Bios of Board of Directors and Volunteer Staff

Tamdin with school kids

Tamdin Wangdu is a native Tibetan social entrepreneur and the founder of the Tibetan Village Project, a nonprofit, non-political organization that promotes sustainable development and cultural preservation in Tibet.  Tamdin received B.A. in Business Administration from the University of Colorado in Boulder, and worked as IT Consultant for several years prior becoming the executive director of TVP. Tamdin was born in Tibet and now travels between his adopted home in Colorado and native Tibet. Tamdin’s interest includes adventure traveling and photographing, socio-economic of contemporary Tibet, Tibetan calligraphy, and meditation and yoga. To learn more about Tamdin, please click here to read an informative article.

Don Cullen lives in Melbourne, Australia, and has a strong business background, mainly in the food industry throughout Australia and New Zealand. He has been actively involved in Tibetan culture for the past 44 years. He has travelled to Tibet a number of times over the past decade and during that time, has developed a great empathy for the Tibetan people who are trying to maintain their religion, culture and quality of life. Don is also the contact point for "Conscious Journeys" in Australasia and Europe, he is one of the leaders that take groups in to Tibet to work on Tibetan Village Projects. Don is the TVP representative for Australia / New Zealand and Europe and serve on TVP board. Click here to see the event calendar of TVP in Australia.

Sunny Klaber: Initiates and carries out innovative projects that generate interest and support for TVP. Sunny's key contributions include (1) helping to create the "Tibetan Village Project Conscious Journeys", an annual journey that invites volunteers to visit and offer support at key TVP project sites in Central Tibet (2) providing the vision and gathering the resources to produce a documentary film about TVP and (3) creating a set of gree ting cards that display beautiful Tibetan calligraphy. Sunny currenly serves on TVP board.

Dr. Diane Hoffman is the Medical Director for Tibetan Village Project. Diane has traveled to Tibet the past several years and understands the great needs of the Tibetan people. Diane has attended to many of medical needs of Tibetans in rural and remote areas.

Dr. Hoffman’s specialties are orthopedics and emergency medicine. She has practiced emergency medicine for more than 15 years in a number of remote and rural locations. Diane was the Coordinator of Emergency Medical Services for the National Park Service in Grand Canyon, on Mount Rainier and in Alaska for 12 years.  Diane’s work at the Flagstaff Medical Center Emergency Department includes taking care of Native American patients whose culture and medical needs some of which are similar to those of Tibetans.

Diane is an accomplished mountaineer, wilderness river runner, and has traveled to third world countries. She is active in environmental issues, charitable and human rights organizations and is a practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism. Diane is an accomplished expedition organizer and leader having led challenging expeditions throughout some of the worlds’ extreme environments.  She is knowledgeable about Tibetan culture, history, medicine and the many needs of the Tibetan people. Diane has worked with Tibetan doctors and “barefoot” midwives and nurses to determine how Tibetan Village Project can best meet the needs of the Tibetan people.