Samye (Tibetan: བསམ་ཡས་, Wylie: bsam yas, Chinese: 桑耶寺) was the first gompa (Buddhist monastery) built in Tibet. It was probably first constructed between 775-9 under the patronage of King Trisong Detsen of Tibet who sought to revitalize Buddhism, which had declined since its introduction by King Songtsen Gampo in the 7th century. The monastery is in Dranang, Lhoka. It was supposedly modeled on the design of Odantapuri in what is now Bihar, India. The 18th century Puning Temple built by the Qianlong Emperor of Qing China in Chengde, Hebei was modeled after Samye. The original buildings have long disappeared. They have been badly damaged several times — by civil war in the 11th century, fires in the mid 17th century and in 1826, an earthquake in 1816, and in the 20th century, particularly during the Cultural Revolution. As late as the late 1980s pigs and other farm animals were allowed to wander through the sacred buildings. Each time it has been rebuilt, and today, largely due to the efforts of Choekyi Gyaltsen, 10th Panchen Lama from 1986 onward, it is again an active monastery and important pilgrimage and tourist destination.
Tongren County (Tibetan: ཐུན་རིན་རྫོང་, Wylie: thung ren rdzong; Chinese: 同仁县; pinyin: Tóngrén Xiàn), known to Tibetans as Rebgong (Tibetan: རེབ་གོང་, རེབ་ཀོང་, or རེབ་སྐོང་) in the historic region of Amdo is the capital and second smallest administrative subdivision by area within Huangnan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Qinghai, China. The county has an area of 3465 square kilometers and a population of ~80,000 (2002), 75% Tibetan. The economy of the county includes agriculture and aluminium mining. The county has a number of Tibetan Buddhist temples and gompas, including the large and significant Rongwo Monastery of the Gelug school. It is known as a center of thangka painting. Rebgong arts were named to the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage Lists in 2009. In October, 2010 there were reports of large demonstrations in Tongren by Tibetan students who reportedly shouted the slogans, “equality of ethnic groups” and “freedom of language."
