Travelling a little further along the steep road we get our first glimpse of Mongpoo. The small hill settlement was already known to the British who in 1862, started a Cinchona plantation here for the extraction of Quinine. During the 1930s Rabindranath Tagore spent some time here and started a school where a small museum and a social centre remain today.
Mongpoo was also chosen for the founding of a Gompa cum hospital by the Tamang Lama, Dinchen Rinpoche, commonly referred to as "Mongpoo Lama," in the early 1980s. The Gompa, which is still under construction, lies on a steep slope just below an old graveyard upon the former site of a slaughter house.
In the week we spent with Mongpoo Lama observing his daily life we collected a lot of valuable material. Some extracts from the extensive interviews with Dinchen Rinpoche are presented here.
These include an extraordinary combination of diagnosis & therapies which are still widely used in the north-eastern Himalayan region. Although the ways of treatment might seem strange and unscientific to us, they have been of benefit to many of the local people who suffer from psychiatric and psychosomatic diseases.
We do not want to go into evaluation of the so called "spirit diseases" but rather simply expose you to an indigenous practitioner who combines traditional healing arts with modern medicine.
Dinchen Rinpoche (36), a trained nurse and registered rural health practitioner, uses healing methods from the Tibetan & Tamang Buddhist tradition as well as local Ayurvedic medicines, and - where necessary - also employs allopathic remedies.
My special abilities were first noticed among my family members when I was very young. One day when visiting a sick relative it was discovered that my touch brought about a speedy recovery. I performed many miracles, but gave these up later. ...Now I mostly use prayers to heal.
I have come to realise that the family in which a reincarnation takes place goes through a stormy time. Until the reincarnate is handed over to the right persons the storm will continue.
Although we follow Tibetan Buddhism, we are culturally Nepali-Tamang. My father wanted me to study at a Nepasli school. While at school I performed miracles, every now and then. After Class V my monastic education began at Durpin Gompa in Kalimpong under Rinchen Phuntsog Rinpoche. From there I was taken to Boudhanath, Kathmandu, where I became familiar with meditation practices and the rules of a monastery, etc. I undertook a Western medical training, and also did my tsam retreat.
As a trainee nurse I learnt many things, including minor suturing and midwifery. I had a feeling that in future I would stay in a remote place where this particular knowledge would be of benefit.
After receiving the blessing of Kalu Rinpoche at Sonada, in 1983, I completed a six-month retreat. Searching for a place where I could go into deep seclusion and meditation I came to Mongpoo where I found the big cave at the Gumbha Dara (hill top monastery). The entire place is a graveyard where people burn and bury their dead.
Later people persuaded me to stay and build a monastery. … For 3 to 4 years I stayed in a sort of a shack and treated sick people with both, tantric and Western medicine. After a while we started to collect donations to build the monastery.
Now its ground floor serves as a hospital for the sick and poor who cannot afford to go to Darjeeling, Kalimpong or Kurseong. We have facilities to provide medicines, minor sutures, drips, injections, etc. All the nurses have been trained by me.
Today I have to take care of five monasteries, in Rangoo, Tangta, Kathmandu and Mongpoo, and 85 disciples, in all. My father was a monk in one of the monasteries and my mother now lives there as a nun.
My father was a village mandal (head
of a village) and a very holy person. His family comes from a lineage of
lamas that I had visited in my previous life. Before leaving for Tibet,
I gave them precious belongings sealed in a leather bag. I told them that
I would come back for it one day. … When I took rebirth into his family
he became all the more religious. My mother handed over the responsibilities
of the house to my elder brothers and became a nun.
This monastery was constructed over a slaughter
house to encourage people to understand that killing is cruel and that
all living beings have the right to live.
Personally I feel Eastern medical systems
are the best. But if someone comes in with a severed hand, then I'll suture
it. If a person comes with severe dehydration, vomiting and diarrhoea,
he will get saline. Serious cases are referred to a bigger hospital. If
a patient can pay we charge him, otherwise the medicine is free. Many medicines
are donated, others we have to buy.
Apart from a good hospital I would also
like to have a home for the aged. Already orphans and handicapped are living
with me. But since we all live together, the monks & nuns get distracted
in their studies which is quite disruptive.
If a person's faith is strong and his past life has provided him with a strong planetary disposition, he cannot be troubled by dark spirits. But those who have no faith and are filled with fear possess a weak planetary support. Such persons can easily become a victim of these spirits.
The spirits are always filled with longing:
they want to talk but no one can hear them, they want to eat but cannot.
Spirits attain a certain power in their ethereal state. … Some can enter
a person and cause them to have fits, or render them unconscious or even
insane. Sometimes a paralysis is cured the moment the spirit leaves the
person.
Anyone who wishes to know more about Dinchen Rinpoche and his work may contact him through ITTM.