We woke up as early as usual. Everyone here at the school was rushing and informing us of plans. The plan was for all of us faculty, monks, and Emory study abroad students to go the Tibetan Children's Village ( http://www.tcv.org.in/ ) in McLeodganj to hear His Holiness present his final teaching of three planned for our stay. This particular teaching was the only one we were all able to go to because we have been working... PLUS- it was the first official graduation ceremony for the 5th year monks in our class! It was a monumental day in the program for this reason.
I kinda didn't know what was going on... or how big of a deal this whole program is... now I do.
We arrived via taxi to the auditorium wayyy early. So we spent out time chillin' in front of the building watching all the chaos unfold as the leaders of the whole shebang tried to pull everything together. I was starting to get the the idea that this was a bigger deal than I had thought, even though I knew it was pretty huge to begin with.
We stood there with our badges for an hour, I think. Most of the time I was watching a skinny white man with HUGE earphones, black dentist face mask, and winter jacket meditate (I guess) while standing in front of the building. I was anxious looking at him. If he were doing that in an airport- he would have been arrested immediately. But in this case, everyone just watched and pondered. Eventually opened his eyes and walked over to the door where two men stood with machine guns. And started the ritual again. Right next to the back entrance to the stage. Suspicious. I felt like a complete jerk daydreaming that he were hired by someone to... I mean. I dunno. That jacket was big. Ya'll know I've been sweating. Just, suspicious. (now I feel like a jerk again)
Finally we walk in through the metal detector and onto the stage. We walked single-file to our cushions on the floor on stage left. The audience was unbelievable. Completely huge. Thousands of Tibetan students sat looking at us in their uniforms. I looked up to see the Emory students in the back looking down at us. As I looked down while walking to my cushion I saw our monk students looking up at me from the front row. I smiled big and waved. They are so cute.
We sat...
Across from us on the other side of the stage sat other monks and teachers. In the center of the stage sat a throne obviously meant for His Holiness. The throne has a side table with flowers and a stack of fruits. Finally, my eyes fell upon his holiness. (that sounded dramatic)
He sat in front of a desk with his back to the students in the audience. I could see him well. He was practicing his teaching. After about 10 minutes, He rang a bell, the room fell silent, and he moved to his throne.
Then, he spoke in Tibetan for about an hour. We all had little radios with earphones so that we could hear real-time translation. The translation/radio sucked butt. Nonetheless, I sat listening and trying to piece together the few sentences I actually caught. Luckily we were all given books too. The book was what the teachings were based off of. I will spare you the little details. Also, I will spare you the summary of the teaching... but only because I have no summary.... I really didn't get it. He started where we left off from the previous day, in Tibetan, with horrible translation, about things that I just don't really know about. Just being honest. But I listened. The things I did grasp were inspiring enough for a small capacity peasant like me.
He was a great speaker.
After the teaching was completed we began the graduation ceremony. The Tibetan organizer of the program (ETSI) spoke a few words, the Vice President accredited with the start of the program (who I'm just not particularly fond of) spoke some words (that were so typical and faux-inspiring and I just didn't really like him) about how he is just so happy for the success of the program (but mainly his personal success, I'm sure). Then other things happened and people talked and the monks came up on stage to receive their diplomas. All of the graduated shook His Holiness's hand and received a blessed white scarf called a 'khata'. I researched these before I came to India... so I was like all jealous and wanted one. Oh it was just inspiring. So that was the end of the ceremony. Then we left.
JUST KIDDING!
THEEEENNNNN someone else gave a speech about the importance of teachers or something... I can't remember because I was becoming severely anxious about what was about to happen. The spoke. And then... we were called to the front of the stage to receive our own khatas...
Ouch, I will never forget the feeling I had when we were called up. At first, I wouldn't stand. I didn't think I was supposed to because I was just the TA. So I sat, and Dad insisted I stand to walk up there... but jesus, Dad usually doesn't know what's going on. What if I walked up there and they only had enough scarves for the teachers?! Disaster! But Dad made me stand. I felt like falling. I felt uncomfortable and like I wasn't supposed to be there. This was more stressful than the feeling of meeting Colbie Caillat, Jason Reeves, Nelly Furtado, and The Weeknd all at once.. and equivalent to meeting all 5 of the Spice Girls for lunch. I was about to cry. But I walked up. I don't remember who was standing next to him or who whispered to him over my shoulder saying "the assistant" to introduce me... but I remember him placing the khata over my neck and shaking my hand and looking at me in the face.
And so that was that.
We returned to our seats and he spoke for a while in Tibetan, but then he summarized in English what he had said. He inspired the crap out of me to study hard. That's all I can really muster up to say about that.
I didn't wanna talk to anyone after the ceremonies. I kept telling Dad to shut up. I just needed to chill and think for a while. Look, I'm not a hardcore Buddhist. I'm not religious at all, we all know that. I don't get starstruck badly ever. And I'm normally a very calm person when it comes to serious situations. But something about this situation was different. This man is an idol humanitarian. I don't really wanna go much further into this for fear of not doing a good enough job at it.
Then we left. And ate lunch. And shopped for hours. And had an average day.
(This is too long to edit tonight. Goodnight.)
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