I realized I had owned a Poster of the 21 Taras that I had bought in Dharamshala, India in early 1986:

when I was there with my family then. We had traveled there from Bodygaya, India where the Buddha became enlightened under the Bodhi Tree about 2500 years or more ago (around 500 years before Jesus in the Middle East). And since India's Brahmic Culture goes back at least to 10,000 BC this is interesting too.

Anyway, while I was in Dharamshala with my family (most of the month of January 1986) I found and bought a poster of the 21 Taras there while we were staying at the Green Hotel in Dharamshala.

I just checked online. The Green Hotel Still exists here in 2025:

There is a hotel in Dharamshala named Green Hotel, a budget-friendly option with amenities like free WiFi and balcony mountain views. Another hotel, Green View Hotel and Restaurant, is located on the Dharamshala Strip, a short walk from the Dalai Lama Temple Complex. 

Green Hotel 

• Description: A basic hotel offering a terrace and mountain views.
• Amenities: Free WiFi, balcony, TV, and air conditioning.
• Room Types: Deluxe Room, Budget Double Room, and Standard Double Room.
• Location: In Dharamshala, Himachal Pradesh.

Green View Hotel and Restaurant 

• Description: A well-rated hotel with a restaurant.
• Location: Situated on the Dharamshala Strip.
• Nearby Attractions: A short walk to the Dalai Lama Temple Complex and the Tushita Meditation Centre.

• Green Hotel, Dharamshala – Updated 2024 Prices

  

  Booking.com

Green View Hotel and Restaurant, Dharamshala - Hotels.com

Green View Hotel and Restaurant is located on the Dharamshala Strip, a short 11-minute walk from Dalai Lama Temple Complex and 15 ...

Hotels.com

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At the time I think parts of it were still being built. At that time in January 1986 we first stayed at the Kailash Hotel but because we were a family of 5 the accommodations at the Green Hotel were better for us because my wife and I were 37 and our children were 10 to 14 years old at that time and people in the Kailash Hotel were younger and mostly single or couples who lived together and they were pretty loud and world travelers and mountain climbers like that.

 

So, when we moved to the Green Hotel we had more room to breathe and it was easier to sleep at night and not as loud as the Kailash Hotel was then with people from all over the world visiting Dharmashala who were interested in Mountain Climbing and Tibetan Buddhism and studying other cultures than their own for short or long periods of time then in January of 1986.

 

At that time the showers were cold I believe so hot water wasn't happening yet. Also, at that time there were not heaters in the rooms and it was January at around 6000 feet elevation sort of like Lake Tahoe in California elevation. So, we needed to sterilize water because that is how we stayed alive then by boiling whatever water we drank for 5 minutes and letting it cool. There was no reliable water to buy that was clean enough without boiling it at that time. So, I bought a kerosene cook stove to boil water and to cook whatever food we wanted to (even though one could inexpensively buy food from stores and restaurants too at that time. Most of the people who lived in Dharamshala then were Tibetan Refugees who were devoted to the Dalai Lama as their teacher and head of their religion sort of like the Pope is for Catholics and they mostly wore traditional Tibetan Dress then except for the younger people who tended to develop more Western or California types of tastes for food and clothing and because often people from California and the whole U.S. donated money to people in Dharamshala which helped many of them become better educated about everything on earth. and people from Europe were there a lot too doing the same thing at that time.

 

Another interesting thing at that time was that there was a type of monkey that is silver and black and if it stood up straight would be between 5 and 6 feet tall. We were told not to wander around in the woods there after dark because they were known to walk off with children and eat them. So, we made it a rule that the kids couldn't go off after dark alone. But, other than this we felt relatively safe and I think I remember that our rooms that we rented by the day also had a bathroom or more specifically a sink and a toilet which consisted of a hole in the floor of the bathroom which was common at that time all over India. It could also flush. Also, what was common in hotels across India then was  the Guest House style of inexpensive hotel where there was a shower that fed into the toilet so there was no toilet separate from the one that also the shower fed into as a drain. It was one of the many things we had to adapt to while traveling in India and Nepal.

 

However, recently I realized I had lost track of my poster of the 21 Taras in the last almost 40 years now and so I ordered one online. It came recently and I wondered how it made it through the shutdown of most things from overseas because of tariffs because this poster came from the Ukraine which I thought was interesting too. So, the poster of the 21 Taras like the one I originally purchased in Dharamshala India in 1986 I now have hanging next to my framed picture of White Tara that I have had for some time in my bedroom.

 

The Mantra of the 21 taras protects from many things and each of the Taras represents a certain kind of protection. Together the 21 Taras are similar in a divine sense to Mother Mary in the Catholic Church as they represent Divine Mother and the mother of all the Buddhas.

 

I have always been close to Mary the Mother of Jesus and so I also became close to the 21 Taras represented by the Green Tara who represents all the 21 Taras at once. My mother always loved Mother Mary the Mother of Jesus too. So, I came by this worship of Divine Mother naturally.

 

by God's Grace