RYI STUDENT BLOG

A letter to Classical Tibetan Dear Classical Tibetan, our story began three years ago, when I came to Nepal to study a Buddhist text at a Shedra, and they also offered Classical Tibetan lessons. In the beginning, I was amazed by all your lines and squiggles, since I never learned an alphabet different from my own. When I first managed to transform these squiggles into actual sounds, I thought the hardest part would lie behind me. Little did I know. You forced me through your spellings that just made zero sense to me, and then you threw all these particles at me until I couldn’t feel my brain anymore. In the beginning, all I could understand were sentences about yaks and rabbits drinking tea. I hadn’t looked at a sutra in my life, and I was planning to keep it that way. But with your subtle but persistent charm you lured me into RYI, and there I was, sitting in a proper class setting, learning your expressions for Dharma things. Slowly I got to read along puja texts...

THE FEELINGS Firstly as the recipient of the South Asia and Himalayan Scholarship, I am highly honored and would like to express my sincere heartfelt gratitude for the tremendous support bestowed to me through this scholarship. Without a doubt this scholarship will play key role in my educational dreams and I knew I had been given the privilege to attend a prestigious program that not many people were lucky enough to which bestowed in me a sense of obligation to use the opportunity effectively. Changes can make people overwhelm with the newness of the situation. Moving from a high school to a university is one of the largest changes to my life. I was very excited, since I finally made it to the university that I and my parents dreamed about. But then at the very beginning it’s hard to put my nerves to the bed, as I felt that I entered some new world and this program made me realize how big and complex the world really is. Will I fit? Am I smart enough? Will I be able to rela...