A Step Away from Paradise: A Tibetan Lama's Extraordinary Journey to a Land of Immortality (22 page)

When he had poured tea for the four of us, he sat back down.

‘The black dogs?’ he said. ‘They are quite necessary. For
dip shing
you need black dog meat. It started like this: one day I was walking through the village when I saw a black dog that had just died on the side of the road. That’s how it is with this
dip shing
; sometimes you have to wait for such an opportunity. One of the ingredients is the meat of an entirely black dog. Since I am Buddhist, I cannot look for a black dog and kill it. Therefore I have to wait. I took the dog—it was a big dog—and I held its front legs and I swung it over my shoulder and brought it home on my back. There I cut off strips of meat and dried them.’

Kunsang turned towards me, bursting with laughter: ‘The meat of a black dog and the stick from a crows’ nest—flowing upstream. Incredible, incredible; insane, insane.’

‘If you got the meat,’ I asked Géshipa, hesitatingly, ‘why the thirteen black dogs at the gate?’

‘Oh, them?’ he said, as if it were obvious. ‘They’re for the shit, not the meat. They’re not for becoming invisible. They have nothing to do with
dip shing
; they’re for making rain. There are other methods for making rain but using black dog shit is the most effective. You have to dry the black dog shit and grind it. Then you have to mix it with
tsampa
and make round balls out of it. You mix
tsampa
and water and form it into a vajra. First you touch the tip of the vajra to the shit. Then you dip it in a natural spring. That’s how you stop rain. You also have to throw shit into the fire at the same time.’

Though I couldn’t quite believe I was having this conversation, I asked him, ‘How much shit do you need? Does it have to be the combined shit of thirteen black dogs?’

‘No,’ Géshipa said in a measured way as if he were a theologian discussing a fine point of doctrine. ‘It actually has to be a black dog with a white sun and moon on its chest, over the heart.’

‘Then what are the other dogs for, to keep it company?’

‘It is like this,’ Géshipa said, ‘I told Yab Maila—the owner of the big house, my
jinda
who owns this cowshed—I told him that I needed a very specific black dog. So one day he saw a black dog and he offered the owner 2000 rupees. The owner liked the dog but 2000 rupees is 2000 rupees. So he sold the dog to my
jinda
and my
jinda
gave it to me. But the dog wasn’t right. He doesn’t understand about the white marks. He thinks the more dogs the better, so a few days later he came home with another dog, this one he had purchased in Gezing for 2500! But again it wasn’t right. It wasn’t until he came with the thirteenth dog that he got one with the proper markings, a little white moon and star over its chest. Then I told him to stop. But I think he’s still keeping his eyes out for more.’

Kunsang gave me a wink. He got up, and excusing himself he braved the gauntlet of black dogs to find a bush on which to pee. He was gone quite a while.

‘I just saw Yab Maila, the owner of this land, Géshipa’s sponsor,’ he said when he returned. ‘He was also a big sponsor of my father’s. We hadn’t met in over forty years! It seems Géshipa has been speaking seriously about making another attempt at Beyul. Yab Maila made me promise I’d convince Géshipa not to. He’s too old and has a heart condition. Yab Maila said Géshipa’s mind is like a child’s. The old man might be crazy but the young man is the one going around finding him black dogs, and paying for them!’

Kunsang looked at me with wide-eyed mirth.

‘Is all of this true,’ I asked Kunsang, ‘or is this crazy?’

His reply was simple and to the point, ‘It is truly crazy!’

As Kunsang, Wangchuk and I were walking back to the village in a merry mood, a black dog was lying in front of someone’s house. ‘Oh, look,’ I said, ‘I think it has a white spot!’ At that moment the dog jumped to its feet, the hair on its spine bristling. It lowered its head and growled.

‘Don’t touch my shit,’ Kunsang growled back like a ventriloquist, without moving his lips. ‘
Don’t touch my shit
!’

‘Smart dog,’ he said, ‘maybe the incarnation of some lama. I don’t know. Some crazy bad lama!’

CHAPTER TWELVE
The Auspicious Center

Tashiding Gompa, the Kanchenjunga range in the background.

Tashiding Gompa is a forty-five minute walk up a wooded mountain path from the village of Tashiding. On the auspicious day that Tulshuk Lingpa and his
khandro
and followers were first climbing that path, Géshipa was coming down from the
gompa
on his way to the village. He says that when he turned a corner and saw this lama wearing a white robe with long braids wrapped around his head, his
khandro
at his side and his attendants following, he had a sudden intuition. Remember, Géshipa had left his native Bhutan for Tashiding precisely because he had divined the time was coming for the lama who would open Beyul to arrive there.

Géshipa stopped and waited for Tulshuk Lingpa to reach him; then Géshipa pressed his palms and inclined his head.

‘Where are you from?’ was the first thing he asked Tulshuk Lingpa.

‘I am from Kham,’ came the reply.

Géshipa could not help himself reaching down to touch the lama’s feet. He knew the prophecy that the one to open Beyul would be from Kham, and that’s why he had asked the question. When he stood back up, Géshipa had tears rolling down his cheeks.

‘We have been waiting so long,’ Géshipa said and brought him up to the monastery.

Among the lamas of Tashiding, many of whom lived with their families in houses surrounding the monastery, word quickly spread—in a secret sort of way—that Tulshuk Lingpa had arrived.

Tashiding Gompa is a collection of temple buildings, behind which lies an area of stupas. There is a
kora
, a well-worn path circling the temple complex and stupas, by which the faithful circumambulate the holy site intoning the holy mantras, cycling through the 108 beads of their rosary-like malas.

Along the
kora
, towards the back behind the stupas, one finds the rock face by which the monastery actually derives its name. The full name of the monastery is Drakar Tashiding.
Drakar
means white rock. Tashiding means Auspicious Center. So the name of the monastery translates to White Rock of the Auspicious Center. The rock face does in fact have a light-colored area roughly rectangular in shape and the size of a small door, and it is this section of the rock face that lends its name to the monastery. Since the most ancient times, there has been a belief prevalent in Sikkim that this white area of the rock is actually a door to Demoshong. There was even a small cavity in the rock inside of which was a loose stone. The opening of the cavity was such that though one could fit one’s hand into the cavity and move the stone, you couldn’t get the stone out. This was the ‘key’ to the door.

One of the lamas of Tashiding told me the story of a lama from the Pemayangtse Gompa, situated on a neighboring mountain, who came to Tashiding to perform some prayers. He stayed at Tashiding for some time and used to do many
koras
every day, morning and evening. With each
kora
, he’d pass that white rock door. As he passed it he got to thinking about how his ancestors used to speak of Demoshong, what it would look like and how one would know when it was time for it to be opened. It would happen in the Great Age of the Seven Fires and One Water,
kalpa medun chuchik
. A kalpa is a great age. Medun chuchik means seven fires, one water. That means that whatever heat one sun generates today, whatever heat we receive, will be multiplied seven times. Everything will burn, all crops will wither and nothing will survive. After that there will be rain. That will be the time for the opening of Demoshong.

So this monk was doing his
koras
morning and evening. With every round as he passed by the white stone door he deepened his meditation about Demoshong. One time around, he stopped in front of the white stone door and started praying. According to the lama who told me the story, this lama from Pemayangtse started praying to the rock and suddenly found himself transported to the land behind the door. He met seven
dakinis
and they gave him a plant called sakusha. Sakusha is the Sikkimese name of the plant; the lama recounting this story couldn’t tell me the English name. But he assured me it grew in Demoshong and nowhere near Tashiding. The
dakinis
gave him the plant, made him promise not to tell anyone about the Hidden Land and to take the plant to Pemayangtse Gompa.

Then, quite suddenly, he found himself transported out of the Hidden Land and he was standing once again in front of that stone door, holding in his hand the sakusha plant. Without telling anyone what had happened, he grabbed his bag and started down the mountain towards the Rangeet River at Legship in order to cross the river and climb to Pemayangtse. When he reached the river he was hot and sweaty. He took off his clothes and left them on the river bank. He took the plant with him right to the water’s edge and left it on a river stone there, and he bathed himself in the river. While he was washing the river rose and swept the branch away.

When they brought Tulshuk Lingpa to the
Drakar
stone that first day, he stood silently before the rock face and examined it closely. ‘This stone has
ter
in it,’ he proclaimed, ‘but I am not the one to take it out. It isn’t time.’

He took a small stone and scratched into the stone above the door the following tantric formula: HA A SHA SA MA. People asked him what it meant. ‘One day a terton will come who will understand,’ he said. ‘He will be the one to open this door.’

Géshipa and the other lamas of Tashiding, though pulsing with excitement that the lama had arrived who would fulfill their highest dream by opening the door to the secret place, kept this knowledge to themselves. To everyone else it was simply that a great lama had arrived, and the occasion was marked by a festive atmosphere. People flocked to get his blessings.