Remembering Tomorrow (19 Tibetan short stories)

Description

Richly contextualized and in succinct, fluent English, Gu ru 'phrin las is intimately familiar but also removed from the world he describes. His stories are more than personal childhood reminiscences for they are collective memories of the many Tibetans with a herding background who grew up in a black yak-hair tent (including me) but who now rarely see such a tent in their homeland. While the stories illustrate a life that might be described as unsophisticated and impoverished, dotted with moments of sincere compassion, they do not avoid the complex brutality and revengeful emotions that are also an integral part of this life. Antagonistic values and tangled emotions are displayed mirror-like, one reflecting the other. A little girl admires children who had changed their grass-insoles during Lo sar 'Tibetan New Year', but these same children admire her for being allowed to sleep as long as she wants. A boy’s understanding and interpretation of his brother, "the crazy monk," is more profound than his father's. Eight yaks paid for the death of a poor family's son is compared to eighty yaks in compensation for the revenge death of a rich family’s son. These stories challenge the reader in a multitude of ways. Are they memories or imaginings, fictional creations or lived realities, remnants of the past or tomorrow's authenticities? Rig grol རིག་གྲོལ། Victoria University, Australia Gu ru 'phrin las, a local Tibetan, created a life for himself beyond his home herding community on the Tibet Plateau, and when he was granted an opportunity to study in a major Chinese city. It is within this physical remove from his birthplace that he recounts stories based on memories of community life and relationships that a time-traveler would find little changed from a thousand years ago. Grandparents, parents, children, boys, girls, monks, customs, patterns of thought, and beliefs are revealed, reflecting a social existence in sharp contrast with what many might consider "ideal community life." These stories are a testimony to fundamental social transformations in the last few decades - changes that continue today at an exponential rate as the old is dismantled and replaced by the novel. With this in mind, engaging these narratives is a revelatory deciphering of embedded core values and an informed interrogation of tradition. Dpal ldan bkra shis དཔལ་ལྡན་བཀྲ་ཤིས། Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin Gu ru 'phrin las echoes his grandmother's voice in nineteen short stories, vividly narrating unadulterated Plateau life in a Tibetan herding community. While the grassland is fragrant flowers and colorful rainbows of aching beauty, it is also harsh winter snowstorms and their lethal consequences. Yak-hair tents, herding livestock, hunting wildlife, compassion and sin, challenges confronting women, moving between summer and winter pastures, young men's rivalry and bloody conflicts over girls, bandits and livestock theft, complex mental turmoil, and much more are featured. Why is it taboo for a guest to visit a family with an infant at night? Why should women not butcher animals? Why do herders kill lambs during blizzards? This pool of accounts is a rich ethnographic resource characterizing herding lives and is a must read for those interested in Plateau lives. Kelsang Norbu (Gesang Nuobu, Skal bzang nor bu སྐལ་བཟང་ནོར་བུ།) These nineteen, well-written narratives developed from the life experiences of a Tibetan elder, transport the reader into the actual lives of Tibetans inhabiting a remote pastoral area of A mdo. Told under the mantle of "fiction," Gu ru 'phrin las enriches our understanding of Tibetan pastoralists' lives, spirituality, livestock, and rangeland based on true life experiences. Tshe dpal rdo rje ཚེ་དཔལ་རྡོ་རྗེ། University of Canterbury What do children in herding areas do on the first day of Lo sar 'Tibetan New Year' for good luck? What is the social status of women in Tibetan herding communities? What choices does a woman have if her fiancé has an affair with her mother? How do religious beliefs conflict with real life? How do young women deal with the conflict between arranged marriage and their desires? How do people seek justice within traditional social structures? Read Remembering Tomorrow for answers to these and other questions. Duo Dala (Stobs stag lha སྟོབས་སྟག་ལྷ།) International Institute of Social Studies, Erasmus University Rotterdam This extraordinary collection of nineteen thoughtfully written stories reflects various aspects of a traditional herding society before being swept away by the speedy waves of modernity. The stories not only open a window for curious outsiders eager to glimpse the challenging herding way of life, but also serve an educational purpose, ensuring that future generations better understand people's cognitive perception of religion, animals, relationships, and methods of dealing with daily life dilemmas. Li Jianfu 李建富 (Libu Lakhi, Zla ba bstan 'dzin ཟླ་བ་བསྟན་འཛིན།) Gu ru' phrin las' Remembering Tomorrow is a short story collection profoundly capturing the very essence of the premodern, A mdo Tibetan nomad experience. Rich, thick descriptions allow readers to feel, smell, and visualize pastoral lifestyles as well as better understand the multiplicities of Tibetan character. This extraordinary achievement suggests the possibility of reinventing ourselves without forfeiting the dignity and meaning of an ever-fading past. Rinchen Khar (Rin chen mkhar རིན་ཆེན་མཁར།) University of Massachusetts, Amherst Gu ru 'phrin las' vivid short stories illuminate nomadic A mdo Tibetan life. Growing up in a herding family, the author portrays the local community's religious beliefs, taboos, family conflicts, marriage, and social norms. This book's critical descriptions of ordinary moments in herders' daily life complicate the stereotype and romanization of Tibetan pastoral life. Sangs rgyas bkra shis སངས་རྒྱས་བཀྲ་ཤིས། Duke University ...memorable tales of a past in a remote corner of the Tibet Plateau, highlighting mundane life's harsh realities, reflecting social norms, customs, beliefs, and the herding way of life. It is unusual for such a young author to have experienced living in a yak-hair tent - a lifestyle that has nearly vanished. Such unique lived experiences enable Gu ru 'phrin las to grasp and depict his grandmother's stories vividly and persuasively. Each story opens a window, revealing a hidden actuality in often sentimentalized nomad life. These nineteen stories allow outsiders to experience harsh realities as they travel through romance and realities. Gengqiu Gelai (Konchok Gelek, Dkon mchog dge legs དཀོན་མཆོག་དགེ་ལེགས།) University of Zurich Concise, quick, and vivid accounts of Tibetan nomad life from Golok in western China from the mid-20th to the early 21st centuries. Easy to read and quickly moving readers through chronicles depicting Golok's harsh climate, daily lives, pastoralism, relationships, conflicts, women, men, communal hierarchies, domestic violence, traditions, food, dating, arranged marriages, poverty, kids, bandits, and more. Remembering Tomorrow is also about remembering yesterday. These vanishing experiences of ordinary herders would not have been recorded, valued, told, and retold without the intelligence and thoughtfulness of this young Tibetan writer. Nyangchakja (Snying lcags rgyal སྙིང་ལྕགས་རྒྱལ།) CONTENTS Acclaim Contents Notes Acknowledgements Introduction THE STORIES 1 YOU ARE MY MOTHER'S MOTHER 2 "I'M SUCH A HORRIBLE PERSON!" 3 ADMIRATION 4 AN ICED YELLOW LEAF 5 BUILDING A TEMPLE 6 DILEMMA 7 HOMELESS, CRAZY MONK 8 HORSE HERDER 9 INJUSTICE 10 MIRROR 11 MTSHO MO AND THE LITTLE BOY 12 MTSHO MO'S DREAM 13 PAIN 14 REVENGE 15 SKIN, BLOOD, EVIL 16 STUBBORN SISTER 17 THE LUCKY LEADER AND HIS SON 18 THE SHEPHERD 19 A DAY Non-English Terms