Kung Fu Nuns – These Nepali women defy tradition

“Eyes on the target!” Concentrate!” JRLham yelled at the vanquished nun, looking her straight in the eye by the whitewashed temples at the Druk Amitabha Monastery on a hill overlooking Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu.

JRLhamo and other members of her religious order are known in Nepal as kung fu nuns, belonging to an 800-year-old Buddhist sect called Drukpa. This word means dragon in Tibetan.

Both in the Himalayan region and around the world, his followers now mix meditation with martial arts.

Every day, the nuns exchange their maroon clothes for a brown uniform to practice kung fu, an ancient Chinese martial art.