The Puja

One morning as I walked to school I noticed a large tent on the side of the road. Inside were dozens of monks wearing their distinctive red robes on the ground, chanting. Unable to grasp what was transpiring, I walked a few minutes further until I reached school and immediately asked the first person I encountered about what I had seen. I was told that recently there were several accidents along the stretch of road just below my house. The death of the gup, otherwise known as the village head or mayor, and a young engineer occurred just a month prior to my arrival, and those deaths were preceded by another tragedy involving a teacher from my school a half year earlier. The most accepted Buddhist interpretation of these events blamed evil spirits for causing the cars to careen off the cliff into a seemingly endless ravine. Concern over the area’s safety was so high that religious and political authorities from the capital and the local dzong issued a puja (Buddhist ritual) to take place with the purpose of purifying the grounds.

That afternoon during one of our tea breaks the entire faculty went to visit the site. Upon arriving I was asked if I had ever prostrated before. I shook my head no, though over the years I had seen it done many times. I stood by and spectated as a small group stepped in front of the monks, pressing their palms and fingers together into an arrow-like shape. They moved their hands together from their forehead to their mouth, down to their heart before kneeling with both legs, spreading their arms out parallel at shoulder’s width, and touching their palms to the floor. At last they lightly touched their foreheads to the earth, then stood up and repeated the process two more times.  After they were finished I was asked to show my respects so I joined another small group and clumsily mimicked those around me. The act is humbling and symbolic on many levels, showing veneration whilst purifying the mind of defilements such as conceit. Everyone had a turn before sitting cross-legged on a thick bed of pine needles, where we were offered sweet tea and local snacks. The mood was carefree despite the nature of the puja, perhaps because death and misfortune is so commonplace here, so we ate merrily in the midday sun before returning back to our conference hall for further meetings.

Later in the evening as I was going to bed I could still make out the low, soothing tone of chanting through an electronic sound system. The sounds reminded me of Arabic songs and prayers bellowed from speakers atop mosques in Senegal, though somewhat more subdued. I was slowly lulled to sleep but when I awoke, I could still hear chanting. I am not entirely certain whether they went on through the night or took a rest and woke up before me, but their efforts went on for another full day until that evening when the site was finally dismantled.

A couple weeks have since passed and now only a few stubborn pine needles remain, though recently I have seen a half dozen men working day in and day out constructing a chorten—I assume to commemorate the efforts of the monks and to honor the lives lost on that precarious bend in the road.

(The chorten in different stages of construction)