The Noodle Maker of Kalimpong: The Untold Story of My Struggle for Tibet

by Gyalo Thondup, Anne F Thurston

Overview

Shortly before midnight on March 17, 1959, the Dalai Lama, without his glasses and dressed as an ordinary Tibetan solider, slipped out of his summer residence with only four aides at his side. At that moment, he became the symbolic head of the Tibetan government in exile, and Gyalo Thondup, the only one of the Dalai Lama's brothers not to don the robes of a Buddhist monk, became the fulcrum for the independence movement.

The Noodle Maker of Kalimpong tells the extraordinary story of the Dalai Lama's family, the exile of the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism from Tibet, and the enduring political crisis that has seen remote and bleakly beautiful Tibet all but disappear as an independent nation-state.

For the last sixty years, Gyalo Thondup has been at the at the heart of the epic struggle to protect and advance Tibet in the face of unreliable allies, overwhelming odds, and devious rivals, playing an utterly determined and unique role in a Cold War high-altitude superpower rivalry. Here, for the first time, he reveals how he found himself whisked between Chiang Kai-shek, Zhou Enlai, Jawaharlal Nehru, and the CIA, as he tried to secure, on behalf of his brother, the future of Tibet.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781610392891
Publisher:	PublicAffairs
Publication date:	04/14/2015
Pages:	384
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.40(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Gyalo Thondup, the older brother of the Dalai Lama, lives on a hilltop compound in Kalimpong, India, that also houses the noodle factory he set up with his late wife, Diki Dolkar (Zhu Dan).

Anne F. Thurston is a China specialist and senior research professor at the Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies. She was the coauthor for the international bestseller, The Private Life of Chairman Mao, and is the author of Enemies of the People and A Chinese Odyssey. She lives in Alexandria, Virginia.

Table of Contents

Map vi

Introduction ix

Preface xxv

1 Taktser Village and Kumbum Monastery 1

2 My Family 11

3 The Search Team Arrives 23

4 My Brother Is Recognized as the Fourteenth Dalai Lama 31

5 The Dalai Lama's New Life 41

6 My Family's New Life 49

7 My Life Changes 57

8 My Student Days in Nanjing 69

9 Stranded in India 83

10 Becoming an Intermediary 89

11 The Chinese Invade 99

12 The Long Journey Home 117

13 Home Again 129

14 Escape from Tibet 139

15 Beginning Life in India 145

16 The Dalai Lama Visits China 153

17 The Dalai Lama Visits India 157

18 The CIA Offers to Help 167

19 The Dalai Lama's Escape 181

20 From Mussoorie to Dharamsala 191

21 Mustang 201

22 Settling Down in India 211

23 The War between China and India 223

24 The CIA Stops Its Support 229

25 A New Life in Hong Kong 237

26 My Return to China 243

27 The Tenth Panchen Lama 253

28 Meeting Deng Xiaoping 257

29 Return to Tibet 263

30 Our Negotiations Fail 273

31 Another Opportunity Lost 279

32 Opportunity Lost Again 285

33 Return to Tibet 289

34 Watching the World from Kalimpong 293

Afterword 303

Notes 315

Selected Bibliography 327

Glossary 333

Index 337

Editorial Reviews

06/29/2015
China scholar Thurston (China Bound) assists Thondup, elder brother of the Dalai Lama, in telling the story of his life and his homeland's battle for autonomy. Thondup recalls his family's humble origins in the Amdo region; they were uprooted and traveled to Lhasa when his four-year-old brother was declared a candidate for Dalai Lama. Groomed to become a political advisor, Thondup is sent from tumultuous Tibet to study in China, establishing close ties with Chinese president Chiang Kai-Shek and hoping to return home to institute modernization reforms. The 1949 Communist takeover in China and subsequent invasion of Tibet puts his plans on hold; Thondup returns to an impoverished Lhasa as Chinese troops bomb monasteries and use "colonial, imperialistic tactics to divide and rule." Escaping to India, Thondup works with the CIA to train resistance fighters. A tense situation escalates with riots at Norbulingka Palace and the Dalai Lama flees to India, where the brothers organize a "government in exile." After decades of broken negotiations, Thondup returns to Tibet to take over a noodle factory, ruminating on Tibet's continued status as a colony in a world where so many have been liberated. Thondup is straightforward about his regrets regarding his own actions and remarkably less bitter than one would expect. Thurston challenges some of his memories and assertions in her afterword, though it's unclear why she did so. Though the narrative grows repetitive by the end, this is a vital narrative of Tibetans' ongoing effort for independence, and Thondup's bravery is commendable. Photos. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

"...A fascinating and important book...[the book provides] extraordinary insight into Tibet's struggle against China to regain its independence...A crisp and magnetic story."—The Wall Street Journal

“Full of tales of international intrigue.”—Foreign Affairs

“A vital narrative of Tibetans' ongoing effort for independence, and Thondup's bravery is commendable.”—Publishers Weekly

"Anyone seeking a detailed version of the history, life, and struggles of Tibet, the Dalai Lama, and his family will find it here, recounted in an authorial voice that is both conversationally personal and educational."—Booklist

“…heartbreaking, gripping…”—South China Morning Post

From the Publisher

03/15/2015
This memoir by Thondup, the Dalai Lama's older brother, is also the story of an isolated and unprepared Tibet's annexation by China, long years of armed Tibetan resistance, and the eventual creation and administration of a Tibetan government in exile. It is a story about clandestine dealings with foreign intelligence agencies such as the CIA and behind-the-scenes political intrigue as much as it is about Thondup's personal experience and activities. While the author succinctly describes Tibetan life, social structure, and religious customs, general readers will need to have a basic understanding of modern Chinese history and the Cold War to fully understand the events described. Unlike the Dalai Lama's writings on Tibet and its people, Thondup's account is less concerned with spiritual struggle than with the violence, political missteps, and miscommunications that led to his country's current political situation. VERDICT Coauthor Thurston (director, Grassroots China Initiative, John Hopkins Univ.; A Chinese Odyssey) acknowledges that she does not necessarily agree with several of the conclusions drawn by Thondup and that some of his narrative is contradicted by the writings of his contemporaries. Nevertheless, this memoir adds an important first-person perspective on the history of Tibet from a key political player.—Rebecca Brody, Westfield State Univ., MA

Library Journal

2015-02-04
From Thondup, the current Dalai Lama's elder brother, a personal perspective on the history of Tibet since the Chinese occupation.Both proud Tibetan nationalists, Thondup and the Dalai Lama were decidedly separated at birth. The Dalai Lama was destined to "cultivate and practice love, tenderness, compassion and tolerance," while Thondup has been well-versed in the grittiness of international political intrigue: "I do not care whether the people I work with are good or bad, whether I like them or dislike them. I just try to carry out my work." Thondup tells his story to China specialist Thurston, who delivers plenty of her own opinions in the introduction and the afterword. Thondup doesn't forgo family history—there is excellent background on the famed Kumbum Monastery and the Yellow Hat sect of the Gelugpa school of Buddhism—nor his latest incarnation: "I am known here as the noodle maker of Kalimpong." But in between, the author chronicles a life of vibrant activity, which, depending on one's political persuasion, was heroic or ill-advised, though not self-aggrandizing. What emerges from the tales of his diplomacy and interlocution, shuttling among Tibet, China, Taiwan and India, wherever he was needed; the scheming and plotting with the CIA ("My role with the CIA weighs heavily on my conscience"); and the at-times overwhelming detail, is that Thondup is a progressive Tibetan, a foe of the entrenched elite and a friend of the workingman—though he often found himself in the wrong place, with the wrong people at the wrong time. Additionally, elements of the story are hard to believe, most glaringly that the Dalai Lama had no knowledge of CIA involvement in Tibetan resistance, as well as the claim of foreign-instigation behind the recent riots (both of which Thurston notes). A thorough but not always convincing story of foreign intrigue.

Kirkus Reviews