Adelaide, Australia, 21 June 2013 - As the Winter Solstice dawned over Adelaide today, the sky was dark with benign rain. His Holiness the Dalai Lama was received on arrival at Adelaide Town Hall by Senator Sarah Hanson-Young and Bob Brown, who escorted him to a private meeting the focus of which was a ‘Discussion on Compassion.’ He responded to this welcome:

Melbourne, Australia, 19 June 2013 - This morning His Holiness the Dalai Lama drove about 12 kilometres out of Melbourne to the Quang Minh Temple, a centre for the Vietnamese Buddhist community, overlooking the Maribyrnong River. He was invited by Geshe Sonam Thargye, Director of the Drol Kar Buddhist Centre, to give an explanation of the ‘Heart Sutra’ and ‘Eight Verses for Training the Mind.’ Well-wishers, among them Tibetans, Vietnamese, Chinese and Australians, crowded the temple’s halls to greet him and listen to him speak.

Sydney, Australia, 17 June 2013 - A quick drive around the block took His Holiness the Dalai Lama from his hotel to the Sydney Town Hall this morning to attend a session of Young Minds, an exciting forum exploring issues facing youth today. The forum’s slogan, emblazoned on bright red and white banners throughout the venue read: warm heart, cool head, bright future. The theme of this morning’s discussion, before a capacity audience of more than 1200, was ‘How do we grow a good person?'

Sydney, Australia, 15 June 2013 - His Holiness the Dalai Lama resumed his seat in the Sydney Entertainment Centre punctually at 9.30 this morning. In the centre of the backdrop to the stage is a large screen onto which images of different historic Buddha statues have been projected.

Sydney, Australia, 13 June 2013 - His Holiness the Dalai Lama left Auckland in the quiet before dawn today, but it was a beautiful morning when he landed in Sydney at the beginning of an eleven day visit to Australia. A sea of smiling faces awaited him as he emerged from the airport to drive to the University of Sydney. 

Dunedin, New Zealand, 11 June 2013 - There was a brisk chill in the air today when more than 30 local church leaders and representatives of various religions and faith communities belonging to the Dunedin Interfaith Council gathered on the steps of St. Paul's Cathedral to welcome His Holiness the Dalai Lama to Dunedin.

Dhramsala, India -- Buddhist women are celebrating a landmark victory: For the first time in the history of Tibetan Buddhism, 27 nuns have gathered in North India at Jamyang Choling Nunnery near Dharamsala and have begun their exams for the Tibetan equivalent of a Ph.D., the so-called Geshe-title. 

Kanderai, Pakistan -- Neglected by the government, Kanderai, the remains of one of the largest and most fascinating Buddhist settlements, will soon crumble to dust.

31 May 2013 -- In the spring of 1963, a French geologist set out from Kabul to carry out a survey in Logar province in eastern Afghanistan. His destination was the large outcrop of copper-bearing strata in the mountains above the village of Mes Aynak. But in the course of boring for samples, the geologist stumbled on something much more exciting: an entire buried Buddhist city dating from the early centuries AD. The site was clearly very large – he estimated that it covered six sq km – and, although long forgotten, he correctly guessed that it must once have been a huge and wealthy terminus on the Silk Road.