Page 4

I landed in Kathmandu in mid-2010 to spend a year studying Modern Standard Tibetan at one of the Buddhist monasteries. Many Tibetan refugees settled in Nepal, in and around the famous stupas of Boudhanath and Swayambhu. Stupas are important Buddhist monuments that first developed after the death of the Buddha. They often symbolize the Buddha sitting in meditation and house relics and sacred texts. As such, visiting them is considered to bring great blessings and both the Boudha and Swayambhu stupas have long been pilgrimage destinations for Tibetans. It’s not surprising the refugees fleeing the Chinese invasion would settle around them.

Over time, the Tibetans rebuilt their lives and built monasteries. Both stupas are surrounded by monasteries from the different schools of Tibetan Buddhism. Nyingma. Sakya. Kagyu. Geluk. With the monasteries, suburbs developed. I remember chatting with one abbot, a high reincarnate lama, in his small, cozy room for audiences. He described how he could hear women singing in the fields when the monastery was first built. Long gone are the fields. Now one finds bustling shops, restaurants, hotels, and cafés.

I met an older Tibetan in Swayambhu who said something similar. A gentleman in his 60’s, he had light grey hair and was dressed elegantly in linen pants and shirt. We were leaving a birthday celebration for the Dalai Lama. The police had suddenly swooped in to disperse the event. We chatted by chance as we walked briskly to avoid trouble. He wistfully observed that Swayambhu had been jungle when he had first arrived in the 60’s and how kind the Swiss Red Cross had been to the Tibetans. Swayambhu today is a thriving neighbourhood filled with homes and shops.