Since I last blogged I've lost three more people (and I haven't even taken that much of a break from blogging).
My uncle Lee succumbed to his increasingly age-weakened body (a heart operation had left him too weak for more operations), and he fell sick again.
My next-door-neighbor Steve was felled by complications of lung cancer (and no he wasn't a smoker except for smoking salmon very expertly). Steve was my neighbor as long as I could remember. Growing up my first best friend was his daughter Gretchen (regrettably only around during summer vacation).
And I really valued both Lee and Steve, but I didn't cry. I teared up a little thinking of how my aunt and how Steve's wife and children were feeling, but I didn't cry.
Then Karjam's niece, Ahyangtso died. I wrote about her, here. Not that long ago, either. I loved her. She was the one who ate the food that I couldn't manage to refuse, but wasn't going to eat. She was the one who watched out for me and my needs even when Karjam was too distracted to notice. She was the one I was willing to have come and live with us. She was amazing.
She died in a freak accident, and hopefully it was almost instantaneous.
When I realized Karjam wasn't joking, that this had really happened to the girl he called his favorite niece, and to the girl who definitely was my favorite Tibetan niece (I like Drashijhet a lot, too, just for the record), I turned off the stove (I'd started cooking dinner), marched into my closet, closed the door and bawled until a little part of my brain started worrying about my throat and the fact that I had to teach eight hours the next day using that same throat.
Ahyangtso never got to do the things she wanted to do with her life. She was 19. So incredibly unfair.
A photo of Ahyangtso features on this blog entry that I wrote a few months ago.
Showing posts with label mourning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mourning. Show all posts
Thursday, May 1, 2014
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Death and Mourning in Tibet
All of us could learn from Tibetans and from Karjam's family something about how to handle death and mourning. It was amazing, absolutely amazing to me, as a Western person, how the family was able to deeply honor Apa Lorae, but also continue to be happy and full of laughter, and remember him in a really good way. Of course, each death is different, how a person dies and the life the person has lived really impacts how the survivors handle the death. In Apa Lorae's case he was diagnosed with advanced stomach cancer, already spread to the liver, in September. This gave the family some time to prepare, mentally and practically, for his passing. That time to prepare, obviously, helped everyone. I think Tibetans would kick Western ass at dealing with a death in the family in the case of a sudden death, too, but that was not what happened in this case.
By the end Apa Lorae was in a lot of pain, and very weak, only able to take a few spoonfuls of broth or milk. He had to ask someone to shift his body every twenty minutes or so, and according to Karjam, not everyone was able to do it to his satisfaction, so in those last weeks Karjam was by his side, especially all night long, as Apa Lorae only slept a few minutes at a time, to help him. He retained his mental acuity until the morning of his death, and Karjam had some very touching stories of the things he said. Although he had been living in a house in the village, when he was preparing to die they moved him to Tubko (his second son)'s winter house in the grasslands-- a house where at night the yaks were tied up, and the sheep gathered close. He spent a lot of time on the glassed-in porch, looking out across the grasslands, and soaking in the sun (the Tibetan sun is very very bright and if you're protected from the wind, such as on a glassed-in porch, even with single pane glass, during the day you'll stay quite warm in the sun). As had been his lifelong habit he was able to continue fingering his prayer beads, and spinning a hand-held prayer wheel. Monks also came and visited and chanted with him, a lama placing his hand on Apa Lorae's head and chanting-- in other words he prepared well for his death. The day before his death it was one of those gorgeous mornings where temperature inversion causes a fog to lift off the land and swirl in the sun, making the landscape magical. Karjam told his dad how it looked, and his dad told him "dear one, you must take a photo." This touched Karjam very deeply, because he felt that even as he was too weak to move on his own, his father was thinking outside his own reality (he's never used a camera in his life), and placing himself within Karjam's world and the things that were of importance to Karjam.
On the morning of his death Karjam saw a sudden change in him, physically, and was able to call together most of the family to be there as he took his last breaths (there was a little less than an hour between when they called everyone and the actual passing). At this point he no longer appeared to be mentally engaged with his surroundings, but the family held him and Tubko chanted the long form of the mantra for Tara very loudly, telling Apa Lorae to hold on to the sound of his voice. Karjam was very complimentary about how perfectly his brother did this-- the exact words someone should have in their ears as they pass to the next realm. Contrast that with wailing and crying and you have a very powerful image, just in that moment.
After someone dies there are 49 days during which they have not yet moved onto their next life, and during those days the business of their life needs to be settled (as well as all the funeral processes taken care of). The first 21 days are the most important of those days. I arrived in Ahwencang on the 20th day, so I missed most of this.
The body (after death) could not be touched by any of Apa Lorae's children, because symbolically this is equated with having killed your father. Two people were selected to take care of this process, one of whom was chosen by Apa Lorae himself, Dorsey (son of Zhyibuk, Apa Lorae's first son). Dorsey is full of failings, and I am so mad at him on some levels (as are others in the family), but he had a very close bond with Apa Lorae and his heart is very good. He and another relative prepared the body (and later they had to be specially spiritually cleansed). Karjam described how Dorsey was extremely protective of Apa Lorae's body, making sure that something that might hurt a live person did not happen to him in death (protecting from bumps in the road when they drove the body to Xiahe to be cremated, for example). They did decide to cremate the body, a decision that Apa Lorae made with them, because even though Tubko's house is on the land with the sky burial site in Ahwencang, unlike other areas of Tibet there is no special person who is a "body breaker" to prepare the body to be eaten by vultures, instead in Ahwencang family members (but not children) take this job. It's emotionally not easy. Karjam's family, relatively modern, opted for cremation and spreading his ashes at a lot of sites, including the sky burial site in Ahwencang, where they also ritually erected a prayer flag offering for Apa Lorae (around the 10th day, I'm not exactly sure). That prayer flag offering is the closest thing to a headstone he will have.
According to everyone Ama Dunmajhet cried once after Apa Lorae's death, when something that one visitor said really struck home for her. A large number of people who felt the need continually visit the house (especially during the first 21 days) after the death to offer their support to the family, and express their love of the deceased. It's very bad form if certain people do not visit, certainly the family is not left alone, nor do people just bring a casserole and then quickly leave after an awkward and strained silence. The family is constantly entertaining for those 21 days. People may speak of how great the deceased was, and the deceased can be the topic of conversation, or not.
Although people don't bring casseroles, they can support the family by bringing meat (carcasses, or parts of carcasses) because during the YEAR after his death the family cannot kill or sell any of their animals. They can buy meat, and eat meat, but they cannot kill. This, of course, is quite inconvenient when you have to provide meat for all the guests that keep coming, and all the monks performing different ceremonies (such as that already described on this blog). I was rather fascinated with the no-kill idea, and kept trying to figure out who it extended to. It's a bit of a grey area. Definitely all the households of all Apa Lorae's children (that's 8 households) and the grandchildren who have lived with him (none of those have independent households yet) are included, but whether or not other grandchildren (many of whom do have independent households) are included is less defined. I never asked if his sister's household (he only had one sibling, Jabu's mother) would also be on the no-kill list. I also wondered what happened if then another family member died before one year was up. Would a nomad family with an increasingly large herd be prevented from killing or selling (that's their source of income) any animals for two years? [This is a tangent, sorry.]
After someone dies a special monk (not a lama), who has extensive training will determine what sort of life they've lived and what sort of ceremonies and chants are needed to atone for any problems with their life to help prepare them for a good rebirth. I kept trying to push Karjam to give me more information about how this monk would know-- "do they ask the family if he lived a good life?" but what Karjam knew was that the monk was able to calculate this based on spiritual powers, more or less. Apparently no one ever thinks this has been done "wrong." In the case of someone like Apa Lorae, well known for being generous and unconcerned with material wealth (he never learned to tell one piece of money from another), as well as an extremely ardent Buddhist (taking pilgrimages, circumambulating the temple, chanting constantly), the various ceremonies the monks needed to do were relatively "easy" -- the types of things that many monks are authorized to do (not more advanced and specialized ceremonies). A neighbor died while I was in Ahwencang and Karjam said he heard that family was having a really hard time because the ceremonies they needed monks to do were very hard to find monks for, often needing lamas to lead them, and that was expensive and difficult to organize, and the family was scrambling to get it all done during the 21 days (and might not be able to).
I think that being so busy dealing with guests and ceremonies helps to keep the family from dwelling on loss in a bad way. Western death needs more ceremony! It needs more acknowledgement. Don't just send that family home from the funeral to dwell and fester on what they forgot to say or do during the departed's lifetime! Also Apa Lorae meant to finish certain Buddhist tasks (spinning a certain prayer wheel at the temple X number of times, or circumambulating a certain prayer hall at another temple X number of times, or doing X number of prostrations at X site) and didn't, so these tasks were taken by the family to be finished during the 49 days, as a sort of last gift to Apa Lorae, they were doing these instead of him to help him acquire even more merit for his rebirth. I feel like these actions helped in the mourning process, too. Especially Tubko's children were very active with this (Tubko's family is the family line, the family that has taken over Apa Lorae's herd, etc. and that he's lived with). Having something to do for the dead after they've left is another really good thing the Tibetans have that Western culture doesn't. I do 108 prostrations a day for Apa Lorae. This is not a lot, per se, but it has been tough at times (when I'm sick, when I'm on the road). The prostrations allow me to think on Apa Lorae and actively and intently visualize his wonderful rebirth. Apa Lorae was one of the best people I've ever met, and so close to attaining enlightenment, so just perfectly good, so I've been hoping that in his next life he has the opportunity to really focus on spiritual cultivation.
Final point I want to make, since I've been writing this when I need to get work done now that I'm back in Korea, is that the family is fine. They're still happy. They lost Apa Lorae, but at his age (first half of his 70s), and due to the time to prepare after the diagnosis, they accept it as natural (when first diagnosed Karjam was really upset, because he felt he'd screwed up by not getting his father fully checked in order to detect something in advance). For them death is a serious thing, with ritual and rules that will govern their lives for the next year, but life goes on, not as some tear-soaked tragedy, but with beautiful memories. I spent that time with Karjam's family and never once did I feel an aura of sadness, pain, or grief. Days after they've lost the family patriarch, and no grief. There is a lot we can learn from that.
* Below, yet more momo are prepared for yet more guests.
By the end Apa Lorae was in a lot of pain, and very weak, only able to take a few spoonfuls of broth or milk. He had to ask someone to shift his body every twenty minutes or so, and according to Karjam, not everyone was able to do it to his satisfaction, so in those last weeks Karjam was by his side, especially all night long, as Apa Lorae only slept a few minutes at a time, to help him. He retained his mental acuity until the morning of his death, and Karjam had some very touching stories of the things he said. Although he had been living in a house in the village, when he was preparing to die they moved him to Tubko (his second son)'s winter house in the grasslands-- a house where at night the yaks were tied up, and the sheep gathered close. He spent a lot of time on the glassed-in porch, looking out across the grasslands, and soaking in the sun (the Tibetan sun is very very bright and if you're protected from the wind, such as on a glassed-in porch, even with single pane glass, during the day you'll stay quite warm in the sun). As had been his lifelong habit he was able to continue fingering his prayer beads, and spinning a hand-held prayer wheel. Monks also came and visited and chanted with him, a lama placing his hand on Apa Lorae's head and chanting-- in other words he prepared well for his death. The day before his death it was one of those gorgeous mornings where temperature inversion causes a fog to lift off the land and swirl in the sun, making the landscape magical. Karjam told his dad how it looked, and his dad told him "dear one, you must take a photo." This touched Karjam very deeply, because he felt that even as he was too weak to move on his own, his father was thinking outside his own reality (he's never used a camera in his life), and placing himself within Karjam's world and the things that were of importance to Karjam.
On the morning of his death Karjam saw a sudden change in him, physically, and was able to call together most of the family to be there as he took his last breaths (there was a little less than an hour between when they called everyone and the actual passing). At this point he no longer appeared to be mentally engaged with his surroundings, but the family held him and Tubko chanted the long form of the mantra for Tara very loudly, telling Apa Lorae to hold on to the sound of his voice. Karjam was very complimentary about how perfectly his brother did this-- the exact words someone should have in their ears as they pass to the next realm. Contrast that with wailing and crying and you have a very powerful image, just in that moment.
After someone dies there are 49 days during which they have not yet moved onto their next life, and during those days the business of their life needs to be settled (as well as all the funeral processes taken care of). The first 21 days are the most important of those days. I arrived in Ahwencang on the 20th day, so I missed most of this.
The body (after death) could not be touched by any of Apa Lorae's children, because symbolically this is equated with having killed your father. Two people were selected to take care of this process, one of whom was chosen by Apa Lorae himself, Dorsey (son of Zhyibuk, Apa Lorae's first son). Dorsey is full of failings, and I am so mad at him on some levels (as are others in the family), but he had a very close bond with Apa Lorae and his heart is very good. He and another relative prepared the body (and later they had to be specially spiritually cleansed). Karjam described how Dorsey was extremely protective of Apa Lorae's body, making sure that something that might hurt a live person did not happen to him in death (protecting from bumps in the road when they drove the body to Xiahe to be cremated, for example). They did decide to cremate the body, a decision that Apa Lorae made with them, because even though Tubko's house is on the land with the sky burial site in Ahwencang, unlike other areas of Tibet there is no special person who is a "body breaker" to prepare the body to be eaten by vultures, instead in Ahwencang family members (but not children) take this job. It's emotionally not easy. Karjam's family, relatively modern, opted for cremation and spreading his ashes at a lot of sites, including the sky burial site in Ahwencang, where they also ritually erected a prayer flag offering for Apa Lorae (around the 10th day, I'm not exactly sure). That prayer flag offering is the closest thing to a headstone he will have.
According to everyone Ama Dunmajhet cried once after Apa Lorae's death, when something that one visitor said really struck home for her. A large number of people who felt the need continually visit the house (especially during the first 21 days) after the death to offer their support to the family, and express their love of the deceased. It's very bad form if certain people do not visit, certainly the family is not left alone, nor do people just bring a casserole and then quickly leave after an awkward and strained silence. The family is constantly entertaining for those 21 days. People may speak of how great the deceased was, and the deceased can be the topic of conversation, or not.
Although people don't bring casseroles, they can support the family by bringing meat (carcasses, or parts of carcasses) because during the YEAR after his death the family cannot kill or sell any of their animals. They can buy meat, and eat meat, but they cannot kill. This, of course, is quite inconvenient when you have to provide meat for all the guests that keep coming, and all the monks performing different ceremonies (such as that already described on this blog). I was rather fascinated with the no-kill idea, and kept trying to figure out who it extended to. It's a bit of a grey area. Definitely all the households of all Apa Lorae's children (that's 8 households) and the grandchildren who have lived with him (none of those have independent households yet) are included, but whether or not other grandchildren (many of whom do have independent households) are included is less defined. I never asked if his sister's household (he only had one sibling, Jabu's mother) would also be on the no-kill list. I also wondered what happened if then another family member died before one year was up. Would a nomad family with an increasingly large herd be prevented from killing or selling (that's their source of income) any animals for two years? [This is a tangent, sorry.]
After someone dies a special monk (not a lama), who has extensive training will determine what sort of life they've lived and what sort of ceremonies and chants are needed to atone for any problems with their life to help prepare them for a good rebirth. I kept trying to push Karjam to give me more information about how this monk would know-- "do they ask the family if he lived a good life?" but what Karjam knew was that the monk was able to calculate this based on spiritual powers, more or less. Apparently no one ever thinks this has been done "wrong." In the case of someone like Apa Lorae, well known for being generous and unconcerned with material wealth (he never learned to tell one piece of money from another), as well as an extremely ardent Buddhist (taking pilgrimages, circumambulating the temple, chanting constantly), the various ceremonies the monks needed to do were relatively "easy" -- the types of things that many monks are authorized to do (not more advanced and specialized ceremonies). A neighbor died while I was in Ahwencang and Karjam said he heard that family was having a really hard time because the ceremonies they needed monks to do were very hard to find monks for, often needing lamas to lead them, and that was expensive and difficult to organize, and the family was scrambling to get it all done during the 21 days (and might not be able to).
I think that being so busy dealing with guests and ceremonies helps to keep the family from dwelling on loss in a bad way. Western death needs more ceremony! It needs more acknowledgement. Don't just send that family home from the funeral to dwell and fester on what they forgot to say or do during the departed's lifetime! Also Apa Lorae meant to finish certain Buddhist tasks (spinning a certain prayer wheel at the temple X number of times, or circumambulating a certain prayer hall at another temple X number of times, or doing X number of prostrations at X site) and didn't, so these tasks were taken by the family to be finished during the 49 days, as a sort of last gift to Apa Lorae, they were doing these instead of him to help him acquire even more merit for his rebirth. I feel like these actions helped in the mourning process, too. Especially Tubko's children were very active with this (Tubko's family is the family line, the family that has taken over Apa Lorae's herd, etc. and that he's lived with). Having something to do for the dead after they've left is another really good thing the Tibetans have that Western culture doesn't. I do 108 prostrations a day for Apa Lorae. This is not a lot, per se, but it has been tough at times (when I'm sick, when I'm on the road). The prostrations allow me to think on Apa Lorae and actively and intently visualize his wonderful rebirth. Apa Lorae was one of the best people I've ever met, and so close to attaining enlightenment, so just perfectly good, so I've been hoping that in his next life he has the opportunity to really focus on spiritual cultivation.
Final point I want to make, since I've been writing this when I need to get work done now that I'm back in Korea, is that the family is fine. They're still happy. They lost Apa Lorae, but at his age (first half of his 70s), and due to the time to prepare after the diagnosis, they accept it as natural (when first diagnosed Karjam was really upset, because he felt he'd screwed up by not getting his father fully checked in order to detect something in advance). For them death is a serious thing, with ritual and rules that will govern their lives for the next year, but life goes on, not as some tear-soaked tragedy, but with beautiful memories. I spent that time with Karjam's family and never once did I feel an aura of sadness, pain, or grief. Days after they've lost the family patriarch, and no grief. There is a lot we can learn from that.
* Below, yet more momo are prepared for yet more guests.
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| Ahyangtso |
21st Day Funeral Celebration, Post I
12/30/2013
In the morning as soon as we awoke we proceeded to Tubko (2nd brother, older than K)'s winter house (the family seat, where Apa Lorae died) to get to work. Or mostly I stood around, non-integrated into what was going on, and being more of a pest by asking to be given tasks than just staying out of the way. I did make myself a big hot cup of coffee which expelled a headache that had been threatening to take over my entire noggin. Thanks be for the healing power of coffee.
A huge influx of people came to help. I didn't recognize some of them, Karjam said they were the sons of the patriarchs of the 34 households that make up the 'community' (a formal community that one cannot just move into or out of, having less to do with locality than historic ties and including the households of three of Karjam's siblings but not all), because today was going to be so much actual work that the sons were sent by the fathers. They worked on butter lamps (this had been started the day before, when 400 butter lamps were prepared), cleaned, reorganized the Buddhist ritual room, cooked (a heaping pile of momo -- meat filled dough-pockets to be steamed-- were made, meat was boiled on the bone, soup was made) and people spent quite a lot of time talking with each other (more sitting around and talking if they were older). I only had one long conversation with a person other than Karjam-- a relative who is nearing the end of high school (in his early twenties), who claimed a great interest in all things foreign. The people I felt closest to who were there were much too busy to stop and entertain me. The most delightful person present was clearly Tsela's illegitimate daughter who is being raised by Munjer and Darkojhet (Tsela's mother, Karjam's sister who is my age-mate). Reukshijhet is bright, social, very precocious, and cute as a freaking button.
Norzun (youngest sister), who has changed her name to Damdentso (to avoid her physical ailments, and her youngest son loudly reminds anyone who screws up of the new name, that of a healthy person), came with clothes for me to wear while I'm here, several of the things she brought were totally sweet/necessary-- a lower back-wrap made of lined silk, a fancy belt (mine are on Lopez), and work gloves. I had a chance to talk to Ama Dunmajhet about Apa Lorae, and how much my family and all Karjam's friends in the US are supporting her and sending good wishes. She has been eating only one meal per day as a fast (it's lunch, right at noon, as has Ahyangtso) since Apa Lorae passed.
All the people (close to 30) spent the day preparing for the monks to come, which they finally did around 3pm. Today is the 21st day since Apa Lorae's death, and a crucial day (the first 21 of 49 days are all important, but this marks the end of the 21 days and hence is special). No one (including Karjam) really understood about the ceremony that day, so when I watched it I mostly understood that it was a day when 1,000 was important- burning 1,000 butter lamps, making 1,000 tsampa statues (I'll explain more in a second), etc. but the entire ritual was overseen by Karsang Danzen, Karjam's double first cousin (Jabu's younger brother), and later I got a chance to grill him about it, so I will describe it here with the extra benefit of that knowledge, not present in my actual diary entry from the 30th.
So, burning the butter lamps was a big part of the day. The family wanted to find 1,000 lamps, but couldn't, so they instead burned 500 lamps twice. The lamps were all burned in the actual room/place where Apa Lorae died, the ante-room to the Buddhist Room, and by the end of the day the walls were nearly black with soot. During the day the heat was so intense, it was hard to walk through the room, but someone (a young man) had to stay inside the room the entire day to monitor the lamps and take care of things (as each first round lamp burned out it had to be quickly cleaned, re-wicked, re-buttered, cooled until the butter was hard, and circulate back into the room). Lamps could not go out before they were done, and the heat could make wicks droopy, so there was a lot of monitoring of lamps. One had to cover one's mouth to do this work, or to go near the lamps, out of respect.
[this is the first post of two detailing everything from this day, please read the second post, too]
In the morning as soon as we awoke we proceeded to Tubko (2nd brother, older than K)'s winter house (the family seat, where Apa Lorae died) to get to work. Or mostly I stood around, non-integrated into what was going on, and being more of a pest by asking to be given tasks than just staying out of the way. I did make myself a big hot cup of coffee which expelled a headache that had been threatening to take over my entire noggin. Thanks be for the healing power of coffee.
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| When we got there Rinchin and Jolo were still collecting Yak dung from the previous night |
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| Damdentso and Ama Dunmajhet at the start of the day |
A huge influx of people came to help. I didn't recognize some of them, Karjam said they were the sons of the patriarchs of the 34 households that make up the 'community' (a formal community that one cannot just move into or out of, having less to do with locality than historic ties and including the households of three of Karjam's siblings but not all), because today was going to be so much actual work that the sons were sent by the fathers. They worked on butter lamps (this had been started the day before, when 400 butter lamps were prepared), cleaned, reorganized the Buddhist ritual room, cooked (a heaping pile of momo -- meat filled dough-pockets to be steamed-- were made, meat was boiled on the bone, soup was made) and people spent quite a lot of time talking with each other (more sitting around and talking if they were older). I only had one long conversation with a person other than Karjam-- a relative who is nearing the end of high school (in his early twenties), who claimed a great interest in all things foreign. The people I felt closest to who were there were much too busy to stop and entertain me. The most delightful person present was clearly Tsela's illegitimate daughter who is being raised by Munjer and Darkojhet (Tsela's mother, Karjam's sister who is my age-mate). Reukshijhet is bright, social, very precocious, and cute as a freaking button.
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| Karjam and Reukshijhet |
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| See how charming she is? |
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| The hazards of cooking outside. A sheep comes to try to steal food from Rinchin (but she's just pouring off tea) |
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| When the lambs don't survive, they get skinned and given to the dogs. The skins are tanned, wool on. If a sheep dies with a lamb, they try to graft the motherless lamb onto a ewe who has lost her lamb. It sometimes works. |
Norzun (youngest sister), who has changed her name to Damdentso (to avoid her physical ailments, and her youngest son loudly reminds anyone who screws up of the new name, that of a healthy person), came with clothes for me to wear while I'm here, several of the things she brought were totally sweet/necessary-- a lower back-wrap made of lined silk, a fancy belt (mine are on Lopez), and work gloves. I had a chance to talk to Ama Dunmajhet about Apa Lorae, and how much my family and all Karjam's friends in the US are supporting her and sending good wishes. She has been eating only one meal per day as a fast (it's lunch, right at noon, as has Ahyangtso) since Apa Lorae passed.
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| Damdentso and her youngest son. |
All the people (close to 30) spent the day preparing for the monks to come, which they finally did around 3pm. Today is the 21st day since Apa Lorae's death, and a crucial day (the first 21 of 49 days are all important, but this marks the end of the 21 days and hence is special). No one (including Karjam) really understood about the ceremony that day, so when I watched it I mostly understood that it was a day when 1,000 was important- burning 1,000 butter lamps, making 1,000 tsampa statues (I'll explain more in a second), etc. but the entire ritual was overseen by Karsang Danzen, Karjam's double first cousin (Jabu's younger brother), and later I got a chance to grill him about it, so I will describe it here with the extra benefit of that knowledge, not present in my actual diary entry from the 30th.
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| Tubko's oldest (illegitimate) son, and Zhyibuk's oldest legitimate son. |
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| Damdentso, Rinchin, and Tsebae |
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| Many guests means a lot of tea and hot water going at once |
So, burning the butter lamps was a big part of the day. The family wanted to find 1,000 lamps, but couldn't, so they instead burned 500 lamps twice. The lamps were all burned in the actual room/place where Apa Lorae died, the ante-room to the Buddhist Room, and by the end of the day the walls were nearly black with soot. During the day the heat was so intense, it was hard to walk through the room, but someone (a young man) had to stay inside the room the entire day to monitor the lamps and take care of things (as each first round lamp burned out it had to be quickly cleaned, re-wicked, re-buttered, cooled until the butter was hard, and circulate back into the room). Lamps could not go out before they were done, and the heat could make wicks droopy, so there was a lot of monitoring of lamps. One had to cover one's mouth to do this work, or to go near the lamps, out of respect.
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| Karjam helps line up the lamps for burning |
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| Butter melting in a teapot next to other teapots on the stove |
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| Before the lamps were lit, they were ritually purified with juniper smoke |
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| Dorsey (1st brother's oldest legitimate son) pouring butter into the lamps |
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| Lamps being lit (using incense sticks) |
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| Ending the first round of 500 lamps |
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| Onto the second round |
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| Monitoring half the candles (the rest are to his left). The barrier is trying to keep drafts from blowing them out and also trying to direct the heat a little. |
21st Day (Funeral Celebration), Post II
[I was not able to get all my photos in one blog post, so I split the post up, hoping this would solve the problem.]
Finally the monks arrived, 11 of them. I did not take any notes during the ceremony which lasted over three hours, and I didn't watch all of it, either. I was one of the only people who watched much of it, but the 11 monks filled the Buddhist Room, so usually I could only watch from outside, through a dirty window. I was not allowed to stay in the room at certain parts of the ceremony. But since Karsang Danzen was in charge, I was able to take photos (from the vantage points I had).
First let me explain what I learned later-- this 21st Day Celebration was for us! The family left behind, not so much for Apa Lorae. The ceremony was for Tsela Nampson, for the people who remain to have a long life and do well -- to dispel the bad luck of a death in the family. At the time I didn't know that.
After a chant (quick) and a snack the monks washed their hands (soap, hot water) and started making 1,000 figures out of tsampa. The different monks had to make different types of figures, but the majority were altars (for Tsela Nampson?), most of the 1,000 being small altars, but bigger altars also, as well as one very large stupa (also confusingly referred to as a stupa on a mountain?)(at the time I didn't identify these as altars, and K didn't know what they were, either). The barley flour was mixed with water and melted butter, and the cookie-dough textured result was shaped by the monks. 5 different things were made--
~The big stupa
~1,000 altars
~Larger altars
~Incense holders
~small balls of tsampa (a little bigger than deer poop)
Everything except the balls were painted with melted butter.Then butter in cold clear water was formed and shaped and affixed to the small and large altars, as well as the stupa (extremely precisely to the stupa, nicely to the larger altars and just slapped onto the small altars). Karsang Danzen told me some monks just practice how to sculpt butter and tsampa. The ornate and specific placement of butter, especially on the big stupa, done by one monk with another assisting, took the same time as four monks making all of the small altars. Everything was placed on a table with the stupa in the center, with butter lamps, cups of water, cups of barley, and lit incense. Then the monks circled it, chanting (another set of 1,000), sat chanting, bowed, circled more, and so on.
At the end of the day everyone went outside for a ceremony called 'tee.' This cleanses everything that's been done on that day. The people bow to the monks three times, who wash with juniper purified water (it was white, maybe with milk in it?), then offer the water to the people to drink from their palms and wipe across the crowns of their heads. After the 'tee' everyone went back inside.
Then the monks destroyed the altars, except for the stupa. The destruction is after the tsampa has been offered to Tsela Nampson to eat, so the sculptures have already served their purpose. The tsampa can then be given to animals or just kept somewhere. A few days later I noticed a large basin of it in the corner, but K wouldn't let me feed any to the sheep (who love it).
When their work was done the monks had a grand momo and boiled meat feast before they left. The leftover momo and meat became dinner for everyone else, who slowly cleaned up, waiting for each lamp to go out, throwing out the wick, polishing it, and packing it away to be returned to whoever had lent it. Each monk costs about 2,000 RMB for the ceremony, in cash, according to Karjam.
Finally the monks arrived, 11 of them. I did not take any notes during the ceremony which lasted over three hours, and I didn't watch all of it, either. I was one of the only people who watched much of it, but the 11 monks filled the Buddhist Room, so usually I could only watch from outside, through a dirty window. I was not allowed to stay in the room at certain parts of the ceremony. But since Karsang Danzen was in charge, I was able to take photos (from the vantage points I had).
 |
| Karsang Danzen starts to mix the tsampa |
 |
| The vantage point for the kids was always through the window, but only the kids and I were really watching |
First let me explain what I learned later-- this 21st Day Celebration was for us! The family left behind, not so much for Apa Lorae. The ceremony was for Tsela Nampson, for the people who remain to have a long life and do well -- to dispel the bad luck of a death in the family. At the time I didn't know that.
After a chant (quick) and a snack the monks washed their hands (soap, hot water) and started making 1,000 figures out of tsampa. The different monks had to make different types of figures, but the majority were altars (for Tsela Nampson?), most of the 1,000 being small altars, but bigger altars also, as well as one very large stupa (also confusingly referred to as a stupa on a mountain?)(at the time I didn't identify these as altars, and K didn't know what they were, either). The barley flour was mixed with water and melted butter, and the cookie-dough textured result was shaped by the monks. 5 different things were made--
~The big stupa
~1,000 altars
~Larger altars
~Incense holders
~small balls of tsampa (a little bigger than deer poop)
Everything except the balls were painted with melted butter.Then butter in cold clear water was formed and shaped and affixed to the small and large altars, as well as the stupa (extremely precisely to the stupa, nicely to the larger altars and just slapped onto the small altars). Karsang Danzen told me some monks just practice how to sculpt butter and tsampa. The ornate and specific placement of butter, especially on the big stupa, done by one monk with another assisting, took the same time as four monks making all of the small altars. Everything was placed on a table with the stupa in the center, with butter lamps, cups of water, cups of barley, and lit incense. Then the monks circled it, chanting (another set of 1,000), sat chanting, bowed, circled more, and so on.
 |
| These big altars were what Karsang Danzen made |
At the end of the day everyone went outside for a ceremony called 'tee.' This cleanses everything that's been done on that day. The people bow to the monks three times, who wash with juniper purified water (it was white, maybe with milk in it?), then offer the water to the people to drink from their palms and wipe across the crowns of their heads. After the 'tee' everyone went back inside.
Then the monks destroyed the altars, except for the stupa. The destruction is after the tsampa has been offered to Tsela Nampson to eat, so the sculptures have already served their purpose. The tsampa can then be given to animals or just kept somewhere. A few days later I noticed a large basin of it in the corner, but K wouldn't let me feed any to the sheep (who love it).
When their work was done the monks had a grand momo and boiled meat feast before they left. The leftover momo and meat became dinner for everyone else, who slowly cleaned up, waiting for each lamp to go out, throwing out the wick, polishing it, and packing it away to be returned to whoever had lent it. Each monk costs about 2,000 RMB for the ceremony, in cash, according to Karjam.
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| Are you in love with her, yet? |
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Here you can see the way there were two sides to the lamp area.   
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