a BOARDING PASS NAME:
Alec Terrana CLASS :
’10
DESTINATION:
India, Bhutan, Tibet, & China Terrana (at right) with a snake charmer in Rishikesh, India
The official state oracle of Tibet was a man of great importance, able to channel the spirit of a Buddhist deity as he advised secular leaders on their affairs. Yet, Alec Terrana ’10 couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. Tiny and thin, the oracle could barely stand under the weight of what seemed like 100 pounds of ceremonial armor. Assistants had to support him just so he could enter the room. Then, without warning, the oracle jumped up from his throne. Flashing a sword in the air, he danced through the temple, lithe as a ballerina. Terrana could hardly believe his eyes. “I’d never really taken myself as much of a believer in that type of thing—of the possibility of spirits entering a body,” Terrana said. “But sitting there it was very hard not to believe. He would have people throw pieces of paper at him with questions on them. They would just hit his helmet, and he would answer the questions without having to read them.
When Terrana started college he was an economics major, interning at venture capital firms and hedge funds. He’s now a religious studies major, with plans on returning to Indian monasteries this summer to study the relationship between meditation and the senses. And to think, a year ago Terrana was “just kind of Googling around” for something to do last summer when he came across Emory University’s student exchange program with Dharamsala’s monastery.
“There were a lot of things going on there that have really defied any rational explanation I’ve tried to come up with.”
The program intrigued him, partly because he’d been dabbling in meditation on his own, but also because he wanted to give India a second try. During Terrana’s junior year at BB&N he participated in a program called “School Year Abroad,” which placed him in Mumbai for a semester. But it wasn’t the experience he’d hoped for. “I left the country with kind of a bad taste in my mouth,” he said.
It was the first time during Terrana’s six-month sojourn to Asia that he had to rethink how he saw the world. For sure, it wouldn’t be the last.
From the moment he saw the state oracle—just 48 hours after he arrived in India last summer— he knew this trip would be far different.
Over the span of six months, Terrana, a junior at Pomona College, meditated with Tibetan monks, slept on trains bound for the fabled Silk Road, watched fireworks explode over Hong Kong Harbor on New Year’s Eve, and, oh yes, met the Dalai Lama, who personally laid a scarf around Terrana’s neck.
In China, where Terrana studied in Beijing for four months, he was humbled by a language that was incredibly difficult to learn. In India, he was stunned by shopkeepers who would “just pack up and leave no matter what time it was” if they thought of something better to do.
His adventures in India, Bhutan, Tibet, and China make for some terrific stories. But unlike a typical college semester abroad, Terrana says his experiences have changed his direction in life. The Himalyan villagers Terrana met trekking through the countryside were happy with merely a bowl of rice in their hands. So, when Terrana got home, he got rid of his Xbox and other creature comforts. “I realized they really didn’t do anything for me,” he said. When Terrana lived among monks in Dharamsala, India, the Dalai Lama’s home in exile, he followed much of their way of life, eating a vegetarian diet, avoiding alcohol, and forgoing relationships and even music. Now when he wakes up in his college dorm room, adorned with Buddhist tapestries and prayer flags, he meditates. Once or twice a week, he makes his way to a Chinese monastery near his school for deeper soul searching.
“Their attitude there is very casual and carefree. It was kind of infectious,” he said. Meeting the Dalai Lama face to face, with just 15 fellow students and a number of monks sharing the room, was also pretty cool. The scarf His Holiness placed around Terrana’s neck—“I looked up, and he just had the most incredibly heart-warming smile”—now hangs above his bed, a reminder of just how much he’s learned about himself. And all that is to come. “My experience has given me a better sense of direction, a better sense of who I am as a person,” Terrana said. “I have a better sense of how many more ‘selves’ I have, if that makes sense.” 17