Tag: Lhasa

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Review

To Lhasa, with Love

Book Review by Somdatta Mandal

Title: Old Lhasa: A Biography

Author: M.A. Aldrich

Publisher: Speaking Tiger Book

“Contrary to common perceptions, Lhasa is not forbidden to outsiders” – M.A.Aldrich

Old Lhasa: A Biography, (a revised edition published in 2025 for the South Asian market of a book originally published in 2023), is a voluminous 615-page book that combines historical research, travel writing, religion, and culture to offer a comprehensive account of Lhasa, the capital city of Tibet. The author, M. A. Aldrich, is a lawyer who has lived and worked in Asia since the 1990s and had earlier published books on cities like Peking and Ulaanbaatar. Written on the basis of his multiple trips to Lhasa and its surroundings (the last one as late as September 2024), he is happy to discover that Old Lhasa has stood the test of time and still accurately captures the sight, sounds, and feelings of the city and foreigners can wander about freely without a minder so long as their papers are in order. As this book slowly emerged, it grew into both a portrait of the history and culture of that city as well as a serviceable guidebook for readers who are able to go to Tibet when political and regulatory circumstances permit.

Aldrich paints an intricate portrait of Lhasa, a storied city and its history, by giving us the evolution of how the Tibetan script came to be, with inspiration from ancient India and at the same time livens up the narrative with humorous anecdotes, interesting legends and charming fables that makes this book blend many genres into one. Divided into 49 chapters and enriched with several maps and black and white photographs, the chronological narration rightfully begins with the first chapter titled ‘Prelude to Lhasa’ where we are told that with Lhasa as the geographical focal point of their faith, Tibetans believe the dharma[1] has always been connected to their country. He begins the journey in the seventh century during the final moments of the life of Buddha, mentions specific Buddhist virtues such as compassion, wisdom, and benevolent power, among other essential qualities for the path to awakening. For Tibetan followers of the dharma, the history of Tibet is the history of the Bodhisattva of Compassion, which is simultaneously woven into the story of Lhasa.

In the 1920s, when Tibet enjoyed its greatest freedom from outside interference in the modern era, Lhasa had a population of only around twenty-five thousand. It was divided into two districts: one that is now the Old Town, with its seventh-century Jokhang Temple (or, more simply, the “Jokhang,” meaning the “House of the Lord”) at its centre; and the other being Shol Village, which is at the foot of Marpo Ri (Red Mountain). These administrative districts were divided by a north-south boundary that ran through the Turquoise Bridge, another structure dating to the seventh century. The Old Town was not much larger than two- or three-square kilometers, while Shol was even tinier. The residents of Lhasa at that time took immense pride in the religious heritage of their city. Nearly every luminary in Tibetan history had come to Lhasa because of the importance of the Jokhang as the focal point from which Tibetan civilization evolved and expanded. No other city could rival it.

Lhasa grew organically outward in concentric circles. Around 1160, a monk built the Nangkhor, a pilgrim’s circuit (korlam) directly adjacent to the inner sanctum of the Jokhang, so that devotees could practice the religious ritual of circumambulation. It is from this kernel that the boundaries of Old Lhasa came into existence. By the 14th century, Lhasa was enclosed within the Barkhor, a kilometre-long korlam circling the temple and a monastery among other buildings. By the 1650s, Lhasa’s outer limits had been expanded to the Lingkhor, a ten-kilometre pilgrimage route. And so, the boundaries of the city remained until recently.

Lhasa’s significance also drew heavily upon the nearby presence of government buildings and monastic sects of learning. The Potala Palace, with its superb representation of Tibetan architecture, is a massive and dazzlingly beautiful fortress-like monastery that had been the residence of the Dalai Lama and the seat of the Tibetan government since 1648. Three monasteries outside the city were centres of the so-called Yellow Hat or Gelukpa School of Tibetan Buddhism, preserving a venerable tradition of scholasticism and monastic training that had been imported to Tibet from the universities at Nalanda, Odantapuri and Vikramshila in Northern India. Daily life in early 20th century Lhasa was mostly grounded in religion for both the laity as well as the clergy. The Lhasa calendar year revolved around a sequence of religious festivals that tracked the flow of one month into another in a never-ending cycle of faith and devotion. Though religion permeated society, Lhasa was not an “other-worldly” place. In 1951, when the People’s Liberation Army marched into Lhasa behind portraits of Chairman Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai, and Liu Shaoqi, the days of the city with its self-administered culture were numbered. During the 1959 Tibetan Uprising, the Chinese Communist Party reacted to the civil unrest as if Tibet should be taught a lesson. The Party continues to do so despite brief intermittent periods of slightly relaxed policies. Though Chinese modernity has been imported wholesale into Lhasa, the author opines that Old Lhasa is still there in its people who maintain their centuries-old faith and customs. One just needs to know where and how to look.

In the Prologue, Aldrich had confessed that this is not a “serious book” about Lhasa as the term is understood within the narrow confines of modern academia, since its objective is only to share what he had learned about Lhasa with simpaticos. His audience is the general reader or armchair traveller with a basic understanding of the tenets of Buddhism and the broad outlines of Asian history. He does not go into great depth on religious theory, and he hopes his views might also be of interest to Tibetans who have come of age in the diaspora and are curious about what a non-Tibetan thinks of this fabled city. He attempts to avoid the excessive solemnity and despair that attends much writing about Tibet. It is not that he is ignorant of ongoing atrocities and the appallingly cruel policies of the Party, but he has no doubt Tibet will have a renaissance. He opines Tibetans will overcome the current dark cycle just as they have overcome other bleak phases in their history.

In conclusion, it can be said that even after reading it thoroughly and enjoying it, this book as the author rightly states, “will nudge readers to learn more about Tibet and Tibetan culture.” Also, as Dr. Lobsong Sangay, former head of the Tibetan Government in Exile, rightfully mentions in the ‘Foreword’

, “Though the story of Tibet is an ongoing tale of tragedy, it also is a tale of the human spirit and the resilience of the Tibetan people. …this book is a window for seeking genuine access that will help you make meaningful discoveries of your own, whether you are physically travelling through the streets of Lhasa or traveling through the pages of this book far away from Lhasa.”

[1] faith

Somdatta Mandal, critic and translator, is a former Professor of English at Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan, India.

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Editorial

Storms that Rage

Storm in purple by Arina Tcherem. From Public Domain

If we take a look at our civilisation, there are multiple kinds of storms that threaten to annihilate our way of life and our own existence as we know it. The Earth and the human world face twin threats presented by climate change and wars. While on screen, we watch Gaza and Ukraine being sharded out of life by human-made conflicts over constructs made by our own ‘civilisations’, we also see many of the cities and humankind ravaged by floods, fires, rising sea levels and global warming. Along with that come divides created by economics and technology. Many of these themes reverberate in this month’s issue.

From South Australia, Meredith Stephens writes of marine life dying due to algal growth caused by rising water temperatures in the oceans — impact of global warming. She has even seen a dead dolphin and a variety of fishes swept up on the beach, victims of the toxins that make the ocean unfriendly for current marine life. One wonders how much we will be impacted by such changes! And then there is technology and the chatbot taking over normal human interactions as described by Farouk Gulsara. Is that good for us? If we perhaps stop letting technology take over lives as Gulsara and Jun A. Alindogan have contended, it might help us interact to find indigenous solutions, which could impact the larger framework of our planet. Alindogan has also pointed out the technological divide in Philippines, where some areas get intermittent or no electricity. And that is a truth worldwide — lack of basic resources and this technological divide.

On the affluent side of such divides are moving to a new planet, discussions on immortality — Amortals[1] by Harari’s definition, life and death by euthanasia. Ratnottama Sengupta brings to us a discussion on death by choice — a privilege of the wealthy who pay to die painlessly. The discussion on whether people can afford to live or die by choice lies on the side of the divide where basic needs are not an issue, where homes have not been destroyed by bombs and where starvation is a myth, where climate change is not wrecking villages with cloudbursts.  In Kashmir, we can find a world where many issues exist and violences are a way of life. In the midst of such darkness, a bit of kindness and more human interactions as described by Gower Bhat in ‘The Man from Pulwama’ goes some way in alleviating suffering. Perhaps, we can take a page of the life of such a man. In the middle of all the raging storms, Devraj Singh Kalsi brings in a bit of humour or rather irony with his strange piece on his penchant for syrups, a little island removed from conflicts which seem to rage through this edition though it does raise concerns that affect our well-being.

The focus of our essays pause on women writers too. Meenakshi Malhotra ponders on Manottama (1868), the first woman-authored novel in Bengali translated by Somdatta Mandal whereas Bhaskar Parichha writes on the first feminist Odia poet, Bidyut Prabha Devi.

Parichha has also reviewed a book by another contemporary Odia woman author, Snehaprava Das. The collection of short stories is called Keep it Secret. Madhuri Kankipati has discussed O Jungio’s The Kite of Farewells: Stories from Nagaland and Somdatta Mandal has written about Chhimi Tenduf-La’s A Hiding to Nothing, a novel by a global Tibetan living in Sri Lanka with the narrative between various countries. We have an interview with a global nomad too, Neeman Sobhan, who finds words help her override borders. In her musing on Ostia Antica, a historic seaside outside Rome, Sobhan mentions how the town was abandoned because of the onset of anopheles mosquitos. Will our cities also get impacted in similar ways because of the onset of global ravages induced by climate change? This musing can be found as a book excerpt from Abiding City: Ruminations from Rome, her book on her life as a global nomad. The other book excerpt is by a well-known writer who has also lived far from where he was born, MA Aldrich. His book, From Rasa to Lhasa: The Sacred Center of the Mandala is said to be “A sweeping, magnificent biography—which combines historical research, travel-writing and discussion of religion and everyday culture—Old Lhasa is the most comprehensive account of the fabled city ever written in English.”

With that, we come to our fiction section. This time we truly have stories from around the globe with Suzanne Kamata sending a story set in the Bon festival that’s being celebrated in Japan this week for her column. From there, we move to Taiwan with C. J. Anderson-Wu’s narrative reflecting disappearances during the White Terror (1947-1987), a frightening period for people stretched across almost four decades.  Gigi Gosnell writes of the horrific abuse faced by a young Filipino girl as the mother works as a domestic helper in Dubai. Paul Mirabile gives us a cross-cultural narrative about a British who opts to become a dervish. While Hema R touches on women’s issues from within India, Sahitya Akademi Award Winner, Naramsetti Umamaheshwararao, writes a story about children.

We have a powerful Punjabi story by Ajit Cour translated by C.Christine Fair. Our translations host two contemporary poets who have rendered their own poems to English: Angshuman Kar, from Bengali and Ihlwha Choi, from Korean. Snehaprava Das has brought to us poetry from Odia by Aparna Mohanty. Fazal Baloch has translated ‘The Scarecrow’, a powerful Balochi poem by Anwar Sahib Khan. While Tagore’s Shaishabshandha (Childhood’s Dusk) has been rendered to English, Nazrul’s song questing for hope across ages has been brought to us by Professor Fakrul Alam.

Professor Alam has surprised us with his own poem too this time. In August’s poetry selection, Ron Pickett again addresses issues around climate change as does Meetu Mishra about rising temperatures. We have variety and colour brought in by George Freek, Heath Brougher, Laila Brahmbhatt, Luis Cuauhtémoc Berriozábal, Snigdha Agrawal, William Miller, Ashok Suri, Scott Thomas Outlar, Dustin P Brown, and Ryan Quinn Flanagan. Rajorshi Patranabis weaves Wiccan lore of light and dark, death and life into his delicately poised poetry. Rhys Hughes has also dwelt on life and death in this issue. He has shared poems on Wales, where he grew up— beautiful gentle lines.

 In spring warm rain will crack
the seeds of life: tangled
roots will grow free again. 

('Tinkinswood Burial Chamber' by Rhys Hughes)

With such hope growing out of a neolithic burial chamber, maybe there is hope for life to survive despite all the bleakness we see around us. Maybe, with a touch of magic and a sprinkle of realism – our sense of hope, faith and our ability to adapt to changes, we will survive for yet another millennia.

We wind up our content for the August issue with the eternal bait for our species — hope. Huge thanks to the fantastic team at Borderless and to all our wonderful writers. Truly grateful to Sohana Manzoor for her artwork and many thanks to all our wonderful readers for their time…

We wish you all a wonderful reading experience!

Gratefully,

Mitali Chakravarty.

borderlessjournal.com

[1] Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow (2015) by Yuval Noah Harari

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Excerpt

From Rasa to Lhasa

Title: From Rasa to Lhasa: The Sacred Center of the Mandala

Author: M.A.Aldrich

Publisher: Speaking Tiger Books

In 1904 at the behest of a suspicious imperial government in India, a British expeditionary force under Colonel Francis Younghusband occupied Lhasa in a fruitless search for evidence of Russian meddling in Tibetan politics. Prior to this bellicose assignment Younghusband had spent years exploring the remote, blank spaces of late nineteenth century Central Asian maps and acquiring an unusually sensitive insight into Asian religion for someone in his position. After visiting the Jokhang Temple, Tibet’s most sacred shrine, he penned a description that still resonates today.

Here it was that I found the true inner spirit of the people. The Tibetans from their mountain homes seemed here to draw on some hidden source of power. And when from the far recesses of the temple came the profound booming of great drums, the chanting of the monks in deep reverential rhythm, the blare of trumpets, the crash of cymbals, and the long rolling of lighter drums, I seemed to catch a glimpse of the source from which they drew. Music is a proverbially fitter means than speech for expressing the eternal realities; and in the deep rhythmic droning of the chants, the muffled rumbling of the drums, the loud clang and blaring of cymbals and trumpets, I realized this sombre people touching their inherent spirit, and in the way most fitted to them, giving vent to its mighty surgings panting for expression.

For Tibetans, the Jokhang Temple is at the heart of a mandala, a circular geometric design that serves as a symbol of the universe as well as a visual guide to complex and esoteric Buddhist principles. The devotional ritual of circumambulation around the temple reinforces its status as the sacred center or a “life-pole.” It is the geometric center of Lhasa’s three imaginary concentric circuits: the three korlam that are pathways for pilgrims to practice the dharma by circumambulating the Jokhang.

Eight protective shrines were built around the Jokhang. There are other nearby sites tied to the legendary account of the construction of the temple in the seventh century. Some of these sites are still used for worship, while others have become shops or residences; sadly, some have disappeared into the ether over time. The sacred and the secular were not separated in the streets of Lhasa, just as the normal and supernormal were entwined indivisibly. To expect otherwise would have come as a shock to the residents of old Lhasa and sounded downright silly to them.

For nearly all of its existence, the Jokhang Temple was Lhasa in the minds of Tibetans. Ninth-century Tang dynasty chronicles suggest Lhasa might have consisted of nothing more than mobile encampments for nobles, soldiers, and nomads, with only two permanent buildings constructed in stone (the Jokhang and its sister temple, Ramoche); but Chinese chroniclers did not always examine the ways of barbarians with much care. Lhasa did not come into being as a modest-sized city until the seventeenth century. Nevertheless, the Jokhang was felt to be synonymous with Lhasa, the “Place of the Gods.” Even in recent times the city’s bus drivers cried out “Lhasa” to their passengers to announce arrival at stops near the Jokhang Temple.

Tibetans reaffirm their view of religion as permeating all elements of the phenomenal world by perceiving them in the form of a mandala. Indeed, the mandala model applies equally to the universe as a whole, to the country, … to each city, to each temple and shrine, and, tantrically, to the worshipper’s own body. The realization of one’s own identity with these larger designs is the attainment of salvation.

ABOUT THE BOOK

A sweeping, magnificent biography—which combines historical research, travel-writing and discussion of religion and everyday culture—Old Lhasa is the most comprehensive account of the fabled city ever written in English. It is a portrait not only of a city but also an entire people—both those who still live in occupied Tibet, and those who are in exile.

‘[This book] brings you closer to the real spirit of Lhasa.’—Lobsang Sangay, former head of the Tibetan Government in Exile

‘This remarkable history should be compulsory reading for travellers, academics and armchair historians. Experts will find that Aldrich has shaken the kaleidoscope of the history and geography of Lhasa and Tibet into new and illuminating patterns. Immersing himself in the place and its past, he unravels the colourful threads that make Lhasa and Tibet so fascinating… This splendid book is a compendium of knowledge about the city and its place in Tibetan history and culture—including, of course, religion.’—Alan Babington-Smith, President of the Royal Asiatic Society, Beijing

‘Aldrich has provided in these pages a whole simulacrum of a country and its wonders. What shines in the book and gives it life is not only his amazing knowledge and understanding of Lhasa and Tibet but also his passion, enormous humour and, above all, love for its people.’—Adam Williams, author of The Palace of Heavenly Pleasure

‘Aldrich has produced an outstanding narrative focused on one of the most interesting cultural capitals in Asia… [A] fascinating history that will continue to attract readers for a long time to come.’—Jonathan S. Addleton, author of The Dust of Kandahar

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

M.A. Aldrich is a lawyer and author who has lived and worked in Asia since the 1990s. Besides Old Lhasa: A Biography, he is the author of The Search for a Vanishing Beijing: A Guide to China’s Capital Through the Ages,The Perfumed Palace: Islam’s Journey from Mecca to Peking and Ulaanbaatar—Beyond Water and Grass: A Guide to the Capital of Mongolia.

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Review

Little, Lhasa, Shangrila and More in the Heart of India

Books Reviewed by Somdatta Mandal

Titles: Little Lhasa: Reflections in Exiled Tibet and Tibetan Suitcase

Author: Tsering Namgyal Khortsa

Publisher: Speaking Tiger Books

Following the forced escape of His Holiness the Dalai Lama in March 1959, thousands of Tibetans were forced to flee Tibet, and it was these refugees who formed the early exiled community. The refugee community now stands at a figure of around 130,000, with Tibetans spread across numerous settlements in India, Nepal and Bhutan, and thousands more displaced all around the world. The Tibetan government in exile is based in Dharamsala, India. It is called the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) and was founded in 1959 by the 14th Dalai Lama. In the 1980s, a second wave of Tibetans fled due to political repression. The CTA advocates for human rights, self-determination, and the preservation of religion and culture for Tibetans. The CTA has a parliament, judiciary, and executive branch and its principles include truth, non-violence, and genuine democracy. The Dalai Lama has said that the exile administration would be dissolved as soon as freedom is restored in Tibet.

After over seventy years of being in exile, a whole generation of Tibetans have come of age in a land far from home. With the Dalai Lama and other great masters as their spiritual guides, they have grown up cut off from their homeland. Their experiences have been unique, as they have, despite globalization, kept alive their religion and culture. In Little Lhasa: Reflections in Exiled Tibet, Tsering Namgyal Khortsa writes comprehensively about the different aspects of their life today. Comprising of ten essays and six interviews, this volume becomes an eye-opener on the multifarious aspects of the present situation of Tibetans at large. Beginning with different writers writing about Tibet and exile in the very first essay titled ‘Little Lhasa’, the next one ‘Shangrila Online’ tells us about the role of social media, internet cafes and how technology in remote Dharamsala often enables one to participate in other people’s experiences in real time. The writer describes in detail how such lifestyle changes in contemporary times have enabled the creation of a “virtual Tibet”. In the next essay ‘Buddha’s Children’, Khortsa describes the young generation of exiled children in India and how their religious identity has triumphed over all other identities. We are also told about the different kinds of foreigners who come to India to take religious courses, and the writer wonders whether they go home feeling merely inspired by their visit to India and their meetings with Tibetan masters or whether such exposure and experience actually triggers a paradigm shift in the way they view the world.  

In the next essay we are told how Tibetans lead demonstrations in Dharamsala and other parts of India every year, especially the one held on March 10th  that commemorates the anniversary of the failed uprising against Chinese invasion. ‘Movies and Meditation’ mentions a film festival in Dharamsala which reveals how recent Tibetan films highlight a growing and vibrant filmmaking community within the Tibetan diaspora, but Khortsa laments the paucity of full-length films about Tibetans in exile and the issues they confront, namely patriotism, individualism, and reconciliation of personal fulfilment with the Tibetan cause. The titles of the three following essays, ‘Dharma Talk’, ‘The Lure of India’ and ‘The Monk at Manali’ are self-explanatory. The last essay of this section ‘Nation of Stories’ tells us about writers who write and publish in the English language, and though diverse in terms of their education, upbringing, background and geographical location, one common condition that they all share is the collective trauma of the Chinese occupation of Tibet, which is invariably a leitmotif in Tibetan literature.

Part Two consists of six interviews, each one different in perspective than the other, and they must be mentioned here to understand the kaleidoscopic nature of the people involved in the Tibetan cause. Thus, we have conversations with Lisa Gray as ‘A Western Buddhist’, Ananda Nand Agnihotri as ‘An Indian Tibetan Buddhist,’ Ngawang Woeber, ‘An Ex-Political Prisoner’, Nyima Dhondup, ‘A Swiss Tibetan’, Tenzing Sonam, ‘A Tibetan Writer and Filmmaker’ and Tenphun, ‘The Tibetan Poet’. All in all, Little Lhasa becomes a valuable record of the life of a people who refuse to bow down or forget, and even while adapting to a rapidly changing world, continue to nurture their roots.

II

After the non-fiction, Tsering Namgyal Khortsa comes up with a brilliant piece of fiction and read together, each text complements the other beautifully. In the ‘Editor’s Note’ at the very beginning of the novel Tibetan Suitcase, Tsering Namgyal Khortsa tells us that while he was working as a business journalist in Hong Kong he once ran into Dawa Tashi, an old acquaintance and an aspiring novelist from Dharamsala, India who was working as a meditation teacher and was quite busy with his job. He had a suitcase full of letters and documents and wanted him to turn the contents of the suitcase into a book. After going through the collection, Khortsa discovered that the contents of the suitcase, if organized with care and discipline, could indeed make for an epistolary novel. So, he declares that except for correcting a few typos here and there and add note and datelines to the letters, he had not done anything. He also categorically states, “None of the letters are mine, except some entries that I wrote, making the book partly fictionalized.” He also wanted to leave room for readers to imagine (or ‘feel’ for themselves) what is not mentioned in the book, in deference to the Tibetan culture of reticence and taciturnity, rather than turning himself into an all-knowing chatterbox.

Tibetan Suitcase is a remarkable novel about the peripatetic Tibetan community in exile. It is divided into six parts, beginning roughly from 1995 to 2000. It opens in Hong Kong where a tycoon Peter Wong opens a meditation centre and employs Dawa Tashi, our protagonist as a meditation teacher and a guru, though he is not really trained to be a lama. Dawa Tashi is an India-born Tibetan. His parents fled Tibet when the Chinese invaded, and Dawa has grown up in the quiet, verdant Indian Himalayas. When Dawa applies to a well-known university in America (Appleton University in Wisconsin) to pursue a course in creative writing, his hitherto ordinary life changes dramatically. At the university he befriends, and falls in love with, Iris Pennington, an unusual American student who is studying Buddhist literature. He also comes in contact with Khenchen Sangpo, a renowned scholar of Buddhism and a reincarnated Rinpoche himself. Circumstances lead Dawa back to India too soon, but the connections he makes take his life into many new directions. Some, with Iris and Khenchen, take him deeper into the mystical and mysterious world of Buddhist scholarship. Other journeys take him back to his roots, making him question his life’s directions.

Apart from the interesting incidents and characters we meet in the first four parts of the novel, Part Five is an exceptionally engrossing to read. Beginning with the reportage in the Fall Issue of the journal Meridian, which is edited by Brent Rinehart, we are told that on his seventy-ninth birthday Khenchen decided that he had to go back to Tibet to see his native land. Having gained a quick residency status in the United States, and possessing an American passport, Khenchen still had many relatives in Tibet, some of them quite alive and well, despite the Chinese occupation. He travels to Lhasa in 1996 and goes for a trip to Lake Manasarovar but things take a different turn when he is arrested by the Chinese authority because he was apparently “endangering national security”. What follows are different press releases from the US Statement Department, reports from the International Association of Tibetan Studies in London, address by the President of Appleton University and as Iris writes to Dawa, she never expected herself to be so politically involved and “did not realize Tibet was such a political subject”. It was ironic that one of the world’s most spiritual places was one of its most burning political issues. Tibet might be a small place, but it has a reasonably big space in the collective consciousness of the world. Of course, Khenchen Sangpo is ultimately released and without disclosing the actual ending of the novel, which in a circular fashion ends in Hong Kong from where it began, many loose ends are tied up and life came to a full circle for everybody, especially for Iris Pennington who finally managed to find her roots.

Both the non-fiction and the fiction book by Tsering Namgyal Khortsa prove to be eye-openers for all readers who have very little knowledge about the sorrow and plight of the uprooted Tibetans who live in exile and many of whom do not even have a country to call their own. Based in Dehradun, India at present, Khortsa’s narratives are so powerful that it has aptly prompted Speaking Tiger Books to reprint the updated versions of both the books in 2024 and one can call it a yeoman service to readers both serious and casual. A must read.

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Somdatta Mandal, critic and translator, is a former Professor of English at Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan, India.

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Categories
Essay

The Magic Dragon: Cycling for Peace

It’s been five years since the American cyclist ‘Hutch’ died, yet his message of peace remains, as Keith Lyons remembers the global citizen who challenges us all to live life to its fullest

In early 2019, having not heard from an old friend ‘Hutch’ for a few weeks, I learnt that the American I’d first met in China has died of natural causes at his new humble home in the mountains of Greece. He was almost 80 years old.

There’s nothing extraordinary about living until your late 70s. Or relocating to live the last years of your life in a warmer place. But Hutch was not your ordinary septuagenarian retiree. Nor was he a typical American. Though when I first heard about him in 2009, it was when a German friend staying with me in southwest China had come across a sign on the wall of an Italian restaurant in Lijiang, Yunnan, seeking fellow cyclists for day trips around the area. The deal was, go on a ride with Hutch and other cyclists, and he would pay for lunch or dinner. “So how was he?” I asked my friend about the organiser, who had a website promoting world peace. “American, very American,” she replied. I was intrigued by this.

But it wasn’t till another month or so that our paths crossed, and I met him in a café with a gaggle of others: locals, Chinese youngsters who had moved to Yunnan province, and some foreigners.

Hutch was treating them all to drinks and pizza. I found out later, he bought bikes for some ride participants who became his friends. That’s the kind of person he was. 

Hutch was not a tall man in stature, and the cycling obviously kept him very fit, I noted on first meeting him. He wore lycra cycling gear, a neck scarf and bandana, and had a gentle face, with a bright eyes and a benign smile. He was polite, and entertaining, and clearly enjoyed the carbo-loading pizza as much as the entourage, made up of English-speaking Chinese who ranged from their 20s to 40s.

He invited me to join them, as after pizza, there was going to be cake and dessert. He got up to shake my hand, and I noticed he was wearing cycling shorts, with spindly yet muscle-toned legs.

Having set up his new China base in the mountain town where I’d been living since the mid-200s, I got to know him over drinks, meals, outings and adventures. Mr F. A. Hutchinson (I never knew what those initials stood for) acquired names in each country where he stayed – Haqi in China, Nima (meaning ‘sun’) in Tibet, Hache in Bolivia. At one stage he was signing off his emails with ’The Magic Dragon’, his serpent name. ‘Or just call me a bum on a bike’, was tagged to the end of his signature. I just knew him as Hutch. 

Generous and giving, sometimes overly generous, he also adopted adult children, accumulating a family of daughters and sons in China during his half decade living in Xining and Lijiang. While his trusted bike, Ms.Fetes, was loaded with pannier bags front and back, he didn’t carry much baggage from his past, which had seen him serve in Vietnam, work for decades in TV sports production in the US, and establish a talent development agency in China in 2007. 

Over the couple of years I knew him in Lijiang I can only recall a few occasions when he was not sporting padded cycling shorts. More often than not he turned up to cafe, meeting and events on his bicycle, sometimes not bothering to take off his cycling helmet indoors. 

That cycle helmet proved its value one day when we were out cycling in the hills to an alpine lake around 2,600 m above sea level not far from LIjiang. Hutch was a cyclist with remarkable stamina, and his slow and steady approach could burn off others 40 years his junior on hill climbs. While Hutch had cycled all over China for a number of years, without major incident or accident — a fact which impressed all who inquired about the safety and sanity of cycling in The Middle Kingdom — while out with me he broke that 100% safety record. Coming down a winding hill late one afternoon the wheels of his bike skidded on icy gravel and he ended up falling off his bike, a large truck behind him putting on its brakes just in time to avoid running him over. Worried he was requiring an ambulance or hospital treatment, I rushed over to Hutch to find him un-fazed by it all. He cycled back to where he was living, and tried to tend to his battered and bloody knees, elbows and hands himself, a wry smile over his beard-stubbled face. 

One of Hutch’s most impressive achievements in China was to cycle from Lijiang across Tibet to Lhasa and onto Mt Kailas, a feat made more incredible by the challenges and dynamics of a group ride (participants from several countries included Elvis), and then the breakaway split by some cyclists which jeopardized the whole mission. I helped with some of the logistics during the year-long adventure, but am still in awe of anyone who can cycle for weeks at altitudes over 4,000 metres across the Tibetan plateau. The tale of the 70-year-old American who cycled across China to Tibet made newspaper headlines, and he featured on the front cover of cycling and outdoor magazines. We gave him a hero’s welcome when he returned to Lijiang, his story still told by expats and locals living in north-west Yunnan. 

As well as his cycling pilgrimage to the holy mountain of Tibet, we worked on a housing project for small Tibetan-style eco-houses with wind and solar energy made for US$10,000. In Lijiang, he helped his friend Irlin set up a small eatery (possibly to ensure he had a reliable supply of Western food), and he was a regular visitor to my café, ‘Lijiang Millionaire’s Club’, and the crosstown cafe (and tango dance studio), ‘Over the Bridge’, run by fellow New Zealander, Stephen Dalley. 

After Hutch’s years in China, he was ready for a change. Increasingly worried about the Chinese government’s clampdowns on freedom of speech, his frustrations spilled over from the anonymous government to the Chinese people. He often carried a green canvas shoulder bag with the words in Mandarin of Chairman Mao ‘Serve the People’ — and found occasion to show that to shopkeepers, bank clerks, ticket sellers or government officers — anyone who was stonewalling him or telling him ‘mei you’ (don’t have). 

Perhaps inspired by the practical and easy-going nature of Kiwis, Hutch was looking forward to heading to New Zealand, where he already had a number of contacts. After Lijiang, he went to Australia, New Zealand, and then to South America, before moving to Europe a few years ago to live in Spain, Germany and Greece. 

He was on a personal crusade, to promote peace and understanding, and wanted to get more people on bicycles, by holding inclusive, inexpensive cycle tours. “One of our slogans, Burn Fat, Not Oil,” he wrote.

One of Hutch’s key talents was to enlist others to join, and get them working together, even though he admitted he didn’t like groups. However, the laziness or greediness of others sometimes meant that his efforts floundered into anarchy and stagnation.

While often on the move, Hutch wasn’t a ‘rolling stone gathering no moss’ kind of person. Instead, he acquired more friends everywhere he went. I never saw him play the age card, but enjoyed hearing his wisdom acquired from a long and interesting life. He had some strong opinions on various subjects. Once you met Hutch and he got your contact details, it was like being on an email subscription list you could not get off. A few times I got fed up with the email exchanges, not so much from Hutch, but from some of his old American friends, and despite requests to opt out, found myself back on the list a few months later.

Taoist Hutch believed we needed to change the world, and to change ourselves. He quoted Mahatma Gandhi on his site: “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.”

He rallied against capitalism, materialism, money and greed. He complained about how money was god, the world was going mad, and against the failures of democracy with widespread corruption of its leaders. One year his favourite slogan was, “We have met the enemy, and he/she is us.”

Hutch urged ‘women of the world to unite’. He was impressed by former New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern, often sending me links to news articles about her, but he was not so favourable about Myanmar’s leader Aung Sun Suu Kyi and her lack of response to ethnic cleansing, telling me, “I am starting to really dislike this woman.”

He called for urgent measures to address what he saw as the biggest and most unrecognised problem facing the human race: over-population. Each day he posted comments with news articles under the title ‘Pathology in America’, or with his take on issues, written in upper case: SLEAZE-BAG TRUMP’S AMERICA. He cursed wrongdoers, and hoped they would face the consequences. ‘WOE BE UNTO TRUMP FO ALL THIS! MAY ALL THE 7 DEPREDATIONS, FULL UPON HIM AND HIS CHILDREN’S CHILDREN, FOR 7 GENERATIONS’1, he penned recently after a second child died in government custody at the US border. 

Sometimes his missives were written as poems or as cryptic riddles. Likewise, he was prepared to consider other views, new information or the different opinions of those better informed, and he would figuratively smoke the peace pipe.

Hutch did occasionally like to smoke a pipe, not with tobacco but with the ‘happy baccy’. (Indeed, today there’s an article in Scientific American suggesting THC in marijuana may boost rather than dull the elderly brain).

“As I get older, I seek peace and tranquillity,” he wrote in one of his emails to me. “What has been important to me is a different life, one seeking answers to the riddle of life.” In another he sent last year, he said he was getting closer. “Closer to what? The peace of mind of having overcome materialism.” In another email he wrote “at this age, we take life one day at a time”.

He wrote latterly that he had wanted to live in Meteora in Greece, having fantasised about it while in Germany, visiting his long-time friend and patron, Rucha. The rock formation in central Greece has a stunning hillside Eastern Orthodox monastery, second in importance only to Mount Athos. Almost prophetically, he said recently, “We never know when our time has come, so better to act Now!”

On Christmas Eve last year, after a good day out cycling around Meteora, the 78-year-old wrote a poem which started:

What a cycling day this has been,
What a rare mood I’m in
Being the Light
Screaming Delight. . . .

It was in the small town of Kalampaka near Meteora where Hutch died, around 2 January 2019 — according to his close friend Xu Tan — after coming down with a bad cold a few days before. He was cremated at the base of the Meteora rocks. 

“I’m not much big on ‘goodbyes’,” Hutch posted as he left Australia in late 2011 on his way to New Zealand. “I usually slip out the back, Jack . . . get a new plan, Stan — and basically get myself down the road.”

“There is no reason to be sad when someone dies and sheds their body,” he said. “In fact, we should celebrate such a transition.” 

After learning of his death, many candles were lit in memory of Hutch, in China, Australia, New Zealand, South America, in Europe, in the USA — all around the world, a remembrance and celebration of that cranky, freewheeling legend, as he cycled over the hill into the sunset, and into a brand new dawn.

And five years later, we still remember the man and his message.

Photo provided by Keith Lyons
  1. These are authorial comments retained for colour but do not reflect the stand of Borderless Journal ↩︎

Keith Lyons (keithlyons.net) is an award-winning writer and creative writing mentor originally from New Zealand who has spent a quarter of his existence living and working in Asia including southwest China, Myanmar and Bali. His Venn diagram of happiness features the aroma of freshly-roasted coffee, the negative ions of the natural world including moving water, and connecting with others in meaningful ways. A Contributing Editor on Borderless journal’sEditorial Board, his work has appeared in Borderless since its early days, and his writing featured in the anthology Monalisa No Longer Smiles.

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Categories
Stories

Lunch with Baba Rinpoche in Kathmandu

A fiction by Steve Davidson

Like most people, I had always been fascinated by the ‘Celebrated Wisdom of the East’.  Especially exotic was the ‘Ultra Mysterious Wisdom of Tibet’.  So, when a university acquaintance in British Columbia mentioned that, through a personal connection, he could set up a meeting in Kathmandu with one of the most storied of all the lamas, Baba Rinpoche, I rose to the challenge. 

As was his wont, in the springtime, Baba Rinpoche would be walking across the Himalayas, from Tibet to Nepal.  I, being of a less transcendental bent, would be flying into Darjeeling, then taking a helicopter, Riddington’s Ride, into Kathmandu. 

We connected for lunch at the Lama’s Lair, a miniature version of the Potala Palace in Lhasa, sat near the fire, and dined on vindaloo curry over basmati rice, with green tea.  Baba Rinpoche is about five foot eight, lean, with a shaved head, and was wearing Ugg boots (“One must keep up with the times”), and a thick maroon robe.  He moved with ineffable grace, spoke with excellent diction, seemed to have a permanent facial expression of subtle joy, and altogether radiated the cheerful serenity of perfect self-control.  I was struck by the ultimate logic of his communication, then recalled that he had been a philosophy student at a highly regarded English university prior to the unfortunate incursion from Beijing, when he returned home to provide his people moral support.

When we met, he pressed his hands together, bowed, and said, “May peace be with you”.  I asked him if that were a standard Buddhist greeting, and he said, “No, but, although I am a good man, I am my own man!”  Pious, but a perky personality turned out to be part of his charm.

BR:  Now, I understand you would like to investigate the obscure and storied “Wisdom of the East”.  From that, I assume, you will essay to deduce lessons for good living in the West.  I am not certain I am a repository for any knowledge you do not already possess.  Nonetheless, I will be happy to respond to your questions with . . . something. 

However, as I am a Tibetan monk, you must be prepared that some of my answers will in fact be . . . nothing.  Silence. 

Validating, I suppose, your initial premise of impenetrable Oriental mystery!  But this is our Way.  Take it or leave it!

Now, what may I tell you? 

I:  I really only have one question.

BR:  And what is that? 

I:  Buddhists world-wide revere life itself.  And that includes all the animals.  But most

people feel that the only animals that really count are us.  How do you explain your reverence for all life?

BR:  Scaling.

I:  Scaling? 

BR: “Let us go then, you and I”, to quote Eliot, that American, who became a Brit, and then became a citizen of the world, a refugee of the wasteland, a wanderer in the rose garden of the mind.  Where was I?  Oh, yes.  “Let us go then, you and I”, onto the plains of the Oriental intellect.  Then let us go and make our visit to the room where the women come and go, speaking of the mystical Dao.  Let us be prophets in our own land.

I:  I think I already may have had too much green tea.

BR:   Not possible.  Now, one of the reasons Eastern thought seems obscure, not to say irrational, to Westerners is that Western thought is narrow, focused, and concrete, whereas eastern thought is broad. holistic, and abstract.  Western thought was born on the Island of Samos, a small place, with many rocks.  Eastern thought was born on the Gobi Desert, a large place, with much open sky.  That scaling of geography emerges, like Houdini from an iron box, in the scaling of thought.

I:  I am completely lost!  And here I expected to go to all this trouble and at last nail down Eastern thought.  But it’s already completely out of reach!

BR:  Not to fret.  You see, that is the first thing I told you—be at peace!  Does a lotus flower worry if the Royal Orient Train will be on schedule?  Does a perfect piece of jade brood as to whether anyone influential is admiring it? 

We all have our place, and that place is here.  We all have our time, and that time is now.  We all have our person, and that person is us.  Our most precious possession is our minds, and our minds are always present.  Thus, we are secure.  So, be of good cheer!

Logic is hard to master, yet terribly basic.  But the logic of scaling is not so complicated.  You’ll get it.

I:  I’m going to have to take your word for it! 

BR:  You see.  We’re already making progress!  Consider Genghis Khan. 

I:  I’m lost again.

BR:  Though no one in the West wants to admit it, Genghis Khan conquered the world. Nobody beat the terrible khan. 

Think about this.  One yurt, perfectly arranged, with military precision.  One cavalryman, a masterful rider.  Dead shot with bow and arrow.  Comfortable in all kinds of weather.  Tough as a piece of iron.  Dedicated to the leader, and instantly responsive to commands.

Multiply that by two hundred thousand.  Now you have a crack force that can level cities from the Yellow Sea to the Danube River.

That’s scaling.  

I:  I think I have had too much, or not enough, vindaloo curry.  Maybe I should have had a hot dog.

BR:  Enlightenment ever calls for patience.

Now, consider this.  The Great Wisdom, which created the World, wants to create Life.  The skies are in place.  The mountains are in place.  The seas are in place.  But it would be nice to have some company.  But, to build Life, a design is needed. 

I:  A blueprint?

BR:  Even so.

Of what will Life be comprised?  That is, what is the list of Qualities that go into what we think of as Life?

I:  And that is?

BR:  Perception that sketches out the nature of reality: wet and dry, hard and soft, sweet and bitter.  Interpretation of perceptions: opportunity or threat, safety or danger.   Identification and classification of pieces of reality: self or other, friend or foe, refuge or exposed field.  Causal relations: this does this, and that does that.  Social relations: this is my group, and we cooperate; that is their group, and we compete.  Planning: I will go here and do this to get that, and to avoid the other thing.  Emotions: I got what I wanted, so I feel good; I got injured, so I feel bad.

I:  Wow.  That’s a lot! 

BR:  Not so much, really.  What in logic we call necessary and sufficient.  A minimum set of Qualities necessary and sufficient to comprise what we think of as Life.  Some life ranks higher on the complexity scale, naturally, and some life ranks lower on the complexity scale.

I:  Ah, I think I may be getting this!  Life is essentially the same, up and down the scale of complexity.  The lowest level is essentially the same as the highest level. 

BR:  Even so.

I:  The dolphins are a lot like us, the whales and the orangutangs, the parrots and the jaguars, the bears and the beavers.  It’s the same basic system up and down!   The scale doesn’t change the system.  Is that right?

BR:  Precisely, exactly so.

I:  And that’s why Buddhists all over the world revere life itself, because it’s all essentially the same.  “They” are all “Us”.  “We” are all “Them”.  Is that it?

BR:  Spot on!

I:  You know, I think I might have a little more vindaloo curry and green tea.

As we stood outside the restaurant, Baba Rinpoche hitched his small blue canvas backpack onto his shoulders and looked south into the sapphire mountain sky at a distant, huge, drifting, snowy cloud, as if trying to decide whether it was going to be friendly or unfriendly.  “I am going to visit the Bodhi Tree, where Buddha found Enlightenment.  I haven’t been there in years”.  He mentioned that as casually as if he had said, “I’m going down to the market to pick up some tea”. 

“But it’s hundreds of miles to that place,” I protested.  “And you haven’t any money.”

He gave me one of those little serene smiles of his, and that placid look gazing a thousand years into the future, and said, “The world will provide”.  And off he strode, zigzagging through afternoon traffic with the grace and ease of an Olympic skater.

And he was right.  I paid for our lunch.

Guru Rinpoche (Tibetan “Precious teacher”) lived in the 8th-9th century. He was the founder of the Nyingmapa school of Buddhism in Tibet. Courtesy: Creative Commons

Steve Davidson is a psychologist from California, the author of the clinical textbook “An Introduction to Human Operations Psychotherapy”.

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Categories
Stories

The Tree of Life

A flash fiction by Parnil Yodha

Tashi was padding barefoot with his goat. The sparkling light of the progenitor of life shone on his bald skull. His maroon kasaya robe seemed like the perfect camouflage for him amidst the flaming red grove of Royal Poinciana. He observed a bumble-bee perched on a tricoloured — white, purple and yellow– flower of a wild pansy, lapping its sweet nectar, while being as clueless as the bacteria (the sole life form that inhabited the Earth for the first two billion years) that spawned the tree of life. Rapt in the splendour of that spectacle, Tashi lost control of his grip; his brown threngwa (rosary) comprising one hundred and eight beads slipped from his fingers and plopped down in a muddy puddle. His goat also yanked its leash free from his grasp.

The goat scurried off to a tree that had low hanging boughs full of green chewy leaves. Tashi lay on his back, his head reclining on his arms, in the shade of a tree whose leaves were dappled sunlight — a gas burner facilitating cooking, photo-synthetically speaking – while the goat kept pouncing at its green food. As he lay abstractedly, a rueful yearning for his homeland Tibet arrested his mind.

Tashi used to be yet another shepherd boy with a small herd of Changthangi (Pashmina) goats residing in a village of Tibet, when he came to know about His Holiness Dalai Lama leading the cause of Tibetan people in India. His parents would talk about His Holiness in whispers, wary of the Chinese officials and spies. Tashi had made up his mind to flee. But his ailing grandmother was too attached to him.

‘Chetu, I love you more than my life,’ his grandmother would say.

So, it was only after his grandmother had passed away that he fled to Lhasa. He joined the caravan of the refugees who were going to India via Nepal. A hundred people including children were led by two guides to Nepal from Lhasa on foot. They walked at night and hid behind the rock-mountains during the day. It was chilly; all they had was a gray sky overhead and the snow-capped mountains around. The harsh wind would bite them without mercy.  One night was so chilly that Tashi thought he would die!

Nevertheless, they would doze off during respite-breaks at night, due to exhaustion. The travellers would lie alone shivering at times, whereas snuggle up to each other to share body heat at other times. The travellers would sometimes quarrel over petty issues with one another, like who would occupy the best spot to rest first. The guides would desperately try to mediate. After about one month of endless walking, the caravan reached the Tibetan Reception Centre in Nepal, from where it was led to Dharamshala, India after the grant of the necessary clearance.

Shortly, Tashi’s eyelids got top heavy and dropped shut like, the magnetic door of a refrigerator. He saw a majestic, semi-arid expanse with steep-sided mountain ranges and two-horned, densely furred Tibetan yaks. A bright yet balmy white light dazzled his eyes. He shrouded his eyes partly with the back of his right hand, and began to peep through the gap between his fingers, looking for the source of the light. He raised his foot to walk towards the light, but as he raised his foot, he felt something tugging at it: a sleek, jet black snake had coiled itself around his leg, like a metallic foot cuff. While he grappled to free his leg, he saw his grandmother’s face – a childlike smile on a sallow face. He yanked his leg free. Soon, everything went black.

When the darkness dissipated, Tashi saw himself sailing in the air, stiff as a log. When he edged closer, he saw a pocket-clock dangling around his neck with its hands moving anticlockwise. With a jolt, his stiff self started up like a car engine, and was soon trundling in reverse gear. As this mid-air journey proceeded, his body began transforming itself into an antelope, then a golden retriever, then a Banyan tree, then a fern and in the end, he became as minuscule as an atom. He ground to a halt. He looked around; it was an eerie landscape, rather a moonscape, with whitish-grey pumice plains and dark greyish-black basalt rocks. There was no sign of life yet. Far ahead, he saw a towering volcano, throwing up sizzling lava and darkening the sky above it, too ready to cool its lava down into crystals by dropping the slimy mass into the lake below formed from a melted glacier.

A rumbling thunder roused Tashi from his marvelled slumber. Tashi scrambled to his feet, got hold of his goat’s leash and ambled backed to the monastery. Tashi was seventy now, and would die soon, he thought, without even setting a foot again on the land of his forefathers. And why, only because some of us cannot fathom the truth of our existence: that the long, long voyage that all our genes travelled to reach where we are today was, a joint enterprise and not a separate one. Then again, he knew that a monk was supposed to be devoid of all desires; so he immediately wiped off the wistful moist from his eyes.

At the monastery, Tashi tethered the goat to a bamboo pole and held the teats of the goat between his thumb and forefinger and massaged the udders downwards. He squirted the milk out into a steel bucket and took a gulp. The energy from the sun – the source of all life — that had flowed to the tree, then, in turn, to the goat had reached the man like a message, the message of interdependence and compassion. He sat bolt upright in dhyana, closed his eyes and accepted all the things that were beyond his control. He breathed in, breathed out, breathed in, and then never breathed out again.

Courtesy: Creative Commons

Parnil Yodha is a law graduate and aspiring writer and poet based in New Delhi (India). Her works have been published in literary magazines like Indian periodical and Indus Women Writing.

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