At the same time, it unleashed nearly two decades of religious persecution, killing most senior lamas and destroying thousands of temples.

Regarded as a mahasiddha by many senior lamas, he is seen as having embodied the crazy wisdom (Tib.

The senior lamas may have made their peace with the Chinese authorities, but they make no bones, either, about their loyalty to their exiled spiritual leader.

When the senior lama noticed me, he beckoned and motioned for me to lower my head.

However, the Panchen Lama stayed in Tibet, and many of the senior lamas from the Tashilhunpo Monastery therefore stayed as well.

The monastery was an important halting-place for many senior lamas on their treks to and from the 'Vision Lake', Lhamo Lha-so.

As a part of the ritual, fifty senior Lamas conduct a prayer on the banks of the river.

That's the Way It Was' Pinzuo, another senior lama at Tashilhunpo, a warren of mud-brick temples set against a hillside, was even more explicit.

During the 1960s many senior lamas and monastics left Tibet and helped re-establish new monasteries in India, Nepal and Bhutan.

The group met with Dalai Lama, and other senior lamas, as well as numerous government Ministers.