Good times with my monks

Last thursday was my last day of teaching the Tibetan monks. They went back to India yesterday. I have been teaching them for 7 weeks. I will miss them.

It took me by surprise when they told me the last day of teaching would be a week earlier. I only had 2 nights to prepare for their exams. On the day of the exam, it was hot, muggy, and tense. The kids were really nervous taking the exams. I saw some of them PRAYING before class started. They did very well on their exams and I was extremely proud of them. During lunch, I walked around the school and one child came up to me, and handed me a folded piece of paper. I opened it and it was a letter, thanking me. So CUTE! Then more kids ran in and gave me their letters, it was so great to read, I will save these letters forever.



After the exams it was playtime. Yay! No more class! Few of them were playing football (soccer) and most of us talked on the porch. The younger boys sang and danced for me. For dinner, we had Thukpa, which is a thick flat noodle soup with vegetables. After dinner, all the kids gathered in the big classroom. Tashi, the owner of the school, told me the kids had something to say in English, they all said "Thank you Miss for teaching us!" Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww. Then, Tashi gave a speech, appreciating me for volunteering and going through the awful transportation to teach his monks. He pulled out a Mala sash and put it over my neck. Then presented a Buddha statue as a gift (definitely sending it home cause I cannot travel that heavy thing in my backpack), a gray pashmina (to wear when I visit northern India), a DVD about Limi (a town where the monks are from), and a thank you letter with all the monks signatures and a photo of all them. I wasn't emotional, there were smiles everywhere. As I was leaving on a motorbike back to home, all the kids were screaming on the top of their little lungs "GOODBYE MISS!!!! GOODBYEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!"

Mala Ceremony, any type of thank you gift always includes a sash (called a mala).

Sunday morning, Tashi called me and invited me to a pilgrimage. They picked me up at my bus stop and traveled for 40 minutes up north into the mountains. We went to a monastery that once belonged to Pema Simbawa, from the 7th century. In history, it was said that Simbawa was an Indian monk that brought Buddhism into Tibet. We walked up a long flight of stairs and reached to the top of the hill. All the monks gathered in a circle and started chanting.



Myself and a few others went further up the hill to hang prayer flags. After an hour we had a picnic and did more rituals. One of the rituals, each of us grabbed a finger-full of flour, lined up in a circle, and looked at each other. Tashi raised his arm slowly and said "ohhhh," then everyone else copied, after 3 more times all the older monks released their flour and went "Aiiiiiiiiii!" and then the rest of us screamed "Aiiiiiiiii!" and released the flour, the flour was blown away onto the people facing east and was covered with flour. Everyone was laughing hysterically, I will not forget that moment.