Thursday, April 28, 2022

A friend of mine graduated UCLA with a Master's degree in History specializing in Buddhism and Sanskrit

 So, since we were rock climbers in places like Taquitz Rock in Idylwild and rock climbing in Yosemite National park or climbing places like Mt. Shasta then, often we would stop in Berkeley at Shambala Bookstore near UC Berkeley to buy Sanskrit books because in the 1960s and 1970s that was the only place we knew of to buy books like this off the shelf. My friend could speak and write and read Sanskrit and since Hindi is a Sanskrit based language he could somewhat communicate using Sanskrit in Hindi too. Tibetan is also a Sanskrit based language as well as Russian by the way which I found very interesting at the time.

Eventually he was playing music professionally in Europe and I called him and told him my family and I were going to India, Nepal, Thailand and Japan in 1985. He was angry at first I made it there for the first time before he did but decided to come visit me in Kathmandu, Nepal from Switzerland where he was visiting relatives and playing music at the time. He flew there from Europe through Pakistan then and landed in Kathmandu, Nepal where he met me and my family then in 1986 by the time he got there. We had been in India, Thailand and Nepal for a few months before he arrived in Kathmandu and he had to wait for us a little to take an air conditioned bus back from Dharamshala, India at the time to Kathmandu, Nepal where we met.

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