Tibetans relive memories of Shadow Tibet
Thursday, 18 January 2007, 4:45 p.m.
 (Photo Lrik Minaktsang) |
Dharamshala: The silence was total, except for the intermittent sobs that punctuated the night.
The stench of “gunpowder” was nauseating, as a pall of smoke wrapped the carnage site.
A soft, melodious dirge echoed from the backdrop, as a woman wriggled on the floor in deep agony–before death eventually took the better of her.
Just a few steps away, a comatose monk, flat on ground, drenched in blood, suddenly showed some faint signs of life.
Holding on to every last breathe in him, the monk staggers to his feet, moaning and groaning in pain, clutching the Tibetan flag with both hands in a feat of Tibetan spirit.
In one deep breath, he musters all his strength and waives the flag, shouting at the pitch of his voice: “Bod Gyal Lo”.
Follows a thunderous applause.
Fortunately, no casualties of “post-traumatic disorder” have been reported as yet from the 400-odd audience of “A contemporary play: Twenty Years of Struggle, 1987-2007,” staged here yesterday by an organization of former Tibetan political prisoners, Gu-Chu-Sum.
 (Photo Lrik Minaktsang) |
Some two weeks ago, after the play was staged at a special institute for adults, four students had to be hospitalized late that night.
One of them, a female student was critical. After the play, she had become so depressed, or rather angry, that she attempted to take her own life. The girl is now said to be recovering well.
Despite the absence of masterly crafted graphic scenes, or sophisticated lighting, the play had raw human emotions that moved and shook the audience from their comfort zone.
“Everything you saw here was true. People who performed had actually suffered them. The scenes enacted today happened in actuality. We have not altered one little bit for dramatic effect,” said Venerable Ngawang Woeber, president of the NGO.
“On the contrary, many of what we had suffered were simply too horrific and beyond the limited capacity of our performing arts. We simply didn’t know how to act on them,” added Venerable Woeber, in his concluding speech to a packed hall of the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts.
In over an hour, the play dealt with a whole host of abuses ubiquitous in towns and villages across the length of Tibet, among people from all walks of life, from nomads and peasants to students and monks/nuns.
Besides the daily ordeal inside Chinese prisons and labour camps, the play highlighted how the vicious cycle of miseries and sufferings never leaves a political prisoner, even after his release from the prison.
The only viable option then is to escape into the freedom of exile.
The play also pays homage to the silent spirit of resistance and defiance that continues to simmer inside the Tibetan hearts and minds.
“However, acting on one’s wounded memories was extremely painful,” says Tsemonling Pempa, a former prisoner, now a staff of the NGO.
In the month of rehearsal, “many of us were so into the scenes, as if we were reliving them. As a result, we don’t feel like eating or talking for several days.”
Besides, staging such plays also carry one common hazard.
Some weeks ago, after the troupe had performed at another school here, some small children ambushed those who had played the characters of the Chinese prison guards.
“The troupe took that with a generous laugh. We were happy that we could connect the Tibetan youth, born and raised in exile, with the gravity of sufferings back home.”
A slice of whole truth
Speaking in a grim subdued voice, deeply moved by the play, the Kalon for Relgion and Culture, Tsering Phuntsok, reminded the audience that the sufferings in the play were just a slice of the whole truth.
“If you recounted the memories since 1949, the enormity of the Tibetan sufferings would be of biblical proportions,” Kalon Phuntsok said.
“Those memories, no matter how painful, will never be erased from the annals of Tibetan posterity.”
The play was performed by some 20 former Tibetan political prisoners, who are at present doing one-year computer course at the Gu-Chu-Sum, which also teaches Tibetan and English.
The Gu-Chu-Sum now plans to perform the same play at the Tibetan settlements across India, if they were able to raise adequate funds.
