Alexandra david-neel biography

She meets the philosopher Ekai Kawaguchi who had managed to stay for eighteen months in Lhasa as a Chinese monk in disguise a few years earlier. By end of September they renew passports in Seoul and in early October arrive in Peking, China, where she meets a rich Tibetan Lama from northeastern Tibet. He invites Alexandra to join his armed caravan on the return to Kum Bum, where she could study at the monastery.

Alexandra david-neel biography

In return she would help him write a book on astronomy. After numerous adventures, sickness and miles of travel, Alexandra and Yongden arrive at Kum Bum, the birthplace of Tsong Khapa. Life among the monks at Kum Bum was almost paradise for lama Alexandra: waking up early before dawn, one hour of walking or meditation, English breakfast at nine, doing translations until noon, then a hot tub break; then more translation work of rare manuscripts from Kum Bum library.

In the afternoon she had a vegetable soup and fruits for desert. Nine was the time for bed. Sometimes meat was served. As the civil war in China was heating up, anarchy and brigandage flourished, and she and her attendants had to carry guns for self-defense. Along the border of Amdo and Kamsu, they meet famine and cholera, while tigers and leopards come out of the woods to eat corpses.

By autumn the crops fail, and people die of starving and cholera. But Alexandra is not in the mood to leave Tibet for Europe yet. To succeed in reaching her dream destination she learned from many previous failed attempts made by other westerners. Yongden tells Alexandra to warm herself with the practice of tumo reskiang that she was initiated in.

While Yongden went away to collect cow droppings, she tries to remember the practice that she lately neglected in favor of warm clothes. Excited, Alexandra spots the Potala palace with the golden roofs glistening in the sun. They stay in Lhasa for two months visiting the holy city and the large surrounding monasteries: Drepung, Sera, Ganden and Samye.

Dalai Lama who returned from exile in , knew her well, but he didn't know that she was in Lhasa and she could not reveal her identity. Despite her face smeared with soot, her yak wool mats, and her traditional fur hat, she is finally unmasked due to too much cleanliness — she went to wash herself every morning at the river and denounced to Tsarong Shape, the Governor of Lhasa.

The palace of the Dalai Lama, despite richly decorated interior is nothing in particular. I have no curiosity about Lhasa. She arrives in Northern India through Sikkim partly thanks to the rupees borrowed from Macdonald and to the travel papers that he and his son-in-law, captain Perry, obtain for her. Alexandra and Yongden arrive in Gangtok, Sikkim.

Charles Bell, the British resident reverses his predecessor order of expulsion and invites Alexandra to stay as long as she wishes. With the old maharaja, Lama Dawasandup and Sidkeong dead, Gangtok is not anymore as attractive as before. August 15th, Alexandra writes to her husband that she is coming home to write the books that the American editors are asking for.

The Revue de Paris asks for her Tibetan and Asian memoirs; an American magazine offers dollars for three articles. Her reputation is soaring. May 4th, the two arrive in Valencia, Spain, but the Spanish customs direct them to Le Havre after seeing the huge amount of luggage and artifacts. Unable to enter Tibet from the west due to Chinese control, she devised a plan with Tibetan novice Aphur Yongden to travel to Japan, Korea, and China, and then approach Tibet from the east.

In February , she succeeded in entering Tibet, disguised as a pilgrim. She described the surreal moment upon being mistaken for a local at a border check: Exploration and Return Alexandra spent two months in Lhasa, witnessing the Potala Palace, the residence of the Dalai Lama. She embarked on a perilous return journey, eventually arriving in Le Havre, France, in , having spent fourteen years in Asia.

Her first destination was the Hindu holy city of Benares, India. She spent two years living in an anchorite cave at 12, ft 3, m practicing Tibetan yoga and meditation. Here she met a year-old monk, Aphur Yongden, whom she later adopted. She met the Pachen Lama at the Tashilhunpo Monastery. He welcomed her and gave her the honorary titles of Lama and doctor of Buddhism.

Her desire to visit exotic lands was finally quenched in , when she went to India after receiving an inheritance from her grandmother. She stayed until her funds ran out, and for the next few years earned a living by singing in a traveling opera company under the stage name Mademoiselle Myrial. She also kept her maiden name but added her husband's and created a hyphenated name, a relatively rare practice at the time.

In , she returned to India, this time with the help of a grant from the French Ministry of Education, and studied Sanskrit in Benares, the Hindu holy city. On this trip she was introduced to the thirteenth Dalai Lama — , born Thubten Gyatso, who had recently fled Tibet when Chinese troops invaded the neighboring mountain kingdom. There were rumors the two were romantically involved.

The country had been closed to foreigners for several decades by then, because its leaders feared the encroaching Russian and British empires and were wary of permitting the country to become part of the trade route to India, which would have destroyed its unique character.