Despite living in isolation, these monks know how to fend for themselves

Removed they may be from the worldly prejudices, but not from worldly affairs. The monks are aware of everything from the latest technology in computer to US strikes over Iraq.

quot;Our interest may lie in the other8217; world and attaining nirvana but while we are in this world, we have to keep abreast with all happenings taking place in our surroundings, says a monk, Yenzin Atisha.

Though training in monastic life may start at a very young age for the monks they are initiated in the spiritual world only after completing basic education.

But youth shows its vibrant strands everywhere whether it is a city or amonastery. Jeeps and bikes racing through the fields of the 4,500 acres Loseling and Gaman Monastery with smiling monks enjoying the beats of the latest Bollywood number shows that youth would take some time to mature.

A senior abbot smilingly observes that quot;all of us have passed through this stage and it takes time for the monks and the nuns to fall into the monastic discipline but once they perfect it, they never look backquot;.

quot;Children who want to be initiated into the monastic order have to at least complete their matriculation so that the lack of basic education does not come as an impeding factor, says Jigme Thimly, secretary of the Loseling monastery.

quot;If they wish to obtain further formal education, there is no pressure on them but for monastic life they have to have a thorough and in-depth understanding of the religious scriptures, says Thimly.

Prayers and meditation are an integral part of a monk8217;s life and at least two hours in the morning and two in the evening are to be spent in doing thesame.

quot;The day starts early for us and after prayers and a quick breakfast, we have to concentrate on understanding the message of god contained in theological and philosophical texts written by saints and philosophers, says a monk.

But merely mugging up the teachings does not help ideas have to be intensely debated after the teaching periods which may sometimes stretch into the dead of the night.

A unique feature of the debate is that all prompting during the debate is done by clapping as the monks are too polite to cut each other by word of mouth.

quot;Keeping an open mind is the basic tenet of all monastic discipline so that there is no room for prejudice. Debating helps us formulate our own convictions, says Loping Tisha, another monk.

But life for the monks is not all about poring over scriptures in the cloister. Though monks in earlier times were required only to study and meditate, pressures of modern living require them to expand their ambit.

They have learnt to be self-reliant in the absenceof donations and do everything from working in the fields to building the complexes in which they stay, says Thimling. And all monks, by rotation, help out in tilling the fields, tendering the fruit orchards and also work in the kitchen.

The picturesque Loseling Monastery with its brightly painted walls, Tankha paintings and carved doors hardly betrays the fact that the monastery is not designed by professional architects.

quot;With the help of local masons, the monks built the monastery purely based on what they had seen of other monasteries, says Dr Rinpoche Lama, head of the Karuna Foundation, a non-sectarian Buddhist organisation which provides donations to them.

But in the fixed curriculum of theological debates, religious understanding and toiling in the fields, do they miss the cosy atmosphere of their families?

Though most monks instantly say no, the long queue at the lone STD/PCO booth in the monastery premises tells it all.

Some eight kilometres from the monastery is the Chainchuk Nunnery 8211; aremote island in the settlement mostly inhabited by men. In their maroon robes and tonsured head, they like the monks, are trying to understand the cosmic truth, with stricter restrictions.

The rules of gender are hardly better for them as they can venture out only in a limited way and do not have many options. quot;Though we get enough to eat, I will like it if we can get an extra helping at the dining table, says a 15-year-old nun betraying the comparatively stricter life at the nunnery.

Breaking from the daily routine of studying theology and understanding the principles of the middle-path8217;, the nuns are given a weekly off on Mondays but their constant confinement to the nunnery seems to have built an aversion to the outside world.

quot;Only on Mondays can we step out of the nunnery and at the most we go to the fruit and vegetable hawkers in the premises of the settlement to make some purchases. But we do not like the practice as we are not used to it and prefer sitting in the nunnery and talking to ourfriends, says Dosang, who hails from Lahaul and Spiti.

The nuns, by rotation, help out in the nunnery kitchen thereby contributing in their own small way to their immediate community. But they are apparently best at carrying out the duties of monastics.