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Equal Opportunity for Nuns - an Interview with Ven. Tenzin Palmo
published by The Star
Wednesday June 14, 2006
It was the start of the rock 'n' roll mania, just before the hippie era, and
Diane Perry was a young librarian in London who adored Elvis Presley.
But that was, in her own words, "another lifetime" ago.
Now Perry, 63, is Drubgyu Tenzin Palmo, a Tibetan Buddhist nun who spent 12
years meditating in a small cave up in the Himalayan mountains and founded a
nunnery in northern India.
Drubgyu Tenzin Palmo: 'We want to equalize things more so that in future
there would be female teachers and masters.'
So how did Tenzin Palmo's path in life take such a different turn?
"I came across a book about basic Buddhism by John Walters entitled The Mind
Unshaken.
"I liked the title because living in the middle of the city can be wild and
filled with madness where one needs a 'mind unshaken'," said Tenzin Palmo
when interviewed in Kuala Lumpur recently.
Tenzin Palmo and her brother were brought up in East London by her mother.
Her father died when she was two.
She remembered a pleasant childhood and adolescence, and growing up in a
spiritual environment.
"My mum was a spiritualist at that time. There was this lady, equivalent to
a medium here, who would come to our house every week and our neighbors
would seek her help such as contacting a son killed in the war," Tenzin
Palmo recalled.
Although she was generally contented with her life, she was also searching
for the meaning of existence.
After becoming a Buddhist at the age of 18, she felt she needed to find a
teacher, which in London was very difficult to do in those days.
"So India was the obvious choice," she said.
Two years later, at age 20, she made her way there and eventually met her
Tibetan guru, the eighth Khamtrul Rinpoche.
Tenzin Palmo studied under her guru for six years and became one of the
first few Westerners to be ordained a Tibetan Buddhist nun. Her name means "glorious one who holds the doctrine of practice lineage".
After the six years, Rinpoche then sent her to the Himalayan valley of
Lahaul to a small monastery for more intensive practice, where she remained
in retreat during the long winter months.
Then her guru told her to further practice her meditation and that's when
she decided to seek more seclusion in a small cave in the Himalayans, where
she stayed for 12 years, the last three in strict retreat.
Asked what was the most difficult moment during those long years, Tenzin
Palmo paused before answering: "I suppose it was when I was caught in a big
snowstorm for 10 days.
"Everything got covered. There was an avalanche and many villagers died. My
cave was completely covered too and I was trapped inside.
"I was initially worried, because my cave was very small, that I would run
out of oxygen and suffocate. I thought, "Okay, now I am going to die, so
what was it that really mattered?'"she recalled.
When she narrowed it down, she said it was Lama Rinpoche, her teacher, who
was at the top of the list.
"So I prayed to him to take care of me in this lifetime and the lifetimes to
come. Then I heard his voice inside me saying, 'Dig out'," she said slowly.
Painstakingly, she tunneled her way out and up the cave. However, when she
finally found an opening, there was still a blizzard outside so she went
back down.
She had to make her way up a few more times before finally the storm
subsided.
"But I was calm (about the whole thing ) and I did not panic," she said
about her ordeal.
Reconnection
In 1988, Tenzin Palmo finally came out of her retreat because she felt she
needed to reconnect with Western culture.
She decided on Italy, where some of her good friends had gone, and taught at
various Dharma centers there.
"There were a lot of religious groups there and a lot of people were
interested in Indian spirituality. It was just outside of Assisi, a
beautiful place, and not like you landed in the middle of Manchester."
Throughout the years, she also felt strongly about one issue - prejudices
against women in Buddhism.
"The feeling is that traditionally, if you were born into a female body,
pray hard, be good and next time, one could come back in a male body.
"The only reason for this previously was females did not get the opportunity
and freedom to study and practice. There were also not many examples of
women practitioners," explained Tenzin Palmo.
She added that some lamas still maintained that one could not achieve
enlightenment in a female body.
"That is not fair and is demeaning to women and creates low self-esteem
among them," she said.
"Buddha Himself did not say one could not achieve enlightenment in a female
body. However, according to some later texts, a woman could attain Nirvana
and realization but not attain unsurpassed enlightenment as a Buddha."
She added that in Tibetan tradition, almost all lamas, great teachers and
authors were male, even though in Tibetan society, women were very strong.
"We want to equalize things more so that in future there would be female
teachers and masters," she said, adding that such prejudices have since been
reduced, especially among Tibetans as they meet nuns from both the West and
East who are highly educated.
Dalai Lama apologizes
Before Tenzin Palmo's guru died in 1980, he had on many occasions asked her
to start a nunnery but it wasn't until she returned from Italy to India in
the early 1990s that she began the project.
In 2000, Tenzin Palmo founded the Dongyu Gatsal Ling Nunnery to give
education and training opportunities to women from Tibet and the Himalayan
border regions.
"It's to bolster their sense of self worth, which is quite low because
society directly and indirectly gives them the message that they are
inferior.
"Even His Holiness the Dalai Lama apologizes for this," she emphasized.
"So the first thing is to educate the women, to give them the confidence so
that they believe in each other."
Dongyu Gatsal Ling, or Delightful Grove of the True Lineage, is located in
Tashi Jong in the state of Himachal Pradesh, northern India. It is situated
six kilometers from Tenzin Palmo's late guru's Khampagar Monastery.
Construction of the 2.8ha nunnery, where study and retreat centers are being
built, is still ongoing. A traditional Tibetan temple is also in the
pipeline.
To date, funds have come in the form of small donations from all over the
world. For the nunnery to be fully completed, Tenzin Palmo estimated that it
needed another half a million US dollars (RM1.87mil).
Her life story can also be read in a book entitled Cave in the Snow, written
by Vicki Mackenzie, which has generated much support for the nunnery
project.
At present there are 38 nuns at the nunnery who come from the Himalayan
border regions of India, Bhutan and Nepal. Each student spends six years
practicing meditation and studying Buddhist philosophy, ritual, English and
other practical skills.
When fully completed, the nunnery can accommodate around 100 students.
"We train them so that they can realize their innate intellectual and
spiritual potential," added Tenzin Palmo.
One of the main aims of the nunnery is also to revive the ancient tradition
of the female monastic Togdenma (literally meaning "realized one"),
associated with the Drukpa Khamtrul Rinpoche lineage.
This lineage of female yogic practitioners dedicated to enlightenment is
hoped to result in a pool of qualified female meditation teachers in the
Tibetan tradition.
"It takes an enormous amount of work and dedication to practice meditation.
"It's like baking a cake. You put all the ingredients in the oven but you
can't keep taking it out. You need to leave it in for a certain amount of
time.
"The problem in Tibetan Buddhism is a lot of teachers are not well trained
as they used to be in meditation practice. It takes 15 to 20 years of
meditation retreats, usually alone, and is a lot of hard work," she said,
adding that now, many come out of retreat after three years.
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