Photo of Dechen Pemba taken by Natasha Sturny
Dechen Pemba, born in UK, graduated from University College London with a BA in English and German Language and Literature. After over three years lobbying and campaigning on Tibetan issues at International Campaign for Tibet Germany in Berlin, Dechen moved to Beijing in September 2006 to learn Chinese at the Central University for Nationalities. Dechen travelled to Tibet several times and lived in Beijing until July 2008.
Dechen completed a Masters in Chinese Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, in September 2009. Dechen is the editor of the website High Peaks Pure Earth that monitors Tibetan cyberspace and translates social media and blogs into English.
Dechen has contributed to Global Voices and The Huffington Post and keeps a personal blog at https://dechenpemba.wordpress.com/. Always interested in supporting Tibetan cultural and creative expressions, current projects include Tibetan Writers Group, smartvote Tibet and Tibet Film Festival London.
Dechen's Blog 
Hi Dechen!
Is it possible for you to send me one of this free tibet bags from marc jacobs? pls!! i want this so much but her in switzerland i dont find it.
thanks for your answer
best regards and tashi dhelek!
Yangdon
Hi Yangdon! I would if I could but someone told me that the range is not being sold anymore! It’s a real shame, I wonder if it was just for the summer or something, if I hear that it’s still around I will let you know! Best, Dechen
Hi Dechen,
I am a producer in Los Angeles and am looking at The Tibet Code book series. I wondered whether I could read your masters thesis about the first book. I would also be curious whether you finished reading the series or if you know anyone who has with whom I could speak.
Kindest regards,
Tracey
Hi Tracey,
Thanks for getting in touch. Yes of course you can read the thesis, I’ll email you shortly!
Best, Dechen
Hi Dechen,
Are you the Dechen Pemba who went to Greenfield’s Junior School around 1986? If so, we were friends – I often think of you and it would be great to get in touch.
Best wishes,
Christine
Dear Dechen,
It’s me, Frank Stewart, from Manoa Journal in Honolulu, editor, with Fiona Sze-Lorrain, of SKY LANTERNS: NEW POETRY FROM CHINA, FORMOSA, AND BEYOND, which features your wonderful translation of Woeser’s essay “Sky Burial Master.” This winter, we will publish ON FREEDOM: STATE, ART, AND SPIRIT, featuring your translation of Woeser’s essay “Garpon La’s Offerings.”
I’m writing to thank you for the work you do for Tibetan writers and culture, including your indispensable work as a translator. I want your blog’s readers to know that they can access your translations of Woeser’s essays, in the volumes mentioned above, on-line without cost. They are available through the electronic data bases Project MUSE and JSTOR. Both are subscribed to by many university and municipal libraries and the essays must be accessed through the library servers; unfortunately, not all libraries subscribe to the data bases, but many do, worldwide: http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/manoa/ and http://www.jstor.org/journals/10457909.html
Best regards,
Frank
Frank Stewart, Editor of Manoa: A Pacific Journal of Internationl Writing
Thanks so much Frank!
Dear Dechenla，Tashi Delerk. My name is Ren who is a chinese activist working for the tibetan cause,currently living in london. Woeserla told me about you and and maybe Wen or Tenzin tsundue did in mcleod as well. I was longing to meet you but silly me…I didnt recognize you somehow during this year’s losar event. I should have talked to you a lot ealiear. and I was in Beijing during 2008 as well later on went to Tibet in 2010. Anyway, at moment I am studying animation/moving image here in the UK.so far I have made dozens of short films for Tibet, especially for self-immolation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHafBz_r3GM here is one woeser has posted on her blog. and my blog is :http://ilovetibetan.wordpress.com/ I wuld love to work with activists/artists/film makers here, to try to do more for the tibetan community. if there is anything u need, i wud b very happy to help in any way.
Dear Dechen
I just wanted to say how much I admire the work and effort you put in for non Tibetan speakers to understand the opinions and voices of Tibetans in relation to how their society and livelihoods are affect by China.
My name is Krisha Gandhi, and I am a School of Oriental and African Studies student of Chinese and History studying in Beijing for my year abroad. I am currently researching for the Sinological Project I have been tasked to write during this year and am hoping you may be able to give me some advice.
The area of research I have chosen to focus on is the extent to which it is possible for Tibetans to maintain a sense of social identity when living in other areas of China. I am currently in Beijing and given that I don’t speak Tibetan have found it a little difficult to know where to go for first hand research other than the obvious known tourist spots/restaurants/shops. I do understand the need to be careful, cautious and often discrete when investigating this topic, but would really appreciate it if you had any advice for me, or knew of anyone who would be willing to talk to me.
Thank you ever so much for your time. The work you have done so far really has inspired me to explore the real situation as much as I can at least whilst out here.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Kind regards,
Krisha
我是一名在印的流亡藏人，听说你在做把汉文翻译成英语的工作，我很有兴趣，不知你那里还有没有人员的需要？
扎西得勒!
扎西德勒最近你建康吗？
Dear Madam,
I’d like to enter in contact with you in order to present you a project for teh Tibetan Cause.
Looking forward to Hearing from you soon,
Yours sincerely.
Thank you from the depths of heart for doing such a wonderful job for the cause of Tibet .
Thanks!
Hi Dechen,
My warm winter greeting you. It’s nice and interesting to go through your blog. I’m Dawa Tsering, Tibetan entrepreneur based in NYC. I’m creating a b2b business portal focus on few Tibetan products. Is there any way you can promote my web. With best regards.
hey, just came across your blog. I’ve been writing about Tibet and am new to blogging, wanted to see your take on what I wrote. hope we can get into thoughtful debates
Hi! Thanks for stopping by!
Hi Dechen,
Hope all is well! I’m writing to you on behalf of Eliot Pattison, the author of the internationally acclaimed Inspector Shan series. He had the pleasure of meeting you when you hosted an event for him through ICT in Berlin.
Set in Tibet and China, the Inspector series calls attention to the continuous human rights violations against the Tibetan people and is the only English-language fiction series to be banned by Chinese censorship. Eliot is also the only author in history to receive “The Art of Freedom” award from the Tibet House for his advocacy for Tibetan rights. Eliot’s newest book in the series, Soul of the Fire, deals with self-immolations and was just released in Germany.
We’re trying to get the word out to the Tibetan community in Germany and German media about the book and its important subject matter, and wondered if you had any tips for us. Happy to send a copy of the book for review. For more on Eliot and his advocacy for Tibet, visit http://eliotpattison.com/why_i_wrote_about_tibet.html
With deep appreciation,
Julia Drake
Hi Dechen,
I found your piece on the play ‘Shangri La’ after being advised to check it out by a member of the Tibetan Feminist Collective. I was speaking to her as I’m currently doing research and development for a play in which I’d like to include a Tibetan character.
The play looks at (amongst other things) the white saviour complex, white British ignorance of our colonial history and the treatment of People of Colour in contemporary British society. As a white British woman, it’s obviously impossible for me to write a Tibetan voice (and would totally undermine what I want to do with the piece!) so what I’m trying to do is first of all to speak to as many Tibetan women in the UK as possible to hear about their lived experience of the issues above. Eventually, I would like to use these as a starting point for devising dialogue with a Tibetan actor and director, as well as to develop and write a ‘white saviour’ character.
I appreciate that you must be extremely busy, but if you do have time I would really love to speak to you. I don’t want to bombard you with information about me or the project here, but please feel free to check out this piece I wrote for Contact Magazine by way of introduction:
http://www.contactmagazine.net/dharamasla-life/we-plan-to-return-as-often-as-we-can-this-months-volunteer-story
I’m also very happy to answer any questions you might have about the project, and to share drafts on an ongoing basis. I will obviously credit all contributors too.
If you would like to talk, please do drop me a line on otherlucy@hotmail.com and we can go from there.
Many thanks,
Lucy
Hi Lucy, Thanks for getting in touch! I will drop you an email! Dechen
Hi Dechen;I have seen the film about your work and it was wonderfull
I love knitting with yak and alpaca yarn
I wish you luck and many ideas to make wonderfull thinks many hugs from germany with www the world is in contact❤
Hi, I think you might have me confused for someone else but thanks for stopping by! All the best!
Hi, Dechen,
My name is Chimey, a Japanese translator of Tibetan literature. I found that you are a niece of Dr. Tsewang Yeshey Pemba, whose novels and autobiography fascinated me a lot. I am now wondering whether I could translate his last novel into Japanese. If you know who to contact, could you please introduce me to that person? I look forward to hearing from you.
Best,
Chimey
Hi Chimey, Thanks so much for getting in touch, this is exciting. I will email you! D