May 5th, 2009 - by Tenzin Namgyel of Kuensel (Bhutan)
Overlooking the dusty and crowded Katmandu in Nepal is the Druk Amitabha Mountain where about 300 nuns live, many from Ladakh, Vietnam, Himalchal Pradesh and Tibet. But there is one nun from Bhutan. And she’s at home here.
Sonam Wangmo, 31, from Sherimukhung, Mongar, her head neatly shaven, blends in with the rest of the nuns, chanting prayers, and sharing light banter when not reading scriptures. She graduated from Sherubtse College with Honors in Dzongkha language. But her heart was on Buddhism. She wanted to become a nun. A hopeless short stint in the civil service convinced her further. She left her job in 2005 and joined the Druk Amitabha Mountain run by His Holiness the Gyalwang Drukpa.
“By this time I’d have become a good practitioner if my parents had sent me to be a nunnery when I was young,” said Sonam Wangmo. However, she believes that she’s not too late. “It was my fate that I chose Dzongkha subjects. It introduced me to some really in-depth perspectives on Buddhism.”
Sonam spends her time meditating and haven’t gone home in Bhutan in four years. Recently her younger brother and a sister died in a car accident but, even with His Holiness’s permission, Sonam chose not to attend the funeral in Bhutan. “Death is natural occurrence and everybody has to pass through the same path. There’s nothing to be sad about when somebody loses a family member. It’s a way of life,” said Sonam.
Most of her colleagues are from Ladakh and Sonam speaks fluent Ladhaki. But learning Ladhaki was not difficult as it was similar to Kurtoep language, which she speaks too. Sonam has perfected her Tibetan language too and has no difficulty in learning the various Buddhist teachings taught in Tibetan. The eldest in the family of four, Sonam spent her early years looking after cows.
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