Tibetan School Annual Day

San Francisco Tibetan Annual School Day
June 8, 2013 Saturday

བྱང་ཀེལ་བོད་ཀྱི་སློབ་གྲྭའི་ཉིན་མོ།

チベット学校の日

Berkeley: 3^rd Tibetan Sunday School Annual Day was observed on the day in full of Tibetan spirit of fun and gaiety. The annual day is observed to give the children an opportunity to perform what they have learnt and to enjoy with their peers and the elders the rich culture of their homeland. The day is celebrated in the month of June because it is the end of the Academic year in the States. Certificate of achievement was given to all the students.  Kalsangla, the MC of the function welcomed the guest and the public and introduced the event briefly.  Mr. Ugyen Tserng, the Principal of the school read the School’s annual report in Tibetan and English.

Berkeley Councilmember Kriss Worthington was the chief guest at the function. He expressed his support to the Tibetan cause. “Tibet faces religious suppression and political persecution. This event is the key for raising awareness of the issues while preserving and promoting Tibetan culture.” He said.

Tibetan School Committee Chairman while giving the vote of thanks quoted the writings of Tibetan Scholar Gedhun Choephel, “It’s good to learn and adapt; but copying everything means being brainless. It’s good to learn and know many languages; but if you forget your mother tongue, it’s shame.” And spoke on the purpose of the Tibetan school as to educate the young Tibetan children to be good responsible citizen of the country, yet at the same time be proud of Tibetan identity and its rich culture.

The young children performed Tibetan dances and songs. The parents of the children also performed good Tibetan dance which was warmly received by the audience. The games such as: musical chair, cake walk, tin hitting, bingo etc. made the scene lively and active. The school presented a little work of exhibition at the corner where the children have written and worked on different projects related to Tibetan language and culture.

It was observed that number of visitors was less compared to the last year. This was attributed to the visit of the Chinese President Xi Jinpིng to the States. Many Tibetans from the region have gone to L.A. to protest the Chinese occupation of Tibet. It was also because of the absence of live Yak and Yak dance this year. Many expressed happiness to see the Tibetan atmosphere and to be among the Tibetans. Elderly Tibetans and foreigners commented satisfaction to see young children singing in Tibetan but some lamented the use of English as first language at a place where 95 % of the audience was Tibetans only. Overall the Tibet School Annual Day went very well. The event was covered by San Francisco Chronicles. It was a great learning experience for all said one of the School Committee members.

སློབ་གྲྭའི་ཕྲུ་གུ་ཚོས་གཞས་སྣ་ཁྲབ་སྟོན་གཟིགས་འབུལ་ཞུས་བཞིན་པ།