Rumtek is most famous for it’s monastery which is the official seat of the Karmapa. Unfortunately the current Karmapa has not been able to reside here due to a court case where another person is claiming to be the Karmapa – so neither of them or their retinue are allowed here. The place is also under armed protection by the Indian police – firstly because the items that are housed here are very valuable and there is the court case over them; and secondly because it was found to be on a list of targets by a group of terrorists.
My stay here was nothing but peaceful though. I stayed in a ‘hotel’ just at the entrance of the monastery, and managed to spend two weeks here just doing my practice (prostrations and mantras). The old Rumtek monastery is a 10 minute walk away from the new one and is where the Karmapa stayed when he fled Tibet during the Chinese occupation. It is a tiny gompa (temple), but a very powerful place.
The new monastery where i am staying is home to over 300 monks, ranging in age from very young to very old (i don’t know exact ages.. lol!) The young monks go to regular school up until class 5, and then they decide on their future in or out of the monastery.
While i was here it happened to be the Karmapas birthday, and although he was not here, they had a small celebration in his honour. They hung special curtains in his honour and the school children came and did a little concert with traditional Tibetan, Nepali and Indian dances – as well as some singing (microphone lessons would have been helpful!!). When it came to singing happy birthday, they proceeded to sing it about 5 times... and they still wanted to go on, but thankfully the older kids stopped them.
It has also been the world cup football while here, and every evening the monks come and watch the games on the little tv at the hotel – what a lively occasion!! We all choose a side at random and then shout for that team as if our lives depended on it... LOL!
I cant quite explain how beautiful it is here... it is rainy season, so there are always clouds about, and often times rainbows to go with that. The clouds are not always above, but sometimes below, which is such a strange feeling to be up in the clouds – literally! And i see all of this from my bedroom window...
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