoche's previous' meditation cave, for the Nyungnay Avalokiteshvara fasting retreat in Saka Dawa May/June 2005. These are some of the nuns I'm sponsoring and raising some money for. The Khari Rinpoche, the reincarnated lama who runs the nunnery, is seated in the center of the photo.


Some more Khari Gompa nuns with flowers they grew. I took this photo in March 2004.


Three generations of practiotioners at the Khari Ani Gompa (nunnery) in Khumbu, Nepal (Everest Region). Sangye Thinlay, the older monk, passed away last year. His grandneice in the center of the photo has since taken robes there as a nun and lives and studies with her aunt, the nun on the left.


Below Nagi Gompa there is a Tamang village that the trail from Boudha winds through. The monument is a Buddhist stupa, a type of reliquary built to give people something to make offerings to, among many other things. Some older Tamangs are taking a break from walking next to the small tea shop on the left.


Some cute goats I spied while walking from Boudha up to Nagi Gompa for the drupchen and some retreat about two weeks ago. I took this about fifteen minutes climb from the stupa in the previous photo.


My seat at the Ngagso (confession and mending of samaya) drupchen, with the pecha (tibetan text) I borrowed in front of me. I got the opportunity to read along with the monks and nuns for a few days, and even mananged to lend an English translation from a friend, so I could better understand what was meant in the prayers. Very powerful stuff!


Prayerflags in the wind above where I set my tent at Nagi Gompa for the drupchen ceremony.

back from the nagi gompa

Today I walked quickly back down to Kathmandu, on a dusty limestone path that follows a pine ridge south from the Shivapuri National Forest. It took me two hours to get back to a hot shower and the internet, it takes over three to walk up the hill, a climb of about four thousand feet. I spent the last ten days at the nunnery. I managed to attend the last five days of the Ngagso Puja Drubchen (a nine day continuous ceremony for mending breaks in committments to the Dharma). The past five days were spent actually doing some practice, as I have been fantasizing about for some time.

Wake up with the horns announcing the morning chanting session for the nuns, which starts at 5:30. Prostrate, chant, meditation until 7:30. Breakfast with some nuns and an American, three Canadians and a Swede. Back on the cushion before 8:30, until 11:30 for a lunch of lentils, rice, vegetables and fresh yogurt, cow and water buffalo. Afternoon session was difficult for the legs and back, it varied for me, but usually from 1:00 to 7:00 with an hour break in between for some physical yoga stretches to loosen up my legs and back. Dinner and then reading a Dharma book for awhile, and finally an hour of practice before passing out, exhausted into a swirl of dream fantasy and peace.

There are around 90 nuns at Nagi Gompa, 32 of which have completed a 3year 3 month intense meditation retreat. There are ten who are in retreat right now, and after 2 years that number will increase to 42. Its quite impressive, the nuns are more dedicated to actual recitation and meditation than most monks I've met, but part of that comes from their lack of other opportunities. They have no formal education, and do not get to participate in the courses of study in philosophy or language like their male counterparts.

Related to this, I have sponsored the purchase of a text on basic philosophy for the nuns at the Khari Gompa in Khumbu Nepal (Everest Region), where I spent 2 months on three different occasions over the last few years. I bought 31 copies of the introduction to LamRim, which cost about $170 in total, but it was well worth it, because I believe strongly in the equal education of monks and nuns, and have had a wonderful experience with these nuns. I hope to spend a longer period of time with them in the future, at least for some retreat at their beautiful mountain hermitage.

After my short retreat this week, I am even more committed and excited about doing longer silent solitary meditation retreats. I am praying for long life, if only to be able to take advantage of this opportunity for plodding the path.

I snagged this photo of the Khari Nuns from the Tibetan Nuns Project website.