Tibet

It was heartening to see the number of protests surrounding this year’s Olympic torch race, as many people used this as a way of protesting China’s treatment of Tibet. I always like to see get involved in political causes - especially human rights issues. I feel that it gets talked about so much that in a lot of the Western world people do still think of it as a separate country—but we know that’s not true in practice, and the Dalai Lama has been in exile for decades. Though it is not a holiday in Tibet—obviously that is not allowed—the Tibetan exile community observe 2 September as Tibetan Democracy Day. There’s so much debate about Tibet that matters like size and population can’t be settled.

I was rewatching Twin Peaks recently, and had forgotten Agent Cooper’s speech about how the plight of the Tibetan people moves him. In a way, it’s so out of left field (compared with, say, Scorsese’s Kundun) that, at that point when everyone wanted to know who killed Laura Palmer, I hope it made people think about that little area of the world that didn’t seem to be as much in the public eye in 1990 as it is now.

After the outside world had come to Tibet (bringing with them, for instance, the first potatoes in the country) in the 1850s Tibet shut its borders to outsiders. The British sent in people in disguise to secretly map the area, and there are stories of various people disguising themselves as pilgrims.

In 1913 the country officially issued a proclamation of its independence. It was 37 years later that China invaded Tibet, leading to the Dalai Lama’s departure in 1959.

One of the things that interests me is that while the Dalai Lama named Gedhum Choekyi Nyima as the 11th Panchen Lama, the People’s Republic of China named a different child—Gyancain Norbu. Tibetans in exile refer to him as the Panchen Zuma, or fake Panchen Lama. I suppose I find it strange that the PRC would name someone at all.

Pico Iyer has written a number of essays on Tibet. He is wonderful.

Today’s poem comes from Language for a New Century and is by Tsering Wangmo Dhompa.


One more say

Think on this when prayers fall like thick paint on dry asphalt.

Think on this when the face is fading.

Think on this and be decisive in your motions. The breathing. The
utterance.

No Eastern star leading conch shells and a rainbow at dusk. Those
who must believe, so.

Who dares to question the accuracy of a direction when the journey
was not theirs.

The moment of birth. Before the father extended his arm toward
the mother.

Here is a location. Here it is scattering like mustard seeds.

—Tsering Wangmo Dhompa
from Language for a New Century