Catching a Moment - On Witnessing a Tibetan Sky Burial

kelleyfoyt — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 13:52:14 GMT

I strained my ears to hear, but I wasn't convinced I wanted to listen. The air was quiet, so I watched. There was a lump in my stomach and I hadn't worked out how I felt. My gaze was fixed ahead of me where a dozen or so people surrounded a horizontal shape meticulously wrapped in cloth. Without being told, I knew it was his body. To my right, the vultures peered on even more intently than I.

To Tibetans, sky burials are as normal as a funeral is to me. Buddhists believe in rebirth, so preserving the body is unneeded. After a death, the soul is ceremoniously detached from the body. The next day, the body is carried to a mountaintop where it is cut in precise locations and left exposed to the harsh elements of the Himalayas, the vultures being the first.

The day of the sky burial, I woke before the sun and it had just begun to warm my back as I reached the mountaintop. The vultures were waiting, and they sat much closer than I preferred.

I watched the man's family arrive and I wondered how they were remembering him. As I tried my best to be respectful, I realized I wasn't entirely sure how to do so. When the monk leading the ceremony arrived, I immediately sensed something was off.

My guide spoke to him in Tibetan and I tried to listen even though I knew I couldn't understand. My group was motioned away from the main area. I wanted to feel betrayed for not being allowed to watch as closely, but I couldn't. I had never wanted to intrude.

From there, the scene was still visible but I was decidedly removed from the Tibetans. My mind raced. I tried to meditate as I had been taught in the weeks prior, but couldn't seem to remember how. I could hear them sharpening knives and the noise enveloped me. I couldn't stop trying to decipher my surroundings, all the while straining my eyes and ears and simultaneously trying to relax and take in the experience. I watched the monks and I watched the vultures, but perhaps most intently, I watched his body. Time passed in a way with which I was unfamiliar and minutes, or maybe an hour, passed. I focused on the sound of the knives and tried my best to be still.

The monk motioned to us. He spoke quickly in Tibetan and my heart raced. For a moment I had a glimmer of hope that we were, after all, going to be allowed a glimpse of this private and treasured piece of culture. And then my guide turned to us and said two definitive words: "Let's go."

We walked back to the monastery in silence, alone in our thoughts.

Travel Journalism

Catching a Moment - On Witnessing a Tibetan Sky Burial