Escorting a Monk to America We had heard that Khenpo Karthar, Rinpoche (our teacher) had a nephew, Karma Dhundil, living in Katmandu. Of course, we wanted to meet him. Moreover, we found out that arrangements were in the works to bring him back to the states and place him at KTD, our monastery near Woodstock, New York. Better yet, there was a chance we could accompany him back to the states on our return. And meet him we did, the next morning after we arrived in Kathmandu. It turns out that he was staying at Thrangu Monastery, the very folks who had picked us up at the airport, the night before. He showed up at our hotel accompanied by other monks. Of course, we were happy to meet him and I believe it was mutual. His English was not great, but he was a great communicator, if you know what I mean. Just 20 years old, he was very sincere and very appealing. You can just tell by looking at him that here is a sincere monk. We became friends right off. And we were to see Karma Dhundil many times as we came in and out of Kathmandu on our various journeys. We volunteered right off to have him accompany us back to the states and we were gratified when Khenpo Karthar, Rinpoche sent a message stating that he would like us to do just that, escort him to America. The details were in the hands of Gloria Jones, Thrangu Rinpoche’s secretary and a most valuable and great person to know in Kathmandu. She was busy making all the arrangements for Rinpoche’s nephew to return with us to America and always went out of here way to be helpful. I don’t know how many times we met and conversed as best we could, but he was ready to go with us. He was packing his bags. The day before we were to fly home, I wanted to take a look at Karma Dhundhil’s baggage, to make sure there would be no problems getting it on the airline. Sure enough, he had jury-rigged rope-wrapped bags that weighed a ton. I was not sure they would be easy to get through customs and onto the plane, so we went out and got two (maroon colored) duffel bags and showed him how to redistribute the weight, so that he had two bags of equivalent weight. The next step was to get him through immigration and onto the plane. It is a pain in the butt even for westerners, but I was given to understood it could be even more difficult for Nepalese leaving their own country. They often were delayed, questioned, and sometimes even denied exit. And it was here that I was able to help out a bit. After my family and I were whisked through customs and immigration, I returned to stand in the long line of Nepalese trying to make the same plane. And the line moved like a glacier. It was getting closer and closer to take off. I was starting to worry and began making faces and noise to the officials, who were wondering why I was in that line at all. When we got to the front, they spread out Karma Drundhil’s passport and were pouring over it, trying to figure out what was going on here. That is when I stepped forward and announced that I had come to Nepal to escort this monk back to America, where he would reside at a Buddhist monastery. This action on my part kind of took them by surprise. And every time they began to move to question the monk, I would speak up, pointing to the name Karma Triyana Dharmachakra Monastery right on his passport and proclaiming that I am here to take him with me, that I would be responsible for him. In the end, they never asked him a single question, but just let us pass through. As it turns out, we had to run for the plane and were the last people to board. We flew with Karma Dhundil to Hong Kong, where he spent the night with friends at Thrangu Rinpoche’s center in the city. The next morning, we met at the airport, where, aside from losing one of my daughters for 40 minutes in the place, nothing else eventful happened. We flew from Hong Kong to San Francisco with Karma Dhundil like he was a member of my family. He is only 20 years old. Every time we would reach any kind of checkpoint, we would surround the young monk until people were very clear that, if they were going to hassle him, they had all of us to deal with as well. This worked very well and we at last passed through the final customs and immigration checkpoints at San Francisco. I informed Karma Dhundil that he was now safely within the United States and we all went off to drink some American water and have an American sandwich. Karma Dhundil looked around the San Francisco airport and declared to us, "No monks." That’s right, there are very few monks here in the United States. Karma Dhundil returned with us to our center in Michigan, spent a few days, and then was flown on to New York, where he now lives at KTD Monastery. One last comment on Karma Dhundil. I took him with me to visit a very well-known Sikkimese thanka painter, who now lives in Kathmandu. When he saw the young monk, he told me privately that he knows this monk. He sees him early every morning at the Boudha stupa, doing extensive practice, including not just the usual circumambulation, but great numbers of prostrations in all kinds of weather. "This is a very good monk." he declared. I could not agree more. ...back to the opening page go on to the next story...