Dalai Lama's Family Runs Refugee Centre

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30478, 27 June 1964, Page 2

Dalai Lama's Family Runs Refugee Centre

The mother and the sister-in-law of the exiled Dalai Lama of Tibet are helping to run a centre for Tibetan refugees that has been established in Darjeeling, northern India, since Tibet was taken over by the Chinese.

‘•Mrs Thondup, the Dalai Lama’s sister-in-law, just spends her life going from place to place to enlist support for the refugees.” Mrs D. G. Stewart, who has spent 10 years in Darjeeling, said in Christchurch this week.

Mrs Stewart is the wife of the principal of the Mount Hermon School in Darjeeling, which is run by a group of protestant missions. Mrs Stewart, who is a teacher at the school, last year had a class of 12 young Tibetans who could not speak a word of English. “And I cannot speak a word of Tibetan, either,” said Mrs Stewart. “I went along the first day armed with such things as a cup. a spoon, and other familiar things, and we started by learning the names of those.” After the “direct-approach" noun lessons, verbs followed, commands being acted out by teacher and class. “I am very impressed with the Tibetan people,” Mrs Stewart said. "They have such strong characters, and wonderful senses of humour.” Laughter in the class was frequent on both sides in the early attempts at making each other understood. “What is wonderful now is to actually get letters in Eng-

lish from some of them." she said. Refugees were still straggling out of Tibet Mrs Stewart said. She learned some of the stories of her . pupils, who were aged between 10 and 18. One boy of 12 saw his father shot and his mother taken prisoner. Before she was taken, however, the mother told the boy to take his four-year-old brother, and some clothes, and run away. After wandering alone for two days, the two children joined a refugee band and went with them to safety. There were many similar .stories. “Half the children had seen their parents killed,” she said. Most of the refugee children attended their own school at the refugee centre. Only some were chosen to learn English. The adults are taught various skills —weaving, carpentry, carving, knitting—so they can support themselves and leave the centre, making i room for new refugees.

"They are encouraged to be self-supporting; they are worthy of any help that can be sent to them." she said. Groups from the camp are sometimes entertained by ; groups of senior students from Mount Hermon school. Mount Hermon school was primarily a boarding school and catered for children of many nationalities. Some; came from as far away as Teheran and Japan. Many were children of missionaries, Indian politicians, and other professional men. Education Centre , Darjeeling, 6800 ft up in the i foothills of the Himalayas. 1 and surrounded by the best! tea-growing area in the world, was a big centre of education, said Mrs Stewart. ( The schools there included the language school which missionaries attend to learn the language before serving in the Bengal area. Mr and Mrs Stewart are Australians. With their four-year-old son David, they are on a round-the-world trip which will finish back in Darjeeling at the end of their year’s furlough, in December. On their journey they will |meet students from their ;school in almost every i country they visit.