The following are photos that I took at the Dolma Ling Nunnery in Dharamsala, site of the Tibetan Nuns Project, which has the purpose of educating nuns on the same level as monks. Tibetan women, including nuns, have been treated like second class citizens for centuries in what is yet another patriarchal culture, despite the perception that so many Westerners have that Tibetans are perfect and peaceful.

The group with which I was staying in Dharamsala, India, a major Tibetan exile community, took several taxi cabs to the Dolma Ling Nunnery, a large grouping of two- to three-story white and red buildings that look rather new. The architecture was simple and streamlined, and I’m tempted to say it looks more Indian than Tibetan, but it was impressive nonetheless. We met up in front of the buildings and a couple of young women in chupas led us in. We walked across an attractive paved courtyard with steps and bushy plants. Surrounding the courtyard were white columns forming a sort of cloister. We climbed the steps into one of the buildings and thus entered the main chanting hall of the Dolma Ling Nunnery.

The main hall is set up like a basic traditional Tibetan prayer hall, with long red cushioned benches facing each other and running parallel to the length of the room, and with a dais at the far end of the room, facing the doors. In the center of the dais was a yellow brocade-draped throne displaying a large framed photo of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. Behind the throne was a huge, colorful appliquéd tapestry, and to either side of it were glass cabinets holding traditional manuscripts and statues. Shantum, our meditation instructor and tour guide, led a meditation sitting, and I felt relaxed. Then he asked one of us to read from a sutra, originally given by the Buddha’s buddy Shariputra, on ways to put away anger. It is called the Discourse on the Five Ways of Ending Anger and was originally recited in Sravasti.

The Dolma Ling Tibetan Nuns Project was set up in the early 1990s when nuns started coming here, escaping Chinese-occupied Tibet. The seventh Dalai Lama had set up the original Dolma Ling some centuries back.

We followed a couple of Tibetan women to the video room to see a film called A Day in the Life of Dolma Ling. According to the video, the nunnery was established in 1991 and includes nuns from Tibet, Spiti, and Ladakh. It also includes a few female laypeople. The construction was completed in 2005. The nunnery will have a solar hot water system, but it’s not constructed yet. It has a clinic and even an Internet room. The nunnery includes a staff of about two hundred, including teachers. The Dalai Lama and the Tibetan Nuns Project have helped to give women opportunities for study, progress, and respect, and for them to obtain full ordination. They have their own cows and sheep and fields and produce a lot of their own stuff, including making their own tofu. They don’t yet grow their own vegetables, but will at some point.

We went on a tour that included, among other places, the computer room and the library upstairs. We took our time in the library, a spacious room with many rows of glass-door bookcases, most of which had plenty of space for more books. I noticed that some books were in English. In a far corner was a wooden and glass cabinet containing a sand mandala.

We stepped out onto a roof with a stunning view of the mountains, some of which are topped with snow in the distance, and the sky was bright blue. Someone asked why a row of trees was chopped up so much, concerned that it might be for the ironic reason that the trees obstructed the view; but no, it’s because the branches are used for firewood and they will grow back. We stood on the roof, with its traditional tubular gold "victory banners" at the corners, signifying the Buddha's victory over the demon Mara. We looked out at the water system tank, which involves a tank (a big rectangular body of water, that is), a building, and big black cylindrical tubs. We went back inside, to a large room with a cabinet displaying free copies of Tibetan Nuns Project newsletters and post cards, and we sat down for a talk with the founder of the Tibetan Nuns Project.

Rinchen Kunun, a Tibetan woman in an elegant dark green chupa, is Head of the Tibetan Nuns Project, and she also runs the guesthouse Kashmir Cottage, where about half of our sangha stayed. She has worked for the Tibetan government in exile, but her pet project is the Tibetan Nuns Project and was overworked when she participated in both. She has been the head of the Tibetan Women’s Association in the past. She also happens to be married to the Dalai Lama’s brother, Tenzin Choegyal, who was identified as a Rinpoche but stepped down because the job didn’t suit him. We had a great interview with her at a long table, where we munched on snacks and drank tea.

Among other things, as we neared the end of the talk, someone asked, “Are the nuns now writing commentary on texts?”

Rinchen Kunun replied, “Yes, they’re beginning to do it, and it’s so exciting to have commentary from a female point of view.”

http://www.tnp.org/ = Tibetan Nuns Project