The nunnery as viewed from the fertile Dodé Valley

Negodong nunnery is located in the Lhasa suburb known as Dodé, northeast of Sera (and also of Lhasa). The nunnery is about one kilometer from the main road – that is, from the road that leads from Lhasa to Penpo. It sits on a small rise overlooking the Dodé villagers’ fields of barley. It is about a two hour walk from downtown Lhasa, and slightly less from Sera. Today most people would take the bus from Lhasa to Dodé and walk from there. The nunnery is also located at the base of the mountain below the Khardo Hermitage (Khardo Ritrö).

As is typical of the hermitages (ritrö), the surrounding landscape is imbued with religious significance. For example, the “imposing, dark-colored, solid-rock mountain shaped like a triangle” to the east of the nunnery is believed to be the soul-mountain or lari of the protector deity of the nunnery, Lhamo Nyizhön. It is called Jomo Sisi, and is reckoned as one of the “Three Great Mountains” (Richen Sum) on the outskirts of Lhasa. The peak north of the monastery is called “The Soul-Mountain of Juniper Forests” (Shukpé Nak Lari), because it used to be covered with juniper trees (some juniper trees are still to be found close to the top of the mountain today). Two other nearby peaks1 were sites that local Lhasans would visit (to) make burnt juniper offerings and raise flags (sangsöl dardzuk) on the third day of the Tibetan New Year.

There are two important springs very close to the hermitage: the Ravine Spring (Drokmo Chumik) and the Sound-Catcher (or Ear) Spring (Dradzin Chumik). Each of them is said to have clean, clear water with medicinal properties. The water, it is said, never freezes, but continues to run even during the coldest winter months. The area around the springs is used as a picnic spot by the local laity, who will often take their noontime meal here when they come to the nunnery for worship.

The front façade of the main temple.

According to its self-description, the nunnery contains the following buildings and rooms:

• A two-pillar temple front porch
• A five-pillar temple with a four-pillar assembly room
• A two-pillar scripture chapel (Kangyur lhakhang)
• A four-pillar kitchen (just west of and sharing a wall with the main temple)
• A two-pillar storage room on the other side of the main entrance from the kitchen
• A twenty-two-pillar dormitory with three stories (located behind the main temple)

To this “self-description” we might add that the main temple has a reception room and a protector deity chapel on its second floor. This is also where the present administrator – a senior nun – has her rooms. Some newer buildings have recently gone up just northeast of the main temple. They contain nuns’ living quarters, and at least one of these contains a small improvised chapel that appears to have been added almost as an afterthought to attract the donations of lay visitors.

The nunnery is reckoned as one of the three practice-centers (drupdé) associated with Khardo Hermitage (Khardo Ritrö) (the other two being Khardo Hermitage itself, and Nenang).

Nuns outside the main entrance to the nunnery.

Little is known about the early history of Negodong. Tradition has it that it was originally used as a retreat site by the great scholar of the Jé College’s (Dratsang Jé) Gomdé Regional House (Gomdé Khangtsen), Namkha Gyeltsen (1532-1592).2 It was founded as a formal monastery with seventeen monks.3 We do not know precisely when the site came under the aegis of the Khardo Lama’s estate (Khardo Labrang), although it obviously must have been sometime after the founding of Khardo in the eighteenth century.4

Initially the nuns in this region lived not at Negodong but in the more remote Nenang (up-valley and east, about a one-hour walk from Negodong). Living so far from the village, the nuns were afraid for their safety, having been attacked, robbed and raped by brigands at least once before.5 They asked to move closer to Khardo, and so the Khardo Lama had the monks residing at Negodong trade places with the nuns. Negodong thus became a nunnery, and the more remote Nenang (the original home of the nuns) became a hermitage for male monks. This occurred sometime around 1930.

According to a former monk of Khardo Hermitage, sometime in the 1930s or early 1940s (we do not know exactly when) there was talk that the nunnery was too close to the village. Around this same time the Tibetan government’s “money printing press” (ngülgyi parkhang), which had been located in Dodé where Negodong now sits, moved, and the large complex of buildings was bought by the Khardo Lama’s estate. The Khardo Lama’s estate then moved the nuns into this much larger facility, and took the site that was originally the nunnery and made it into a large residence that became the headquarters of the Khardo Lama’s estate in the Dodé Valley. After all of the possessions of the Khardo Rinpoché were confiscated by the Tibetan government in the wake of the Radreng (d. 1947) affair,6 the government decided to move the nuns back into the mansion-like residence (which was, in fact, their original residence before they were sent to the printing house buildings). All of the buildings comprising the printing house complex were then destroyed by order of the Tibetan government. This took place sometime around 1949 or 1950.

The nunnery was close to being in complete ruins after the Cultural Revolution. In the 1980s, one of the former nuns of Negodong, Püntsok Trinlé (twentieth century), went on a begging tour throughout different regions of Tibet to raise money to rebuild the nunnery.

Before 1959, the principal deity inside the main (three-story) temple was a statue of Lokeśvara made of sandalwood with a figure of Padmasambhava (Pema Jungné) on its crown. It is said to have been donated to the monastery by the Seventh Dalai Lama Kelzang Gyatso (Dalai Lama Kutreng Dünpa Kelzang Gyatso). The protector deity of the nunnery is Lhamo Nyima Zhönnu. All of the statues inside the temple today appear to be new.

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