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  • From: Lawrence London <lfljvenaura@gmail.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [permaculture] The people of Tibet need help now - Boing Boing
  • Date: Wed, 6 Mar 2013 10:01:48 -0500

The people of Tibet need help now - Boing Boing
http://boingboing.net/2013/03/06/tibet.html

Sunday marks the most important date for all Tibetans; those inside Tibet
as well as those in diaspora across the globe. March 10 is Tibetan Uprising
Day <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_Uprising_Day>, and we who live in
the free world shall protest in front of Chinese consulates and other
sites, to amplify our voices on behalf of all who are voiceless inside
Tibet.

Ever since China's military
invasion<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Chamdo>of Tibet in
1949-1950, the religion, the cultural heritage and sovereignty
of the Tibetan people have been severely compromised.

With the signing of the 17-Point
Agreement<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventeen_Point_Agreement_for_the_Peaceful_Liberation_of_Tibet>with
the Chinese signed under duress on May 23, 1951, Tibet surrendered its
sovereignty to the Chinese for the first time in its long history. Tibetans
hoped that Beijing would comply with the Chinese side of the agreement. But
that did not happen.

The situation inside Tibet deteriorated progressively, year after year
following the invasion. The human rights of Tibetans were not honored.

Activists have created a petition, at The White House's *We the
People*website, calling on the Obama administration to implore China
to lift its
suppression of Tibetan cultural and religious practices. If 100,000 people
sign
the petition
<https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/implore-china-prevent-tibetan-self-burning-suicides-lifting-suppression-tibet%E2%80%99s-cultural-practices/hpW7MYlZ>by
March 12., the White House must respond to it.

In 1956, violent protests began in the
Kham<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kham>region of Tibet. Many natives
of that region, who are known as Khampas,
left their homes and took refuge up in the hills with their weapons. They
attacked Chinese posts whenever the situation was tactically favorable.
Gradually, our Khampa warriors left Kham, and banded together in the
vicinity of Lhasa and the
Lhokha<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lhoka_%28Shannan%29_Prefecture>(southern)
region.

The situation in Tibet worsened by the day, and many skirmishes between the
Tibetans and Chinese forces erupted throughout Tibet.

During this tumultuous period in Lhasa, the Chinese military general
invited the Dalai Lama to the local army headquarters for a dance
performance. They insisted that the customary entourage and security detail
not accompany His Holiness.

Lhasans were stunned and suspicious. They smelled danger. They were
convinced that as soon as the Dalai Lama entered the military headquarters,
the Chinese would kidnap him and fly him to Beijing, just as had happened
with many other Tibetan freedom fighters who disappeared after accepting
similar invitations from the Chinese.

On March 10, 1959 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1959_Tibetan_uprising>,
tens of thousands of Tibetans in Lhasa gathered to protest in defiance
against the Chinese military, demanding they go back to China and leave
Tibet to the Tibetans. The demonstrators surrounded the Norbulingkha
palace<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norbulingka>,
to protect the Dalai Lama. The angry crowd even stoned to death two
Tibetans identified as spies, who were on the special Chinese payroll.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama escaping Tibet to take political refuge in
India in March, 1959, courtesy tibetoffice.org

On the night of March 17, 1959, the Dalai Lama disguised himself as a
Chinese soldier, slipped out of his summer palace, and headed south toward
India. He was escorted by his loyal entourage, and by Khampa warriors.

At the time, I was five years old. I was living in the Ganden
monastery<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganden_Monastery>in Tibet, as a
reincarnated
Tulku <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulku>.

Word of the escape spread quickly. As people throughout Tibet learned of
the Dala Lama's flight, many decided to make the perilous choice to try and
follow him to India.

Some of our monastery elders fled, and they took me along with them to
exile in India.

I was separated from my mother and father.

I never saw them again.

Thepo Tulku: "I am in the front row, second position from left to right. It
was 1960, and I was about 6 years old, at the Tibetan Young Lamas Home
School (which included all five different sects of Tibetan Buddhism), in
New Delhi, India."

I have worked for my people's cause all my life. I do my best to serve as
a conduit between our younger generation and older folks. I'm a follower of
the Middle-Way
Approach<http://www.dalailama.com/messages/middle-way-approach>endorsed
by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. I believe that this approach makes
the most sense in our ever-changing geopolitical environment.

On March 10, 2013, I will join Tibetans around the world in protest. On
that day, I will attend protests in the Bay Area, then fly to Washington DC
to lobby American lawmakers to support human rights in Tibet, on March 18
and 19. There will be many Gangchenpas (“People from the Land of Snow”) in
DC for our lobbying efforts, from some 20 cities throughout North America.

I urge every Tibetan reading this message to make an effort to join us in
Washington, DC, for our lobbying efforts. We need the participation of as
many Tibetans as possible.

The Tibetan
self-immolations<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-immolation_protests_by_Tibetans_in_China>,
which are occurring mostly inside Tibet, are our people's desperate call
for justice and support from the international community. This began as a
contemporary phenomenon in Tibet starting around 2009. In early 2013, the
number of Tibetans who have burned themselves alive surpassed
100<http://www.savetibet.org/resource-center/maps-data-fact-sheets/self-immolation-fact-sheet>.
In a brutally occupied land where there is no freedom of speech, immolation
has emerged as a most desperate form of expression.

Each of those 100 fellow human beings demanded the restoration of
fundamental human rights in Tibet, such as the freedom to practice one's
spiritual beliefs in accordance with the teachings of the Buddha. They all
call out as one voice for the return of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to
Tibet.

All of my fellow Tibetan families and children are suffering so much inside
occupied Tibet. It is important for all conscientious netizens of the
global community to amplify our collective voices on behalf of the
voiceless in Tibet.

We are united in our desire to raise the awareness of the international
community. We want the world to hear and see the atrocities being committed
against Tibetans solely for the crime of speaking their minds; the crime of
human expression. We want to continue our spiritual practices in line with
the teachings of our great gurus, not under the dictates of a state entity
that does not believe in the right of religious freedom, or freedom of
thought.

I urge world leaders to give us a hand. We want China to abide by
globally-recognized principles of basic human rights and freedoms for the
people in Tibet, as enshrined in the United Nations Universal Declaration
of Human Rights <http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/index.shtml>.

China, give us genuine autonomy and there will be harmony.

FREE TIBET.

PEACE ON EARTH.

—Thepo Tulku <https://www.facebook.com/ttulku>

The author, with a young fellow Tibetan

VENERABLE THEPO RINPOCHE was recognized as the 8th Thepo Tulku and trained
in the Ganden Shartse
Monastery<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganden_Monastery>in Tibet. From
1975 to 1980, he worked at the Library
of Tibetan Works and Archives <http://www.ltwa.net/library/> in Dharamsala,
India, and served as a special cultural advisor for the Smithsonian
Institution Tibetan Library. In 1983, he moved to Northern California, and
has worked as an activist for the Tibetan cause in various capacities: as a
founding board member of the Bay Area Friends of
Tibet<http://friends-of-tibet.org/>in 1983; a board member and
co-founder of the Tibetan
Association of Southern California <http://www.socaltibet.org/> in 1990;
President of the Tibetan Association of Northern
California<http://www.tanc.org/>in 1994; and as Coordinator for the
Tibetan Resettlement Project beginning
in 1993. He is currently a board member for the Tibetan Association of
Northern California
<http://hcbss.stanford.edu/event/symposium-tulku-system>and the Santa
Barbara Tibet Summit <http://www.sbtibet.com/>. Email: thepo@msn.com.




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