The Story Teller

Sitting on the library step

an old man enthrall'd our hearts

with tales of mystic east.

Hour after hour he wove his spell

till we, enrapt'

marvelled at the tales his eyes'd tell.

Japan, and blood red suns,

golden skies, giant drums -

all were there in tales of mystic east.

Now, I know not what he said

nor how he looks, that old man,

but for 30 long years I've marvell'd

at the tales his eyes'd tell.

22nd December 1988

Guhyloka solitary

Paired Days

-->Friday 14th January 2000

I left Kalimpong to travel back down to Siliguri where Chatral Rimpoche was staying at his small monastery. I hardly recognised the village or the monastery although it was only about three years since my last visit. The village had built up very fast into a major suburb of Siliguri. And the gompa instead of having just a few small buildings I found to be a complete complex - with two very large buildings of three floors each, and each with a sizeable hall. Each hall was packed with people, each room, each landing and corridor had straw laid out for people to sleep. Every corner, nook and cranny was packed: hundreds of lay people; young and old monks; Kashmiri featured, Tibeto-Burmese featured, Mongoloid featured, Ladhaki featured.
 
I’d already been told that a ‘Nyung-nye’ retreat was going on. Nyung-nye, means ‘paired days’, and is a strange retreat based around the figure of the thousand-armed Avalokiteshvara. What is strange is that the paired days are days of silence, puja, meditation and fasting alternated with no-silence, puja, meditation and feasting. I feared I might arrive on a silent day but found everybody in a festive mood, talking chatting, laughing, playing, twirling prayer wheels and clacking beads and of course cooking. Seeing me in bright yellow robes, not the more familiar dark maroon, old folk looked on me in amazement, stuck their tongues out and hissed in devout respect (I hoped). One old Bhutanese woman hobbled up and bowed very low, with tongue out. Although I protested gently and humbly, "No! No!" still she waited for a blessing. I wasn't sure whether it had to be by the laying on of hands or just by gesture? I opted to gently touch her folded hands with mine. She hobbled away delighted. 
 
I was told to go and see Rimpoche's daughter and ask her if I could stay. It was the daughter I hadn't seen before. She was very nice to me and knew of Urgyen Sangharkshita and so was happy for me to join the throng - if I could find a place stay. She directed me to the office where I met her mother, Rimpoche's wife. She immediately recognised me and remembered my last visit. She asked how was Sangharakshita and how old he was now and so on. And she asked how I was and my health and so on. Of course I asked how Rimpoche was, too, and found he was well and 88 years old. She also gave me the blessing to stay and I was directed to a young monk who would help me.
The handsome young monk was very fair skinned with a clear complexion and a ready smile. He set me up in the hall where he and all the monks were staying. He said it was better I stay here with the monks rather than outside in some hotel, and he knew a way to 'adjust'. 'Adjust' is an amazing Hindi/English word which communicates a whole variety of things from flexibility to force. In this case I suspected that it meant he would shift other people around to get me the best place. I wasn't far wrong. He started moving bedding – mostly straw over the concrete floor, covered by a variety of blankets, all of different qualities according to the pocket of the various monks. Moving each bundle of bedding by just a few inches he managed to produce a space about 20 inches wide - just enough. And, lo and behold, it was a space just right next to his bedding, and his brother’s! Next, I needed straw. Out we went to the farmer next door and bought five stooks of straw for 10 rupees and we quickly set it out on the floor. He then fished out of a bag a spotless nylon sheet with floral patterns on it. Next I needed blankets and there was no choice but to take a rickshaw into Siliguri and buy a double blanket (£5.00), which I could fold in a long thin strip, four sections thick, to lie on, and a single blanket which I could fold double and use on top of me. And so I was all set up - except for cup, plate, spoon and bowl. A local store produced the items for just under a pound. I was set up for £7.00 in all. I rested easily in the shade in the late afternoon but I was contemplating what I had let myself in for. The Nyung-Nye retreat is hard. One of the days is fasting of a very strict type – not only does no food pass your lips but not a drop of water either. It’s even considered virtuous by some to spit out any saliva that collects in the mouth. But then, I thought, hundreds of others are managing it and there were about 7-8 other Westerners as far as I could see. Some of them told me it was tough; one said no talking was tough, another said the no food was tough and another the long sits. Nobody mentioned the water though. That would have been tough. And then there were prostrations for each session. How was I to manage with my duff arm? And the cartilage of my right knee was still playing up and I was having to go very carefully to avoid busting it altogether. 
 
I saw my new friend the monk, Guru Tenzing, had just finished his duty of distributing 20 rupees to everybody in the throng (a donation four times a day for each person attending Nyung-nye – one could get rich like that!). He called me into a room for a cup of tea. While he was chatting to me and trying to follow my Scottish accent one of the laymen came in and asked me to step into the office. Strangely it felt like a call to the headmaster's room. I followed him and sat down in the seat offered, not knowing why I had been called in. In came another man who I knew spoke English. The first man spoke to him in Tibetan from behind his desk and laid out a white scarf, a blessing cord, some blessed pills and large poster of Tara. I knew what was coming. The second man proceeded to explain that Rimpoche was very pleased I had requested to join Nyung-Nye but that I should understand that this was primarily for the lay people not really for the monks. (There were over a hundred monks!) Further, the place was so crowded that it was not possible to adjust (there's that word again) to accommodate me. Even if a corner could be found - and here my friend piped up that I had been accommodated but he was told in Tibetan, sotto voce, that this was Rimpoche's wish (i.e. be quiet) – that it would not be really at all respectful to accommodate me in such a way with the common people. Even if I could find a place with the monks still Rimpoche would feel very ashamed that I would have to ‘rough it’ in an unseemly way. Rimpoche understood that I did not mind roughing it but that for the sake of the Dharma it was quite shameful that such a senior monk as myself would have to live in such a way and that, primarily, the lay people would find it very embarrassing. Finally, in the meditation hall it was so full that I would not be able to be given a seat without adjusting others in such a way as to cause difficulties and so I would have to sit outside with others in the sun. All the lay people would feel very bad about this. So, all round, it would be best if I accepted the gifts from Rimpoche and returned from whence I came. On my part I could fully understand their position, and the place was indeed bursting at the seems. I don't think Rimpoche just wanted rid of me – after all, other Westerners were there - but that to accommodate me half way through was too much. I accepted Rimpoche's wishes with good grace and let the man know that. I only had one more thing on my mind, which was what to do with the khata, the offering scarf, that Sangharakshita had sent with me for Rimpoche. Life being so uncertain I thought maybe I should just send it anyway with a note to the effect that the scarf was given to me by Sangharakshita to give to him and that he conveyed with it his best wishes for Rimpoche's continued good health and long life. I also gave a scarf to be given on my own behalf. These were accepted graciously with a promise to pass them on to Rimpoche. However, I was told that Rimpoche would be staying in the gompa after the Nyung-Nye finished in about 10 days time if I wanted to return them I would be most welcome. The door was definitely left open!


This story has its sequel. About a year or so later, when I was visiting the UK, I was asked to be one of the readers for a manuscript for Windhorse Publications. The manuscript had been sent by a man in London on behalf of a Tibetan who had written a memoir of his meetings with various Lamas. I had not heard of the author before but the material being ‘Tibetan’ I was, of course interested. On the first day I was given the big brown packet I opened it and began reading. The author it seemed was an elderly Tibetan gentleman, a highly trained doctor-cum surgeon of Western Medicine (one of the very first, if not the first). The manuscript was based around his experiences of attending various Tibetan lamas, in fact, most of the most famous lamas of the 20^th Century. I found the whole account fascinating and I was only disappointed that he had neither mentioned Dhardo Rimpoche nor my teacher, Urgyen Sangharakshita. Whether this was because he had never met them or because they weren’t considered at all important in his account I don’t know. There were accounts of meetings with the two famous Khyentse Rimpoches, Kalu Rimpoche, Karmapa and Dudjom Rimpoche. And there was quite a bit on Chatral Rimpoche too. As I read he wrote of attending a retreat at Siliguri in 2000 during which he had seen something quite strange that had sparked his curiosity. He saw a western Hindu monk come into the retreat – red as a lobster and sweating profusely – and then quietly leave again after some time. He remarks that it would have been interesting to find out who was that orange robed westerner and what was in his mind? Red as a lobster, yes; Hindu, no; sweating profusely – yes, that was me.