When Patsy met the Dalai Lama: Joanna Lumley’s Road to Enlightenment

By Kate Saunders

It is a hot and dusty afternoon, and tempers are frayed at the Foreigners Booking Office in New Delhi railway station. My travelling companion, British actress Joanna Lumley, and I have left our passports in the hotel – a bone-jolting hour’s auto-rickshaw ride away – and are told that it is impossible to buy tickets for our train as a result. The bespectacled booking clerk, sitting amidst teetering stacks of brown files under a whirring fan covered in grime, is unmoved until Joanna takes off her sunglasses, fixes him with a cool gaze, and breathes, ‘Sir, we are so terribly sorry – is there ANYTHING you can do?’ The apology is conveyed in a tone of such rapturous intimacy that the clerk is immediately spell-bound. He foregoes bureaucratic procedure to sign a chit to the effect that ‘Ms Lumley will be carrying her passport with her on the train’ and issues our tickets.

For Joanna Lumley, former model and Britain’s best-loved comedy actress, our train that night through the Punjab and into the foothills of the Himalayas is the beginning of a journey to rediscover her Indian roots – 58-year old Joanna was born in Srinigar, Kashmir. Our trip to Dharamsala in Himachal Pradesh, a small town nestling amid pine forests in the shadow of the snow peaks, is also the fulfilment of a long-held dream for Joanna, because she is meeting the man known as a ‘God King’ and revered by millions all over the world – the Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.

Joanna, who is best-known as the outrageous, champagne-quaffing Patsy in the hit sit-com Absolutely Fabulous as well as numerous film and TV roles in a career that spans more than 30 years, uses the profile gained through her fame and fees from her acting to support more than 40 different charities. But she is particularly passionate about the Tibetan cause. She explains: ‘My grandfather, Captain Leslie Weir, worked for the British government at the time of the Raj in the Kingdom of Sikkim in the Himalayas, and was close personal friends with the last Dalai Lama, the 13th. He spoke Tibetan and studied Buddhism.’ Joanna’s Stockwell home is adorned by water-colour scenes of Tibet, including the Dalai Lama’s former home the Potala Palace, painted by her grandmother, who accompanied her husband on his many trips to Tibet, and were among the first Western visitors to the ‘Forbidden City’ of Lhasa.

Joanna says: ‘When I was growing up, our family home was always full of oriental artefacts from tea-cups to thangkas (Tibetan religious paintings) and Buddhas of every kind. So Buddhism to me is not exotic, but deeply familiar. There was always a sense during my childhood that Tibet was a very special place, and that our family had a very special relationship with the Tibetan people. This is one of the reasons why I have always dreamed of meeting the Dalai Lama – and of presenting him with a very special gift from my family.’

Joanna, whose new autobiography will be published in October, has drawn upon the spiritual teachings of the Dalai Lama to help her find a balance in her life amid conflicting demands from her celebrity, acting roles, charity work and family.

She says: ‘I think the Dalai Lama is a hero simply because he emphasises the most essential teaching of Buddhism, which is to be kind, and that is rather an unfashionable subject for world leaders or other religious figures to talk about these days.’

It is a message that Joanna has clearly taken to heart. Ab Fab’s Patsy doesn’t care about anything – but the actress Joanna Lumley cares about everything, from the plight of pack mules in Egypt and the state of the earth’s environment to the anger of a homeless alcoholic in her local newsagents in south London a few weeks ago (‘I told him, I’ll buy you a packet of fags, but you have to stop being so rude! Of course I didn’t buy him Gitanes, just B & H.’)

As our taxi rattles up the steep dusty roads, lined with eucalyptus and past stalls selling water-melons, brown settees, and Ambassador Whisky, Joanna talks about her childhood in the Far East. Her father, Captain James Lumley, was born in Lahore and served on the North-Western Frontier as a Gurkha officer. Soon after Joanna was born in India, the family moved to Malaya, which was then at the height of a civil war in which communist guerrillas were attempting to drive out the British. She remembers her father disappearing for months into the jungle with his Gurkha troops and returning, much thinner, and with a long beard. Joanna continued her education at a school in Hong Kong before being transferred to a convent school in Sussex together with her sister.

She says: ‘I don’t remember India as I was so small when we left. But generations of my family have served in the Indian Army – my great great grandfather joined the regiment here in 1796. So I have a deep connection to India. Everything seems familiar here; the dogs barking at night, the sound of crickets in the garden, a cold glass of nimbu pani, the temple bells. I used to be so uninterested in my family history. But I think as you get older you begin to care more. These days I find myself looking more and more through my grandparents’ letters and poring over maps, and reading about the period to see how it was and how it would have been.’

Joanna’s interest in her ancestry coincides with a new generation in her family – she has just become a grandmother to baby Alice, the daughter of her photographer son James, who she brought up as a single mother, and his girlfriend Tessa. ‘I babysit whenever I can,’ she says. ‘Being a grand-mum is an immense privilege.’

On our arrival in Dharamsala, base of the Tibetan government in exile and home to approximately 20,000 Tibetan refugees, the Dalai Lama gives permission for us to attend a rare audience with Tibetans who have recently arrived in India. His private secretary, Tenzin Taklha, takes Joanna and I to the Dalai Lama’s private quarters, where about 60 Tibetans are clustered at the spiritual leader’s feet and on the steps leading to his rooms beyond a small sunlit courtyard full of orange and yellow flowers. There are red-cheeked children in torn jeans and tee-shirts, Tibetan grandmothers in dusty chubas, crouched low to the ground and clutching their rosary beads, sturdy nomads with braided hair and turquoise necklaces. Approximately 2-3000 Tibetans make the perilous journey across the Himalayas each year to escape from the repression of Chinese rule in their homeland and to be in the presence of the Dalai Lama, whom they regard as the reincarnation of the Buddha of Compassion.

The Dalai Lama tells the Tibetans to make the most of their opportunity in exile to learn about the Tibetan Buddhist religion they are not allowed to practise freely in their homeland. When he finishes speaking, there is silence, but for the muffled sobs of many of the Tibetans, overwhelmed to be in the presence of the spiritual leader who has become such a potent symbol of Tibetan identity and hope over despair. ‘I hear there is a former political prisoner among you,’ the Dalai Lama says quietly. A slight, slim young girl with long black hair, dressed in shabby trousers and a blue hooded top, stands up, sobbing so hard she can barely speak. ‘You have done something for your people, you have been brave,’ the Dalai Lama tells her. They are words that the young girl, a 29-year old nun called Damchoe, who was sentenced to six years in one of Tibet’s most notorious prisons simply for shouting ‘Long live the Dalai Lama!’ in Tibet, will never forget.

Later Joanna and I visit a transit centre run by the Tibetan government in exile to provide temporary shelter and food for Tibetans who arrive in exile. Joanna is immediately surrounded by small Tibetan children in a cramped, shabby dormitory, where mattresses are laid out on the floor and the sole possessions of the refugees are stored in paper bags and plastic suitcases somehow carried across the most forbidding mountain ranges in the world. Joanna talks to a young Tibetan boy who is curled up in a corner, studying English letters in a tattered notebook. Eighteen-year old Gyaltsen was caught on his first attempt to escape from Tibet and imprisoned. He was beaten and tortured, and forced to carry out hard labour. After he was released, he risked further imprisonment by making the long journey into exile again – determined to join his parents, who had arrived in safety in India.

Despite his bleak surroundings, Gyaltsen looks immaculate in a smart, buttoned-up grey waistcoat and pressed trousers. He tells Joanna: ‘Living in Tibet is like being in a very dark room, with just a glimmering of light that is the possibility of escape to India. I had to walk towards that light.’ Joanna is moved by his maturity and determination to make something of his life. While meeting the Dalai Lama is a spiritual and personal quest for Joanna, she is beginning to learn about the political realities of life in Tibet.

On the day of our meeting with Tibet’s revered leader in exile, Joanna is nervous. She is wearing a patterned blue silk traditional Tibetan chuba, held together with a safety pin, and with a striped apron meaning she is a married woman. ‘He’s a living God and a Buddha and a political leader. There is no one else of his stature worldwide. I feel very privileged that he’s agreed to meet me, particularly because I’m not a Tibetan, nor a Buddhist, nor an exile.’ She adds: ‘I’ve brought him some socks, for his visit to Britain at the end of May. He’ll be teaching in Scotland and I thought they would be protection against the midges – they are burgundy, which is a respectful colour for a monk, isn’t it?’

But Joanna has another more significant gift when we are ushered into a simple reception room adorned with religious paintings and a gold Buddha at a shrine, and into the presence of the Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, whose name means ‘Ocean of Wisdom’ in Mongolian. The Dalai Lama gestures for us to sit on a comfy settee, and Joanna places a package wrapped in maroon patterned cloth on the table before him. She explains: ‘Your Holiness, this is a gift given to my grandfather by the 13th Dalai Lama, your last incarnation. The present was given to thank my grandfather for his advice on how to help Tibet defend itself against China. My grandfather would have been so so sad about the Chinese invasion of Tibet in 1949 – and so angry that the British didn’t speak out against it, despite the close relationship between the two countries.’

The Dalai Lama carefully unwraps the gift, a set of handwritten scriptures on fragile parchment encased by two wood-blocks. He calls for one of the monks, and says something in Tibetan. The monk soon returns with another set of scriptures, which the Dalai Lama presents to Joanna. ‘I will accept your gift,’ he tells her. ‘But in return, I want to give you a present. These are ancient texts on Buddhism that I would like to present to you in honour of your forefathers and your parents.’ He sits back and laughs, a deep, familiar laugh, bubbling with joy. Joanna clasps her hands in delight, and tells him: ‘My mother will be over-joyed. It was so important to her that I gave this gift. It is like closing a circle. I’ll always remember this moment.’

The Dalai Lama may be regarded by millions as a divine being, but he is no ethereal figure. He has the energy and build of a man much younger than his 68 years. As he and Joanna talk, about Joanna’s family, the Dalai Lama’s hopes for the future, politics and religion, they laugh uproariously. When he takes her hand to lead her across the room for a photograph, his grip is surprisingly strong. When we leave, he clasps his hands together in the tradition Tibetan greeting before presenting Joanna with a white silk Tibetan scarf, a gesture of respect. ‘See you again,’ he says seriously.

As Joanna stands quietly in the courtyard to collect her thoughts, the next VIP guest arrives – a tiny, white-haired English woman clutching a vase of yellow flowers, which she gives to the Dalai Lama, telling him that she picked them this morning. He engulfs her in a bear hug. Later, we see the old lady, who wears a Tibetan chuba, slowly making her way up the steep path home, past the jewellery stands run by exiled Tibetan nomads and the Indian shops selling spices and SevenUp.

Over dahl and rice in a simple local restaurant, Joanna says: ‘This was a momentous meeting for me. I never dreamed that it would happen. The Dalai Lama has such a weight of responsibility, such dignity, and yet such lightness and such joy. In the face of this, everything about my life in London seems unreal. I would give up my job if I could to do something for Tibet, for the sake of my grand-father’s love of the country. This is what is real. Acting has always been something I do; it’s not what I am. So much of celebrity is about illusion.

‘You know, you think that when you get older you will have your life sorted out, but that’s not been my experience. You have commitments – I have Stevie (her husband, Stephen Barlow, the orchestral conductor and composer), who I love more than life itself, my mother Beatrice, who is in her eighties, my son, my grand-daughter. I’m lucky enough to have earned enough money not to be under financial pressure, and I turn down most roles I am offered – sometimes I don’t even read the scripts. But there never seems to be enough time to think, to pause, to stand still, because of the life we get caught up in. Being here, and meeting His Holiness, puts life in perspective.’

Joanna and I decide to find Damchoe, the young nun singled out by the Dalai Lama for her courage. A Tibetan friend takes us to the small Tibetan-run Gu Chu Sum organisation that provides welfare for former political prisoners, where she is staying. We sit in the sunshine with cups of tea and Damchoe joins us. She tells us that she was imprisoned when she was in her early twenties for peaceful political protest. At Drapchi prison in Lhasa, as punishment for refusing to sing Chinese national songs, she and other nuns were forced to stand underneath the burning summer sun all day, for days. She tells us: ‘We all became very weak but the guards would kick us if we fell to the ground. I suffered from terrible headaches; it was like someone pushing needles into my head. After one day of standing motionless I had a high fever and fell to the ground unconscious. Later I was taken to be interrogated and tortured with electric batons. A light sparked from the baton and it felt as if all my inner organs, my heart, lungs and liver, were being chopped up.’ Because she refused to agree that Tibet would never be free, Damchoe was put in a solitary confinement cell for several months. She was given one meal of rice with half-cooked vegetables per day, and no water. The cell was pitch-black, and she was not allowed any visitors. ‘My family thought that I had died and they performed the appropriate rituals like the offering of butter-lamps for me,’ Damchoe tells Joanna.

Joanna asks her, ‘In prison, did any of the guards, ever, show you any kindness or sympathy?’ The young nun, who has only just arrived in exile after leaving her family in Tibet, is shy, overwhelmed with sadness, and can scarcely meet Joanna’s eyes as she suddenly realises the truth of what she is about to say. ‘No,’ she tells Joanna. ‘Never.’ When Joanna suddenly and impulsively clutches both her hands in hers, Damchoe looks up at her and beams, with a sudden flicker of joy at such spontaneous and unaccustomed human warmth.

I tell Damchoe that Joanna is a well-known actress in the UK and that she has devoted a lot of her time to the Tibetan cause. Joanna’s eyes are full of tears. ‘But compared to this woman,’ she says quietly, ‘I am nothing.’ Damchoe disagrees. Through our translator, she says: ‘Please tell her that even though she has everything and is happy in her life, she has travelled a long way to listen to our stories and to share her own. That is really something.’