Shattered Land of the Buddha

In northern India in the foothills of the Himalayas lies the small town of Dharamsala, which has been the headquarters of the Tibetan government in exile since the 1960s. The Dalai Lama lives here when he is not traveling and it is fair to say that his presence is the main reason for the visits of so many Westerners and others to this picturesque hill station. The scenery is lovely and the thousands of Tibetans who have made this town their home give it a special atmosphere of friendliness and color.

During my four trips to Tibet, I was largely engrossed in my photography, concentrating on the grand monasteries and temples, vast grasslands and nomadic way of life. Only slowly did I come to realize how deeply the Tibetans are devoted to the Dalai Lama, and how many people have entrusted their lives to this one person. Throughout the suffering and hardship of Chinese rule, His Holiness has been a pillar of strength and support. As the focus of their faith and hope, he has enabled his people to endure the worst.

Thirty-five years ago, nearly 100,000 Tibetans fled to India with the Dalai Lama, and today the flow of refugees continues. Between 20 and 30 new arrivals come to Dharamsala each day, and many of them have harrowing stories to tell.

In the room of a nunnery that was previously a private house, Kelsang Pemo, a 29-year-old nun, calmly talked to me about her days of torment five years earlier. Just next door, a young nun who recently escaped from Tibet lay in bed, exhausted and sick, unaccustomed to the Indian weather.

Kelsang, along with eight other nuns and two monks, held a demonstration while circling Lhasa�fs Jokang Temple. The date was May 17, 1988. According to Kelsang, she and the others first went quietly around the Jokhang Temple three times, each circuit taking about 15 minutes. Finally, upon reaching the police station across from the temple, they shouted �gFreedom for Tibet! Long Live the Dalai Lama!�h As soon as they started shouting, policemen appeared on every rooftop and in an instant they opened fire with automatic weapons. Though the firing was meant to warn and disperse the gathering crowd, one of the monks was shot in the leg and collapsed. Immediately armed police charged the small group, kicking and beating them, Kelsang was hit with the end of a gunstock and fell down from the below. All were quickly thrown into army trucks and taken away. The injured monk continued to shout slogans for Tibetan independence, despite his untreated, bleeding wound; each time he spoke out the Chinese police fired warning shots, cursed him and beat him repeatedly.

The following day the torture began. The police wanted to know who was behind the demonstration. When the nuns told the truth that they themselves had organized the protest, the authorities did not believe them, thinking that young nuns could not possibly be so motivated. The police beat them, kicked them and made dogs bite them.
Electric cattle-prods were used on their bodies, and many of the nuns lost consciousness. Their cell filled with the stench of an overflowing pot that served as the toilet. Just thinking of the torture that would continue the next day made them so frightened they could not sleep. The Chinese ill-will became clearer with each passing day.

Meals were very poor and the nuns sometimes found dirt mixed with the food. They even discovered that steamed bread had been dipped in a toilet. One day they were given yellow pills, said to be a help for their wounds. Supper was denied that night and it turned out that the pills were simply a further form of torture; a �gmedicine�h that induced hunger.

After a month of constant brutality by two policemen, the number suddenly increased to five. The men removed Kelsang�fs clothes, held her down and then forced an electric prod into her vagina. Kelsang recalled, �gFor an instant I felt a terrible burning pain in my belly and I lost consciousness�cHunger and torture had robbed all of us of our strength and spirit. My facial features had changed completely and it seems the police considered my state of health quite dangerous. They decided to bring in two women doctors. These women asked me where the pain was and I answered that it hurt all over. In response they spat in my face, said that was the medicine I deserved, and left the cell laughing scornfully.�h

Kelsang was released two months later, but the effects of torture left her unable to walk properly, so she was admitted to a hospital. In the meantime, nuns from her nunnery held three demonstrations that brought about a severe retaliation. All were banished from their nunnery and robbed of the right to practice religion. During this entire ordeal, Kelsang felt she might be killed, but never did she expect to be expelled from her nunnery, denied her life�fs calling. At this moment she and others decided to flee Tibet to go to Dharamsala, where they could live a life of religious freedom.
Kelsang and another nun found people willing to smuggle them in a truck to Mount Kailash in West Tibet. Once there they met, by prior arrangement, four other nuns and two monks, and with the help of two nomad guides they began to cross the high peak of the Himalayas. To avoid the army they took steep byways, often losing the way, and sometimes went without food for two or three days. One great difficulty was crossing a freezing, swift mountain stream; none of them knew how to swim. After two months the little party finally reached Kathmandu, Nepal�fs capital.

Once free, Kelsang declared that to lose her life would be a worthwhile sacrifice if it helped the world realize what the Chinese were doing in Tibet. Forcing the Dalai Lama into exile, destroying the Buddhist religion and carrying on the occupation of her country were intolerable acts. Her courage, non-violent opposition and testimony are ways of bringing about that realization.

Dope Adi, aged 58, is a woman who spent 27 years in prison, until her release in 1985. Two years later, she escaped to Dharamsala. She came originally from Kham, the province of East Tibet, known for its strong, handsome people and fierce opposition to the People�fs Liberation Army in the 1950s and 1960s. Her husband was killed by the Chinese and she was captured while spying for the Tibetan resistance.

Of 300 women prisoners, only four survived the cruel prison experience. For years, Dope Adi suffered from hunger; only her unbreakable faith kept her alive. She kept a paper cutting in the shape of the Buddha, and made a rosary from a thread of torn prison clothing by tying tiny knots as beads. In this way she could pray silently, and to speak her prayers she covered her mouth with a piece of cloth. Whenever found out by guards, they beat and tormented her.

Dope Adi remembers that once a Chinese showed her his fat arm, cursed her and then said, �gLook at you! Compare your emaciated arm to mine! What has the Buddha given to you? Give up your Buddhism if you want to live.�h All the while this man was sitting on a thangka, a sacred icon painting that usually is mounted and hung on a wall. He used it as a seat cover.

One day during forced labor at a road construction site, Dope Adi felt that her heart would break. Before her, she saw truckload after truckload filled with Buddha statues being taken away to China, where they were to be melted down for use in industry. For many days, she witnessed this sacrilege and silently wept; she thought the end had really come for Tibet.

In Tibet, high monks are called Rinpoche (precious one) and they are highly revered for their learning, wisdom and holiness. Adi was shocked and horrified by the Chinese who systematically persecuted and tormented the Rinpoches. Cruel acts were performed against them as a kind of �gritual�h to show the Tibetans that such men were worthless and powerless.

One day Adi and other prisoners were taken to an area where high monks were forced to hold hammers in their handcuffed hands, while guns pointed at their heads. They were made to smash green caterpillars one by one on a block, an act repugnant and unthinkable for religious men, who honoured and protected all life.

A monk was made to crawl about on his hands and knees with a straw bridle in his month, carrying a woman on his back. Later it became known that this woman had gone crazy and had started to drink her own urine and paint her face with her own excrement. Everyone saw this as retribution for ridiculing the monk.

Sometimes the Chinese urinated on meditating monks, even forced monks and nuns to copulate in public, thus humiliating them to an unspeakable degree. All this was done to break the spirit of the Tibetans, destroy the religion and force the people to accept communism. The Chinese showed no mercy.

Severe oppression started towards the end of the 1950s, long before the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution in 1966. While Tibet underwent such nightmares, the Dalai Lama, who escaped to India in 1959, continued to preserve the Buddhist faith and teachings. This proved to be immeasurable support for the people of Tibet.

At the end of our talk, Kelsang said, �gBy escaping, I am worried about the danger I have put my family in, but as long as Tibet is not free I do not think about going back, nor do I have a place to return to. When I think of the Chinese who have treated me so cruelly, I cannot help but feel very sad for them. In prison, when I could not sleep from the torture, many times I thought of the terrible karma they would have to carry into their next lives. If I was reborn and became one of them�cthe thought was very frightening.�h

From the book,Tibet,published by Shambala, 1995.