The first time I met Thupten, she was working at the hotel where we were staying. I kept running into her all week and she would always greet me with the nicest smile. I figured she was Vietnamese or Laotian. I later discovered she was a Buddhist nun from Tibet.
She entered the monastery at age 11. After 18 years she left, married her husband and then they moved to Ithaca. He works as a translator here. She has a school-age son and took a job as a chambermaid at the university hotel on campus, which is where I shanghaied her to clean house for me.
I thought Thupten became a nun because her family couldn’t afford to raise her. Turns out Tibetan families pay to send their daughters to be educated, it is a great honor, very prestigious and the girls study hard. The newly ordained nuns work from early morning into late at night, learning language, grammar, literature, prayers, sutras, tantras and texts. Crafts, astrology and medicine are also subjects they master. Generally, the education process lasts 18 years.
Well, with all that, who has time to sit around daydreaming about sex anyway?
Before I jumped to conclusions about why she left the monastery, I thought I best do a little research. I found this great explanation from a Buddhist nun:
“When most people hear the word ‘nun’, they think of Catholic nuns. Often, their first question is why would I want to give up having sex forever. Stated in this way, it puts sex on a par with things such as smoking or drinking: self-gratifying acts of pleasurable consumption. If one understands sex according to such a selfish, loveless definition, then I suppose that yes, I have "given it up". One of the vows I made when I was ordained pertains to sex, and it states that you should not use your sexuality in a way that harms. It is not what you do, therefore, but how you do it: using someone as a commodity for one's own satisfaction is definitely harmful if considered in that light.”
My cheeks flushed as I read. Here is a religion thousands of years old and they have had it right all along. No shame, no guilt, no pressure, and no fine print: for reproduction only!
No wonder Buddha always has a smile on his face.
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