Tibetans, Nepalese find community in Boulder
By Mary Butler,
Camera Staff Writer
Driving past Hedgerow Farm or seeing the snowcapped Rockies reminds Tamding Wangdu of the pastoral lifestyle he left behind a decade ago this May when he became part of a resettlement that brought more than 20 Tibetans to Boulder.
A former political prisoner, Wangdu escaped Tibet before the Dalai Lama chose him as one of 1,000 Tibetans given passage to the United States.
Today he is a Web site developer and founder of a humanitarian nonprofit organization dedicated to improving education, health care and sustainable development in his homeland. And he is part of a thriving community of about 200 Tibetans in the Boulder-Denver area.
“There is an awareness for what is happening in Tibet here,” Wangdu said.
A local affinity for Tibet and its neighboring Nepal becomes apparent to most who walk through downtown Boulder.
A second Old Tibet spiritual gift shop, operated by Nepal native Narayan Shrestha, opened this month on Pearl Street. Buddhist- and Himalayan-inspired shops and restaurants abound throughout Boulder County.
Last fall, Sherpa’s Adventurers Restaurant and Bar, a Nepalese climbing-themed restaurant, opened on Walnut Street. Owners hope the restaurant becomes a meeting place and resource for books and travel advisers for Boulder’s avid mountaineering community and people interested in Nepal.
Some point to Chogyam Trungpa, Rinpoche, a Tibetan Buddhist meditation master, artist, author and poet, as the early catalyst that introduced the cultures to Boulder.
Trungpa founded the Boulder Shambhala Meditation Center 30 years ago, establishing Boulder as a “bodhagaya” — an important place on the Buddhist map. Trungpa, who died in 1987, also founded Boulder-based Naropa University, described as “the nation’s only accredited Buddhist-inspired university.”
Trungpa “talked about how he felt like the landscape here looked like Tibet,” said Peter Volz, Naropa’s director of international education. “He felt at home here from the beginning.”
Volz speculated that Trungpa may have been the first Tibetan in Boulder. His work, which made Boulder one the nation’s largest bases for Buddhist practice and study, attracted many area residents hailing from the Himalayan region.
Others landed here by chance.
Boulder jackpot
“I didn’t choose Boulder,” Wangdu said.
Tibet gained independence from China in 1911, but lost it in 1953 after a military invasion and the installation of a Communist government. A Tibetan uprising in China and Tibet in 1956 was violently halted by Chinese troops. Buddhism, the Tibetan state religion, was effectively suppressed. The spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, and 100,000 Tibetans fled to exile in India.
Many others, like Wangdu, later escaped.
A lottery, part of the Tibetan resettlement project, determined where he and the other chosen Tibetans relocated. Boulder hit the jackpot when more than 20 local residents volunteered as immigrant sponsors. Wangdu, like most other resettled Tibetans who came here 10 years ago, has remained in Colorado. After living in Boulder for nine years, he and his wife, Tsering, also a Tibetan, bought a home in Westminster.
A framed photo of the Dalai Lama, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 for his nonviolent struggle against Chinese rule in Tibet, hangs over the fireplace in the Wangdus’ new home. Tibetan prayer flags wave in their backyard, where Wangdu tends a large vegetable garden that he says reminds him of his rural, farming roots.
“I like the weather here,” he said. “The people are nice. There’s strong support for Tibet around here, which helps me when I’m promoting my work. And there are Buddhists.”
Dawala Dorjee, a Tibetan born in India, also immigrated to Boulder as part of the Tibetan resettlement. An Adams County middle school teacher, Dorjee said that although she experienced culture shock upon moving to Boulder, she felt welcomed.
“Of course, Boulder is very white dominated,” she said. “But I’m cool with that. It’s just so friendly. People are interested in you and want to learn your culture and get educated.”
According to the 2000 census, about 88 percent of Boulder County residents are white and 3 percent, or about 8,900 residents, are of Asian descent.
Old Tibet owner Shrestha remembers seeing very few faces like his when he moved to Boulder in the 1980s after a university professor friend had told him, “You’ll love this town. It has mountains and there are excellent, good people there.”
Shrestha bought his business from a Tibetan, whom he approached to ask if he was from Nepal. Now in addition to Old Tibet shops in Boulder, Broomfield and Longmont, Shrestha owns restaurants in Glenwood Springs, Avon and in other states and countries.
On his first trip to buy items for Old Tibet in 1986, he also led 14 local residents on a trek to Nepal. Such trips have been taking place every year since. Shrestha estimates he takes 350 people a year to Nepal and has had a hand in bringing more Nepalese and Tibetans to Colorado through marriages and the publicity his trips generate.
“In Nepal, Boulder is popular,” Shrestha said. “It’s on TV and in the newspapers because of my journeys.”
The active and passive
Well-traveled and educated Boulderites are sympathetic to the political and humanitarian challenges facing Tibetans and Nepalese, said Bill Warnock, president of the Boulder-Lhasa Sister City project. Boulder’s Lhasa connection is the only city partnership in Tibet.
“People here want to be involved,” he said. “Some people feel driven and passionate about human rights activism; others want to spend more time on humanitarian work. Each group has its good intentions.”
The city partnership focuses on humanitarian efforts, such as improving care at Tibetan hospitals. Wangdu’s nonprofit Tibetan Village Project, which he runs out of his Westminster home, is similar in its mission to upgrade education, medical care and sustainable development. Old Tibet’s Shrestha, too, runs a humanitarian nonprofit called Helping Hands Health Education.
University of Colorado students Tenzin Dhongyal and Tashi Dhondup, both Tibetans and members of CU’s Students for A Free Tibet organization, however, say not enough people are fighting for human rights.
On March 11, the two were part of the 44th Tibetan National Uprising Day demonstration in front of the Boulder County Courthouse lawn, marking the anniversary of when the Dalai Lama fled Tibet. About 60 people marched.
“You see a lot of Free Tibet bumper stickers and Tibetan prayer flags around here, but that doesn’t mean there’s a lot of awareness of what’s going on in Tibet,” Dhondup said. “There’s a crisis there.”
Dhondup said he would like to see more people writing letters to the United States government to pressure China into lifting restrictions that many fear will destroy Tibetan Buddhist culture.
“We welcome the sister city project and other humanitarian efforts, but politically, we don’t see eye to eye,” Dhongyal said.
Preserving the cultures of Tibet and Nepal, however, is an effort supported by all.
This summer, Wangdu’s Tibetan Village Project is presenting a week-long series of films, lectures and slide shows at the Boulder Public Library.
Dorjee, who is the Colorado Tibetan Association’s president, points to the Tibetan New Year celebration held earlier this month at the Boulder Jaycee’s Depot.
“We want to organize event that foster our culture, philosophy, Tibetan traditional dances and music,” she said. “We also want to organize peaceful demonstrations to raise awareness of the suffering in Tibet under Chinese rule.”
Contact Mary Butler at butlerm@dailycamera.com or (303) 473-1390.
