Have You Seen A Moon At 11.00AM - In The Morning???

The moon is just above the big tree

Have you ever seen a moon at 11.00am in the morning up in the sky with the sun beating on your back? This picture was taken just outside Songsten in India. in November this year. Last year there was a smiling moon over Songsten.

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.

Easy Sex Transplant

Male papaya plant with longish fruits

Female plant with round fruits

I have heard of male and female papaya plants and I am sure most of you would have heard of that too but what I am going to reveal to you, I am sure, is going to be something you have not heard of before.

We know that male papaya plants bloom flowers but the flowers do not eventually bear fruits. Most times, we just let the papaya plant be what they may be or at times we have it chopped down. Yesterday we went for lunch at a Tibetan friend’s house. We were there last year too (around the same time of the year) but we did not notice the two papaya plants right in front of her house or maybe they were rather tiny then. The two plants were not any taller than a human being and both were bearing fruits. One bears longish papayas and the other more rounded ones.

Notice the iron that has been punched through the plant

The one that bears the longish fruit is supposedly to be a male papaya plant. This plant underwent a “sex transplant” by a very simple process of having an iron nail hammered into the trunk, near to the base of the plant. And that took care of the fruits.

Spastic Internet Line

My daughter is going to cry foul when she knows what I cooked for dinner. Preserved vegetable (char choy) with tomatoes and onion soup, BBraised potatoes with hard boiled eggsand the ‘crème de la crème” is fried long beans with sambal belachan.


And all this is happening in India. I can only feel guilty when she tells me that her meal is the same old stuff packed off the shops after work and to know that little Ryan does not have his regular soup every night.

The bananas look green but the taste is great

After dinner went online. Felt truly spastic with the internet line running at 230.4kbps. You can actually go brush your teeth and by the time you get back to your computer, your page is still struggling to be uploaded. But then, what else can you do in India at night? Have patience, pay a little more and wait for your page to get uploaded and maybe possibly send off an email or two if you are lucky.

My 'life saving' modem. How can I live without you????

Beautiful Chortens

Just when I thought the shopping flavor on this trip to spiritual India was the one flavor missing, I bumped into this beautiful chorten.

Chortens are symbolic for the three aspects of the Buddhas which are the body, speech and mind. Great merit is said to be accumulated when we do circumambulations around chortens and even more when we build or are involved in the building of one.

This lovely chorten you see is of plastic material, measures about 6” x 6” at the base and is about 10”~12” tall (sorry do not have a ruler). It lights up when plugged to a 220V power source.

I Was Almost Electrocuted!

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'.

Happiness Is Seeing A Good Ole Friend

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.

Back In Inida

Picture taken just outside my room

C'est la vie

Arrived Delhi on 2 November close to midnight and stayed a night at the usual Tibetan Colony Settlement. Early next morning headed for Dehra Dun. Arrived around 5.00pm.

It felt so good to see our tibetan friends and they made us feel so warm and welcomed. They went to great lengths of even having fruits in the room with 2 bottles of mineral water. rice cooker and stove and everything that is needed to make one feel at home. Thank you!

This morning went to meet up with Khenchen Rinpoche at Jangchub Ling and later went down town to stock up on groceries.

Now a little time to relax before going to Khenpo Rangdol's place for tea at 5.00pm