Back in New York......

They say it snowed in New York this morning, April 8th, in April! That's a far cry from the 90 degree weather in Delhi. I do prefer the snow rather than the Delhi heat with the dust, dirt and bugs. Arrived back in NY just after 1:00 p.m. today and cleared customs and the Delhi-like taxi ride into Manhattan around 3:00. A good friend told me about a natural (yea right!) sleep regulator that is good for jet lag and adjusting to time changes - melatonin. It is available from any health food store. Well it seems to work, not always, but often enough. It helps. Take it with caution. It appears to effect people differently. I have never taken more than two small capsules once in a 24 hour period just prior to sleep.

Thursday Morning: Well, it doesn't all seem quite like a dream just yet, although it was a very full trip with many meetings. A lot was accomplished and it is now time to try and bring many of the discussions into reality. Off to the office after a small stop at my favourite Belgian breakfast restaurant.......

Leaving Delhi & the Hong Kong Airport Lounge

The rest of Tuesday went as planned and we left for the airport at 7:30 with our favourite driver. Delhi can be a confusing city. Sometimes it is best to hire a driver to take you around in your own car, especially at night. The airport was a little frantic and the passengers boarded buses to get out to the plane. There was no reason offered for this lack of a modern ramp side gate. At the gate I was given an upgrade to Business Class. On an older plane it doesn't always make that much difference. There are three Cathay Pacific Business Class lounges in the Hong Kong airport. All of them have free food, wi-fi, showers and more.

The image above is of the Yamuna River running behind the Tara Guest House in Majnukatilla, New Delhi.

Delhi & Prof. Lokesh Chandra

It has really warmed up here in Delhi. The dust and smells have also increased. You simply cannot walk with your mouth open or you will literally be feasting on luscious fat flies.

Yesterday I had a very long and successful meeting at Tibet House. I finally had to say that I needed to go. I was tired and mentally worn out. After that the three of us, Tsedor and Jamyang Lekdrub, went to Cannought Place and found a a restaurant named Becor's. It is primarily Thai and Chinese cuisine. One of the juniour chefs is the nephew of my hosts and travelling companions. The food was very good and I recommend the restaurant to anyone travelling to Delhi.

Last night was probably my worst night in India. I had become tired during the day because of the heat and also I think because of a slight salt deficiency. I had a heat fever throughout the night and worse, the mosqitoe repellent that plugs into the electrical outlet did'nt work. It could be that the chemical chip was old, but that wasn't the worst. Sometime after 2:00 a.m. my right arm was attacked by bed bugs. In the Tibetan language these creatures are called 'dre shig' which means demon lice. They are really awful and itch like hell. Generally by morning the itching stops unlike the milder mosquitoes bites.

This morning, Tuesday, we had breakfast at 8:00 and then left at 9:00 with a driver to go to my last appointment with Prof. Lokesh Chandra. We had a very good time. The uncle of my two companions was hired in the sixties to re-draw many of the block print images published by Raghu Vira (the father of Lokesh Chandra).

Saujanya Books has a new outlet in Majnukatilla. I spent some time with the sisters that own the Saujanya book shops and purchased a recently published set of the Collected Works of Dagchen Kunga Lodro. He is one of my favourite authors and many of my translations from Tibetan are of the texts of Kunga Lodro.

I'm off to pack and tidy up some loose ends like hotel bill, etc. If I'm lucky I can get a short nap in as well. We leave for the airport at 7:30 and my flight is at 11:30 p.m. The Hong Kong Airport offers free wi-fi throughout the complex so I will e-mail from there.

New Delhi & Tibet House

It is Monday morning in Delhi. The sun climbed through a dusty haze which will probably stay for the day unless a big wind comes up and sends the dust to the east. I had a relatively mosquito free night although it was warm even with all the windows open and the overhead fan spinning. We are off in a few minutes to go to Tibet House. If we have good luck we will even be able to arrange my second meeting for the afternoon. Dinner is already planned with my good friend Pema Wangchuk. He is Bhutanese and always brings a fresh perspective to Indian and Tibetan cultural life. You are guaranteed to be laughing at his irreverent observations of the various quirks and customs he observes.

Pema Wangchuk and I spent August 2004 together in Eastern Tibet documenting all of the art of an entire monastery. For relaxation we hiked the high mountains above 14,000 feet that rose behind the monastery. We were looking for caves and special places associated with Tertons and Padmasambhava. We found one cave. We stopped for a little while to let our clothes dry after a torrential mountain down pour caught us out in the open. I had to scramble to keep my camera equipment dry. (The image above which I had already posted earlier is from that rainy trek in 2004 with Pema Wangchuk).

Anyway, off to Tibet House......

The Day That I Ate Delhi

Arrived in Delhi after 7 and a half hours on the road. It was a good ride until we hit the northern edge of Delhi and there were two large traffic jams. Each took one hour to get through. What about that wind and dust storm? That was something else. At times you could only see about a 100 yards. I swear there were sand dunes forming vertically on the sides of cars and then just as quickly as they appeared they were blown away by another gust. It is safe to say that this is the day that I ate Delhi. Aside from these minor inconveniences, and clearing the dust out of the throat, it is important to know that horses, cows and buffaloes are the kings and queens of the road here. They can block traffic anywhere they please.

After that and during lunch we learned that there is a new short cut through Sahrahanpur that cuts the trip down to three hours. We asked the directions but were told you had to know the road. That was a lot of help. Jamyang Lekdrub will look for the short cut on his way back to Dehradun later this week. I had lunch with the younger Dungsay Rinpoche yesterday and he is now staying in the same guest house as us. In fact the guest house in owned by the Drolma Palace of Sakya and it is where the Lamas usually stay when passing through Delhi. It is called the Tara Guest House. The Ngorpas also have a guest house as does the Chu Shi Gang Drug and many other Tibetan religious and cultural organizations. The area is in the extreme north of Delhi and called Majnukatilla. The Indians tend to stay away because it was once a cemetery of sorts, rather a charnel ground. It also figures very much into a Muslim love story akin to Romeo and Julliet. Needless to say it didn't end well. The Hindus especially never populated this area. It borders on a tributary of some river which I don't know the name of. Mosquitoes are the largest cash crop. Dirt and bad smells are the runners up.

I will be meeting again with Dungsay Rinpoche later in the day and then plan a quite dinner with Tsedor and Jamyang Lekdrub. The meetings for tomorrow and Tuesday I will also set up by phone later in the day after a nice long nap.

Leaving Dehradun & Manduwalla

I had a wonderful time today with Sakya Trizin and the two Dungsay Rinpoches. We spent a lot of time talking about art and some other subjects. After that I left Rajpur and went back to Manduwalla to meet with Luding Khenchen Rinpoche. This meeting also went very well but it was a social call to meet one of my old teachers. We did not talk about art, only of the past and when we would meet again. He is basically retired now and travels very little.

We are up at 5:00 tomorrow morning to be on the road for 6:00 to try and beat the traffic, heat and dust, so that we can be in New Delhi early to enjoy the heat and mosquitoes. Apparently the temperature has been hovering around 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Jamyang Lekdrub's mother insists that I get up early enough to go to the local stupa (see earlier blog about Gega Lama) and say prayers to the Padmasambhava statue inside before leaving. Tsedor, JL's older brother, has already booked rooms for us at the Tara Guest House in Majnukatilla. He is there now attending an annual Chu Shi Gang Drug meeting (Four Rivers Six Mountains). I have mentioned Tsedor before, he used to be a well known painter and his photograph along with his teacher (uncle) are in David Jackson's publication on Tibetan Tangka Painting, or some such title.

After two days of Delhi I may be desperate to get onto an air conditioned airplane. I have two appointments to keep and people to see. Delhi is a big place and I may not be able to do both in the same day but I will try and do as much as possible. There are also some bookstores worth checking out.

The image above is of the family dog named Jangsem. We became good friends during my stay in Manduwalla. During the day he is chained up so that he won't bite the Nepalese workers that make the vajras and bells, etc., and at night he is allowed to run free in the compound.

Dolanji Bon Centre

This is an image taken from across the valley to the south looking back from the road to the Bon complex. You can see just how big it is. There are still many buildings that can't be seen in this photo such as the Ani Gompa which is also on our south side of the valley from where the picture is taken.

Morning Images From Dolanji

These are some early morning images taken by Jamyang Lekdrub from the lower patio of the Bon Guest House in Dolanji, Solan. The morning mist and clouds are reminiscent of Chinese style landscape paintings.

Too Many Places to See!

The top image is looking across at the back of Sakya Center in Rajpur. The photo is taken from the road that leads to the Sakya Nunnery in the Dekyiling community. It is not more than an hour walk from Rajpur and 10 minute drive. The image in the middle is of the new Ngor Tantric College built in Manduwalla under the supervision of Luding Khen Rinpoche. And the bottom image is of the famous Drigung Songtsen Library. Tenzin D. and I visited the library when we were in India in 2005. I will not have an opportunity to visit this time, nor will I be able to visit Sakya College and Khenpo Gyatso, Gongkar Chode, Sa-Magon Puruwalla, and a host of other sites. It would take at least a month in Dehradun with a serious schedule prepared to be able to see most of the sites. For the Sakya alone there are twelve or thirteen monasteries, colleges and retreat centres in the Dehradun area. The Hindu holy places of Rishikesh and Haradwar are also a short drive down the road. On Wednesday the Dalai Lama flew into the local airport and then spent the day in Haradwar with a famous Indian Sadhu. He then flew back to Dharamsala in the afternoon. One of my hosts had to be at the airport to officially welcome the Dalai Lama and give a formal greeting representing the Lingtsang community.

Looking at Art

My meeting with Sakya Trizin was postponed until tomorrow morning because of the lengthy preparations for the seven day Vajra Nairatmya ritual at Sakya Center, Rajpur. That however didn't postpone my lecture this afternoon. It was strange to be lecturing to over 120 monks in a place that I used to call home. I have lectured to monks before but not that many. Their ages ranged from kids to adults. I had to vary the lecture so as to include everybody equally as the targeted audience.

The first image above is of Avalokliteshvara belonging to the RMA. The second image below is from a set of nine paintings sometimes thought to have been originally created or commissioned by Situ Panchen Chokyi Jungne. The painting is in a Chinese style although almost any painting associated with Situ Panchen is incorrectly said to be in a Karma Gadri style. There are many reasons for this, too many to discuss at this time. This second painting is a recent Tibetan copy of an older painting located at a monastery in Eastern Tibet. The only other known painting (photographed) like this is in the Rubin Museum of Art (see first image). Don and I purchased it specifically for the Situ Panchen exhibition which is currently showing. It will be interesting to carefully compare the two images.

The lower painting is of the 5th Khamtrul Rinpoche and done in a Cho Tashi style from Khampa Gar in Eastern Tibet. (Cho Tashi was a famous Drugpa Kagyu artist from the 17th/18th century). The colours are rich, thick, applied heavily and the composition makes full use of the entire canvas unlike the paintings from Palpung that are called Karma Gadri style.

The Twenty-One Taras of Jowo Atisha

Some say there were 10,000 people but I think that is exaggerated. There were easily 5 to 7,000, but my number could be off as well. Today was the day of the Tara initiation at the Sakya Nunnery which turned out to be a shortened version of the Twenty-one Taras of Atisha. We arrived at 8:00 in the morning and finally left the Nunnery at 2:00. It was another long day and it was only half over. I returned to Manduwalla and napped. The weather has gotten a lot warmer in the last couple of days.

I will be busy tonight preparing CDs of images to present to Sakya Trizin tomorrow morning. I have also been asked to lecture tomorrow afternoon at Sakya Center. The topic will be Sakya History and Art.

The painting above is from a set of Tangkas depicting all twenty-one Taras in groups of three. This is the only known painting from this set of approximately nine paintings. I only know of one other set in this configuration and again it is only a single painting in the Rubin personal collection.