He has visited 55 countries -- some of them several times. He has just returned from a visit to Sweden and Norway. Soon after his 70th birthday on Wednesday, he will travel to Switzerland and then onto the United States where he will criss-cross the country for about two months.
India is home not only to the Dalai Lama, but also to about 100,000 Tibetan refugees who live in 35 settlements and numerous smaller communities striving to keep their cultural identity alive while adapting to a foreign land.
Many of them may still dream of a free Tibet in variance with the Dalai Lama's current vision, but they all agree that it is their leader's charismatic personality that has kept the issue of Tibet alive in the international arena.
A columnist for Time magazine wrote, in response to a rhetorical question on what made the simple Buddhist monk heading an unrecognized government-in-exile of an unrecognized nation of 6 million Tibetans so interesting: "Perhaps because he is also a diplomat, a Nobel laureate, an apostle of nonviolence, an advocate of universal responsibility and a living icon of what he calls `our common religion of kindness.'"
As their leader turns 70, Tibetans may pause to think, what comes after? In a recent interview with the Hindustan Times newspaper, the Dalai Lama said, "If we cease to be a refugee community and can live in democratic Tibet, then I don't think there should be a successor to me after I die."
But, he added, "If I was to die in the next few months or before we are able to return to Tibet, there will be a new Dalai Lama."
He does not know yet where the next leader will be found. But when the time comes for him to die, he will know, he said.
Until then, the smiling monk will continue to inspire through his teachings and will not let the world forget the plight of the Tibetans.
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