The Biggest Buddha in the World

I noticed a few days ago a friend of mine had linked a Youtube video to the Tricycle Blog. The video tried to capture the magnitude of the biggest Buddha in the world, something not easily done or often attempted since the original Pali stories of the Bhikshu flying to the limits of space trying to see the top of Shakyamuni's ushnisha, unsuccessfully I might add.

I on the other hand, unlike the pilgrims in the Youtube video, decided to approach the Buddha from below and experience the size from a distance, far out on the turbulent waters of the river, the meeting of three, also on a rainy day. Not many days are without rain on the eastward down hill slope of the Himalayas, the eastern extent of the Tibetan Plateau. (Click on the image).

The story of the origins of this giant Maitreya sculpture, in the article below, is just one of many different narratives. The one I like the best is about the two artists that were approached by the Emperor and asked to carve the statue and how one proceeded and the other did not...

The image above is from my travels in Eastern Tibet and the Chengdu area in the summer of 2004.

"The world’s largest stone carved Buddha is located in Leshan, China. This Giant Buddha (also called Dafo) is a 233 feet (71 meters) tall statue of a sitting Maitreya Buddha. This UNESCO World Heritage Site was carved in AD 713 to calm the rivers that run along the feet of Buddha." (Article).

See the full article about the World's Biggest Buddha.
Youtube Part 1
Youtube Part 2

Back to New York!!!!

Well, my 2 weeks in beautiful B.C. is over. It feels like I spent half the time in VGH or St.Paul's. Such is life. I did manage to get away for two nights up to the cabin in the Okanagan. The weather was very hot. Swimming in the creek was definitely the highlight of the trip. We cooked outside with white gas. It was way too hot to use the cast iron stove. There is also an outdoor burning ban in British Columbia and I find that wood stoves can send up a lot of embers. I'll try and get back to the cabin in late September or early October. It is much more pleasant when the weather isn't so hot and the bugs are less numerous - black flies, horse flies, mosquitoes, wasps, hornets. You name it B.C.'s got it. Have you ever had a horse fly bite right through your blue jeans and draw blood?

Vancouver Bound!

It is time again to return to Vancouver. One can only stay away so long. I haven't been back since May. New York has been busy with many new projects from earlier in the year coming to completion and friends and colleagues leaving town for new adventures, employment, or school of one sort or another.

The HAR website has been a flurry of activity with the new sets gifs and maps of Central Tibet along with so many new outlines, thematic subject sets and of course NEW collections. It is time to sit back and take in a panoramic view of what there is. What there is that has been accomplished, what is working and is not working, and what is in the queue to be uploaded next. Did I forget to mention the new Mandala Technical Glossary?

With all of that said, the SRG has floundered for several months and is in need of some serious attention and content uploading. I think that will be possible in the next couple of weeks. I have been doing a lot of work on Virupa recently based on a tremendous amount of work in the 80s and early 90s. Some of this will go up on SRG and the rest will stay in an unpublished manuscript for the time being. Hopefully not too long.

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......