The Kung Fu Nuns, Fighting for All Sentient Beings
“WHICH WAY TO Seto Gumba?” my taxi driver calls out the window every few minutes. Amid the morning cacophony of honking horns, construction buzz, and the grating of metal shop gates being pushed open for business, we wind our way up the narrow, snaking streets of the outer ring of Kathmandu. Each shopkeeper, pedestrian, and driver questioned responds with the offhand wave of an arm indicating, “Up the road.” So, along with other sputtering, noisy vehicles, we continue up the steep incline.
Finally, we break free of the traffic to complete our ascent to Seto Gumba—the “White Monastery”—which is the locals’ name for the Druk Amitabha Mountain Monastery complex. It sits high above the dusty, congested hustle and bustle of Kathmandu and feels a world away.
The site was acquired in 1989 by His Holiness the Twelfth Gyalwang Drukpa, the dynamic spiritual leader of the Drukpa lineage of Himalayan Buddhism. It is now home to Druk Gawa Khilwa nunnery, a center for spiritual practice and humanitarian causes. Approaching the monastery, I have my first glimpse of the Drukpa nuns and their hands-on stewardship. They’re forming a roadside cleaning detail.
The Drukpa nuns are trailblazers, fearlessly addressing gender equality, the environment, and other issues demanding compassionate social action. In the popular press they’re known as the “Kung Fu Nuns” because
