Each year the Smithsonian Institute - that marvelous agglomeration of some of the most amazing artifacts produced by the human species (all displayed for free!) - hosts a festival of culture on the Mall in Washington, DC, USA. The Folklife Festival is an annual celebration of ethnicity. In the summer of the year 2000, the culture of Tibet shared the famous lawn of the US Capital with that of El Rio (the culture of the Rio Grande/Rio Bravo basin) and Washington itself. The festival was held on June 23-27 and June 30 to July 4.

'Tibetan Culture Beyond the Land of Snows' was billed as the biggest and most comprehensive presentation of Tibetan culture ever to have taken place outside of Tibet. As well as top flight artists and artisans, the festival featured monks and nuns from the great centers of buddhist teaching (rebuilt in exile), high lamas from around the world, and a public address by His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama of Tibet.

On Saturday, July 1, a rally and march was organized to protest the half century of military occupation of Tibet by the People's Republic of China. Specific issues such as the abduction and imprisonment of the 11-year-old Panchen Lama (kidnapped at the age of five!) and the proposed funding by the World Bank of the resettlement of 50,000 Han immigrants¹ on Tibetan soil were key points of focus. The rally took place in LaFayette Park, which is on the opposite side of Pennsylvania Avenue from the Whitehouse. The many speakers included leaders of Tibetan organizations, civil rights activists, artists, and Richard Gere. The tireless and indomitable monk, the Venerable Palden Gyatso, imprisoned and tortured for 33 years, and the fearless Ani Pachen Dolma, the warrior nun, imprisoned for 21 years, took the stage to thunderous applause.

A crowd of about 4,000 found shelter under the many large trees of the park from the heat of a summer's day. Many were wearing chubas, the traditional dress of Tibet. Placards and the flags of Tibet and occupied East Turkestan added to the colorful spectacle and made life difficult for photographers.

The march wound back and forth between massive office blocks, past the World Bank building, to the Chinese embassy. The crowd, which was packed so tightly at the beginning that it was hard to shuffle without stepping on someone's heels, began to stretch as the march proceeded up one street and down the next, until those walking in the middle lost sight of those at the head and those bringing up the rear. Chants of 'Free the Panchen Lama now!', 'Tibet is for the Tibetans!', and 'Shame on China!' were loud, continuous, and unrelenting.

At the Chinese embassy the crowd pressed into a tight knot, venting its anger, its frustration, and its pain at a tall brick building that gave no sign of human occupancy. The police, obsessed with re-opening the road way to vehicular traffic, rode back and forth on motorcycles shouting at people to clear the road, get off the road! While, on the other side of the crowd, a gang of thick-necked goons wielding two inch diameter riot batons yelled at the same people to get off the sidewalk... move back now! To avoid the ugly spectacle of babys in stollers being clubbed and pepper-sprayed, the organizers and their volunteers acted quickly to turn the peaceful march to the Chinese embassy into an equally peaceful march along crowded sidewalks to Dupont Circle, where the Tibetan national anthem was sung to mark the official end of an event which the mainstream media completely failed to acknowledge as a peaceful statement by a significantly large number of compassionate, intelligent people about an outrageous injustice that the world has ignored for far too long... which itself should beg the question, 'Why'.

Credit should be given to the representatives of Students for a Free Tibet, who hosted the rally, bringing so many people together in an atmosphere of friendship and mutual support. Their energy and commitment are an inspiration to the rest of us.Thanks!