Audience with His Holiness

Ok, finally. Drumroll. Bapabapa. Here is the story of the audience with His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama.

So as you read in my last post, most of the day was about waiting for things. We waited an hour to get into the palace, we all sat down after rigorous security checks and wait for His Holiness to enter for maybe even two hours. As we entered the room we received another khata! There is a special way to fold a khata, so a monk showed me how. The Associated Press from Delhi had two camera men situated in the room. I instantly found them annoying. AP also had one interviewer/head hancho situated in the front too. Tim Sullivan. I was even worse annoyed with him. So, whatever. I was in the second row, dead center. Lena (the not-Korean) calculated that I was probably 12-15 feet away from the chair His Holiness would sit in. I sat and waited for basically 5 days in that chair, meanwhile- His Holiness The Vice President of Emory, his daughter, his wife and several other people were missing. We decided they were probably somewhere having a private meeting with the Dalai Lama (this was confirmed later). So we just sat, like I said.
We were in the front row of the crowd because the VIPs weren't seated- so I got a perfect view of the most vigilant security guard I have EVER seen. He was super cute, might I add, so he couldn't be harmful. Uh, yeah, just kidding- this man looked like the boss of all bosses. He stood, wearing a plaid shirt (probs from Rue 21) in a listening pose; feet spread should-width apart, leaning forward slightly, head tilted somewhat to his right to allow his left ear to have optimal hearing capabilities. He held a walkie-talkie with both hands right in front of his sternum. His hands never moved from that position. His head never moved. He was a statue... Expect for his eyes. His eyes darted around the room to follow the sounds his left ear was detecting. He was strong-looking. I'm going to shop at Rue 21 more. We made eye contact a lot. It made me scared. He was looking for threats or suspicious behaviors. I felt like eye contact was definitely suspicious. Sorry!

We also saw men with machine guns out the windows. Watch out.

This blog post is not about security man in plaid, it's about the Dalai Lama. He entered the room after about a month WITH the VIPs!! So they sat down in front of us. I was right in front of him. Well, actually Gary Hawk and his wife were directly in front of him, but my head was centered right in between theirs- so I had a clear/perfect view. Gary Hawk is accredited with all the success of this program because he started it. His wife is just his wife. So, His Holiness, I feel, was mostly looking at them two right in front of me... However *big smile* ... In order for His Holiness to switch from looking at Gary to the Wife- His eyes had to have seen mine in between theirs. #LiterallyWinning

So now I will get to the serious part. Boy, I was scribbling notes like a drunk bat during the whole talk, so here are my notes:
(things in "" are direct quotes as I noted them.)
- He has been interested in science since childhood.
-he insists that Buddhism teaches lessons based on facts.
- commented negatively on atomic bombs in Japan, "very very terrible"
- "we need serious effort to fix violence."
-"prayer is not the answer...prayer is for self. Action is solution."
- mentioned that prayer used to fix world violence is "wishful thinking". He giggled at that concept several times. He told a story about being at a big conference in Japan where people were talking about praying for solutions. He said when it was his turn to talk- he said he wasn't going to pray. He said he was gonna talk about solutions.
- "prayer will never bring world peace"
- stated that if we had been using all the money we'd used on weapons for agriculture and such things... That we would be experiencing positive effects right now.
- "religious reaching failed at bringing world peace," then suggested we try a different approach that appeals to everyone at one time.
- emphasized over and over that we are all born with the capabilities to be a loving and caring and compassionate person... But something goes wrong. We need to use science and other techniques to harness the innate goodness we all have. (basically that sums it up. He said it so much better though)
- said it is our responsibility to build right now for the generations to come.
- predicted that in the future we will not have a military for each country, but instead> regional militaries... Like one military for Asia, one for Europe and so on. Fun fact.
- other than that, he really inspired all of us, I think. It's just inspiring to hear someone with so much positivity and hope talk about the future. Again, I don't wanna get into it and be all sappy on the Internet... But this was pretty important to me.



So afterwards, the AP guy asked a really lame question about nothing and didn't show any respect. Blagh.

And after THAT it was picture time. Omgomg.

Omg.

Faculty (me/us) first!!!! We all began to exit the row to the side, then move to the center where His Holiness was standing. I was in the middle of the row, of course, so some people had already hopped up on the little stage to stand next to him. I kinda lingered below looking for where I should be because obviously I am the shortest person... So I was scanning the area when I saw His Holiness reach out his arm to me. He was saying "come, come, come" as he grabbed my elbow gently and pulled me up in front of him.
Omgomg.
So I was standing to his left, but in front of him... So I looked back to make sure I wasn't blocking him, which i wasnt.. But he acknowledged what I was doing, so I turned back around to face the crowd, and hunched/squatted down just a little bit to be funny. He laughed!!!! He laughed and put both his hands on my arms, just below my shoulders, and raised me up back to normal height. He said, "hahaha, I am just a little bit taller than you!" then assured me I was fine where I was.

All I could do was smile. I didn't feel like I was going to fall down like the last time I touched him. I felt completely at ease.

And then we took pictures. Several. Until the security jumped in front us and ordered the cameras down. And that was it. We all shook his hand and thanked him. He thanked us all back. And then we left.

We had tea and picked up our items we had blessed by Hi Holiness.
And the rest of the day was was just boring in comparison. So that's where I will end sit.