By Colette Davidson
Ever since Wangdu came to the U.S. in 1992 from Shimla, India, he doesn’t miss a chance to drink chaang, wear his best suit and party with his family and friends once a year. He, and over one thousand others, is milling around the Minneapolis Convention Center for Losar, arguably the biggest Tibetan celebration of the year.
“We don’t miss it,” he says, eyeing the man singing karaoke on the makeshift carpeted stage before him. He is surrounded by Buddhist monks in dark red robes, who always get the best seat in the house and rest comfortably on the floor, consistently being served tea and treats by elderly women wearing traditional chupa dresses. Wangdu comes to the Losar celebration not only to watch all the cultural events, like singing and dancing, but because of the sense of togetherness. “We have such a community here,” he says.
Losar is the Tibetan word for New Year. Lo means “year” and sar means “new.” Losar begins on the first day of the first month of the Tibetan calendar, which is comprised of twelve lunar months. For the past two years, the holiday has hit in the middle of February. Usually, Losar begins with a prayer, called a puja, for protection, followed by the days of celebration, which can last from one day in the U.S. to three days in India and even fifteen days in Tibet.
Part of the custom is to eat a special noodle dish called guthuk a few days before the big celebration. Dough balls are added to the soup with fortunes hidden inside. Each person gets one with either chilies, salt, wool, rice, paper or coal inside. What one finds inside the dough is supposed to be an indication for the year ahead. Paper, for instance, means that you will have a hard time sitting still, while getting coal in your dough indicates you will have a black heart.
The Twin Cities event began with the traditional presentation of white scarves, or katas, in which everyone in the hall placed a scarf over the picture of the exiled Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama. The photo of His Holiness was positioned at the head of the room in front of a large backdrop of the famous Tibetan monastery, the Potala Palace. Followed by brief announcements by the various Tibetan organizations represented at the event, such as the Regional Tibetan Youth Congress (RTYC), the cultural performances began.
Kids and teens twirled and swayed in traditional Tibetan dress in everything from the sophisticated Tibetan Opera to line dances. The Tibetan American Foundation of Minnesota (TAFM), which holds weekend classes in St. Paul to teach Tibetan language and culture, not only sponsored this Losar event but also organized the song and dance portion of the evening. For hours after their performance, kids stayed in their chupas, running around the Convention Center playing soccer, cards or eating.
In order to feed the thousand-plus people attending the event, the Tibetan community was instructed to bring a dish to share for the potluck-style buffet out in the hallway. “I’m from Richfield, so I had to bring potatoes,” said Jigme Ugen, General Secretary of RTYC. For others, it was fried rice, steamed bread called tingmo or lentils. Because of the carpeting throughout the hall, no beverages were allowed besides water. “It’s a bummer that we couldn’t drink here,” said Ugen, recognizing the importance of the Tibetan beer called chaang, which is made out of rice, has a thick consistency and is a staple of any Tibetan celebration.
Although access to drinks was part of the fun of being at the St. Paul Armory for the past several years of Losar, the Minneapolis Convention Center offered a much larger space for what is a continually growing Tibetan community in the Twin Cities. With over one thousand people, the armory was simply too small. This year, instead of sitting cramped, kids were able to run around, and people could spread out in circles playing cards and chatting. New to this year’s event was entertainment for the youth population, like bobbing for apples, video games and ball tosses reminiscent of the Minnesota State Fair. The biggest game, however, involved the adults too. For five dollars, everyone could purchase a raffle ticket to win a laptop computer, a flat screen TV or a new digital camera.
RTYC, one of the most politically active Tibetan organizations in the Twin Cities, had a large presence at Losar, manning their table while handing out leaflets and urging people to sign petitions. Their latest venture is a bike ride from Washington D.C. to New York City from April 25-28 to gain support for the release of the Eleventh Panchen Lama, a religious leader similar to the Dalai Lama, who was taken by Chinese authorities when he was a child and has not been seen since. Members of RTYC are fundraising vigilantly in order to get enough petitions to make an impact when they reach Washington. They intend to present them to Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.
As the night wore on, Tibetans of all ages filtered in and out of the large space in the Convention Center as people volunteered to sing onstage and raffle winners were announced. Even though most local newspapers advertised the Chinese New Year much more than the little known Tibetan one, Wangdu, who now lives in Columbia Heights, isn’t too bothered. “I don’t need the papers to tell me Losar is happening. I just found out about it from TAFM and here I am.”
To learn more about upcoming events in the Twin Cities Tibetan community, visit the Tibetan American Foundation of Minnesota’s Web site at www.tafm.org.
