Category Archives: News and Updates

Buddhist Nuns Participate in Tibetan Handicrafts Exhibition

The tailoring program at Dolma Ling Nunnery and Institute received a big boost in July when the nuns were invited to show their handicrafts at a special two-day Art and Craft’s Exhibition organized by the Department of Education of the Central Tibetan Administration.

No other nunneries and monasteries were invited to the exhibition that took place on July 25th and 26th.

Kalon Lobsang Sangay speaking to Tibetan Buddhist nun

The Chief guest at the exhibition was Kalon Lobsang Sangay who was very impressed by the display. He spoke encouragingly to the nuns.

The exhibition was organized to introduce traditional Tibetan crafts to 25 teachers and students from 9 different schools located in Himachal Pradesh, Dehradun and Nepal. The Dolma Ling Nunnery Product Manager, Mr. Tenzin Yanga, and two nuns from the tailoring section attended the exhibition. Continue reading →

Tibetan Nuns in India Close to Earning Highest Buddhist Degrees

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A group of Tibetan nuns have passed the halfway mark toward a historic milestone: winning the equivalent of a Buddhist doctorate degree, until recently almost exclusively reserved only for men.

In May, 22 nuns passed through the second stage of examinations for a “Geshema” degree, the female equivalent of a Geshe degree. The examination process began in May, 2013.

Three senior nuns awaiting their turns to debate during the 2014 Geshema examinations

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2015 Calendar from Tibetan Nuns Project now available

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September is always an exciting time of year at the Tibetan Nuns Project office in Seattle because it’s the month when our annual wall calendar comes from the printer.

The Tibetan Nuns Project has been selling beautiful charity calendars for many years to raise funds to support over 700 Tibetan Buddhist nuns living in India at 7 nunneries.

Proceeds from the sale of the 2015 calendar will help provide food, shelter, health care and education to the nuns.

The 2015 calendar is filled with stunning images of Tibetan life and culture all taken by the nuns. It also includes:

inspirational quotes
the Tibetan lunar calendar
Tibetan Buddhist ritual dates
phases of the moon
major US and Canadian holidays

All the photos were taken by the nuns in India. Dimension 6.5″ x 7″. Price $11.00

The calendar is available for purchase through our online store or by check from our Seattle office at:

Tibetan Nuns Project
815 Seattle Boulevard South #216
Seattle, WA 98134
Phone: (206) 652-8901
info@tnp.org

Please help us sell all 2,000 calendars by purchasing them as gifts for friends, family and teachers. We would be very grateful if you could also spread the word to your networks.

These calendars give back each and every day and bring happiness to you and the nuns.

Postcard from Dharamsala – Geshema exams, Sagadawa and more

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Here’s the latest news from Dharamsala:

Tibetan Buddhist nuns sitting round 2 of Geshema exams The second round of the Geshema Examinations was held at Dolma Ling Nunnery and Institute from May 1-16, 2014. 23 nuns sat the 2nd year exam, while 6 sat the 1st year exam. The results were released on July 6, His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s Birthday. We are very happy to announce that most of the nuns did very well in their exams; only three nuns failed, one from the 2nd year group and two from 1st year group.

Sagadawa, which is considered a holy month, fell this year from June 13 – July 12. Three events in the life of Lord Buddha took place within this holy month, his birth, enlightenment, and demise. If we practice good deeds during this time period, we consider we will earn more merit than usual, so everybody puts their effort into doing some wholesome activities. In the nunneries, they do special Nyungne (fasting retreat) and in some they read the full 108 volumes of the Kangyur (teachings of Lord Buddha) over a number of days. Most observe the specific practice for ordained people of not eating dinner during that month. Continue reading →

Video of Losar at a Tibetan Buddhist nunnery

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The Tibetan New Year – Losar – is a very special time of year. This year, 2014, the first day of fell on March 2nd which, by the Tibetan calendar, is the first day of the Wood Horse Year of 2141.

Losar Video

Losar-related rituals fall into two distinct parts. First, the nuns like all Tibetans, say goodbye to the old year and let go of all its negative or bad aspects. Part of this involves cleaning one’s home from top to bottom. After that, the “new year” or Losar is welcomed, with prayers and by inviting all good, auspicious things into our homes and our lives.

Here’s a Losar video showing preparations and celebrations at Dolma Ling Nunnery and Institute near Dharamsala, northern India with photos taken by the nuns themselves. The nunnery is home to over 230 nuns. Enjoy and Happy Losar!

Celebrating Losar at a Buddhist Nunnery

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Losar, or Tibetan New Year, falls this year on March 2nd 2014 and is the start of the Wood Horse Year, which is year 2141 in the Tibetan lunar calendar.

Happy Losar card - nuns hanging prayer flags by Olivier Adam

Photo of nuns hanging prayer flags courtesy of Olivier Adam

This year will be the first time in many years that Losar celebrations will take place at Tibetan exile communities and at Dolma Ling Nunnery near Dharamsala, India and other nunneries.

Since 2008 and the unrest in Tibet, many of the Tibetan settlements, monasteries and nunneries in India have not been celebrating Losar. With many Tibetans self-immolating for the cause in Tibet, Tibetans in exile have joined together in prayers, but have not followed traditional Losar celebrations.

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2013 Milestone: Geshema Exams for the Tibetan Nuns

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May 2013 marked the beginning of the first ever Geshema examinations. After years of rigorous study, 27 nuns from 5 nunneries – 6 from Jangchub Choeling, 7 from Jamyang Choeling, 2 from Geden Choeling, 2 from Khacho Gakyiling (Kopan) and 10 from Dolma Ling Nunnery and Institute – gathered at Jamyang Choeling near Dharamsala, India, to complete the first round of a four-year examination process.

The nuns were tested on a variety of areas of study, including the Perfection of Wisdom, the Middle Way, and other subjects such as Tibetan grammar and science through both written examination and demonstration of their debating skills.

In July, just in time for the celebrations of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s birthday, the examination results for the first round of examinations were released with the very good news that 25 of the 27 candidates successfully passed the first round. If these nuns can continue to successfully demonstrate their knowledge over the next three years, they will be awarded the prestigious Geshema degree.

The Geshema degree will be the highest degree in Buddhist philosophy for nuns. A basic requirement for the nuns to take the exams is to have completed the full 17-year course of study with average marks of 75% or higher.

The opportunity to take the examinations to earn this degree has been made available especially by the continuous support of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the dedication of the nuns, and the Department of Religion and Culture of the Kasur Rinchen Khando la meeting with the nuns Central Tibetan Administration. The Tibetan Nuns Project and its supporters have also played a significant role in making this landmark achievement possible, working over the past 25 years to increase the educational level of the nuns.

low res Yangdron_Delek_2013_05_GeshemeExam_19 copy

Rinchen Khando Choegyal, the founder of the Tibetan Nuns Project, addresses the nuns at the Geshema exams.

The higher-level educational opportunities that nuns have today were not always available, creating a gap between the education of monks and nuns. The Tibetan Nuns Project has worked to close this gap and prepare the nuns to demonstrate their skills and learning. The debating practice that nuns undertake daily, as well as at the annual Jang Gönchoe inter-nunnery debate, have been highly beneficial to the nuns, expanding their understanding of the Buddhist philosophical texts and allowing them to develop the debating skills that are tested during the Geshema exams.

Congratulations to all the nuns who have successfully completed the first round of exams!

Established in 1987, the Tibetan Nuns Project provides education and support to more than 700 nuns in northern India.

A Message from the Directors of the Tibetan Nuns Project

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Thank you for being a supporter of the Tibetan Nuns Project.

You are part of a community of compassionate people who care deeply about providing equal access to education for ordained Buddhist women, about the Dharma, and about preserving Tibet’s unique culture.

We wanted to share with you some of our achievements this year that you’ve helped make possible:

23 nuns reached an historic milestone when they sat the first part of the Geshema exam in May, like a PhD in Tibetan Buddhism;
8 retreat huts at Dolma Ling Nunnery have been built and furnished. Now, for the first time, the nuns of Dolma Ling can go on retreat;
Over 400 nuns from 8 nunneries in India and Nepal have participated in the month-long Jang Gonchoe debate session in October, a special step in their learning;
Over 700 nuns living in exile have been provided with food, shelter, education and health care.

We still need your help urgently.

Within Tibet the situation is truly dire. There is no real freedom for the nuns there to practice their religion. They, like their sisters in India, wish nothing more than to live, study, practice, and teach in accordance with their spiritual beliefs. With your help we can ensure the survival of Tibet’s religion and culture and we can offer refuge to those who have escaped and help heal their trauma.

Inflation and rising food prices in India are stressing all of the nunneries. With hundreds of mouths to feed each day, you can imagine the effect of skyrocketing food and fuel prices. Sponsorship dollars were only meeting about 2/3rd of the daily needs of the nuns so we did a big sponsorship push this summer. We are incredibly grateful to everyone who signed up as a sponsor, who renewed a past sponsorship, or who generously agreed to increase their sponsorship contribution.

HERE ARE 7 WAYS YOU CAN HELP THE NUNS:

1. SPONSOR A NUN
For $1 a day you can sponsor a nun and help provide her with food, shelter, education and health care. 100% of the funds go directly to India and you will receive updates about the impact of your gifts.

2. MAKE A SINGLE DONATION
We have a number of current projects where you can direct your gifts or you can make an undesignated gift and we will direct the funds where they are needed most.

3. LEAVE A LEGACY OF COMPASSION
By including a gift in your will to the Tibetan Nuns Project, you will be leaving a legacy of compassion that will have a ripple effect for generations to come.

4. GIVE A GIFT IN HONOR OF SOMEONE
Celebrate a loved one this holiday season, thank a spiritual teacher, or honor the memory of someone with a gift. When you make a tribute gift, we can send a beautiful card to the person being honored.

5. BUY TNP PRODUCTS
We always have a range of products available through our online shop or by calling the office. Our products include the 2014 Calendar, malas, prayer flags, TNP sweatshirts, and much more. Many of the products are made by the nuns to generate income for the nunneries.

6. DEDICATE PRAYERS
Through our online shop you can request that the nuns say prayers or perform special pujas for you or for someone dear to you who may need spiritual help.

7. DO YOUR OWN THING!
Explore your own creative idea for helping the nuns. Every little bit helps. Whether it’s hosting a house party using our kit or coming up with your own idea, like New York artist Miya Ando who created a series of glowing “Prayer Flag” paintings and auctioned them off raising over $4,000 to help with the nuns Media Center and Café at Dolma Ling.

We’re going to give the last word to one of our supporters who wrote to tell us why the Tibetan Nuns Project was important to her:

“Each aspect you are addressing is important not just to these women, but to women, refugees, Buddhists and non-Buddhist religious women EVERYWHERE. This is a model for the future for any group of displaced, religiously persecuted, and in-need-of-support-to-sustain-themselves group. I applaud the efforts of your organization very highly.”
Linda Anne, Idyllwild CA

With our deepest thanks for your compassion and generosity,

Rinchen Khando Choegyal, Director
Elizabeth Napper, Co-Director

Rinchen Khando Choegyal interviewed in Tricycle Magazine

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The Winter 2013 issue of Tricycle Magazine features an interview with Tibetan Nuns Project founder and co-director, Rinchen Khando Choegyal.

The article, entitled “Standing as Equals” is written by Barbara Gates.

In the sitting room at Kashmir Cottage, situated between the main town of Dharamsala and the area that is the seat of the exiled Tibetan government in India, I shared a pot of ginger tea with Rinchen Khando Choegyal, founder and director of the Tibetan Nuns Project and wife of the younger brother of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. I enjoyed the resonant cadence of her voice as she described the history of the project and the work of women, lay and monastic, in keeping alive the teachings of the Buddha and the richness of Tibetan culture amid the hardships of exile.

Rinchen Khando was born in eastern Tibet; her parents, from a farming and business background, were, as she put it, “well-to-do, but very devout and simple people.” At the end of 1958, her family came to India for a pilgrimage to Bodh Gaya and Varanasi. The plan was to leave the young Rinchen in India to attend a boarding school run by Catholic nuns. But before her parents returned home, the Chinese invaded Tibet. Since then, her family has lived in India. “Because we were already in India in 1959,” said Rinchen Khando, “we were saved.” They’d left behind almost everything they had.

In 1987, together with other activist women in the exile community, Rinchen Khando established the Tibetan Nuns Project (TNP). The project is committed to education, empowerment and improved status for ordained Tibetan women. It now supports over 700 Tibetan nuns living in North India. Continue reading →

Report on the completion of retreat huts at Dolma Ling Nunnery

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At the end of October 2013, thanks to the generous support of Tibetan Nuns Project donors and to the hard work of the nuns themselves, the construction, furnishing and landscaping of 8 permanent retreat huts at Dolma Ling Nunnery and Institute near Dharamsala, India was completed.

Retreats are a core part of Buddhist practice and these huts will allow the nuns to develop their own insight and knowledge in complete privacy. This is the first time that retreat facilities have been available at Dolma Ling Nunnery, home to about 250 nuns.

Tibetan nun helping to landscape retreat huts

The nuns plant bamboo near the retreat huts.

Each hut consists of a simple room with a bathroom and kitchen area. They are each furnished with a bed, a storage cupboard, a table, a prostration board, provisions for the small kitchen area and supplies for the small bathroom. One solar panel per hut provides light, power and warm water so that the huts are sustainable and ecologically sound. Continue reading →