The following photoseries is about Thukjay, the nun of Chukchikjall and Thinley, the monk of Gomang, both followers of the Buddhist order of Gelukpa. While sharing the daily life of Buddhist nuns, in the Himalayan in the Indian state of Jammu & Kashmir, the idea to compare the life of a nun and the life of a monk within the same order emerged. Within the comparison between the two followers, my main focus was to investigate the differences in pursuing their paths, considering their status in the order and in the Buddhist community in two completely different regions of India.
Thukjay, the nun, lives in the isolated area of Zanskar with twenty other nuns - a region, which is only accessible in the winter by crossing the frozen river Zanskar. She is responsible for the wellbeing of her own village and her family. As nuns are generally not supported to pursue their religious path, neither by the villagers nor by their families, they have to work in the fields in order to make a living, work that in fact goes against religious rules.
Thinley, the monk has been recruited from his home village in the Himalayan at the age of eleven to join a monastery built in Southern India for refugees that escaped the occupation of Tibet by the Chinese Government in 1959. Along with hundreds of other followers, his religious life is confronted with an emerging modernized environment and lifestyle.
