An encounter in Dharamsala
Today, it is raining. On the way going to office, I dropped by the Reception Center (RC) for refugees where all the newly arrived refugees are kept for awhile till they are sent to school or monastery as they wished. It’s my daily work routine.
I talked with an old woman sitting outside the RC in this chilly winter rain. She told me she came with her nephew who is mentally retarded, around 17. She told me they lived back in Tibet all alone, the boy’s parents died early. She said she and her nephew used to earn their living by pulling human-cart in the busy city streets…the mentally retarded nephew pulls and she push the cart to earn daily foods. The old woman to whom it would even take a great strength of her to climb up the stairs told me it took them around 3 months to cross the Himalayan mountains all alone, begging all the way till they got to the Refugee Center in Nepal.
Now that they are here, she said is very happy that she is now going to have an audience with H.H the Dalai Lama, a dream she’s longed for her entire life and she wished then that she can go to the Old People’s Home. But where is her nephew going to be sent, because there is no a proper institution for such case? She asked me, eyes filled with expectation, if she can take her nephew with her to the Old People’s Home. Technically not, but I could not utter the word “no”. I said the officials will surely arrange him a proper place to go.
Before I left, over the other side of the hall, a group of children from around 7 to 13 were playing. They arrived a few days ago. They said their parents sent them with the guide; they walked for 27 days. They look happy, maybe they are too small to understand the situation. A girl, maybe the smallest of them, approached me holding a pencil and a book in her hand, asked me how to write APPLE.
Tenzin Losel is ICT’s field researcher in Dharamsala, India.
3 Responses to “An encounter in Dharamsala”
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A touching story… one that captures the harsh reality of Tibetan exodus that still persists whatever propaganda the Chinese govt churns out. Propaganda is nothing but numbers and charts on paper but this, right here, is the reality of the people. And as I type these words, I wonder how many more of these unpublished stories are out there and how many more still battling with the harsh conditions to cross into free land.
On a slightly different topic, there is a Tibetan center for mentally and physically challenged Tibetans in Dharamsala, near Norbulingka. It’s call Nying-tob-ling. (http://nyingtobling.wordpress.com/about/) and there is another one called Karuna Home in South India (http://www.karunahome.org/)
It is another of thousands of stories of Tibetans who make superhuman efforts to cross the Himalaya for the chance of a better future in exile. In this case the old women and retarded nephew had to beg all along the way, never certain that they would arrive and probably hungry at times.
When they got to Nepal they probably saw that they are not welcomed warmly by Nepali officials who have the Chinese embassy continually screeching in their ears about Tibetans refugees.
And then they finally make it to Dharamsala. Perhaps the old women will be take care of and that is a good thing but what will become of her handicapped nephew? There are no social welfare programs and as a refugee there are even fewer oppotunities.
Though the future is far from certain, Tibetans are resourceful people and famous for their trading abilities. Perhaps the nephew will buy a few trinkets and put them on a gayly colored blanket and lounge in the spring sun as tourists peruse his wares. Perhaps a rich American will give him a $100 bill for an old, broken mala worth a few rupees and not ask for any change and he will eat well for a few weeks and perhaps buy a gift for the old women who led him out of Tibet.
That is perhaps as good as it gets. Where is the IMF and the World Bank when you need them? And even if those institutions did fund a program equal to SSI for Tibetan refugees, the Indians and Nepalis would seethe with jealousy and rage that Tibetans should be well taken care of in exile…
How sad that the old woman and her nephew will have to be separated, it seems a shame that he cannot stay near to her. What will become of him…are there any homes there for people with mental health issues? It surely would benefit them both for him to be able to visit his aunt at the very least.