Buddhist pilgrims fall in love with India

By Desaraju Surya
Vijayawada: The Vijayawada railway station and its vicinity are reverberating with chants of ‘Buddham Sharanam Gachchami’ as thousands of Buddhists from different parts of the world are descending on the city en route to Amaravati in Guntur district for the Kalachakra conclave. Repin Vasiliy, a nuclear engineer with the Russian Institute of Atomic Energy Project, arrived in Vijayawada with his wife V Koval to go to Amaravati. "This is our first visit to India and we are delighted about it," Vasiliy said. Vasiliy, who has been practising Buddhism for 15 years now, is quite ecstatic to be a part of such a mega event where fellow Buddhists from all over the world are meeting. "The Dalai Lama is the biggest inspiration for us. We have visited Bodhgaya and Dharamshala and from here we plan to go to Kerala where Koval will join a Bharatanatyam course under Shamala Surendran," Vasiliy said. Koval met Shamala during the latter’s trip to Russia in September last and decided to learn classical Indian dance. The Vijayawada railway station has been receiving at least 1,000 Buddhist visitors a day from different countries like Germany, Australia, Israel and the US, besides pilgrims from Thailand, Japan, Laos and Cambodia. Buddhist monks from Tibet are in the majority. For painting contractor Andrew Nicodemus from Colorado, US, Kalachakra in Amaravati is the second such event that he would be attending. Last year, he attended the event in Toronto, Canada along with his group of 10 members from the Mangala Shri Bhuti Institute in the US. "As a Buddhist from the US visiting this great land, where Lord Buddha was born, I too feel that I love Mother India," said Andrew. He said an event like the Kalachakra helps create a dialogue between people of different countries and cultures and promote world peace. It is a great feeling to be a part of an event where one of the peacemakers of the era, the Dalai Lama, is going to be an integral part of the conclave, he said. A group of Tibetan students and some traders who come here every winter to sell woollen garments are helping these visitors by coordinating with the local authorities. . An estimated 20,000 Buddhists are camping here to take part in the Kalachakra, the World Buddhist Convention, and have a glimpse of the Dalai Lama.
The Dalai Lama paid a visit to the Nagarjunasagar, one of the Buddhist sites in India.

(This article was written a couple of years ago when Kalachakra was held in Guntur).