Ein Leben für die Kinder Tibets

Tendol Gyalzur is still a child when she has to flee Tibet alone in 1959. On the difficult journey over the Himalayan passes, she loses her parents and her brother. Years later, the Dalai Lama personally takes care of the orphan girl and sends her to Germany, where she grows up in Wahlwies in a Pestalozzi village with eleven other Tibetan orphans. After Tendol meets her future husband, Lobsang Tsultim Gyalzur, she moves to Switzerland. The two marry and become parents to two boys. When the sons are fourteen and sixteen years old, Tendol returns to Lhasa for the first time. Alone. She stands in front of the Potala Palace and realizes that at this holy place, children are living on the streets and starving. Children like she once was. Tendol cannot help it; she stays. With her modest savings, she opens the first orphanage in Tibet. Today, Tendol and Lobsang are surrogate parents to over three hundred Tibetan and Chinese children. Their sons, who initially found Tendol's decision to stay in Tibet hard to understand, now support her with all their strength. The older son, Songtsen, now lives in the Tibetan highlands and has opened the first craft beer brewery in Tibet, which serves as a training and work place for former orphans. The younger son, Ghaden, lives in Switzerland and promotes the project from there. What both sons particularly appreciate about their mother is her selfless commitment to the welfare of needy children.