Venerable Thamthog Rimpoche, currently Abbot of the Namgyal Tantric Monastery of H.H. the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala, India and Gerry, at a friend’s home in CT, 1995.
Rimpoche, then Spiritual Director of the Center for Buddhist Tibetan Studies in Milan, and Gerry had become great friends through Gerry’s wife Franca, one of Rimpoche’s students. Franca: “Rimpoche had come to spend a month with us in Connecticut, in the Summer of 1995. During his visit, I was scheduled to travel to Switzerland. In the two weeks that I was gone, Rimpoche and Gerry became very good friends, having great conversations on many subjects.”
At Rimpoche’s request, in October 1995, Gerry performed with the Italian singer Ornella Vanoni and the Sera-Je Tibetan Monks, at the Teatro Nazionale in Milan, in a concert to benefit the Sera-Je Buddhist Monastery & University in India. It was the first time a musician, composer and arranger had ever performed with the monks. Gerry’s improvisation to their traditional Tibetan music and chanting was amazing, and the concert was a great success.
Franca Mulligan: “This photograph reminds me of the great friendship Rimpoche and Gerry had and how lucky I am to have known them both.”
