We were sitting five rows away from the stage of where His Holiness would be sitting and speaking, and our anticipation had grown strongly because we had to check in about an hour before the event began. As they announced that he was about the enter, my heart started pounding–I was so excited! He walked out, and we all did small bows toward him and clapped. If you have never seen his smile or heard his laugh, look it up. It’s so contagious!
The event began with him making a speech about the dialogue in general, and then we had a session of Q&A. Before attending, I was told that Chinese students had priority to American students for the event, so I was not expecting to be accepted to attend. Many American students had questioned why the Chinese students were being favored, but I did not have a good enough grasp of the history to explain. The night before, Kou and I watched a documentary on the Dalai Lama, and we both had taken Chinese Film for J-term where we learned about the history of China. Interestingly enough, the Dalai Lama has held his title for a long time and since he was 5 years old! I realized how little is taught about China and Asian history in general in the United States. It was a concept so distanced from our classrooms. The current status of the issue is that the Chinese people took over the power to choose the next Dalai Lama, meaning that when His Holiness passes away in this life, the next Dalai Lama would most likely be Chinese and not Tibetan, therefore changing and impacting the Tibetan culture and society immensely.
That was why the dialogue was meant for Chinese students, so that they would have the opportunity to interact with Tibetans and have conversations about the future relationships between the two countries. One White American student had asked the Dalai Lama about the role of Westerners in this situation, and His Holiness responded that the role is to support your Chinese friends to educate themselves and choose ideas for themselves. That was it. Not to interfere and take control. Not to influence one side or the other. He spoke about how Westerners support the idea of nonviolence but not of Tibet. So, if Tibetans or the Dalai Lama were to become violent, Westerners would not support them anymore, creating a shaky basis for a relationship.
He also spoke about personal challenges people have with finding inner peace and how we can achieve that by controlling the mental obstacles we face in our lives. Sensory-leveled things such as music, food, or movies cannot help to completely overcome mental challenges such as anger, anxiety, and hate.
I’d be happy to talk to any of you more about the dialogue since I already wrote a lot. What have been all of your experiences with learning about Asian histories or Chinese in specific? Do you feel that you’ve been adequately taught about Chinese history given the US’s strong ties with the country? Why/why not would this be something to include in the classroom?
Thank you for sharing this with us. What an honor to be invited to the talk! I would love to keep this conversation going.