THE SNOW LION NEWSLETTER

Dalai Lama's Idaho Visit Draws Wealthy Soul-Searchers

Associated Press
Sept 9, 2005
Boise, Idaho
For the Dalai Lama's trip to Sun Valley starting today, singer Willie Nelson is giving a show to benefit the Tibetan spiritual leader. Hootie and the Blowfish play a $1,000-a-plate dinner.

The entire U.S. House of Representatives is invited, Gov. Dirk Kempthorne is in town, and 300 business people, fund managers and celebrities are due at an invitation-only luncheon hosted by the trip's sponsor.

Even by Sun Valley standards the arrival of so many well-known and wealthy at once has even famously discrete locals wondering: Who'll show up?

The Dalai Lama's visit to central Idaho intentionally coincides with the anniversary of Sept. 11 terror attacks. His 2 p.m. speech Sunday, to be televised live on CNN, has also morphed into a message of compassion for thousands of hurricane Katrina victims, a Dalai Lama spokeswoman said.

Some 10,000 people, including many locals from Blaine County, have tickets for Sunday's event on the Wood River High School football field in Hailey. There's also an address to thousands of Idaho children Monday afternoon, as well as Tuesday's private, invitation-only blessing of an 800-pound bronze Tibetan prayer wheel flown in from India, and a meeting Wednesday morning with 100 religious leaders from different faiths.

Kiril Sokoloff, a part-time Sun Valley resident and financial adviser who in 2001 brought the Dalai Lama's sister to Sun Valley to raise money for Tibetan school kids, is spending about $1 million on the event, including hiring security personnel who worked the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics.

"Focusing on just the wealthy and celebrities who seem to orbit the Dalai Lama is a mistake," Sokoloff said.

"Everybody keeps asking, 'Who are the famous figures? Who are the politicians?' But we have 10,000 people at the stadium, and maybe 20 are celebrities," he said. "The Dalai Lama is a man of the people."

Thomas McKissick, a Los Angeles fund manager and Buddhist who's attending Monday's lunch with the Dalai Lama, expects him to encourage business leaders to give more of themselves—at a time when companies across America are already chipping in millions to Gulf Coast hurricane relief.

There are also political overtones to the trip.

U.S. Representative C.L. "Butch" Otter, R-Idaho, has invited Congress, saying in a letter sent to 434 colleagues in the House that the Dalai Lama is known "for his tireless ecumenical efforts to free his people from the tyranny of Chinese communism."

Last Friday, China celebrated the 40th anniversary of the founding of Tibet's regional government with a military parade in front of the Potala Palace, former home of the Dalai Lama.

His first trip to America since 2003 can be seen in this larger context, supporters say: His unabated popularity—not to mention the live CNN coverage—helps draw attention to his campaign to end heavy-handed Chinese rule in Tibet, where the monk hasn't set foot in 46 years.

"Tibet becomes a subtext, no matter what," said Tenzen Tethong, the Dalai Lama's former official representative in America who now works on Buddhist issues in San Francisco.

Story courtesy of World Tibet Network News: www.tibet.org/News/

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