Saturday, June 21, 2014

'Eastern Sun' by Drolma Yangdzom

གཞས། ཤར་ཉི་མ།། 

Song: Eastern Sun

གཞས་མ། སྒྲོལ་མ་གཡང་འཛོམས།། 

Singer: Drolma Yangdzom






ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo
ང་རང་ཡར་ཡར་འགྲོ་དུས།
Nga rang yar yar dro dü
ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo

The sun is to the east.
As I go higher and higher,
The sun is to the east.

ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo
ཁ་བ་མར་མར་འབབ་བྱུང།
Kha wa mar mar bab chung
ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo

The sun is to the east.
The snow drifts lower and lower.
The sun is to the east.

ཞབས་བྲོ་གཅིག་གཅིག་རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས།
Shab dro chik chik dok dro nyi nyi
རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས་རྡོག་གསུམ་མེ་ཏོག་ཤར།
Dog dro nyi nyi dog sum me tok shar

Dance step (one and one), dance step (two and two).
Dance step (two and two), dance step (three); flowers bloom.

ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo
ཁ་བ་མར་མར་འབབ་དུས།
Kha wa mar mar bab dü
ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo

The sun is to the east.
As the snow drifts lower and lower,
The sun is to the east.

ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo
ང་རང་སེམས་པ་སྡུག་བྱུང།
Nga rang sem pa duk chung
ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo

The sun is to the east.
My heart is filled with grief.
The sun is to the east.

ཞབས་བྲོ་གཅིག་གཅིག་རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས།
Shab dro chik chik dok dro nyi nyi
རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས་རྡོག་གསུམ་མེ་ཏོག་ཤར།
Dog dro nyi nyi dog sum me tok shar

Dance step (one and one), dance step (two and two).
Dance step (two and two), dance step (three); flowers bloom.

ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo
དྲིན་ཅན་ཕ་མ་དྲན་ནས།
Drin chen pha ma dren ney
ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo

The sun is to the east.
As I miss my kind parents,
The sun is to the east.

ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo
སེམས་པ་གཏིང་ནི་སྡུག་བྱུང།
Sem pa ting ni duk chung
ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo

The sun is to the east,
Deep down, my heart is filled with grief.
The sun is to the east.

ཞབས་བྲོ་གཅིག་གཅིག་རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས།
Shab dro chik chik dok dro nyi nyi
རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས་རྡོག་གསུམ་མེ་ཏོག་ཤར།
Dog dro nyi nyi dog sum me tok shar

Dance step (one and one), dance step (two and two).
Dance step (two and two), dance step (three); flowers bloom.

ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo
དྲིན་ཅན་ཕ་མ་དྲན་ནས།
Drin chen pha ma dren ney
ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo

The sun is to the east.
As I miss my kind parents,
The sun it to the east.

ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo
སེམས་པ་གཏིང་ནི་སྡུག་བྱུང།
Sem pa ting ni duk chung
ཤར་ལ་ཉི་མ་ཡོའོ།
Shar la nyi ma yo

The sun is to the east,
Deep down, my heart is filled with grief.
The sun is to the east.

ཞབས་བྲོ་གཅིག་གཅིག་རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས།
Shab dro chik chik dok dro nyi nyi
རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས་རྡོག་གསུམ་མེ་ཏོག་ཤར།
Dog dro nyi nyi dog sum me tok shar

Dance step (one and one), dance step (two and two).
Dance step (two and two), dance step (three); flowers bloom.

ཞབས་བྲོ་གཅིག་གཅིག་རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས།
Shab dro chik chik dok dro nyi nyi
རྡོག་བྲོ་གཉིས་གཉིས་རྡོག་གསུམ་མེ་ཏོག་ཤར།
Dog dro nyi nyi dog sum me tok shar

Dance step (one and one), dance step (two and two).
Dance step (two and two), dance step (three); flowers bloom.

Note: Here is a really nice example of a སྒོར་གཞས་ (gor shey), literally "The Circle Song", a special kind of traditional song and dance that is performed in a circle--as you can plainly see in the video.  Tibetan folk songs can be particularly challenging to translate, due to being formatted in a way that is conducive for singing, but not necessarily for translating. This song is a good example of that. The main problem I had was with the chorus, which I translated rather literally. The numbers you see are in fact there in the Tibetan lyrics, which is a common feature in Tibetan songs; they just seem to enjoy counting as they sing, and it is hard to accommodate it within English but I also do not want to simply ignore the fact that it is there. There is also the bit about the flowers at the end of the chorus line, which I had a hard time making sense of. Regardless, it literally says that the flowers are "rising", which is the verb ཤར་ (shar), which is also the word for 'east" (see the title of this song, for example). So when Tibetans say that the sun is rising, they are literally saying that it is 'east-ing' (You can probably guess how they say the sun is setting!). Perhaps it is meant as a play on words in this song? Though my translation is perhaps less than satisfactory, I just love the spirit and sound of this song--and the gor shey is a favorite genre of mine, I have been wanting to include one here for a while. So I hope you can enjoy it too!


-Sherab 

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