drawing & praying, forms of protests

In Kathmandu, 1^st June saw Tibetan actions peacefully resumed. The break was in solidarity for the victims of the Sichuan earthquake. A very sad event which gives Chinese government to show its kind heart to the world media, motivated by the bad pictures of Tibet and helped by the contrasting very poor management of the cyclone Nargis’s terrible disaster by the Junta.But while the military power in Burma organized a shameful authoritarian referendum, in Lhasa Chinese authorities set mock trials of 5 minutes* and repressed the protests of the Sichuan victims who dared to link the bad building structure with corruption.
Sweep the Maoist nature under the carpet and it’ll erupt by the toilets (Sichuan proverb emigrated from Mongolia via Xinjiang and Tibet).

 In Kathmandu the action was about children drawing their feelings towards the Tibet struggle. With the two Ms Chime we went with 8 children to Samtenling Gompa to honour the invitation of the Tibetan Youth Comity.
For children, to show its own feeling is not easy task, so most of them drew the violence their parents told them and that they imagine. They don’t all know the meaning of the five coloured circles but some of them know the tortures techniques used in Tibet!
However some used the way of the symbol, many with the flags but Lhakila from our school chose by her to go for a monster eating a crane while herself looks in despair at the scene. The class IV pupils attracted with this the journalists, their cameras and their interviews.

  5 days later, at the exhibition opening, I met the mock torch bearer of the protest I told you about. He had a very weak voice. Why? The protest of the previous day of course! Within these 5 days several protests occurred, including a praying march from Buddhanath to Swoyambunath by prostrating on the Ring Road. They achieved it in one day and one night. **

 
* cf Woeser and Jamyang Norbu blogs and  the article of Naoami Klein

** Details on Phayul.com