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Pilgrims thronging Bodh Gaya today witnessed their supreme leaders, the Dalai Lama and the 17th Karmapa, kick off the Kalchakra festival and joined a mass initiation ceremony later, but missed a glimpse of the "holy ashes" of the Buddha, which are preserved in Patna Museum.

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The tale of the CIA's involvement in Tibet has all the ingredients of a great thriller, including a grimly ironic outcome for most of the participants. In the early afternoon of April 29, 1950

'The supreme moments of travel are born of beauty and strangeness in equal parts," Robert Byron wrote. In Gyantse, Tibet, he found beauty, strangeness -- and pleasure.

Bihar's decision not to display the Buddha's ashes at their religion's birthplace has disappointed thousands of Buddhist pilgrims.

From above, it looks like waves of saffron around a splash of maroon and yellow. Get closer and you walk into a mini "southeast" Asia where more than 50 stalls are dishing out Thai, Japanese, Korean, Indonesian, Malaysian and Chinese cuisine.

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In 1959, China invaded and occupied the resource-rich Buddhist homeland of Tibet, and they continue to operate a brutal domination of the once peaceful land. In spite of this, Western leaders have refused to cut ties to China, for fear of alienating a huge trading partner.

The Dalai Lama leads Kalachakra prayers during a ceremony to purify the ground where religious festivities will be held in the town of Bodh Gaya, believed to be the place where Buddha attained enlightenment, during the Kalachakra Buddhist festival in the Indian state of Bihar Friday Jan. 10, 2003. (AP Photo/Elizabeth Dalziel)

The three-day preliminary teachings of the Kalachakra puja by His Holiness the Dalai Lama begins tomorrow at one in the afternoon. His Holiness will teach on the 37 Practices of Bodhisattva and Lamp of the Path to Enlightenment.