By Ven. Sangye Khadro

Going on pilgrimage to holy places is always a special experience but doing so in the company of holy beings is particularly blissful and meaningful. For ten days in January about 90 fortunate people had the opportunity to discover this as they journeyed to several of the holy places in India with Ribur Rinpoche and Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

Ribur Rinpoche first conceived the idea after a very successful pilgrimage to Borobudur, Indonesia, last July, and Maitreya organized it, timing it so the pilgrims could attend His Holiness’s teachings in Bodhgaya. About half the group were from Singapore, with the other half from various countries, including about a dozen monks and nuns. Ribur Rinpoche was with us right from the beginning but Lama Zopa Rinpoche was able to join us only on the fourth day, in Varanasi.

January 13: The pilgrimage began in Sravasti, where the Buddha spent 25 rains retreats. According to Ribur Rinpoche, Sravasti is perhaps the most blessed of all the places associated with Buddha’s life because not only did he spend more time there than anywhere else, but it is also one of the 23 holy places of Chakrasamvara. The actual site of the Buddha’s meditation hut is in the middle of a beautiful and serene park – many of us noticed our minds becoming peaceful and happy merely by sitting or strolling through its gardens.

On our first day there, after a lunch kindly provided by the Burmese temple, we performed Guru Puja in the park amidst the ruins of ancient temples and monasteries. Rinpoche gave a talk on the significance of the place and also gave us advice on the best prayers, mantras and practices to do in holy places. He said that it was excellent to take the Eight Mahayana Precepts and, out of his immense compassion, offered to give them the following day.

January 14: Early the next morning, in spite of the freezing cold weather, we gathered in the park, the darkness lit by candles flickering before a picture of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to receive the precepts from Rinpoche in a simple but moving ceremony. Following a tea break, we began to set up the 1,000 sets of offerings for a Maitreya puja. The organizers had thought of everything: thrones, tables and cloths, 6,000 plastic cups, rice, flowers, incense, candles, popcorn, as well as ground-sheets and cushions for everyone. We managed to finish the setting up by lunch time and started the puja in the early afternoon. The puja consists of visualizing the pure land of Tushita filled with countless Buddhas and bodhisattvas, making many offerings and requests, and reciting Maitreya Buddha’s mantra 10,000 times (collectively). After the puja Rinpoche took us to the ruins of Angulimala’s stupa (Angulimala was a disciple of the Buddha who was able to purify the karma of killing 999 people and attained liberation), where he led us in reciting the confession prayer to the 35 Buddhas. Later, back at the puja site, those of us who were cleaning up were treated to the sight of four large cranes flying in formation overhead – an auspicious sign, perhaps?

January 15-17: The following day we traveled by bus (three buses, in fact, plus a truck to carry all our puja things) to Varanasi, where we were joined by Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Ven. Roger and several other students. Over the next two days, Lama Zopa in his usual style kept us busy accumulating merit and purifying negativities. In Sarnath, we performed the 1,000 Offerings to Maitreya puja as well as Guru Puja in the Deer Park, where Buddha gave his first teaching, and received blessing from the Buddha’s relics enshrined in the Mahabodhi Temple.

We also visited Alice Project School where the children greeted us with songs of welcome and flower garlands.

January 18-19: Our next destination was Bodhgaya, the most sacred and powerful of the Buddhist pilgrimage sites. On our first day in Bodhgaya we visited the Maitreya land, where Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Ribur Rinpoche and various Maitreya Project staff explained the significance, the background and current status of the project. Later that day we walked to Sujata, where Buddha accepted the offering of milk-rice to end his six years of asceticism just before his enlightenment. The nearby Tibetan monastery kindly allowed us to use their gompa to do Guru Puja and tsog.

January 20: Rajgir and Nalanda are both a few hours’ drive from Bodhgaya and can be visited in one day. As more pilgrims had joined us in Bodhgaya, the size of our group had grown to seven bus-loads (over 200 people). We first visited the site of the great monastic university of Nalanda, alma mater of many of our lineage lamas such as Nagarjuna, Asanga, Shantideva and Atisha. Here we performed Guru Puja with boxed lunches as tsog, and when it came time to pass out the boxes, a sort of loaves-and-fishes phenomenon occurred – at first it was thought there weren’t enough to go around and we’d have to share, but in the end we had many leftover lunches!

After walking among the ruins of Nalanda, making prayers to be able to follow in the footsteps of the great masters who had studied there, we traveled to Rajgir and climbed the steps up to Vulture’s Peak where the Buddha delivered the most important of the Mahayana sutras, the Prajnaparamita. When we reached the top, we offered prostrations, candles and khatas, then sat and recited The Heart Sutra as we waited for our gurus to arrive. To everyone’s admiration, Ribur Rinpoche managed the climb all the way, and as the sun set over this inconceivable holy and powerful place, he gave us the transmissions of The Heart Sutra, the first chapter of the Guhyasamaja Root Tantra, the first and fifty-fourth chapters of the Heruka Tantra, and Lama Tsong Khapa’s Praise to Dependent Origination. It was one of the most beautiful and moving moments of the entire pilgrimage.

January 21: After a morning off we took a late afternoon trip to Sujata, just across the river from Bodhgaya, where the Buddha spent six years doing ascetic practices. Lama Zopa Rinpoche and many of our dear geshes led us in Guru Puja and light offering practice on the temple rooftop.

January 22: The final outing of the pilgrimage was to Mahakala Cemetery, one of the eight great cemeteries. Unfortunately Lama Zopa Rinpoche did not come because he had gone to Patna to greet His Holiness, and Ribur Rinpoche stayed at home because the climb is too strenuous, but we were joined by several FPMT geshes including Geshe Lama Konchog, Geshe Lama Lhundrup and Geshe Ngawang Dakpa. The hour and a half climb up the mountain was indeed difficult – what’s a pilgrimage without hardships? Nevertheless, all but a few of us made it to the top where we offered Guru Puja and tsog, sharing the offerings with the many village children who had tagged along on our trek. We all slept well that night!

January 23: Early in the morning, khatas and incense in hand, we joined the Tibetans lining the main street of Bodhgaya to greet His Holiness the Dalai Lama, who began his teachings that same afternoon.

Infinite thanks to our immeasurably kind and compassionate gurus, Ribur Rinpoche and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, for the inspiration, time and energy they contributed to make this beautiful experience possible. And many, many thanks as well to the courageous organizers, the generous sponsors and benefactors, and to all those who participated. Due to these merits, and all other merits created, may the lives of our precious holy gurus be stable and long, and may all their wishes be swiftly fulfilled.