Lion of the Mountains

Lion of the Mountains

Chadral Rinpoche was always full of surprises. During the monsoon months in the Mountains of Nepal, the weather was often misty, damp and cold. It could be depressing day after day.

If Rinpoche felt the general mood among our little camp needed lifting, he would order a picnic, right then, on the spur of the moment and we would all run after him up the trail in one direction or other, usually to some green, flowery meadow and there we would sit around him enthralled, as he told us tales and shared memories from his life, or just made us all laugh with his jokes and funny stories. He knew just how and when the routines needed to be broken.

We would all return from these day-long excursions into high mountain meadows, well-fed and considerably lighter of heart.

One day after we had finished our noon meals, he called us up and set us all to work preparing a fire. We were mystified. What on earth was he up to now? He took a few of us over to a collection of rocks in a stream nearby and then very specifically pointed out just the stones that he wanted us to carry back to the fire, which was by now blazing and hot.

After much-united effort and lugging of rocks we accumulated quite a pile of these stones near the fire, which had, till then, been carefully tended by one of the Lamas. He then told the monks how to place them inside the fire, one by one.

While this was going on, he asked some of the men to bring the large metal bathtub that lived, usually upside down, out the back of his hut. This was to be filled with water...

Read more in Master, Mice and Men