It’s too hot in the kitchen.
The kitchen at Shugsep Nunnery is exposed on three sides, lacks insulation, and experiences extreme heat and cold. It is extremely uncomfortable for the nuns to work for huge parts of the year. Please help us insulate the metal roof to manage the intense summer heat and the winter cold.
The nuns would like your help replacing the existing corrugated metal roof with insulated, powder-coated metal roofing. This product is newly available in the area and would be an exceptionally durable, weather-resistant surface that would not require repainting and, with the insulation, would make the kitchen safer and more comfortable for those working in it.
Severe heatwaves sweeping across North India frequently push maximum temperatures well into the mid-30s°C or 95 to 100°F. Inside the kitchen, where food is prepared for 115 nuns plus staff, it is hotter.
Please help with the Shugsep Kitchen Improvements
To help you can:
- Make a gift online
- Call our office in Seattle, U.S. at 1-206-652-890
- Mail a check to The Tibetan Nuns Project, 815 Seattle Boulevard South #418, Seattle, WA 98134 U.S. (note that it is for the Shugsep Kitchen Improvements)
- Donate securities
- Leave a gift in your will to the Tibetan Nuns Project
Please help make improvements to the kitchen at Shugsep to make it safer for the nuns on kitchen duty.
About Shugsep Nunnery
A Nyingma nunnery, Shugsep traces its rituals and practices to some of the most illustrious female practitioners in Tibetan history. In the previous century, Shugsep Nunnery was home to one of the most famous teachers of her time, Shugsep Jetsunma.
Following the Cultural Revolution in 1959, Shugsep Nunnery in Tibet was completely destroyed. Although the nuns partially rebuilt their nunnery in the 1980s, they faced frequent harassment by Chinese authorities.
In the late 1980s and 1990s many Tibetan Buddhist nuns escaped from Tibet including a large number of nuns from the original Shugsep Nunnery. They lived for many years in cramped conditions before the Tibetan Nuns Project re-established Shugsep Nunnery. It was inaugurated in 2010. Photo from 1991 by Susan Lirakis
Many of the nuns at Shugsep in India came from the original Shugsep Nunnery in Tibet. Chinese authorities expelled them from their nunnery for their political activities on behalf of Tibet and escaped over the Himalayas to practice their religion in India.
The Shugsep nuns who escaped from Tibet lived in this damp, moldy rented house until Shugsep was re-established in exile. Now Shugsep Nunnery is home to over 100 nuns.
The Tibetan Nuns Projecct re-established Shugsep Nunnery in India and His Holiness the Dalai Lama inaugurated the newly built nunnery in December 2010. It is one of two nunneries built and completely supported by the Tibetan Nuns Project. The other is Dolma Ling.
Here’s a charming video tour of the nunnery made in 2017: