“The golden sun rises above,
The silver-conch moon waxes from the side,
When sun and moon come together,
The murky fog of the four continents is cleared afar.
Recently, the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa, and the Jamgon Dorje Chang,12th Khenting Tai Situ Rinpoche, were reunited. During this joyous reunion, they took a photograph together with the precious liberation-on- seeing (thong-drol) statue. Also included is an auspicious verse composed spontaneously by the Karmapa upon the completion of the first day’s meeting.”
The above words are my translation of the Tibetan text posted about an hour ago today 26th January [Tara Day] on the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa’s social media pages.
It is was heart-warming and inspiring to see these photos of the meeting of the karmic student-teacher relationship that was predicted by Guru Padmasambhava himself (as revealed by Chogyur Lingpa 150 years ago) that the 17th Karmapa will be “one mind with Tai Situpa”. These are the first photos of them together since the 17th Karmapa left India in 2017 and never returned.
No announcement was made about why the 17th Karmapa is still “in hiding” in terms of in-person teachings and public audiences. Or why he yet again did not attend the Kagyu Monlam in Bodh Gaya. Or why he yet again did not attend the Kagyu Monlam in Bodh Gaya.
Later, photos were posted with the 17th Karmapa, 12th Tai Situpa, 9th Gyalton Rinpoche and Bokar Rinpoche and Karmapa’s sister at the same meeting.
The location and dates were not publicly announced either, but were on 23-24th January in Bangkok. The day after Tai Situpa had attended a small [non-teaching] event in Bali on the 22nd, at which I had the fortune to attend in person. More on that later!
Nonetheless, may many more such meetings occur with his teacher, 12th Tai Situpa. and may followers of the 17th Karmapa also have the merit and karma to meet with them both too!
Karmically meeting the Karmapa’s sister in a central Bangkok restaurant (December 2025)
Also, one of the photos (see above) shows a monk kneeling with the Karmapa’s sister. In December 2025, before I went to Indonesia, I accidentally bumped into the Karmapa’s sister in a restaurant I often go to in central Bangkok. The monk seated in the middle of this photo was also with her at the table but was dressed in layclothes and a cap, which I remember finding rather odd as have seen him before at Kagyu Monlam events in monastic robes. I took the opportunity of this karmic meeting to ask the Karmapa’s sister politely where the Karmapa was and why he was still in hiding and not giving public inperson teachings as he did before. She was humble and sweet and answered that he was not there in Bangkok and that he was giving online teachings. So it did not answer the question. I said to her that online teachings are not the same as in person ones. Then a layman sitting at their table with a laywoman suddenly (and rudely) interrupted our very brief conversation and told me to go away and not talk to her anymore. I asked the man who he was and that if she had an issue with my talking to her, as she was an adult and not a child, she could say that to me herself. The man insisted though telling me he did not like it. The Karmapa’s sister said she would come and chat to me later at my table. That never happened. Perhaps because of the layman’s intimidating and hostile presence. Wisdom arising.
Other photos published on Facebook:
Original Tibetan text
གསེར་གྱི་ཉི་མ་ཀླད་ནས་ཤར། །
དུང་གི་ཟླ་བ་ཐད་ནས་ཚེས། །
ཉི་ཟླ་ལྷན་ཅིག་འཛོམས་པ་ཡིས། །
གླིང་བཞིའི་མུན་པ་མཐའ་ནས་སེལ། །
ཉེ་ཆར་༧དཔལ་༧རྒྱལ་དབང་ཀརྨ་པ་སྐུ་ཕྲེང་བཅུ་བདུན་པ་ཆེན་པོ་མཆོག་དང་། བྱམས་མགོན་རྡོ་རྗེ་འཆང་༧ཀྭན་ཏིང་ཏཱའི་སི་ཏུ་པ་རྣམ་གཉིས་དགྱེས་ཞལ་ལྷན་འཛོམས་བྱུང་སྐབས་བསྒྲོན་པའི་སྐུ་པར་མཐོང་གྲོལ་རིན་པོ་ཆེ་དང་། ཉིན་དང་པོའི་མཇལ་འཕྲད་གྲུབ་མ་ཐག་རྒྱལ་དབང་མཆོག་ནས་ཐོལ་བྱུང་དུ་ལྗགས་རྩོམ་མཛད་པའི་ཤིས་ཚིག་བཅས་བཞུགས་པ་དགེའོ། །
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Thank you for trying to shine a light on this. As I try to understand why “Karmapa is hiding”- I agree with this characterization, because whatever the reason for his absence, hiding is exactly what it feels like to me- I seek out your reporting as it is significantly more transparent than any other I am currently seeing. So, thanks for that and for your excellent attention to the Dharma, wonderful translations, and beautiful pictures.