Thank you, I want to address a few different people in my remarks today.
First I want to address all of you, the Tibetans here. I want to thank you. I want to thank you for your courage, for keeping up the struggle against the odds. And I want to encourage you to keep up the fight, as your cause serves as an inspiration for people around the world, for people everywhere who truly care about peace and justice and freedom.
And I want to thank you for the technology that Tibetans have brought to the West. Over a millennia, while some people were developing the technology that enables me to talk to all of you through this microphone, the technology responsible for this traffic out here, and this big building of glass and steel, Tibetans were developing a technology that the world needs very badly today. A spiritual technology of self-knowledge, of compassion, of a recognition of the interdependence of all life on this planet.
Now I want to address the non-Tibetans here, the Westerners, the Injis.
Actually if you’re here, I thank you. You’re here to support the Tibetan
cause. I guess I want to address the people who aren’t here, the Dharma
practitioners and Tibetan Buddhists who have benefited from the teachers who were chased out of their homeland into your country, into your communities. To those that have benefited from the technology – the Tibetan spiritual technology – brought to the west from Tibet.
This technology, Tibetan culture, the Tibetan spiritual heritage – is not dying. It’s not dying, it’s being killed! And the killers have names and they have addresses.
[Han paused and pointed at the Chinese Consulate]
And if we want to preserve this precious heritage, if we want to benefit
from this technology, and benefit from the Tibetan culture, it’s not enough to put it in museums and put it in books and put it in institutions and put it in monasteries in the West. We need to preserve it at the source.
SFT’s Grassroots Coordinator Tendor – Tenzin Dorjee – is in Europe today. He’ll be marching in London for march 10th. He said something to me that I thought was important. He said that the question of how to best preserve Tibetan culture and Tibetan religion may be a spiritual question, but it demands a political answer.
The source of this precious heritage, the source of Tibetan culture is in Tibet. It needs to be preserved at the source and that demands a political solution. It demands struggle. It demands activism. It demands direct action. It demands our courage in going to Beijing and facing the leaders in their homes. It demands that we prepare for 2008. As Lhadon and Kunga (Lhadon Tethong, SFT’s Director & Kunga Thinley, Regional TYC President, who introduced Han) were saying, I also had the privilege of being in Beijing this past August and September, on the morning after the Beijing mayor received the Olympic flag in Athens, at the end of the Olympic Games there.
And I had the privilege of being a Westerner, being a white man, being able to go into Beijing and be arrested for speaking up for a free Tibet without fearing for my life, because I knew with my American passport that I might be safe, and I was.
But as we prepare for August 2008, and as we look towards the Olympics in Beijing, we must prepare more than just Injis and supporters and westerners. It’s going to be up to people in Europe. It’s going to be up to people in India. It’s going to be up to people all around the world to take heart and take courage and be prepared to sacrifice.
And now, the last people I want to address are the Chinese leaders.
[Han turned on the stage to face the Consulate and adjusted the microphone to look up at the building]
I want to say that I know you’re getting really excited about the little
party that you’re planning to have in Beijing in August 2008 but we know who you are, and we know what you care about! And if you want to have your little party, you’ve got work to do. because we’re going to be there, and we’re going to spoil your party.
We’ll be at your doorstep. We’ll be at your Consulates We’ll be at your
Embassies. We’ll be on your borders. We’ll be in Beijing.
And we’ll be shouting free Tibet! – Bod rangzen!
Tibet will be free! – – – Tibet will be free! – – – – – Tibet will be free!
Thank you!
Han-shan
Students for a Free Tibet’s Fundraiser and Direct Action trainer
Tibetan National Uprising Day, Chinese Consulate, New York City
March 10, 2005
