RYI STUDENT BLOG

My classmates and teachers during the summer I had the wish to learn Sanskrit since quite a long time. With the help of a generous  sponsor and much needed motivation, I was finally able to join Beginning Sanskrit  Course during Summer 2016 at RYI. Fortunately, on the first day of orientation, Chökyi Nyima Rinpoche-la invited all the  students for a talk and lunch. He gave us motivational speech regarding how fortunate  we all are to get this chance to learn Dharma by one way or the other. I had been learning Tibetan language too. So, at the end of the talk, I gathered the  courage to go forth to him and ask for blessings in Tibetan language to complete the  course. He was amazed to see me do so and gave me his blessings. I left with the smile  on my face and with confidence that I will be able to do the course no matter what  obstacles may occur. Prayer flags at Namo Buddha So, the classes began. I and my classmates were doing f...

Now we are at the beginning of the “spring semester” in RYI (Rangjung Yeshe Institute), however in this  time is very, very cold in Nepal!!! Everyone are using all the warm clothes that is possible to protect from the freeze weather, thus we  have a huge variety of colorful and creative styles around. Even the nuns and monks display their warm  neckerchief and gloves as well different kinds of very warm bonnet, as me they do not have natural  protection from the chilliness… That way, despite of the cold weather everyone is very happy and with warm heart!!! All the students, teachers, staff and nuns and monks are very glad and rejoicing to see each other after  a short vacation of one month. When we meet each other the curiosity to know what we did during the free time is the first subject of  our talking. Some students went home, what means for some to travel for their countries - what mean all the  continents, as our Shedra – university, i...

Namo Buddha, one of the most sacred Buddhist pilgrimage sides in Nepal, was blessed by the Buddha out of his limitless compassion and generosity for sentient beings.   Since then the place has become a sanctuary for pilgrims. It is the greatest source of direct blessing from the Buddha, and the 'classroom' where still anyone can learn the prowess of the Buddha in the course of saving countless ignorant beings from suffering.  Just visiting the cave where the Buddha performed the greatest act of human generosity the area, one is enfolded by the compassion of the Buddha. Spending a few days there, one is removed from afflictive state and levitated in the sphere of blithe. Under the great bless and vision of a Tibetan Bodhisattva, the place’s sanctifying potency has been enhanced, the actual words of the Buddha in thousands volumes are studied with the inspiration that had been planted there by the Buddha.  The learning center, with such a magnificent temp...

I have known the story of Namo Buddha (in Tibetan stag mo lus byin) since I was a child. When we had finished our nomadic livestock work at the end of the day, all of my family gathered in our tent around the mud-stove in the butter lamplight. While we ate our dinner sometimes our father told us some interesting stories including folk stories and some very basic Buddha dharma. He chanted the prayers he had memorized from when he was a monk before the cultural revolution. Among them stag mo lus byin’s story moved me greatly  even I was a thoughtless child. Since I heard that the Buddha had fed a tigress with his living body because of his unbearable compassion for the little tiger cubs’ lives I generated more Bodhicitta than I had before. However I was never expected that I could get to see the real holy place where the Buddha offered his body for benefit of sentient beings’ lives. Nevertheless I got the great fortune to study in the white monastery (shad dra) in Nepal f...

A few weeks ago our first year class took a field trip to Kathmandu University and to Namo Buddha, a holy Buddhist pilgrimage site. They are both about two hours from Boudha. It was my first time to really see Nepal outside of Kathmandu. It is quite ugly and at the same time quite beautiful.  There is so much poverty but there is also so much beautiful landscape. We passed through so many different environments: small country towns, crowded markets, breathtaking countryside.  Kathmandu University is interesting because it is so small and modest but at the same time so ambitious, it really took a lot of struggle and work to get it to the modest capacity it is at now. The director gave us a talk and a tour and he seemed very enthusiastic about our program, and very genuine. He was educated partly in a monastery. After going to Kathmandu University we went to Namo Buddha, where there is a monastery and a stupa. It is supposedly the place where in a former life the Bu...