Tibetan monk tells his story
His vow prevents him from holding a grudge against his Chinese tormentors
During his 33 years as a prisoner of conscience in Chinese labors camps and prisons in Tibet, Tibetan lama Palden Gyatso was dangled over fire as if he was a human steak. He was routinely kicked and whipped while pulling a plow for more than nine hours a day. He had an electrical cattle prod shoved down his mouth, shocking and destroying all the roots of his teeth.
There were many days he wished his guards would kill him. He would spit at his captors, hoping they would shoot him or strike him fatally in the head. His vow as a Buddhist monk prevented him from taking a life, even his.
His vow also prevents him from holding a grudge.
"He almost lost his compassion for the Chinese," said Rigdzin Tingkhye, Gyatso's translator. "But the Buddhist doctrine clearly mentions that anger is one's enemy. He has no anger toward the Chinese, even to those individual guards who punished him. Rejecting anger is the only way to achieve happiness."
Gyatso was released from Drapchi prison in Lhasa, Tibet, on Aug. 25, 1992, and he escaped to India 13 days later. Since then, he's dedicated his life to exposing the atrocities of the Chinese mililtary occupation of Tibet.
Ordained as a monk at age 10, imprisoned when he was 28, released when he was 60 and now 72 - he arrived in Juneau Saturday.
Gyatso will speak before the World Affairs Council, on the first floor of the Dimond Courthouse, at 5:30 p.m. today. He will appear at Juneau-Douglas High School Tuesday and Wednesday. He will be the guest of honor at the Juneau Shambhala Center at 7 p.m. Tuesday. And he will speak at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the University of Alaska Southeast's Egan Library.
Gyatso used to travel with some of the same implements that the Chinese used to torture him. But airline security officials misplaced those items this spring in Chicago.
Juneau is Gyatso's fourth stop in Alaska. He's visited Anchorage, Fairbanks and Homer.
"People in Alaska are a lot more relaxed and a lot more concerned," Gyatso said. "A lot of people are interested to hear more about spirituality, and the land itself looks more like Tibet. So many people have been very sympathetic and so many have asked the same question: What can we do right now?"
Communist China invaded Tibet in October 1950 and began systematic "reforms" of the Tibetan people. The Chinese policy toward Tibet is "almost not changed" to this day, Gyatso said.
"I'm optimistic that Tibet will gain independence one day," Gyatso said. "The reason is that this world has a map and it has boundaries. Tibet is part of this planet and it has its own boundaries."
"If there really are human rights, then Tibet has a right to survive on that map. If there are no human rights, then the United Nations should not maintain this entity called Human Rights."
In 1967, the Chinese began destroying monasteries and imprisoning thousands of monks. Gyatso was jailed in March 1959 after leading an army of 100 monks in defense of the Norbulingka, the Dalai Lama's summer palace, in Lhasa. There are still thousands of political prisoners, Gyatso said, most between the ages of 12 and 32. Gyatso was fortunate to escape, and though he's written about his captivity in his autobiography, "The Autobiography of a Tibetan Monk," he still has difficulty reliving the memories.
"It was hard at the beginning," Gyatso said. "Over time, it gets better and better, but there are still times that the memories become very vivid again."
Gyatso broke down Friday while telling a story at a World Affairs Council lecture in Anchorage. It was April 1, 1991, and James Lilley, then the U.S. ambassador to China, was visiting Drapchi prison.
"There was so much Chinese propaganda that the Chinese, whenever there was an important visitor, would warn that everyone in the prison had to laugh," Gyatso said. "They would bring in their own people wearing uniforms like prisoners. They would have the refrigerators full of wonderful food and everyone would be playing games and dancing."
Gyatso, then held at Drapchi, said Lilley's visit was one of the Chinese' "largest performances." Some of the prisoners, including Gyatso, wrote a letter to Lilley. One of the inmates, Lobsang Tenzin, was able to sneak it into Lilley's left hand.
"But in front of everybody, a Chinese officer woman took it out of his hand," Tingkhye said. "(Gyatso) was crying (Friday). He remembered that insensitivity."