Dalai Lama meets Obama For First Time

If I had enough space for such a long title it would read - Dalai Lama meets Obama For First Time ...but then gets put out with the rubbish!

Sensitive (as ever) to some of the demands of Beijing, Obama had a meeting with the Dalai Llama that was just about as unofficial as a Whitehouse meeting with Obama could get. The Oval Office was not used, the poor old gentleman once described as 'an elderly and very political monk in Gucci loafers' was escorted out of a side entrance normally used for rubbish afterwards and Obama went out of the front door on his way to fly in Airforce One.

Well Obama has now ticked the 'all US Presidents must meet the Dalai Lama box and can relax. After all they both hold the Nobel Peace prize, though even Obama it seems does not seem to feel he should have it. He said afterwards that he was surprised and deeply humbled by the award and that he did not feel he deserved to be in the company of some of the "transformative figures" who had won the prize. Presumably this includes the Dalai Lama.

Full marks to Obama however for actually meeting the Tibetan Leader in Exile despite Chinese demands and warnings.

Believe it or not I have shared a lift with the kindly Lhamo Döndrub (birth name) in a New York Hotel. He had been scheduled to give a talk that evening in a New York theatre but a mob of demonstrators outside the theatre had caused enough public safety fears for the event to be cancelled. He stood robed in Orange in one corner of the lift with two rather large and burly 'minder monks' on either side. Despite what had obviously been a horrible evening he positively radiated peace and serenity. When I left the lift he gave me a very slight, knowing smile as the doors closed.

Maybe this is the secret of the Dalai Lamas power. Whoever he meets, wherever they are, for just one tiny moment he makes them feel a little bit special. I wonder what he did to Obama?