Tiny Tibetan Community Awaits Arrival of Exiles

Since emigrating to Orange County four months ago, Jampa Kahdup has been both haunted and heartened by the question most frequently asked about his homeland: “Where is Tibet?”

While most seek only the general location of this little-known place, the question is a stark reminder to Kahdup of Tibet’s precarious fate under 40 years of Communist Chinese domination that he fears is wiping out what little remains of the mountainous region’s national identity.

It also goes to the heart of why the 35-year-old herbal doctor was willing to move halfway around the globe from his home in rural Nepal to the strange new world of Anaheim.

Kahdup is among the first of about 1,000 Tibetan exiles set to enter the United States over the next year. More than 100 will settle in Southern California--a move likely to increase Orange County’s sparse and familial Tibetan community many times.

The Tibetans come to the county on a mission to inform people about Tibet’s plight and to keep their native culture alive through discussions and displays long prohibited in their homeland.

“We are all ambassadors,” said Kahdup, who was schooled in herbal medicine and speaks English. “We come to America to bring peace to Tibet.”

Kahdup’s ambassadorship involves presenting Tibet in some unusual places--like the recent time in Orange when he fielded questions from a curious man standing next to him in an unemployment line.

“Most people want to know where I’m from and when I tell them, they don’t know where Tibet is,” he said. “It makes me feel sad. But I also like it because I can tell people about Tibet.”

Kahdup’s move to the United States was made possible by the Tibetan Resettlement Project, a privately funded international organization that identifies potential emigrants and helps secure them jobs and housing in the United States.

Tibetan exiles have traditionally had trouble entering this country because the U.S. government refuses to grant them refugee status, project officials said. But those restrictions were eased under the Immigration Act of 1990, which authorized the one-time settlement of up to 1,000 of the estimated 100,000 exiles who have fled from Tibet into nearby Nepal and India.

Officials plan to resettle a broad cross-section of exiles, from educated professionals, such as Kahdup, to poor refugee-camp inhabitants with more modest backgrounds.

Despite their differences, most share the strikingly similar stories of pain, anger and loss.

Located at the “roof of the world” on a plateau in the Himalayan Mountains, Tibet existed for centuries in isolation from the West as a mainly agrarian land that boasted of its own distinct religion, Tibetan Buddhism.

That calm was shattered in 1950, when Chinese troops invaded Tibet, eventually sparking a war for independence that ended in the late 1960s when the Communist government achieved near complete domination.

Today, some fear that China is damaging the environment and systematically erasing all markers of an independent Tibetan state.

Few Tibetans were spared the ravages of war, not even Kahdup, whose family fled into Nepal in 1959 when he was 2 years old. Many of his relatives who stayed behind died. He was separated from his parents for several years.

“We were totally displaced,” said Orange businessman Gedun Phuntshog, 42, who moved from India to Orange County in the late 1960s after leaving Tibet as a child. “The anger is for what is happening now. China is raping our country.”

Nonetheless, Phuntshog, Kahdup and other Tibetans in the United States said they remain faithful to the nonviolent teachings of their spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, who won the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to end Chinese domination.

“We can’t fight a war for liberation because we don’t have enough people in exile and China is the most populated country,” said Kal Wangden, a Santa Ana businessman and resettlement project organizer. “The only way to get Tibet is through peace. America is the place for peace. We come here because this is the place of freedom and liberty.”

Orange County provides an especially desirable home for some exiles, who are attracted by the area’s strong economy, adherence to the free-enterprise system and fierce disdain for communism.

Most hope to land entry-level jobs in the profession they practiced in Asia and to take college courses, Wangden said.

Kahdup arrived in the United States earlier than most exiles because his sister was already living in Anaheim and offered him a home and help in adjusting to urban life.

As more emigres arrive in the area, project organizers plan to rent homes for groups of them. Because many exiles come from rural villages, life in Orange County should be something of a culture shock. In group homes, “they are able to maintain some of their identity,” Wangden said.

So far, Kahdup’s presentations about Tibet have been reserved for the curious passersby who strike up a conversation with him. Eventually, though, he and other Tibetans plan to speak at community clubs and church groups as well as organize their own cultural events for the public.

“We should introduce ourselves and our culture to America. We need to tell the truth about Tibet . . . and communism,” Kahdup said.

Their task is a difficult one in a country where few have ever met a Tibetan person, let alone studied the area’s history. It’s made more difficult because most map-makers don’t recognize Tibet as an independent state.

Yet key distinctions exist between Chinese and Tibetan culture from different languages and social customs.

While no one is predicting a free and democratic Tibet will blossom anytime soon, Orange County Tibetans said they are encouraged by the fall of communism in Eastern Europe. If that day ever comes, Wangden said the incoming exiles could use the training they’ve received in the United States to rebuild their homeland.

In the meantime, Orange County’s Tibetan community is preparing for the unprecedented arrival of their countrymen and -women.

Of the United States’ 600 Tibetans, about 150 live in California and about 20 of them are in Orange County. No one is sure exactly how many Tibetans will relocate to the county, but officials said it could be more than 50.

Wangden and Phuntshog are pioneers, arriving in Orange County in 1969 along with a handful of other Tibetans who all received student visas with the help of the Reddings, a missionary family in India. For the first two years, members of the group lived together in a house in Orange before entering college and going their separate ways.

Most of Orange County’s Tibetans meet throughout the year to commemorate the Dalai Lama’s birthday and celebrate other holidays with parties filled with Tibetan food and dancing.

“We are very close. There are so few of us, when someone needs help, we can call on each other,” Phuntshog said. “This gives us the opportunity to look after the new ones. We will try to do what we can for them.”

Tibetan Snapshot Population: About 2 million native Tibetans Size: 471,660 square miles (about three times the size of California) Location: South-central Asia, with China to the east and India and Nepal to the south Capital city: Lhasa Land: Known as the “roof of the world” because of its elevation. Home to the world’s highest peak, Mt. Everest (29,028 feet). Most of the region is on a plateau. There is some farmland, but large portions are covered with gravel and rocks. Religion: Home to a distinctive religion, Tibetan Buddhism. Religious leader is the Dalai Lama, who won the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize for his nonviolent efforts to end Communist Chinese domination. History: Chinese troops invaded Tibet in 1950 and during the next 20 years tightened their grip on power. After achieving near total control over Tibet, the Chinese government liberalized its policies in the early 1980s. However, troops returned in the mid-1980s to put down Tibetan riots sparked by the slow pace of reform. Life: Most Tibetans work as farmers. Barley is the chief crop. Barley flour, along with milk and cheese, are key parts of the Tibetan diet. The average home is made of stone or brick with a flat roof. Source: World Book Encyclopedia