Offering light
Tibetan mchod me (chomay): the offering light.
A lamp burned as an offering on Tibetan altars, traditionally with yak butter and now often with vegetable ghee; light is offered above all on Chotrul Duchen.
The three-day Tibetan New Year of purification, renewal, and monastery ceremony, rooted in pre-Buddhist Bon tradition and reshaped over centuries into a central festival of Himalayan Buddhism.
How Losar, the Tibetan New Year, is kept: Gutor cleaning, guthuk soup, altar offerings, prayer flags and Chotrul Duchen, and how customs differ by region.
Gridhrakuta, the Vulture Peak at Rajgir in Bihar, is where the Buddha stayed during rains retreats and where Mahayana tradition sets the Heart and Lotus Sutras.
Tabo in Spiti, founded in 996 CE and called the Ajanta of the Himalayas, and Hemis in Ladakh preserve over a millennium of living Vajrayana Buddhist practice.