This year to celebrate the Chotrul Duchen festival with some meritorious actions we have been working to organize the release of live fishes (Photo Gallery ) in a consequent manner. As some of you know this is an activity that was first started years ago with the release of the fishes that were trapped in the gompa pond and who were facing death every year due to the lack of water in the pond during the month of April. Other lives release actions had been done since but always in a limited scale.

This year thanks to the request and impulse of Laurent Van der Maren during the winter, we worked at making it in a bigger scale. So we first went to meet the executive engineer of the Mahananda Barrage to ask for a written permission as it is a restricted area. Our wish got very positively received and permission was granted.

We then went several times at the local regulated market near Siliguri where the main agents bring live fishes to sell them around the region. All sorts of fishes are being negotiated on daily basis there, live and fresh, clear water and sea fishes. We finally could cut a deal with one of the agent and  purchased  320 kg of live fishes which accounted for more than 20.000 of them of 4 different varieties together with some eels.

Early morning, the fishes were giving signs of obvious stress as they had travelled all night, so from the market we headed to the Mahananda barrage which is located close to the gompa at Fulbari. There the small truck full of water and fishes started to be emptied while the tsethar ritual was  being performed by Tulku Ugen, Lopon Choewang and the monks.

Fishes were caught, weighed once again and then released. It was a fantastic experience to witness their joy and relief at entering the stream of liberation. Some jumped several times; others were diving deep down to disappear from human sight as fast as they could. Deep joy could be seen on everyone’s faces as an expression of the shared feeling for taking part in this meritorious act.

Once the truck emptied and all the fishes released we all made the wish to make it an annual event for our Khordong Byangter Monastery with the help of whoever wants to take part. We now have been assured of the barrage authority support and have the right contacts to purchase live fishes, so it will be easy to organize.

For those of you who wonder what is the benefit of saving lives in such a way we invite you to visit the site www.lotsawahouse.org.The text is translated in English and in French.

Here is just an excerpt:

<In this world nothing is dearer to someone than his or her own life. So no greater crime is there than taking life and no conditioned virtue bring greater merit than the act of saving beings and ransoming their lives…> Chatral Rinpoche…

From today we can invite you to join us in this Dharma activity to fulfill the wish of making it an annual event for the benefit of those who will be liberated then.

Please,contact our email thechhimedrigdzinsociety@yahoo.com

Sarwa Magalam and long life to all.

Just a few lines to let you know that Tulku Ugen and his wife Shashi have been invited to Malaysia to spend some time there, rest and look after their health under the supervision of a traditional Chinese doctor.

Tulku Ugen has been requested to give several empowerments and he accepted.

The program is as follow:

18.02.11         Dharma protectors initiation

 According to the terma of Khordong Terchen Tulku Chhimed Rigdzin Rinpoche

19.02.11         Vajrakilaya initiation

According to the terma of Rigdzin Godem

20.02.11         Zhitro initiation

According to ther terma of Khordong Terchen Nuden Dorje Drophan Lingpa

                        Riwo sangcho ritual will be performed to close the week-end

For further information such as location and time please contact:

 Mr Soo Tern nong on his mobile: +60126392599

Sarwa Mangalam

Congratulations to those of you who joined us in the recitation. Hopefully our common aspiration has been heard and as a result will bring us some good news soon. We are happy to inform you that in a joined effort we have successfully managed to recite 145.500 Om Soti prayers.

That was probably the best way to celebrate this 20^th Butterlamp retreat together.

From our side the retreat went fine and as planned we went to Kechopalri lake in Sikkim to start the recitations from there.

We could do it by the lake in the small lamp house that had been built recently, keeping us warm throughout the day. It really was a lovely experience. We also offered and hung prayer flags to keep the aspirations and prayers flow into the air as long as possible

Back to Khordong Byangter Monastery we continued with the retreat while reciting the Om Soti prayer all together on daily basis for an hour. The retreat came to an end on January 14^th, 2011 with a total of 115.000 butter lamps offered for the benefit of all sentient beings and the Om Soti prayers accumulation went on for another two full days.

Normal daily life started rapidly after that. Classes reopened and will continue until the preparation for the celebration of the Tibetan New Year on March 5^th, 2011.

It is now mid-December soon and so far several participants have confirmed their commitment to the butter lamp retreat, while a few more are expected to turn up. We have also gathered the necessary funds for the purchase of the vegetable oil used to fill up the lamps. So we can say that the retreat will once again take place.

Nevertheless we still need your help to realize this important endeavour of going to Kechopalri Lake to accumulate Chhimed Rigdzin Rinpoche, swift reincarnation prayer. We have all been patiently waiting for the last eigth years. Sampa Lhundrub recitations have been completed 2 years ago, yet Tulku Ugen  Chencho is still waiting to receive the clear and final indications as predicted by his father Chhimed Rigdzin Rinpoche and confirmed to him by renowned masters such as Dodrupchen Rinpoche, Chatral Rinpoche and Taklung Tsetrul Rinpoche.

It is Tulku Ugen’s responsibility to find Rinpoche’s yangsi and it should be our deepest wish to assist him in his mission. In the near surrounding of Khordong Byangter Monastery, Kechopalri Lake appears to be the best location, as it is famous for being a place where strong wishes are being fulfilled.

It is Tulku Ugen’s most profound wish to go there this year, together with some students of Chhimed Rigdzin Rinpoche and some of the monks of Khordong Byangter Monastery as representatives of the sangha as a whole, to recite the prayer all day long during seven days, it would for sure have a tremendous impact. Even more if all of you from wherever you are, connect with us in Kechopalri and recite and accumulate the prayer during the same period of time.

This is a wonderful and precious opportunity for the all of us to call upon our teacher together, in one united voice and one united heart for seven days.

This is where we need to feel the support and the presence of each and everyone of you.

Best wishes from India,

 NB: Financially wise support is also welcome as going there will incur extra costs, which are not covered by the retreat fee.

Last week should have been festive, as everybody was celebrating Diwali the festival of lights. But for us here, it has been a different story as our youngest lama, Sonam, gave us good reasons to worry.

It first started out of the blue, with him vomiting, and then the next day, early morning, he started to have strong convulsion crisis, diarrhea and very high fever. Luckily Tulku Ugen and Shashi were there when it started, so that he could be taken immediately to a child specialist. Once at the doctor’s chamber he was in a semi-conscious state.

Sonam got diagnosed with meningitis and admitted at the hospital in emergency. Once at the hospital, entering the pediatric department we could see one child who had just passed away lying on the floor of the corridor. Looking at Sonam, the doctors warned us that they had admitted 8 children from the hills and the plain, with the same symptoms in the past 48 hours and already 4 had passed away. Imagine our despair.

Shashi ran to get the medicine prescribed, while Tulku Ugen called his acquaintances working in this hospital to put things in motion as fast as possible. Taklung Tsetrul Rinpoche could be contacted and immediately advised to recite 1000 Tara prayers, which our lama who stayed at the monastery started to recite straight away. We were racing against time as the brain could be touch and damaged by the virus. Everybody played his part.

The first results came in the afternoon, meanwhile Sonam was receiving treatment. His parents arrived from Sikkim and spent the night with him at the hospital while we all went back, emotionally exhausted and worrying deeply.

But the next morning, the good news came that he was speaking and sitting on his bed. It was such a sense of relief to hear his voice and see a smile on his face. He is now supposedly safe but the doctors wish to keep him in observation for another 10 days to make sure there would not be any relapse. So we take turn to go visit him, bring him food and look after him.

Thanks to Tulku Ugen contacts and the Chhimed Rigdzin Society financial support, the child could be saved, while other children less fortunate, died over the same period of time. It also helped the doctors confirm their diagnosis and their prescriptions, allowing them to treat the next patients directly with no waste of time. It saved lives as no other children died since then, even though many more got admitted with the same symptoms.

Tulku Ugen Chencho comes out of this stressful time even more tired and in worst health condition than before. His mind would like to rejoice and celebrate but his body is exhausted. He is boarding a train tonight together with his wife Shashi to seek admission at the kidney hospital in Kolkata. This opens a new chapter and another door of uncertainty at the gompa.

Be with us…