Ladakh Trip in 2011

With the monks safely back in the monastery it is now time to start planning the visit to Ladakh for next summer. Based at Thiksey Monastery just outside Leh, we will be taking a group of 12 people to visit the monasteries of the Indus Valley, travelling to Zanskar where we will do a short trek along the river to Phugtal Monastery, and returning to visit Disket Monastery and the beautiful Nubra Valley. Dates are still to be finally confirmed, but likely to be leaving UK around 27th July, so that we are in Ladakh to coincide with the visit of HH the Dalai Lama for anyone who might like to attend one of the days of teachings. Details are now up on our website at www.tashi-lhunpo.org.uk, Ladakh Trip. Please do get in touch if you might be interested in coming along.

Nearly at the end...

The final few weeks of the tour have been a whirlwind of activity, involving a huge number of minibus-miles (Salisbury-Kendal-Salisbury-Reading-Hexham-Halifax-Manchester-Salisbury). We haven't yet done the annual mileage count, but we seem to have covered quite a lot of ground in the past three months. Now, with just one more fixture to go, we are beginning the final stages of clearing everything away in readiness for the next tour, checking over the costumes and instruments for damage and doing a stock-take of the shop items to see what we need to re-order. We still leave time for the occasional 'treat' though - and the most successful to date was undoubtedly our visit to Lord's Cricket Ground - the 'Cathedral of cricket' as our guide reminded us - and somewhere as important to those of us who live in India as Tower Bridge itself! We had a wonderful private tour, accompanied by Brian Thompson, a Member of the MCC, who had set things up for our visit. As well as the ground itself, the Ashes, the Pavilion, changing rooms and that extraordinary egg-shaped Media Centre, we also saw a game of Real Tennis being played. In fact Keith, our guide, told us that it was the first time that he had seen a game stop so that the players could peer through the viewing window and take photographs of the people watching! At the end of our official tour, Brian kindly took us around the Indoor School too, so we had a really marvellous day out, and certainly something to tell the rest of the monks about on our return.

Woodford Valley Primary School

Just back from a day in Woodford Valley Primary School, where we had a lovely time. We spent the morning on hands-on workshops, where everyone had a go at butter sculpture, prayer-flag printing, sand mandala-making, dukar wheel making and learning some Tibetan language. We finished up with some of the mudras (hand gestures) from the prayer of Kunrik. After lunch, we gave a short performance to the whole school, including some of the dances and chants, as well as having a brief visit from Singhe the Snow Lion at the end. The children presented Kachen Lobzang Tsultim with a very beautiful Thank You card - written in Tibetan! We look forward to being back in the school for a full performance on 29th September at 7pm.

News from Home

While we are away we still get news from the Monastery, and it was wonderful to hear about His Holiness the Dalai Lama's visit last week. His Holiness often says that Tashi Lhunpo Monastery is His Monastery - and he has taken special responsibility for it over the years. Now with the new Assembly Hall project a reality, thanks to His generous support and encouragement, the monastery has a secure future to look forward to. Work on the new temple is due to begin next month - more news as it comes.

Twenty-one Tara Retreat

The retreat at Hazel Hill Wood began on Tuesday with a small group watching the opening ceremony of the mandala. Hazel Hill Wood is a spiritual retreat centre just south of Salisbury. Its 70 acres of beautiful mixed woodland is maintained as naturally and sensitively as possible to protect the many aspects of its diversity. The beautiful Tara sand mandala is coming along well, and more people are joining as the weekend approaches. The destruction ceremony takes place on Sunday at 3pm. For more information contact Agatha on 07973 280943.

Sold out at the Royal Opera House!

A busy few days since our return from Edinburgh with a lovely visit to Devon (Brixham Theatre) where the sun shone and we had a lovely performance and very comfortable stay with old friends Cecila and Martin Potten in their lovely house overlooking the harbour.

Back to Salisbury and then to London for our big date in the Opera House as part of the Deloitte Ignite Festival. But first to important things! All our groups main ambition on coming to the UK is to see Tower Bridge. To get there, we travelled on a boat down the River Thames, alighting at Tower Pier, and fulfilling all ambitions with a number of excellent photographs. After a very good Italian lunch, we then re-embarked and on reaching the South Bank again, took a flight on the London Eye, by which time the skies had cleared and we had good views over the whole of the city in soft, evening light.

Back to the minibus and to the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden, to find that the performance (in the Paul Hamlyn Hall, formally the Floral Hall) had been sold out some time ago. The staging was extraordinary - a series of trees hanging from the ceiling on which were projected a moving light show. Difficult for us to appreciate from 'backstage' but I suspect very effective from the audience. What an amazing building! We brought all our costumes up to the hall in Europe's largest lift, designed to fit a pantechnicon with all the opera sets etc. What a pity we couldn't have brought the minibus up in it too! The performance was greatly appreciated by audience members we spoke to, and we felt very privileged to have performed in such a space.

Home again...

After ten hours on the M6 and M5, we returned home on Sunday and have been spending the last few days reorganising ourselves before the next part of the tour. The weather has been kind, so the washing machine has been working overtime, and drying clothes has been easy in the sunshine. We are going swimming this morning, and then packing to leave for Devon tomorrow, where we hope the weather will stay glorious for our two days at the seaside! Ttickets for the performance in Brixham are selling well - no doubt helped by our 'Best Ten Gigs' billing in The Indpendent entertainment guide last Saturday, which also mentioned our 'astonishing' new CD, due to be launched on Sunday alongside the performance in the Royal Opera House. Exciting times!