Kopan Monastery

Kopan Monastery is an enormous cream and red structure at the top of a hill, north of Dragon Guest House. Whenever I wasn’t sure of the way, I asked, "Hajur, kahaa Kopan Gompa?" (Please/excuse me/sir, where’s Kopan Monastery?) Two little girls walked with me a little way, practicing their English—"You have brother? What is your name?" while I practiced my Nepali—mostly, "Very nice!" and "I don’t understand…"

The library is incredible. You go up a few flights (you can look over the edge and see lots of baby monks running around in the residential area) to get to the giftshop, flanked by two libraries, Tibetan and English-language. The English-language library has every imaginable Dharma text—all the Buddha’s discourses, as well as modern teachers’ work—also a few novels, like Moby Dick, and some non-English language texts. Also magazines and journals. ("When reading dharma books, please sit appropriately," the sign says). The walls are lined with cushioned benches and a few Western-style chairs. You can sit and read for as long as you like, well, until a monk comes and says "Lunch!"

The café looks out over the valley—lots of green farmland and half-built houses and golden rooftops. Away in the distance, I can make out the Bodhnath Stupa. On a balcony below, monks robes drying in the sun.

I remember a teacher giving a talk at the Shambhala Center, in Boulder, Colorado (where I live). She said, "When you feel complacent or tired or disengaged—change something on the outside. Shake it up. Don’t wait until you feel ready, or think you deserve it. Take a level. Go somewhere. Do anything, and whatever you were blocking will come to the surface." That’s the sense of what I remember, but it probably wasn’t anything close to that—anyway, the words I chose to hear, accurate or not, seem very relevant now.

The Kopan Monastery convenience store stocks Toblerone.