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Take a look at this other picture. It is only 5.30pm and it is just as good as 7.00 or 8.00pm. It is taken from my room balcony at Songsten just last week.
One has to get used to the on/off disruption of electricity when you live in India. I make sure I prepare my soup a couple of hours before dinner time to ensure I have at least a soup to go with rice in the event the electricity board decides to help us save a couple of cents during the peak cooking time.
After an hour’s walk to and from a Tibetan settlement to buy some vegetables, on the way back met up with some Tibetan friends for a drink at a road side tea stall that makes real good, creamy milk tea. Tea is not boiled in India. They are cooked. At this particular stall, the water comes from a near by spring and this makes the tea different from other stalls in and around Dehra Dun. Believe me, many a visitor will not think of stopping by for a cuppa at this stall.
Said our goodbyes for the day and headed back ‘home’. It was only 6.00pm but the skies were beginning to get dark and the cold wind was setting in. The library is extraordinary quiet with only a light or two switched on as almost everyone has left for Nepal. I think only 2 rooms are occupied at this moment.
In the quiet and dark of the night (no electricity again) I crept into the room ready to go to bed. I adjusted the blankets and I heard crackling sound and my blanket was sparkling. For a moment I thought I saw angels but the stinging pain got me out of that wishful state. I still saw the sparkling lights on my blanket and the pain was a little intense so I dropped the blanket on the bed. No, I do not have an electric blanket. It was the static electricity created by the woolen material of the blanket.
Every lunch time is also a hassle for me as I have to always wet my hands before touching any metal items at the dining hall if I dont wish to get 'electrocuted'.
I walked to Jangchub Ling in the morning with the hope of seeing a friend I last saw in December 2007. With some enquiries here and there we still got no where as not many people knew the person we were looking for. He had been in retreat in Almora since December 2007 and this year he had the permission of His Holiness to attend teachings in Nepal. We managed to locate his room through Khenchen Rinpoche but luck was not with us as he was not in his room.
While having lunch a fellow mate alerted us that the person we wanted to see was at Drikung College Institute, just a small run out of the Library. He was preparing to leave India for Nepal with a group of Khenpos from DKI.
Rushed to DKI and I was really overwhelmed when I saw him. He looked good albeit being thinner, had shoulder length hair, with moustache and a long beard. He was a picture of a wise old man. He gave each of us a big, huge hug and we got down to chatting and chattering. And in a fleeting moment he was asked to board the 4 Wheel Drive that will take them to the Dehra Dun Railway Station to head on to Gorakphur for their next leg of their journey to Nepal.
This person is no other than Konchok Yeshe aka Chen Cong Si aka Mr S H Chooi, our former Ratnashri Malaysia President.