500 Buddhist nuns recently completed a 4,000 km. (2,485 mile) bicycle trek from Kathmandu, Nepal to Leh in northern India to call attention to the human trafficking going on in that remote Himalayan region. Along the route, they met many local people, government officials, and religious leaders, and took the opportunity to spread messages of gender equality, peaceful co-existence and respect for the environment.
The nuns explain the initiative in this way: “When we were doing relief work in Nepal after the earthquakes last year, we heard how girls from poor families were being sold because their parents could not afford to keep them anymore. We wanted to do something to change this attitude that girls are inferior to boys and that it’s okay to sell them. Our bicycle trek shows that women have power and strength like men.”
The nuns, who belong to the Drukpa Order, come from India, Nepal, Bhutan and Tibet. Because of their training in the martial arts, they are popularly known as the Kung Fu nuns.