The path to Enlightenment is in the Middle Way.
It is the line between all opposite extremes.
[ Siddhartha Whispering ] If I can reach Enlightenment,
may this bowl...
float upstream.
[ Lama Norbu Narrating ] The Middle Way was the great truth Siddhartha had found,
the path he would teach to the world.
[ Grunting ]
[ Shouting, Speaking in Nepali ]
[ Drums, Wind Instruments ]
- Thank you. - Dad, look!
[ Continues ]
[ Lama Norbu ] Are you sure the other boy will be here today, Sangay?
[ Sangay ] Of course, of course. He's always here.
Wow, Dad, isn't it great?
Yeah, it's lookin' at us.
It's a dome, like the one on your building.
Lama, can I go around and touch those things?
The prayer wheels? Of course.
But remember,
you should always walk around clockwise.
- Okay, Dad? - He will be completely safe here.
Okay, Jesse. I'll see you later.
I'll be watching you!
[ Drum, Wind Instruments ]
Hey, Dad! Hey!
Hey, buddy!
[ Cymbals, Wind Instruments ]
[ Singing in Nepali ]
[ Singing Continues ]
- That's... the boy. - Yes, that is Raju.
[ Lama Norbu ] Look, Champa, the other candidate.
Amongst all these people, the two of them...
have found each other.
[ Singing Continues ]
How much you give?
Ten rupee? Five rupee?
- One rupee? - I don't have any money.
What's in your pocket?
- It's my Gameboy. You want to try? - Oh!
Yeah. I'm champion of Kathmandu.
[ Beeping ]
[ Continues Beeping ]
[ Beeping ]
- You're good. - [ Beeping Continues ]
Hey!
I am champion of Kathmandu!
- What is he doing? - I'll get it back!
Come back! Hey! Dad?
Hey!
Mantu! Mantu, come back!
Hey!
[ Cymbals Ringing ]
[ Girl Shouting ]
[ Speaking Nepali ]
- [ Bell Ringing ] - [ Giggling ]
Hey! American boy! Hey!
My brother is very naughty, but great singer.
- Thanks. My name's Jesse. - I'm Raju. Come!
- Hey, up here, buddy. - Dad! Hey, Dad!
- Champa, can I ask you something? - Of course.
Is Lama Norbu sick? I see him taking those pills.
He's...
not completely well, but very strong.
Dad! Dad, this is my new friend.
- He found me when I was lost. - We know, Jesse. We know.
We've been waiting for you both.
We are very pleased to meet you, Raju.
Sangay has told us much about you.
It is good that two of the candidates...
have found each other in this way.
Now we must visit a third candidate...
whom I've only just heard about.
It will be a very long drive.
So let us hope it is Lama Dorje's... last joke.
Lama Dorje always made jokes about impermanence.
Lama, what's "impermanence"?
You see these people?
All of us...
and all the people alive in the world today--
A hundred years from now we'll all be dead.
That is impermanence.
[ Indian Raga ]
Jesse?
Hey.
Hey, Jesse.
- You wanna call Mom? - Yeah.
Come on.
I send help, sahib.
- Car broken, sahib? - Yeah.
Very bad karma.
Oh.
I hope your journey was not too tiring, Lama.
Thank you. Thank you.
- Now I want to meet the child. - Here is my precious.
Gita. Come and meet Lama Norbu.
Gita, this is Jesse and Raju.
I am the real Lama Dorje, and you are both fakes.
Lama Dorje wasn't a woman.
He was the abbess of a convent.
How would you know? I'm sorry, you don't go to school.
And you're a foreigner.
I have a secret garden.
Come. Come, O ignorant boys.
Me?
Right here in this garden,
my grandfather, who was a raja and a great saint,
was eaten by a tiger.
- Yeah, right! - There was a terrible famine,
and the tiger was looking for food to feed her babies.
So my grandfather offered himself.
He must've been pretty stupid to do something like that.
[ Spits ] Only a great being can do something like that.
- [ Raju Yelling ] - Eat me, O poor tiger!
Eat me!
- [ Yelling ] - You're so hungry!
- Eat me! - [ Both Shouting ]
- [ Growling ] - Oh, no! Aah!
- [ Jesse ] Don't eat me! - This tooth belonged to the tiger that ate my grandfather.
Cool.
You can't fool me. I heard this story a thousand times,
but he don't know that.
My late husband, a man of great faith,
made a donation every year to Lama Dorje's monastery.
Then one day, Lama Dorje came here.
Unannounced. Just appearing at the door like a miracle.
He stayed for two days.
And just as he was leaving,
he placed his hand...
on my stomach... like this.
For a long time, I didn't know what it meant.
But immediately after Lama Dorje died,
I became pregnant.
Something which my husband and I had thought...
was impossible.
A month ago, she wrote to me to come right away...
because a most amazing thing had happened.
- One night, the child-- - Gita was...
chanting prayers in Tibetan, saying things I couldn't understand.
She was speaking Tibetan in her sleep?
The Heart sutra. A little miracle. How could she know that?
She was speaking Sanskrit.
[ Reciting in Sanskrit ]
[ Continues Reciting ]
[ Reciting in Sanskrit ]
[ Continues Reciting ]
- [ Monkey Chattering ] - [ Jesse ] Wow, look at that monkey!
- [ Raju ] He look like my monkey. - [ Gita ] They are all my monkeys.
[ Jesse ] What's that one called over there?
[ Gita ] Don't laugh. You'll scare them. Do you know...
Siddhartha reached Enlightenment under this tree?
- Yeah? - Anyhow, a tree just like this one.
Lama! Lama, is it true?
Is this really, like, Siddhartha's tree?
Well, probably something very similar.
It was outside a little village called Bodgaya.
Siddhartha sat under a great tree,
just like this one.
He had found the Middle Way...
and restored his body to health.
- [ Chattering ] - [ Lama Norbu Narrating ] And then five girls appeared.
They looked like innocent village girls,
but in fact they were the five daughters of Mara,
Lord of Darkness.
They were the spirits of Pride,
- [ Girls Speaking Nepali ] - Greed, Fear,
Ignorance and Desire.
- [ Chattering Continues, Singing ] - And Mara had sent them...
to tempt Siddhartha away from his search.
[ Singing Continues ]
[ Chattering ]
- [ Girls Laughing, Chattering ] - [ Singing Continues ]
[ Chattering, Singing Continue ]
[ Chattering Continues ]
[ Lama Norbu Narrating ] Mara had tried to tempt Siddhartha...
in the cleverest of ways:
by disguising the temptations of life...
in the simplest forms.
But Siddhartha was looking beyond form,
beyond the present.
And now Mara was enraged.
[ All Gasping ]
[ Growling ]
- [ Laughing ] - [ Growling Continues ]
[ Roaring ]
[ Roar Echoing ]
[ Girls Gasping, Shouting ]
- [ Wind Howling ] - [ Shouting Continues ]
[ Thunderclap ]
[ Thunder Rumbling ]
[ Footsteps ]
[ Lama Norbu Narrating ] It seemed as if Mara had been defeated,
but in fact he had not yet given up the battle.
Now he attacked again.
You who go where no one else will dare,
will you be my god?
Architect,
finally I have met you.
You will not rebuild your house again.
But I am your house,
and you live in me.
O lord of my own ego,
you are pure illusion.
You do not exist.
The earth is my witness.
[ Lama Norbu ] Siddhartha won the battle against an army of demons,
just through the force of his love...
and the great compassion he had found.
[ Lama Norbu ] And he achieved...
the great calm that precedes...
detachment from illusions.
He had reached beyond himself.
He was beyond joy or pain,
separate from judgment.
Able to remember that he had been...
a girl, a dolphin,
a tree, a monkey.
[ Chuckles ]
He remembered his first birth...
and the millions after that.
He could see beyond the universe.
- Siddhartha... - [ Monkeys Squealing ]
had seen the ultimate reality of all things.
He had understood...
that every movement in the universe...
is an effect provoked by a cause.
He knew there was no salvation...
without compassion for every other being.
From that moment on,
Siddhartha was called the Buddha,
the Awakened One.
[ Horns Blowing ]
[ Children Cheering, Shouting ]
[ Cheering, Shouting Continue ]
Welcome to our home.
[ Cheering, Shouting Continue ]
Go on, join them, if you dare.
[ Shouting ]
[ Shouting Continues ]
[ Shouting Stops, Laughing ]
[ Laughter Continues, Chattering in Tibetan ]
They began making this mandala the day I left the monastery.
And now it is almost complete.
[ Dean ] It's beautiful. Why is it made of sand?
[ Lama Norbu ] To show the impermanence of all within the universe.
So when it is completed,
it'll be destroyed with one gesture.
Like that.
[ Lama Norbu ] It is very mysterious, Your Holiness.
All three children show the same signs.
Then we must ask the oracle, Lama Norbu.
Though in the end, only you can decide.
[ Children Shouting ]
[ Drums, Cymbals ]
[ Moaning ]
- [ Continues ] - [ Moaning Continues ]
[ Moaning Intensifies ]
[ Moaning Continues ]
[ Moaning, Panting ]
[ Speaking Tibetan ]
[ Drums, Cymbals Continue ]
[ Chattering ]
[ Speaking Tibetan ]
[ Champa Whispering ] Raju! Raju!
Oh, my teacher,
I'm so happy to have found you again.
Raju, come here! Raju!
[ Monks Chanting ]
[ Chanting Continues ]
[ Monks Chanting, Singing ]
Oh, my teacher,
I'm so happy to have found you again.
[ Singing Continues ]
My teacher,
I'm so happy to have found you...
at last.
Perhaps one day, you will find me.
I am truly happy,
three times happy.
But how can we all be Lama Dorje?
[ Singing Continues ]
[ Singing Stops ]
It is very rare, but it has happened before.
Separate manifestations...
of the body, the speech and the mind.
None of these three exists without the others.
All of us are attached...
like the world to the universe.
But remember this:
The most important thing of all...
is to feel compassion for all beings,
to give of oneself,
and above all, to pass on knowledge,
like the Buddha.
[ Whip Cracks ]
[ Chattering in Tibetan ]
Jesse! Jesse!
- You all right? - Uh, yes,
thank you.
A little overcome, that's all.
- [ Sighs ] - It's been a kind of emotional time for all of us.
I'm afraid... I'm not a very good example...
of Buddhist detachment.
Children. We are all children.
Um...
the bowl is for Jesse.
And, uh,
this is for you.
My work is done.
Now I can rest.
I can go back to... Tibet,
to the place I was born.
[ Chuckling ]
You still don't believe in reincarnation,
do you? [ Chuckling ]
[ Continues Chuckling ]
[ Coughs, Gasps ]
[ Pants ]
[ Exhales ]
[ Bell Chimes ]
[ Monks Chanting in Tibetan ]
[ Chanting Continues ]
- [ Speaking Tibetan ] - [ Chanting Continues ]
[ Bells Chime ]
Yesterday, he talked about going back to Tibet.
He must have meant something different.
Someone like Lama Norbu can remain like this...
for ten days...
or even more.
He can sit like a mountain, serene and unmovable.
And he can meditate deep and vast as ocean.
And then, smoothly,
while doing meditation, he can enter into the state of death...
with his own will.
- He's dying. - We're all dying every minute.
Death is a big part of life.
Every breath that we breathe... we die.
What about his passion for life?
What about the people he's leaving behind?
He will come back.
I don't know if I believe it, but I'd like to.
[ Drumming, Chanting ]
[ Drumming, Chanting Continue ]
[ Ceremonial ]
[ Speaking Tibetan ]
- Lama Norbu passed away. - [ All Chanting ]
[ Chanting Continues ]
[ Lama Norbu's Voice ] Raju!
Jesse! Gita!
They are chanting the Heart Sutra.
The beautiful prayer.
Keep it with you in your hearts, always.
[ Chanting ]
Form is empty.
Emptiness is form.
No eye, ear, nose,
tongue,
body, mind.
No color, sound,
smell, taste,
touch, existing thing.
[ Chuckling Quietly ]
Lama Norbu just said:
No eye, no ear, no nose.
No Jesse, no Lama!
No you!
No death and no fear!
[ Lama Norbu ] No old age in death.
No end to old age in death.
No suffering.
No "cause of"...
or "end to"... suffering.
No path.
No wisdom.
And no gain.
No gain.
Thus bodhisattvas lived...
in perfect understanding with no hindrance of mind.
No hindrance,
therefore, no fear.
Far beyond deluded thoughts.
This is Nirvana.
- I can't get it open. - I'll show you.
This is Lama Norbu's kata.
This is Lama Norbu.
[ Dean ] Come on, buddy! Give me a hand here.
Come on, Lisa. Everybody goes!
Okay, I'm coming!
I only wish we had a crane to get me on board.
[ Chanting ]
[ Chanting Continues ]
I can hear him kicking!
Or her.
Hey, Jesse. Is it time?
Yes. I think it's time.