Finally. Proof that the Vengaboys are in fact the soundtrack of Hell.

“Yamantaka’s Birthday

(By Palchen Choeling Tenzin Rabten)

Once a fun-loving man died, and after the forty nine (days of funerary rites) had passed, the Lord of Death’s assistants escorted his soul into the presence of the Dharma King Lord of the Dead (Yamantaka). Once the separating out of the man’s sins and virtues was done, seeing that the man had accumulated an equal number of good and bad deeds, Yamantaka proclaimed: “My servants, due to the fact that when this deceased man lived in the human realm the white and black karma of his sins and virtues were accumulated equally, you can send him in accordance with his wishes to wherever in the six (realms) of beings he most desires to live (for his next incarnation).” At that point, since when he’d been alive and living in the human realm he’d heard all about how nice the god realms were, the man said right away: “Could you please send me to Heaven for a day to look around? If it turns out that it’s nice, I’ll stay, if not I’ll come back right away.” And so he went to Heaven. When he got there and saw all the goddesses carrying celestial guitars, lutes and flutes in their hands and playing them serenely, he grew bored and immediately went down to Hell for a day. That day, the people of Hell were all happily dancing with The Death Lord’s attendants to modern Western songs (by a band) called ‘The Venga Boys’. As soon as the man saw that not only that, but everyone was having a raucous time of it, holding beer in one hand and cigarettes in the other, feeling great happiness in his heart, he arrived magically before Yamantaka (once more). “I want to go to Hell!” he said. “If that’s what you want,” Yamantaka instructed, “after tomorrow I won’t be able to reverse it. You won’t be able to say I’m not staying after that.”

The following day the man arrived in Hell, but as soon as he saw the people there experiencing all kinds of torment he was completely terrified and asked the Lord of Death’s attendants: “Yesterday everyone was having such a good time! Why’s it like this today?!” “You idiot!” said one of the servants. “Didn’t you know yesterday was Yamantaka’s birthday?!” As soon as he heard this, the man fell to the ground unconscious.”

(A translation of a story from  མཚར་གཏམ (‘Amazing/Funny Anecdotes’), edited by Kalsang Khedup, 2009, 1st Ed. published in 2004 by the Tibetan Exile Administration’s Department of Education)