The monks set up a space to create the Mandala in the Northborough Senior Center.

Photo Credit: Bret Matthew

The monks began with a prayer ceremony.

Photo Credit: Bret Matthew

It takes a monk six years to learn how to recreate mandalas from memory.

Photo Credit: Bret Matthew

The process requires intense concentration.

Photo Credit: Bret Matthew

The monks brought with them musical bowls and other wares to sell.

Photo Credit: Bret Matthew

    • NORTHBOROUGH, Mass. — A group of traveling Tibetan Buddhist monks visited the Northborough Senior Center on Wednesday morning, bringing with them both a message of peace and a plea for aid.

    The seven monks, who hail from Jhamtse, South India, are on a year-long tour of the United States. So far, they have visited 25 states. In each place they stop, the monks create—and later disassemble—a mandala. Created from sand arranged into intricate patterns, these ritual diagrams have a strong spiritual significance and are often used as meditation aids.

    After arranging their workspace, the monks' leader, Geshe Lonsang Tenzin, explained to  those watching that they would be creating a "mandala of compassion," one of the many types that exist. Through a prayer for peace, he said, they would remove negative karma in the area.

    The monks' prayer consisted of a series of chants and music they played from traditional instruments. Then, they proceeded to carefully being laying sand on the tablet where the mandala would sit. Huddled together on all sides, heads nearly touching, they coaxed the sand into intricate patterns.

    Meanwhile, some of the monks manned a table where they accepted donations and displayed different wares for sale. 

    In spreading awareness of their culture, the monks also hope to gain support for their cause of freeing Tibet from Chinese control.

    Jeff Beach, who has been driving the monks round the country since September and has gotten to know them well, explained that their South Indian monastery hosts many Tibetan refugees—they themselves are all second- and third-generation Tibetans. At the monastery, the monks feed and cloth those in need. With only $100, Beach said, the frugal monks can feed all 2,000 people at the monastery for a day.

    A Buddhist himself, Beach has come to befriend the monks during his time with them. "Living in close quarters with them has been an extraordinary experience," he said.

    He explained that the Geshe—which literally means "spiritual friend"—is actually a scholar of Buddhism who was required to study for 20 years to attain his position. And the other monks have put in their fair share of time as well. Mandala creation—which they do from memory—takes six years to learn.

    After finishing the mandala and leaving it for people to come and view it, the monks will return on Friday morning to take it down. This too is part of the ritual, explained the Geshe, for it demonstrates a central Buddhist teaching: the impermanence of life.