New Blog Page

I’ve decided to move my blog here to http://tibettalk.wordpress.com/

I think it looks a lot better and organized, also there are a lot more features than the old tibettalk.blogspot.com. Feel free to use the old address if you find it easier because you’ll be redirected to this new site address in any case.

Edmund Hillary, first atop Everest, dies

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — Sir Edmund Hillary, the unassuming beekeeper who conquered Mount Everest to win renown as one of the 20th century’s greatest adventurers, has died, New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark announced Friday. He was 88.

Hillary took his fame in stride and considered himself just an ordinary beekeeper.

The gangling New Zealander devoted much of his life to aiding the mountain people of Nepal and took his fame in stride, preferring to be called “Ed” and considering himself just an ordinary beekeeper.

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“Sir Ed described himself as an average New Zealander with modest abilities. In reality, he was a colossus. He was an heroic figure who not only ‘knocked off’ Everest but lived a life of determination, humility, and generosity,” Clark said in a statement.

“The legendary mountaineer, adventurer, and philanthropist is the best-known New Zealander ever to have lived,” she said.

Hillary’s life was marked by grand achievements, high adventure, discovery, excitement — and by his personal humility. Humble to the point that he only admitted being the first man atop Everest long after the death of climbing companion Tenzing Norgay.

He had pride in his feats. Returning to base camp as the man who took the first step onto the top of the world’s highest peak, he declared: “We knocked the bastard off.”

The accomplishment as part of a British climbing expedition even added luster to the coronation of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II four days later, and she knighted Hillary as one of her first act.

But he was more proud of his decades-long campaign to set up schools and health clinics in Nepal, the homeland of Tenzing Norgay, the mountain guide with whom he stood arm in arm on the summit of Everest on May 29, 1953.

He wrote of the pair’s final steps to the top of the world: “Another few weary steps and there was nothing above us but the sky. There was no false cornice, no final pinnacle. We were standing together on the summit. There was enough space for about six people. We had conquered Everest.

“Awe, wonder, humility, pride, exaltation — these surely ought to be the confused emotions of the first men to stand on the highest peak on Earth, after so many others had failed,” Hillary noted…

See rest of article here

Tibet Space: "a Blogsite for the Tibetan Cultural Institute of Arkansas"

“a Blogsite for the Tibetan Cultural Institute of Arkansas (www.artibet.com)”

A blog run by Sidney Burris, a professor at the University of Arkansas who directs the Honors Studies Program and the Religious Studies Program. For two years, Professor Burris has been team-teaching courses with Geshe Thupten Dorjee in Tibetan Buddhist Philosophy and Culture, as well as a course in the history and practice of Non-Violence centered around Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and the Dalai Lama.

Geshe Thupten Dorjee left Tibet in 1959 and was educated at Drepung Loseling Monastery in south India. Together they founded The Tibetan Cultural Institute of Arkansas, and are dedicated to promoting awareness in Arkansas and America of the Tibetan situation. Their blog site TIBETSPACE is designed to provide readers with the kind of things that will give them a historical understanding of Tibet and its current political dilemma. They believe that before Americans can intelligently offer their support of the Tibetan cause, they need to understand the roots, both philosophical and historical, of the Tibetan situation.

See their blog here