April 10, 2025
Wooden Snake Year
For those turning ages 1, 13, 25, 37, 49, 61, 73, 85 or 97 this year, your animal is the snake. It is an obstacle year for snakes in the Tibetan calendar year of the snake, so we do divinations and rituals. The first one is the Long Life Prayer and Long Life Rituals. The second one is Gyanag Kagdhog, a Cleansing Obstacles Ritual. The third one is Dugskar Dogpa that we do here at Menri Monastery in June or July. It takes 2-3 days.The fourth one is the Sipe Gyalmo Tsok Offering.
BumTsok April 30th to May 5th, 2025
BumTsok is the 100,000 cake offering. This is a very big event every year with all the monks, nuns and tantric practitioners participating. The purpose is to be peaceful, for peace in our world. All the work done is on a volunteer basis.
BumTsok is also healing for obstacles and suffering of the inner mind, physical suffering and health issues. The purpose is cleansing and purifying of negatives. That is why the Sipe Gyalmo Tsok offering is very important.
This ritual is for the whole world and is a very important one. Many Bonpos and practitioners contribute to this. You can do the same through donations through KWL. Your names will be posted and you will be added to the prayers being done at the Monastery.
Donations for the BumTsok can be made at the top of this page. Please include the names of the people you want prayers for.
News About the Health Care Clinic
For almost 20 years we have a health care clinic in Dolpo, Charka, my hometown. We are helping the local people, travelers and visitors alike. We help everybody with medicine and with preventative health care. We send a nurse from Kathmandu 6 months of the year. We have changed nurses a few times over the years. It is a very remote area. The nurse needs to speak the local Tibetan language as the village people can’t speak Nepalese or English. There is no hospital and no roads. The nurse needs to be a very strong person to live in the Himalaya in such a high altitude. The altitude is too high and it is too cold there for people from Kathmandu. For the last few years we had a great nurse from a village near Mount Kailash who speaks the local language. She helped with many births and helped so many people and saved people’s lives. She has health issues herself so she will not be there this year. So this year we’re sending a young man, a nurse, who is from Dolpo.
Many, many people from all over the world help contribute for the medicine and the expenses of running the clinic. We provide medicine and supplies like female hygiene products, education and care for women’s health issues as well as care for everyone down to providing toothbrushes and toothpaste. There is no charge for any of these services. The people there are so appreciative and happy for the donors who keep the clinic up and running.
We buy medicine in Kathmandu and transport them, sometimes by vehicle part of the way, and also by horse and yak. The transportation is very, very expensive. I would like to say to everybody, thank you so much for helping this clinic and especially the KWL board members. They are very helpful and have volunteered for a long time since I came to the US more than 25 years ago. I thank you all very much, all volunteers and supporters and I pray for you all to have long life, happiness and be healthy. I hope you all read this message and many, many tashi deleks to everybody.
-Menri Ponlob
From the Khyungdzong Wodsel Ling Board:
As Ponlob mentioned above, KWL covers all costs for the medical clinic in Dolpo – medical supplies including transportation to Dolpo, salary for our nurse, as well as the cost of his transportation to Dolpo and his food for the 6 months he is there. Our annual cost is about $10,000 a year for everything.
To support the Dolpo Medical Clinic, you can donate via PayPal or credit card on this page, or send a check payable to Khyungdzong Wodsel Ling:
KWL
C/o Dika Ryan
1977 N New Hampshire Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90027
