The Journey to Manjushree
By Stephanie Carter
In
May 2012, THA President Stephanie Carter (co-founder of Wallaroo Hats) embarked
on a life-changing journey to Manjushree, an orphanage in a remote Tibetan
enclave just outside the border of China.
This is her remarkable story.
Tawang is a land where time stands still.
Located in a very remote region of India and accessed only by car after an
arduous 24 hour drive, it remains unknown to much of the world. The town
is nestled at the foot of the Himalayas in northeastern India, 16 km from the
China border. It is a Tibetan enclave in the restricted region of Arunachal
Pradesh. It is situated in India but remains Tibetan in all ways. It is here
that I have journeyed to work in the Manjushree orphanage.
Manjushree was the vision of one young
Buddhist monk named Lama Thupten Phuntsok. He built the orphanage in 1998
with money he raised from the local villagers. When he opened Manjushree he had 17 children.
Today there are more than 200 children. The orphanage sits at 10,000 feet elevation on
a hill with a commanding view of the snow capped mountains in the distance and
the small towns and valleys below.
Lama Thupten Phuntsok and Stephanie Carter
I was invited to participate on this
journey by my good friend, Dr. Mike Carragher, a doctor based in Los Angeles.
He is on the board of AD World Health, which is a non-profit organization that
is building a sustainable medical clinic at Manjushree. Mike has traveled to
Manjushree several times and continues to return to serve this population of
Tibetan people.
There are approximately 40,000 Monpa
people who live in the region in and around Tawang. They have no sustainable health care, clinics
or regular medical support. The most basic needs of clean, potable water, basic
hygiene and medical support simply do not exist in this region. What we so
often take for granted our own country is glaringly absent in Tawang.
The children of the Manjushree
Orphanage
Our
journey began in Delhi on May 6th. Our team consisted of ten people in total.
three doctors, Mike Carragher, Chris King, Dan Miulli and his wife Sandy, two
film editors, Padmini Bergman and Jen Viola, our cameraman Ted Coakley,
PJ Ransome (an actor from LA), 14 year old Hailey King, and myself.
We flew from Delhi to Guwahati on May 7th,
and when we arrived we were met by our drivers in two large SUVs. It was a bit
of a logistical challenge as we had twenty large duffle bags filled with
medical supplies and additional items for the orphans. They loaded the luggage
on the tops of the cars and we began the 24 hour drive to Tawang.
The
countryside in that part of India is beautiful. It is lush and green and filled
with palm trees, beautiful flowers and lots of rivers and lakes.
The
scenery is similar to other tropical landscapes around the world, but here
there is the addition of the free roaming animals and sadly, an abundance of
trash. The drive took us through miles of amazing countryside before beginning
our journey into the mountains.
After
what seemed like days in the car, we finally arrived in Tawang. It was already
9:30 at night and pitch black but there was an official welcoming committee
waiting for us. It was cold as we were now at 10,000 feet elevation. Lama Sir
was there with Geshe Thupten and the other members of the staff and they
presented us each with a white scarf. They placed them around our necks and
showed us to our rooms. They had just completed a new living area for their
guests and our rooms were very comfortable. Each room had two twin beds and a
private bathroom with hot water. It was luxurious compared to what I was
expecting.
Stephanie
and Lama Sir
I
woke early the next morning to join the children in their early morning
chanting. They chant with Lama Sir for 30 minutes every morning at 5:30 am.
Their voices are heavenly and they sing very well together. I felt myself
getting really emotional as I realized the profoundness of this journey and
what it would be like to be one of these children. It reminded me once again of
how lucky I am and how much abundance I have in my life. The children range in
age from 4 -18 and they have all lost parents or been separated from their
families by different circumstances. They have formed an amazing collective
family unit here and are very close to one another, but they are still lacking
the parental component in their lives.
Lama
Sir does an incredible job with these kids, and his kindness and compassion is
evident in everything he does. The children seem very happy for the most part
and they are loving and tender with one another. They definitely have a
system for taking care of each other, which is evident in their daily
activities.
Everyday
held something different for us. I would always arise early and join Lama Sir
and the children for the chanting. When we were done at 6 am I would go for a
run up the road to Tawang. I loved running past the local families and saying
"good morning" and waving as I ran past. It was very obvious that
they had never seen many western people, never mind a white woman running in
shorts. It was amazingly beautiful scenery and looks quite similar to Switzerland.
The view of the snow-capped Himalayas in the distance was a stark reminder of
the altitude, as was the burning in my lungs if I tried to run too fast.
After
running I would come back to the orphanage and join everyone for breakfast.
Geshe Thupten would make all of our meals and he was quite a good cook. He had
a few of the older children helping him in the kitchen to prepare the food.
Breakfast usually consisted of pancakes, French fries and eggs of some kind. I
got in the kitchen a few times and helped him make scrambled eggs and showed
him how to make pancakes with less oil. He was very sweet and always loved
having me in the kitchen. I enjoyed spending time with him and the other kids
and learning more about them.
We
spent the third day we were at Manjushree de-licing the entire orphanage. This
is no easy feat with little hot water and 200 kids. The staff was wonderful and
made the entire day a bit easier for us. They took huge cauldrons of water and
boiled them on a fire just outside of the dormitories.
This
effort took most of the day and the children were all very good-natured about
it. I never heard anyone complain and they never even made a peep while we were
combing out their hair. I was most impressed.
The
next day we traveled with our medical supplies to a
local monastery near the orphanage that is home to 300 monks of varying ages, mostly young
boys. The custom in this area is to send the
second son to the monastery when he reaches five years of age, so there
are a lot of young boys living in the monastery. The families in this region do
not have the money to take care of their children, and this is one way to
ensure that they have fewer mouths to feed. The children are clothed and fed
and educated in the monastery and this is often a better life than if they
remained with their families.
The
young monks after being treated by Dr. Mike.
We arrived around
10:30 and they had biscuits and tea ready for us. We set up our stations and
began the process of collecting names, vital signs and basic information before
having them see the doctors. I was surprised to find that many of the people in
this area suffer from high blood pressure. It is a bit odd as the monks spend
so much time being still and meditating that you would think they would have
very low blood pressure.
Stephanie
taking a young monk’s blood pressure
Once
we were done treating them they presented us each with protection cords and
other gifts from the monastery. We received another white blessing scarf too,
which they placed around each of our necks.
The
next day we went to a local school to treat the kids there. I helped Deb run
the pharmacy and we dispensed medications to the people who had seen the
doctors and needed medicine. We handed out a lot of antibiotics and salves for
various conditions.
Kids at the orphanage waiting to see the
doctor.
The medical treatment we administered was
usually of a most basic type, but we saw a lot of very sick people. It seemed
that most everyone needed to be treated with some type of antibiotics as there
were a lot of upper respiratory infections, coughs, bronchitis, ear infections,
eye infections and impetigo. I found this work to be incredibly humbling as the
end result of this medical care is ensuring the sustainability of this
population of people.
Dr. Mike’s Hygiene Presentation
More than just providing medical care there
is the realization that helping the Monpa people will help their customs and
culture continue to exist and thrive in this area.
Providing
those less fortunate with access basic medical care is very important to me. I
left a small part of my heart in that remote but beautiful place and I am
certain to return to Tawang and work at this amazing orphanage again.
We
should all strive to serve and help those who are less fortunate than we are.
It is such an important part of maintaining community and international
relations.
This
was an experience that I will never forget.
