Between Monks and Monkeys

The city of Dharamshala in Himal Pradesh, has been the adoptive home of the Dalai Lama since 1959 when he went into exile from Tibet. The Tibetan community is established some 10km from the city in upper Dharamshala, or McLeod Ganj and it was to here that Gil Winter came for three months to teach English to Tibetan refugees.

In this book she explains her preparation, part of her travel to and from India, and generally the happenings of her time in McLeod Ganj. There are short chapters covering each topic - such things as the charity school where she worked, festivals, the Dalai Lama, the Western Buddhists who frequent the town, the local monkeys, her fellow teachers, and her students etc.

This short book is is a fairly simple presentation, and gives a realistic portrayal of teaching English in a foreign country, some of the pitfalls, the ups and downs. The uncertainties and the rewards; friendships and satisfactions. There are amusements, and nothing beyond the vanilla in this honest summary of three months. A good read for anyone heading off to do something similar. There are also four pages of photos in the middle of the book to illustrate some of the narrative.

Most of all, however, it was nice to read a self published book completely free from the plague of typos and grammatical errors - but we should expect no less from an English teacher, I would hope.

3 stars