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My Kind of Town Don Chapman |
The age-old question
>> Kapalama Heights
"You're right, world opinion is on the Tibetan side," the second Lama Jey Tsong Khapa said as he gazed down on Honolulu city lights. At 18, the Liliha native was making his first return to Hawaii since being identified at age 2 and spending 16 years in the Himalayas studying and meditating. "But the actions of which you speak, some would call it terrorism."
"No," Kamasami Khan replied, "terror was 100,000 Tibetan monks and nuns being executed by the Chinese Army. Terror is another 100,000 being disrobed and forced to have sex in public. Terror is the fear of practicing a religion your people have followed for 1,400 years but the new occupying force declares illegal and viciously persecutes.
"My dear young lama, the Chinese Communist assault on Tibetan language, culture and religion is not just in the past. It did not end with the Lhasa Massacre in 1959. It's happening right now. We recently celebrated the one-year anniversary of the execution of the monk Lobsang Dhondup. And just the other day, three monks were sentenced to 12 years in prison for merely possessing pictures of the Dalai Lama."
"I had not heard this news."
"It's right there on www.tibetdaily.com," the lama's big brother Joe Kharma said.
"Joe," Khan said, "is our computer expert."
"This is good to know."
To the young lama, his older brother had apparently fulfilled their father's wish and grown up to be a typical American guy -- immersed in popular culture, his head cluttered with it's songs, TV shows, fashions and sports.
Basically a good person, but shallower than a saucer and without a clue of his own divine nature. Still, the young lama had been introduced to computers and the Internet while visiting the Tibetan government in exile in Dharmasala, India, and it had inspired a vision for a new kind of "accelerated vehicle" to spread the teaching of Buddha. Perhaps Joe could help.
"And how, brother, did you come to associate with our friend Khan?"
"It all started at the annual Free Tibet kegger during UH Homecoming Week," Joe said. "After you left, our father became even more dedicated to becoming an American, and he'd never talk about his life in Tibet. But I knew our roots are there, so my sophomore year I went to this Free Tibet beer bash.
That's where I met Khan -- Bodhicita Guzman too. I got hammered and blurted that my baby brother was a lama. One thing led to another."
The young lama yawned. It had been a long day. "Time to go," Khan said.
They were driving back down the hill in Khan's red Ram 1500 when Khan's cell phone rang, to the sound of Tibetan bells and gongs:
"Now we know," Joe exclaimed, "who put the Ram in the rama-lama-ding-dong!"
See the Columnists section for some past articles.
Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek. His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin. He can be e-mailed at dchapman@midweek.com
