Garthar Chöde, 2004

In the night I woke to a noise: rats, a huge number of them, the lawful night-time owners of the monastery after the monks. They rustled behind the walls, gnawed at something in our cell and jumped on me like playful kittens. I had never felt disgust for these animals before. Now I was in real horror. I woke Kirill, hoping for support. Without really waking, he switched on his head torch, muttered, “Let the rats do what they want, as long as they don’t eat our supplies,” switched it off and fell asleep again. In a monastery a rat has as much right to life as a man. I could only be glad that Tibetans have not made rats sacred animals too, or I would have had to feed them and put them to bed in my warm sleeping bag.