MUNDGOD, KARNATAKA
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| NIGHT SKY FROM THE ROOF OF THE MONASTERY |
Last time we were here was
about 27-years ago. Then, the only thing
I remember was visiting Robert Peel at a very modern boys’ boarding school
outside Hubli of which he was the principal.
The red earth was parched in the pre-monsoon heat and the cattle were
skeletal with many dying in the drought.
There had been no significant monsoon rain for three-years and the mango
trees surrounding the school ground were looking dusty and dry.
Robert was the great,
great grandson (not sure how many greats)
of a previous Prime Minister after whom the peelers
got their name, the first established police force in England. Robert, a corpulent figure with florid
features, was very welcoming; and as I sat in his office talking, he opened the
top drawer of his desk and produced a bottle of whisky. This spurred our
conversation as he pointed out the architecture of the main building having
tinted glass openings on the roof to capture the rare draughts of cooling air.
From the school, I can’t
quite remember how, we got to Mundgod which at that time had the largest Buddhist
monastery in India with 11,000-monks herding about in a sea of maroon.
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| A THERAVADAN MONK FROM SOUTH INDIA |
Now the suburb of Mundgod
is Tibetan with various monasteries and Tibetan homes well-established as well
as restaurants selling mo mos, thukpa and various other dishes with noodles as
a base. Surprisingly, there is no butcher
and therefore no meat in the whole village so some of the monks go to the
nearby town and eat there. And so far, I
have seen only a couple of people smoking.
(In Sikkim, public smoking is completely banned.)
Ahead were 12-days of
teaching by HH Dali Lama of philosophical Tibetan texts, mainly based on a
compendium of teachings presented in the Lam
Rim Chen Mo of Je Tsong Ka Pa. The
teaching was not easy and I found myself at a loss with most of the convoluted
arguments about the nature of reality and emptiness repetitive with various
analogies based on objects from the past such as chariots and their various
parts.
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| LAMA SOPA RINPOCHE'S HOUSE WITH HIS TEACHER AND FRIENDS |
The hall and the grounds
outside were filled with thousands of people, mostly monks, some following the
readings but the younger ones playing around fighting or just sleeping: hundreds
of westerners from Asia, Europe and the Americas also attended the teachings,
all looking deadly serious and focused.
The teachings were translated into the various major languages and we
were able to tune in on short wave.
Towards the end of the teachings I did find myself listening to music on
my mp3 instead as most of the discourses were way beyond my ken.
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| YELLOW HAT MONKS |
Each day begins with the
growling sound of the older monks’ low voices as they chant out the
prayers. The voices are amplified and
are loud enough to scare the shit out of small children…and some adults,
including me. The volume increases to a high
crescendo as HH Dali Lama arrives, preceded by lamas wearing the yellow hats of
the Gelugpa sect, unchanged for thousands of years. One Asiatic girl closes her eyes and goes
into a trance, her mouth forming a tight sphinctre, shaking her hands as if
ridding them of water. The young monks
come charging in with large pots of butter-salt tea and we hold out our mugs
for the tea-blessing ceremony.
HH Daila Lama expounds his
own views on Buddhist beliefs: Our pujas
and ceremonies are as if we are praying to gods. This is totally wrong! We have to take responsibility for
ourselves. We pray to the lamas and
yidams (personal guides for visualisation) and live a humble life. We have to use our own wisdom. Why are we so fatigued? We have to see reality as it is. Whatever appears seems to have some objective
existence: What appears dissipates into
reality. The fatigued child takes refuge
in the forest hut and sees things as they really are. See the emptiness – there is no other way out
of this. [Emptiness has a philosophical context here.]
To the best of your
ability, meditate on emptiness rather than the empty words. Do not be
complacent with mere appellations.
The rest delves deeper and
deeper into the argument for nothing being intrinsically existent but is the
effect of various causes beyond our comprehension. It is a beautiful argument but too involved
for this piece so rather than leave you addlepated, let’s leave it here.
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| I BELIEVE THAT THE VERY PURPOSE OF OUR LIFE IS TO SEEK |
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