OUTSOURCED PLAYTIME When I was born [in a Tibetan refugee camp in Nepal], my parents and relatives wanted to give me a spiritual education. From [when I was] three or four years old, I trained in ritual chanting and reading scriptures. I remember watching my friends from the window playing soccer and having fun, thinking they were really lucky. My parents did give me time to play [but only after] I had finished reciting. I didn't have regular toys like cars and [action figures] but ritual objects like bells and prayer wheels. While I was reading, I used to go to the toilet 10 times - just to make time feel shorter. That was my colourful childhood.
Looking back, I feel my parents gave me tough love but for good reason. They [gave] me an opportunity to learn that the other kids' parents did not know how to provide. Today, I am able to help those kids who were playing when I was reading - I can help their kids go to school. I [have been] able to sponsor over 300 children to go to high school and college. I think all my hard work paid off and they played on my behalf.
THE PATH TO INDIA ... AND BEYOND When I was about 15 years old, my grandparents - who were well-known elders in the refugee camp [in which] I grew up - said, 'Any girl in the camp, you just point and we will ask their parents; they will be happy to marry her to you.' That was the turning point. I could have chosen to be married with children at 15 years old but I decided not to follow that route. I asked for more time to study. I could have been anything that I chose to be. I wanted to go to a Tibetan Buddhist univer- sity in Varanasi, India, to study the philosophy of Buddhism.
I was there for seven years. Some study even longer. But [I got] the seven-year itch: I had to run away. I [went to] study with even more profound masters in Nepal. A centre in America sent me invitations twice to [teach]. I accepted and went to America in 1988. I like [Americans'] open-mindedness; my personality probably matches theirs a little. I stayed for more than 20 years, and still go back for two to three months every year.
FOR BETTER OR FOR BEST A year before I met my wife [Tibetan Tenzin Choeden, in New York], I was telling my students: 'I'm never going to marry. I don't think marriage is necessary, blah blah blah.'
The first time [we] 'met', it was on the phone. We decided to date face-to-face. There was this instinctive feeling that I must be ready to marry. [It made me] try to court her in a respectful way, to make her my wife.
I seek the spiritual value to live my life better. When I sought to marry, it must have also been me seeking to live my life better by marrying that person, right? [Marriage] is a spiritual journey in every way. It's not that we have perfected our ability; every moment is teaching us, giving us the opportunity to live life in a meaningful, happy, sensible way. [The couple now have three children.]