Puteri Harbour Marina

Johor, Malaysia

Tibet # 15 Tashilhunpo Monastery – part 2

It was lovely walking through the quiet parts of the monastery.

Empty butter bags left on a window sill.

I love images like this.

I read that how women braid their hair, the number of braids and the style can indicate their family connections or where they live.

Old aunties take a rest.

Placing a bet? Having a fortune told?

The lady in the very center with a dark hair seems to be getting her money ready. The women are all wearing such a variety of hats! Hats indicate local styles and different areas of Tibet have different styles though the white floppy kinds I think are more to keep the sun off than any other reason.

Across the road from the monastery was a small space with some interesting life size sculptures. All showed interactions of local people with visitors. And all of the visitors were made with Caucasian features.

A local man with his sheep talking to a visitor on his bicycle.

He was crying because he wanted to be held by his mom, not sitting on the sheep so his family could take a photo.

A visitor, a local boy and a soccer ball.

Everyone seemed to ignore the statues of the women because there was nothing to sit on or climb on though you could have climbed onto the young girl’s arm. You can see the monastery across the street.

Interestingly, most women tourists I saw didn’t wear anything that short and most had small cameras rather than video cameras.

While Randal and I waited to meet Lobsang, David and Ronnie, we walked past all of the small souvenir stalls and then into a small grocery store where I bought candy to give away and Randal bought candy to eat along the way. It turned out to be a long way so we all ate some of my candy which was kind of like nougat and not too bad.

Then it was back into the car and off for Everest with a stop for lunch along the way.

Ru

DoraMac

Puteri Harbour Marina

Johor, Malaysia

Hi All,

I took lots of photos at the monastery and the small park just outside of the entrance.  It will take a few emails to share them all.

Ru

DoraMac

Tibet # 15 Tashilhunpo Monastery

The Tashilhunpo Monastery has a great deal of historical, religious, and modern political importance associated with it and the Panchen Lama. If you just “Google” it you’ll get lots of anti-Chinese opinions and lots of “official” Chinese versions of any event in Tibetan history. Because of that, I’ve broken my rule not to use Wikipedia because “probably” it doesn’t fall into either camp, though no one is really responsible for Wikipedia’s accuracy. If you’re really interested, go to your local library and see what they have about Tibet. At least library books have been edited and reviewed and there are books representing all perspectives though I was disappointed in our online magazine database which seems to include mostly articles written either by the Chinese press or the Tibet government in exile and not what I would call neutral sources.

Lobsang walked up ahead to get our tickets followed by Randal, David Ronnie.

Saying there were lots more visitors here than the Pelkhor Monastery would be a gross understatement and there wasn’t a chance at all of anyone being locked in a room unnoticed.

“It was founded by the first Dalai Lama in 1447 and is the spiritual home of the Panchen Lama, Tibet’s second most important spiritual leader. The monastery houses 900 monks today compared with the 5,000 in 1959. Key buildings are the Maitreya Chapel with a 85 ft gilded bronze Future Buddha statue, the Kelsang Temple, with its grand hall, the Panchen Lama’s Palace and the 115 ft Thangka Wall where giant images of the Buddha are displayed on April 14 of the Tibetan lunar calendar. Photography inside each building costs 75-150 RMB. “ AA Keyguide China 2009 edition p 212

Randal and I didn’t see any of it. The lines were way, way, way too long and after not liking the crowds at the Jokhang in Lhasa I really didn’t protest when Randal said he didn’t want to go into the really crowded buildings. Ronnie and David didn’t take any photos because of the cost. I first thought that they should just raise the price and let everyone take photos. But many people who come are real “pilgrims” who have made great effort to visit what is a place of religion for them and not a photo opportunity. So there is no reason for them to have to pay a high fee. I did take lots of photos of the women working in and walking through the monastery. Lots of photos.

This photo has a lot to say.

I asked permission before taking the photos. The adorable twin girls have shaved heads. The mom has some butter in her had to add as offerings at the butter lamps. The people on the left side of the photo are mostly tourists with cameras. The ones on the right in more traditional Tibetan clothing are there to visit the monastery for religious reasons. The stack of flat yellow bags are bags of butter for sale.

This looked like a bag check where people could buy their butter and leave their backpacks. The man in gray is carrying his prayer wheel as did many people and their long strands for beads. No one was stopped from wearing their backpack.

It seemed the majority of religious visitors were women.

Not serious visitors!

Look at the young woman in the middle. . When I started to work with the picture, the young woman in the middle looked familiar as did her jeans.

I photographed these women at the Pelkhor Monastery the previous day.

Same young woman? What do you think? She certainly is very pretty as are many of the Tibetan women.

I followed this woman for a while just to take a photo of her shoes.

Actually, most of my photos are of the women we saw.

This was only part of the line waiting to see the giant gilded Future Buddha and why Randal and I didn’t see it.

Once inside all of those people are forced into really narrow walkways that are dark and filled with the smoke of butter lamps. We had separated from David and Ronnie and later when we caught up, they sheepishly said they’d cut the line. They were determined to fill their 6 month, 7 continents with everything they could see. Randal saw everything on his bike trip in 2000 so can easily skip stuff now. I never would have cut the line so there really wasn’t so much time because once inside the lines go really slowly as many people actually spend time praying. I don’t remember David or Ronnie saying much other than it cost too much to take photos and if you’re trying to share the story with others, photos are essential or there really isn’t much of a story.

Restoring the damage done during the Cultural Revolution.

I loved the blue aprons first seen worn by the Ani Tsamkhung nuns.

I don’t know what actually prevented me from going up to speak with these women instead of just taking their photos. I was definitely impressed by their strength. The blue aprons are worn lots of different ways. I don’t take it for granted that people speak English and actually assume that most don’t. Many Tibetans, especially those outside the bigger cities, don’t get a chance at many years of school and even if they do, many are required to learn Chinese rather than English.

Strong women!

This woman is carrying what is probably a container of new butter for the lamps.

Monastery courtyard.

I did go into one of the smaller chapels and on the way out everyone, including me, jumps up to ring the bell.

A small group of monks sit in a courtyard that was once full of hundreds learning Buddhist philosophy.

Puteri Hrobour Marina

Johor, Malaysia

Hi All,

  Randal and I are now 100% sure we’ll be home this fall.  We leave Singapore September 29th and return to Singapore November 22nd.  Sounds like a long time to be home but I already feel panic to get everything done we’ll want to get done.  We want to visit family and friends from Roanoke, other parts of VA and those friends up North.  We have all those “health” appointments we do annually.  It will definitely be good to be away from the tropical weather.  We will move the boat to Sebana Cove early in August and most likely leave it there while we are away.

Ru

DoraMac

Tibet # 14 Shigatse

Shigatse is the second largest city in Tibet with a population of about 80,000 making it about the same size as Roanoke County. It is 160 miles southwest of Lhasa and it had taken us all day to cover those 160 miles. We were driving along what is called The Friendship Highway.

“The Friendship Highway is a scenic route on the Tibetan Plateau. It includes the westernmost part of China National Highway 318 from Lhasa west to Lhatse then south to Nepal as well as the southernmost part of China National Highway 219 from Lhatse to Gar in far western Tibet. Friendship Highway begins at Lhasa, capital of Tibet Autonomous Region. It passes near turquoise Yamdrok Lake and through Gyantse to Shigatse, Tibet’s second-largest city and home of the Panchen Lama. Continuing west parallel to the Yarlung Zangbo River/Brahmaputra, it passes Lhatse and forks just beyond at Chapu.

One branch continues west and upriver as China National Highway 219, finally crossing the Brahmaputra/Indus divide near sacred Mount Kailash and Lake Manasarovar, then on to Ali in Gar County.

The other branch (Our route) from Chapu maintains the Hwy 318 route number. It turns southwest and crosses the main Brahmaputra-Ganges divide at Lakpa-La, 5,250m/17,225′. Descending 800 meters onto alluvial plains of the Bum-Chu — also known as the Arun in Nepal — the highway passes Xêgar (New Tingri) and Old Tingri, both gateways to Rongbuk Monastery and the north side of Mount Everest. Continuing southwest, the highway climbs over Lalung-La (5,050m/16,570′) above headwaters of the Matsang Tsangpo (Sun Kosi). This stream as well as Bum-Chu/Arun flow south into Nepal, two of the Seven Koshis joining forces before breaking out of the Himalayan foothills and continuing south to the Ganges. Friendship Highway then descends through Nyalam, then more steeply through a canyon to Zhangmu where Friendship Bridge crosses into Nepal at a mere 1,750m/5,740′ elevation. The extension to Kathmandu is named Arniko Rajmarg.

Scenery along the highway features important cultural monuments, the upper valley of the Yarlung Zangbo (Brahmaputra) River, vast grasslands and meadows on the plateau, and mountain vistas including five of the world’s highest peaks: Everest, Lhotse, Makalu, Cho Oyu and Shishapangma as well as largely unexplored and unclimbed peaks east and west of Lakpa-La reaching about 6,400 meters. Friendship Highway is also important to pilgrims making their way from all corners of Tibet to the spiritual center in Lhasa and to the sacred circuits of Mount Kailash and Lake Manasarovar.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendship_Highway_(Tibet)

I read one blog where a woman said she’d been warned that the scenery would be monotonous but she found the whole route beautiful. That’s how I felt too!

We basically just stopped in Shigatse to spend the night so we didn’t see anything other than the few blocks around our hotel which wasn’t in the newest part of the city. We arrived in time to get our room, lug our stuff up three flights of stairs, and then walk off to dinner.

Looks a lot like our concrete block hotel in Lhasa.

Behind the curtain is the bathroom, odd! When we first went into the room I noticed an unpleasant smell coming from the bathroom. I tried to flush the toilet and it wouldn’t flush. Randal was still back in the lobby checking us in so I walked down the 3 flights of stairs and over to the lobby and told Lobsang our toilet wouldn’t work. He said that the hotel was full so we couldn’t change rooms but someone would be sent to fix the toilet. I walked back to the room and when I got there, someone was checking the toilet in David and Ron’s room next door. Actually she was just spraying air freshener to fix what she thought was the problem with the toilet. I motioned to her to come to our room (she didn’t speak English) and she started to spray. I showed her that the toilet wouldn’t flush so she left to get more help. By then, Randal had struggled his way up the 3 flights to our room and realized that the water to the toilet had been shut off so turned it on. It worked; not so well as David and Ronnie’s but it would do. And the room did have an electric kettle so we could have our early morning tea and coffee. There was no Internet option in the room, but the small business center had a few computers that weren’t very busy though the hotel was actually full of mostly western tourists.

A glass wall separated the bathroom from the rest of the room. The curtain was sort of a lacy see through material. Not sure whose idea that all was. The bathroom and the bedroom had plenty of light so that couldn’t have been the reason. But the water was hot and that really was more important than an odd glass bathroom wall. They also could have left a bit more room between the toilet and the shower stall. (Our next night we had no running water at all and a squat toilet and the night after that the toilet was in the shower, and in Kathmandu there was only hot water after 7:30 am)

Looking down from our room onto the main road.

The hotel had a dining room, but we thought we’d go out for a walk and find a place that wasn’t so aimed at tourists. We walked several blocks and only found one restaurant that wasn’t just a storefront set with a few tables. (There were more choices, I’m sure if we had walked further, but we were too tired.) We went in and it was not touristy at all: nothing was written in English and no one spoke English. I used my picture book to order broccoli and Randal ordered fried rice. They cooked the entire head of a huge broccoli but we ate most of it.

One of the shops along the way sold solar water heaters and we saw them everywhere in Tibet.

“The per capita utilization of electricity in Tibet is far lower than the national average. (National Average here must mean the average in the country of China.) The region lacks coal, and it is therefore impossible to develop thermal power. The existing large and medium-sized hydroelectricity stations only generate enough electricity to satisfy the needs of Tibet’s dense urban population, while farmers and herdsmen scattered in remote mountain areas must manage without. However, with its dry climate, thin air, negligible cloud, and annual 3,000 hours of sunshine, Tibet is especially suitable for developing solar energy.” http://www.tibetinfor.com/tibetzt/question_e/3/038.htm

And this is also pretty interesting…..

Harnessing the Tibetan sun http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/itw-tibet-tt0604.html

In many villages throughout Tibet, there are two ways to cook a meal. There’s the traditional open fire, fueled by yak dung or the region’s increasingly scarce wood. And then there are solar cookers, concentrating mirrors made of two-inch-thick concrete and covered with a mosaic of small glass mirrors.

The fires produce a lot of smoke, which, especially in the confined quarters of a kitchen, can lead to lung disease. The solar cookers are clean, but so heavy that it takes four people to move one, and they have a poorly engineered focus that sometimes lights fires, cooks food unevenly or even damages metal pots.

When MIT student Scot Frank and Catlin Powers of Wellesley College visited Tibet two years ago, one thing they kept hearing from the villagers was that it would make a big difference to their lives if there was a solar cooker that was lightweight enough to be carried with them when they went off to spend the day tending their fields or their flocks, yet strong enough to stand up to the strong winds that howl across the Tibetan plateau.

A team of students from MIT and from Qinghai Normal University in Tibet’s Amdo region ended up producing exactly that. The lightweight dish they produced, inspired by Tibetan nomadic tents, is made of yak-wool canvas panels, supported by bamboo ribs, and faced with reflective mylar. Easily disassembled and transported by one person, the cooker can then be quickly reassembled in the field and staked down solidly on the ground to resist the wind. In the fall, the students will begin testing their prototype in several villages, and make the design available to local factories for manufacture.”

(You can read the rest of the article at the link. I’m not sure what model is in the photo but it seems to need to be held down by a huge rock.)

These two women were using a huge sewing machine to sew on this giant piece of heavy material. They laughed at my wanting to take of photo of them at work. They probably think it’s the most normal thing on earth to be working as they do.

Then we walked back to our hotel, up the 3 flights and went to sleep.

The next morning we went to the hotel restaurant for the breakfast buffet. Breakfasts were included as part of the tour. There was great bread again and eggs and peanut butter and it was hard to avoid overeating. I drank about a gallon of tea. The dining room was full and you could hear many different languages. But most people were speaking English.

We loaded up the car and drove off to visit the Tashihunpo Monastery founded by the first Dalai Lama in 1447. While we stayed there, Lobsang went off to get our Everest Passes that we’d been too late to get the day before.

Puteri Harbour Marina

Johor, Malaysia

Hi All,

  I feel as if I’m spending more time writing these emails about our trip than we actually spent in Tibet.  I might be learning more about Tibet too as I research so I can explain the photos to you.

Ru

DoraMac

Tibet # 13 Lhasa to Shigatse Pelkor Monastery – part 2

It was like walking the walls of a castle.

David, hands in his pockets, without his trusty video-camera.

I had my camera with me and was taking photos when I noticed that David didn’t have his camera. You had to check them or pay to take photos outside too. I hadn’t known that and my camera was small enough to be in my backpack so with no one around to monitor things, I definitely was faced with a moral dilemma. Luckily David decided he wanted to take photos as we walked along the walls, too, so went back to get his camera and Randal gave him money to pay for me to take photos too. At the time we all resented having to pay for photos. But now that I have been reading about the lack of government support and the political restrictions placed on the monasteries and nunneries, I wish I had given them more money. Especially the nunnery in Lhasa.

David with video-camera.

Ronnie and David divided the tasks; Ronnie mostly used his really good still camera with the huge zoom and David took the videos though I think he said that his camera could also take single photos.

Gyantse Dzong (my photo)

“Gyantse Fort or Gyantse Dzong (Jiangzi Dzong) built on the rugged hills surrounding the Gyantze town (once the third largest town in Tibet) has an arresting presence behind the town. The fortress is dated to 1268 and a castle was also built in side by local Prince Phakpa Pelzangpo (1318–1370) who was influential with the Sakyapa overlords. Buddhist guru Butan Rinchen Drub of Zhalu resided here at the invitation of the prince and made it his religious seat. Later, in the 14th century, the palace was moved from the fort to the Gyantse town where Kunga Phakpa had built a larger complex of buildings and monasteries. During this period, he also built a temple on the hill top called the Sampel Rinchenling. However, this is seen only in ruins now except for some murals made in genuine Newari and Gyantse Tibetan styles” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palcho_Monastery   Wikipedia had just about the same exact photo on its website.

Randal only took out his camera when we got to Everest.

You can see a room built into the side of the mountain just behind the top of Randal’s hat and the fort walls behind.

If we had the day to spend here I would have walked up to explore: but we only had about an hour or so because we had to get to Shigatse to get our Everest permits. You need permits for everything: to go to China, then to go to Tibet, then to drive through Tibet, then to go visit Everest……

Some of the buildings that must have been used for residence or classrooms since this was not only a monastery but also a college.

“Other Information – Background: Richardson mentions this site in High Peaks, Pure Earth , London: Serindia Publications, 1998, p. 325, ” … the thriving town of Gyantse (Rgyal-rtse) (1936-50), well-placed for trade with both Shigatse (Gzhis-ka-rtse) and Lhasa and on the route to India. It is rich in art and architecture of the fifteenth century created by the Gtsang prince,Rab-brtan kun-bzang ‘phags-pa. He enlarged and embellished the temple founded by his father near the rdzong which crowns the summit of the great rock overhanging the town. But his greatest achievements were the enlargement or virtual reconstruction of the Dpal-‘khor Chos-sde temple and the building of the magnificent Sku-‘bum mchod-rten (1936-50). The former is the heart of a community of monastic college residences spread over an extensive hillside enclosed by a fortified wall. Although the Sa-skya-pa scholl originally predominated, all other religious schools were represented here.” http://tibet.prm.ox.ac.uk/photo_2001.59.8.79.1.html

After the fact, I am trying to read more about what we saw so that I don’t just show you photos with no explanation of what you are seeing. I have stumbled across some interesting web sites. The Tibet Album is one of those sites with amazing photos showing 30 years of Tibet’s history.

The Tibet Album presents more than 6000 photographs spanning 30 years of Tibet’s history. These extraordinary photographs are a unique record of people long gone and places changed beyond all recognition. They also document the ways that British visitors encountered Tibet and Tibetans.

Featuring photographs taken by Charles Bell, Arthur Hopkinson, Evan Nepean, Hugh Richardson, Frederick Spencer Chapman, Harry Staunton and the previously unidentified photographs of Rabden Lepcha.

Our specially designed functions (maps, zoom, album…) enable you to browse this site in many different ways. Photographs appear in a variety of formats and can be linked to the visual narratives they were originally used for.

This site provides access to the photograph collections of two important British museums – the Pitt Rivers Museum (Oxford) and the British Museum (London).

The Tibet Album is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

http://tibet.prm.ox.ac.uk/index.php

I loved the way it wasn’t just round but had zigzag corners.

I don’t know what this tiny door led to, but you can see that someone as tall as Randal would have had to bend over to walk in.

These women in local Tibetan dress were walking up the hill behind the temple while I stood under my green umbrella and watched.

Not an easy hike and no high-tech hiking clothing.

Ronnie and David in front of the octagonal stupa.

I wish we’d had time to climb to the fort. I wish I’d paid more attention to the design of the entire complex. And I wish we’d spent more time in Gyantse because I have read that it is much more “traditional Tibet” than either Lhasa or Shigatse.

Our last stop before we arrived in Shigatse was a barley mill where roasted barley kernels were ground into flour. Barley flour is a main staple. This mill fascinated Randal much more than the monastery had.

I was wearing a navy blue wool sweater so the fact that when we left the small mill only one elbow of my sweater was dusted with flour was pretty good.

The finished product. We paid for photos here too.

It was a very small, narrow building.

This was the water wheel that wasn’t being used. The other one was too fast and too blurry to photograph.

The stream provided the power.

Eating barley tsampa…..

http://tsampa.org/tibetan/tsampa/theory_and_practice/ shows the process of mixing the tea and flour to make the traditional staple called Tsampa which Ani the nun in Last Seen In Lhasa always carried with her.

“I once met a foreign girl in Amdo who hadn’t eaten tsampa before. While the mother of the household was preparing her a bowl I could feel the anticipation rising. Soon I would again see a miniature carneval that would end in half of the tsampa being on the floor, with the rest stuck to her fingers like somekind of glue. The Tibetans, clearly more sensitive to her nutritional needs than me and the dog, offered to roll it up for her; to my delight she declined the offer. Several twists and turns later the whole spectacle came to an end. Nearly clean fingers, nothing for the dog. “How did you do that?”, I asked. “I used to do pottery”, came the answer.

Making tsampa is in many ways like working with clay. On the one hand it is a matter of getting the right proportion of ingredients, of balancing the fine line between mud tsampa and sand storm tsampa. On the other hand, it takes a skilled hand to shape it into an edible piece of art without spilling it left and right.”

If you go to the website you can read more and see photos of the process.

Next email Shigatse to Everest!

Puteri Harbour Marina

Johor, Malaysia

Hi All

   Usually when we are traveling I take good notes and know ahead of time what we will see: but not this trip. It was Randal’s idea to go to Tibet and I just sort of went along with it so I really didn’t read up ahead of time and we didn’t take a travel guide. Actually the only thing I read about was altitude sickness and robbers in Nepal, both a bit off putting. And visitors must be part of a tour to visit Tibet, so we would be on a “group” tour with a fairly set itinerary. As we traveled through Tibet I would just download my photos with a broad heading like, Lhasa to Shigatse, because I haven’t figured out Windows 7 picture program and it didn’t allow me to select photos for separate folders. I usually do that in XP so I can label folders with the exact name of the place where I took the photos The point of all that is this: I was pretty sure I remembered visiting a monastery after the glacier and before we arrived in Shigatse and that’s what my photos showed. But our tour print out said that we didn’t. Our entry ticket wasn’t stamped with a date I could read. Randal said that he didn’t remember. Luckily Ronnie and David were there too so I checked their website and read what they had to say.

“We finished the sight-seeing of the day by going to the Pelkor monastery. David coughed up some money in order to be able to film and take photos inside the monastery. He got so caught up in his filming that he didn’t notice when a monk locked him in, in one of the rooms – the monk didn’t notice him sitting there and filming the inert statues for 3.5 minutes ” http://www.project-7.se/?s=tibet

It was really fun reading what Ronnie and David had written about the Tibet tour and their gallery of photos is wonderful. If you select PHOTOS on their website and then click on Galleries, you can find their Tibet photos. Randal and I are even in a few of them!

Pelkhor Chode Monastery

“Founded in the 15^th century, the Pelkhor Chode Monastery is the most famous site in Gyantse, 162 miles southwest of Lhasa. The marvelous octagonal Kumbum (Palace of a Thousand Images) stupa rises up within the walls, with nine tiers, 75 chapels, and 108 gates. Containing a lengthy pilgrim circuit past the magnificent murals, the stupa was completed in 1427. Gyantse’s hilltop fort, the Dzong, dates back to 1268, and has superb views. “ p.306 National Geographic Traveler China It sounds pretty interesting so I wish I’d paid more attention.

Ronnie taking photos of the nine tiered stupa with some of the fort walls showing on the left.

If these weren’t monks I’d say they were all participating in some sort of gambling activity.

There were very few tourists here unlike the monastery we would visit the next morning in Shigatse.

I think the containers hold recycled candle butter.

The women are wearing the lovely aprons indicating they are married.

Lobsang explaining about the mural.

Part of the problem with taking photos is that you concentrate on the photos and not listening to the information about the object you’re photographing. I did look at the mural and saw that it was covered with smoke soot and was fading. Small denominations of Chinese money are donations from visitors. I think Lobsang said it also had some astrological symbolism or the history of the monastery, or….

Carvings on the wall looked like polished wood, but Lobsang said they were mud!

This is a giant covering made of yak skin. It covers a piece of artwork used for special occasions. In the Tibet Museum I saw a boat made of yak skin that looked almost like this though it was stretched tight to make a boat. It felt like leather which made sense.

The Chinese government allows photos of high lamas or abbots though not photos of the current Dalai Lama.

Lots of yak butter in this photo. There are yak butter candles burning in the metal bowls. The tall white decorative pieces in front of the statue are also mounted on stupa shaped sculptures made of barley flour and butter!

I had paid to take photos in this room and while there took many photos of this monk molding the small stupa shaped objects. Randal and Lobsang had gone on ahead so one of the other guides explained to me about the flour and butter and asked the monk if I could take photos. I asked if I could touch it and he said no but broke off a small piece of unused dough so I could feel what it was like. Most monks and nuns do some type of creative work whether it be painting or sculpting or tending flowers.

I was fascinated watching this monk mold the small stupa shaped object.

Front Back

I don’t know what the monk is doing; but he was up and down pretty quick and I don’t know who the statue is supposed to be. I think probably some form of the Buddha.

There were large Buddha statues around the room and all held their hands to indicate different things. Visitors have put donations into one of the hands.

I finally left this room and went off to find Randal, Lobsang and the guys. After getting a bit lost I found them and they asked me where was David? I had noticed a monk locking the door of the room behind me but I hadn’t noticed that David was still inside taking his video of the Buddha. He was locked in. He managed to get the attention of the monks and they let him out and he finally found us.

Next email, walking around the outside walls of the monastery.

Ru DoraMac

Puteri Harbour Marina

Johor, Malaysia

We continue…..

Tibet # 13 Lhasa to Shigatse Yamdrok Lake and Kharola Glacier

“The lake lies in the mountains more than 2,700 feet above the Yarlung-Tsangpo plain and 14,700 feet above sea level, with a surface area of 245 square miles meandering between peaks and up tributary valleys to form an ornate, serpentine letter Y. It is the largest body of fresh water on the northern side of the Himalayas and stores 530 billion cubic feet.” P 40 Tibet Abode of the Gods. The book goes on to talk about the controversy surrounding the building of a hydroelectric power plant and its ecological effect on the lake, the impact of the power plant on the religious belief the Tibetans attach to the lake, and the needed electricity it would generate. The power plant went online in 1996. We only saw a small part of the lake so I have no idea what impact the power plant has caused. We didn’t see any activity on the lake.  Tibetans traditionally don’t eat fish and the weather was too cold at the very end of June for recreational use of the lake if it ever gets used for that purpose which Lobsang seemed to imply that it didn’t.

This photo from Wikipedia shows the Y shape of the lake. Lake Puma Yumco is the oval shaped lake.

The lake shore.

Hundreds of stone piles were built near the lake. I built one too.

Barbara Erickson writes about seeing what I’m guessing are similar piles of stones near the Samye Monastery. “Near Samye Monastery, Tibet’s oldest, we passed a miniature city of stone houses built on the side of a sand hill. Pilgrims had made these simple structures, none more than a foot high, out of a few flat rocks so that their souls would have dwelling places when they died.” P 169 Tibet: Abode of the Gods. Of course, you do see these piles lots of places and I built my first one at a beach near the Golden Gate Bridge.

Our driver, Lobsang, and Ronnie stand near our van while above them you can see the other load of tourists stopping to photograph Yamdrok Lake. When we stopped we were instantly approached by other Uncles with their yak. But we had our yak photos so just walked off to the lake shore.

I did take a photo of this woman and her dog.

By this point the weather was getting colder and I was wearing a thermal shirt, wool sweater and my Red Sox Hoodie. Wearing something over your nose warms your breath which I learned after the fact. Many women wear coverings over their noses and mouths. I should have so my nose and lips would have been saved from the cold dry weather.

Our next official photo stop was the Kharola Glacier.

It was massive and amazing and there’s no way you can tell that from these photos.

I had never seen a glacier and was pretty impressed. I raced about taking a few photos and then looking for something hot to drink. Again and again, our stops were just too short to take photos, search the “souvenir tables,” interact with the people who lived at the foot of the glacier and just look around. It was too rushed and it was also our first feeling of being cold and maybe we didn’t bring enough warm clothes!

It was sort of “right there” but far away too. That’s David in the corner of the photo.

I can never think of what to say to people who have so little when we have so much; so I didn’t go visit with these people across the road from the main parking area. I can’t imagine their lives. It was quite beautiful at the foot of the glacier but the conditions are primitive and at times, probably unsafe with the instability of the glacier and rock. Maybe they only live there in the warmer months. I wish I knew.

This is zoomed and cropped so you can see. I was so far away and wonder if they were just looking or actually looking at me.

On our side of the road with the huge parking area there were some stone buildings and tents and local people selling stones and yak skulls and prayer wheels and beads and flags. And I hated to look because I really didn’t want to spend much money and I really don’t enjoy the bargaining process unless I really do want to buy something. The one thing I did buy was some hot, sweat Tibet tea. I had told Lobsang that I wanted some tea and he sent me to a tent at the back of the parking area. The woman motioned me inside and went to hand me a bottle of water. But the two men in the tent were drinking hot tea and I pointed to that. So she motioned me to sit down and I did and smiled at them all and they smiled at me and I could have spent a lovely time there drinking my glass of hot tea. But we had to go. So I took the glass with me and motioned for the woman to follow which she did because I had her glass. I went to the van and found one of our “Chinese train” mugs and poured the tea in the mug and returned the glass. Then it was back into the van and off we went. By the way, the van had no heat but we never realized that until we were at Mount Everest. I guess the 6 of us gave off enough body heat to keep it warm enough at lower elevations.

Where plateaus were fed by mountain streams, there was lots of lush agriculture. But irrigation hasn’t been made available everywhere and many farmers still struggle in the desert lands. I had a year of geology freshman year at UMass but paid little attention. Learning from the pictures in our text just didn’t give me enough visual cues. This image of stream erosion really grabs my imagination and now I would pay attention. We did happen to catch a National Geographic special about the formation of the Himalayas the other night and that explained quite a bit about what we had seen and how I could have found what looks like a sea fossil at the highest point of our road trip.

Our next stop that morning was the Tashilhunpo Monastery in Gyantse and after that it would be time for lunch.

Ru

DoraMac

Putri Harbour Marina,

Johor, Malaysia

Hi All,

  Still no water, but it rained really hard this morning so we finished filling the tanks with our rain catchers.  Luckily I had walked really early so didn’t get caught in the downpour.  When I left the boat the Sox were down by 2 runs in the first inning.  When I came back an hour later they were behind by 7 runs….I think my lucky red Tibet bead only worked while I was in Tibet.  With this email we leave Lhasa and begin to see some really amazing desert and mountain scenery, amazing Yamdrok Lake and Korala Glacier where I bought a cup of sweet Tibet tea from a family selling water and hot tea from their tent.  We could have stayed hours at each stop but we had lots of miles to cover so was all over way too fast.  We left Lhasa before 8 am and mid-morning made our first, though unplanned stop. 

Ru

DoraMac

Tibet # 13 Lhasa to Shigatse – but mostly a story about a yak.

June 27^th: Lhasa – Gyantse – Shigatse – Group tour

“Highlights: Yamdrok Lake

Today we will drive from Lhasa thru Gyantse to Shigatse, along the road, we will enjoy the blue sky with far away Nianqing Tanggula Mountains. In a minute we will drive along the stunning turquoise like Yamdrok Lake. We will have a look at the stunning Korala Glacier too.

We will keep driving to the second largest city – Shigatse.” Info from our tour itinerary.

6 people and luggage for 6 people crammed into our “not so large” van.

The driver, of course, sat up front and usually either Ronnie or David did also. I usually sat in the middle of the back seat with Randal on one side and one of the guys on the other. Ronnie and David always offered to trade with me and take turns, but my being in the middle made sense and I could lean on Randal. The one time Randal sat up front, I did take a window seat. But Ronnie and David had really good cameras so letting them have the best photo seats made sense. My small camera really didn’t do well while the van was moving and Randal wasn’t taking any photos so we really didn’t need the window seats. Lobsang, our guide, made a nest for himself in back with all of the luggage. Lobsang said that they couldn’t have a roof rack though he didn’t really explain why. It did mean that we could leave some things locked in the van at night so we didn’t have to lug everything into our rooms.

We drove away from Lhasa and began to climb up towards Shigatse, the second largest city in Tibet and our overnight stop. The scenery became desolate and immense and amazing. David and Ronnie were truly enthusiastic cameramen that we took notice of about everything. Lobsang would ask our driver to stop when there was a real photo op. It would have to be something really special because almost every bit of the road was a photo op in my mind. But this was our first one.

Our first photo op stop looking back over the road we’d driven along.

Randal and Ronnie on top of the mountain.

I would have climbed up too, but I had a different interest right at that moment.

This is the real reason we stopped.

We saw an old “uncle” walking his yak. There was a “Ronnie, David, Ruth” chorus of “can we stop!” and we did at the top of the hill where there was a real pull over. Lobsang told us to wait at the van because he knew the man would walk up to us so that he could earn some “photo” money with his yak.

Before the photo, the yak had to be dressed up.

In China and at times here in Malaysia, older people are called Uncle and Auntie which is much nicer than being referred to as “old man” or “old woman” so that’s what I am calling the man with the yak, Uncle. Uncle had walked across to the other side of the road to step behind a wall for a minute. The yak never stopped watching for his return and only trusted us when its owner was standing close. I didn’t approach the yak without the owner being near-by. Those horns are huge and pointed and the yak didn’t have the friendliest expression. They aren’t as docile as cows and probably should be treated more like bulls even if they are female yaks. I have no idea what this is. I asked its name but in a million years couldn’t ever pronounce or spell it. I think the owner made it up on the spot; or Lobsang did when I asked about the name. But I have a “yak thing” just like I still have a “water buffalo” thing so I was happy just to be there.

I could have stayed and “communed” with that yak for quite a while.

We weren’t sure what the saddle was for. Was I supposed to get on? If we’d stayed a bit longer, I’m sure I would have, but we really didn’t have time and no one actually told me to get on, so I didn’t. So it’s still on my to-do list.

Here I am showing the photos to uncle who seemed quite interested to see them.

Now we all pose though the yak could care less.

Lobsang said that photos usually cost 5 yuan and 6 yuan equals a little less than $1 US. The old man didn’t ask for money. I gave him 10 yuan. We did take lots of photos. I don’t know how far he had walked and how much further he would walk. Further along at the overlook for Yamdrok Lake we saw other “uncles with their yaks” and young women with their dogs hoping to earn photo money. I’m glad that we had met the old uncle and his yak just walking along the road. It seemed so much less commercial and you didn’t have to pick which yak to photograph. Meeting on the road made it a “real” interaction. Uncle didn’t speak English so we couldn’t talk with him.

In her book Tibet: Abode of the Gods, Barbara Erickson writes about the importance of the yak to the nomad population.

“Among all the nomads’ possessions the most treasured is the yak, which yields horns, hair, fur, tails, meat, hides, and milk and serves as a mount for riding and a beast of burden. Yak parts and yak milk are transformed into tents, rope, religious artifacts, containers, coracles, boots, blankets, dusters, yogurt, butter, cheese and a cosmetic for women: and yaks, unlike sheep and goats, give milk all year round. Yak milk is twice as rich in butterfat as cow’s milk, but yak meat tastes like beef and yak yogurt is hard to distinguish from supermarket yogurt. Yaks also thrive at high altitudes and low temperatures where cattle would perish. In the lower elevations of Tibet cattle are more common than yaks, but in the highest reaches yaks entirely replace cows, bulls and dzo (a yak/cow mix.)

Yaks are valuable but not always docile. They will balk at their tasks and shake off their loads, or they will toss their formidable horns. They are also difficult to steer because unlike horses, which are guided by a bit, they are steered by reins passed through their noses. Male yaks have larger bodies and horns and longer fur than females, and they are “scary to look at” as one resident of Damzhung put it and truculent. Females (called dri) are timid and manageable. The males are stronger and serve as the chief pack animal. “ p61.

Erickson goes on to say that overgrazing and inbreeding had created problems. The Chinese began working on the problem during the 70s and started a facility known as the Yak Frozen Semen Station so yaks can be artificially inseminated to eliminate the problem of inbreeding which causes a major drop in birthrate and that Tibet’s nomads have been doing better since the program began.

Randal and I ate what was labeled as a “hamburger” which tasted like ground meat mixed with herbs and bread crumbs. Next time, at the same Lhasa restaurant, we ate a “yak burger” and I just asked Randal and he said that it was all meat and we both really did like it. I thought they might have mixed in some filler but he didn’t notice it. During our road trip from Lhasa to Nepal, I ate yak chili and it was great once and terrible the next time. The first restaurant served it ground up and spiced and it was great. The second served sliced yak meat and you couldn’t chew it. I also ate yogurt twice and yogurt cake once and all tasted like yogurt to me though I have no idea what they used. Considering how much I really loved to see the live yaks, I certainly ate my share of yak meat.

Yak chili.

It was plentiful and I had also ordered cheese naan which was naan bread stuffed with cheese and warmed so it melted. Randal had ordered chicken chili and garlic naan. We liked mine best but couldn’t eat half of it because there was quite a bit and it was really spicy so it filled us up with all of our naan. I don’t remember what Ronnie ordered though it came in a portion half the size of mine. But David’s yak burger… I still, even as I write this, laugh over David’s yak burger. He ordered one because Randal and I had raved at the taste and size of the ones we ate in Lhasa. We’ll we weren’t in Lhasa anymore so this is what David got.

David’s yak burger….very very tiny! Where’s the yak?

A “David” is now what Randal and I call tiny portions of food.

When the waitress put the plate down, and David’s came last, like 10 minutes after our food, I took one look at the plate and David’s face and I lost it. I still laugh about it. I think part of David blames our glowing recommendation of yak burgers… But we did share a good deal of our spicy meat and spicy chicken and naan with both David and Ronnie and were glad to do it. I swear that our Lhasa yak burger was as large as his plate.

Next stop, Yamdrok Lake.

After our yak visit we stopped to take photos at Yamdrok Lake but that story will have to wait for the next email.

Puteri Harbour Marina

Johor, Malaysia

Hi All,

  Today was “go to the grocery mall” day and the marina van, per usual, was full of everyone wanting to shop or just get away for a few hours.  I went off for our weekly shopping but Randal stayed on the boat with a case of Putri-itis that is similar to his Rebak-itis.  Luckily no high fever this time, just a very runny nose and lots or achy tiredness.  I think it’s the blahs…. Randal doesn’t agree.  We just need to get back on our bikes and we’ll be fine.  Hopefully this weekend.  There are 3 large grocery stores within walking distance of each other.  Jusco, Tesco, and Giant and they all sell slightly different products.  Today, Pam, our dock neighbor and I got off at Giant and bought cheese and bread.  Then we walked to Tesco where she’d heard they sold pickles so we checked and they did and I bought some too.  Then we lugged all of that stuff back to Jusco where Pam stopped at the Post Office and then we finished our shopping at Jusco where the van would pick us all up.  Jusco has better fruit and veggies than the other two and they also have pretty good sushi and barbecued chicken just like Kroger back in Roanoke.  What’s amazing is that we all fit back into the van with all of our stuff.  But everyone helps everyone and most people bring identifiable bags to keep it all separated.  Back at the marina we all share the marina shopping carts to bring the supplies back to the boats.  Our neighbor Bill pushed the cart down the dock so I volunteered to push it back up to the marina office.  Because we’re only taken once each week, everyone loads up so the van does get very full and there’s lots to lug back to the boat.  I also wanted to walk back to check with the marina office to see if they’d fixed the broken water pipe so we could finally put water in our boat.  We were down to about a cupful.  We had started trying to put water in the boat about 7 am yesterday.  It wasn’t until about 3 pm today that I noticed the water was back on (I kept checking the spigot on the dock) and I quickly filled our tanks.  Good thing because it was soon off again and our two water tanks indicator only read 2/3 full.  But that will last us a while until they finally get the problem permanently fixed.  At anchor you really keep an eye on how much water you have.  At a marina we sometimes let it run low because we know we can always put more in. Our indicator was on the left side of the red EMPTY square before we finally could add water to the tanks.  From now on when we still have 1/3 tank of water, I’m refilling for the “just in case” occasions when the water goes off.  We have been other places where the water was shut off, but you’re warned ahead of time and they tell you when it will be on again.  Here we had no warning and it has been off for two days.  If we were desperate we could use the marina showers and washing machine.  And we could use jerry jugs to lug water from Dock A where they do have water to use for cooking, washing dishes, and flushing the toilet.   But the point of staying in and paying for a marina berth is that you get power and water just like you do at home….where occasionally you do lose power and water if there is a terrible winter storm or something.  Here apparently it was a burst pipe about 10 days ago that still hadn’t been fixed well enough to get water to the two far docks in the marina.  I’m hoping that they get tired of me asking about it and finally get it fixed.  If they had come to the dock to tell us about the problem and if they’d acted as if they cared about our discomfort, I would have been more reassured.  But every time I checked with them, they seemed surprised to hear we had no water.  Very frustrating especially since I had spent 26 years hopping right to it when someone came into the library and asked for help.  I expect that kind of service when I ask for it.  Just another day in the tropics….as Randal would say. 

Baseball starts again tomorrow.  Yippee!!!!  Go Red Sox!!!

Ru

DoraMac

Tibet # 12 Our Hotel and Around the Block

The Mandala Hotel where we stayed in Lhasa.

Nothing architecturally special about the hotel but it was clean and comfortable.

The concrete blocks are indicative of Chinese construction. “The old houses were made of drystone (without mortar,) using alternate rows of small stones and large, and this gave them a textured effect. But the new Barkhor buildings are of preshaped granite, like concrete blocks, uniform in size.” P 145 Tibet: Abode of the Gods.

You see the old style construction closer to the center of the Barkhor and parts of the monasteries. But most of the newer buildings all along the main roads from Lhasa to Everest looked like this. The older style buildings also used wood in the construction and wood is now considered a very precious commodity in the desert parts of Tibet.

Breakfast at the hotel.

Our hotel in Lhasa had the best breads at breakfast. When you walked into the dining room, you asked the chef to cook your plain egg omelet and toast. While he was doing that, a lovely waitress would bring you tea, coffee, and orange juice.

A variety of food was available to satisfy western taste, Chinese guests and Tibetan guides.

The toast that came with the eggs tasted like real, homemade bread but they had more great breads and rolls on the buffet table. Sometimes they had yogurt. They always had cereal and milk and fruit and peanut butter and jams. They also had a bowl of roasted barley flour that Tibetans mix with butter and eat uncooked. The first few days I had ordered the eggs, but towards the end of our time in Lhasa stopped eating them in favor of the bread and peanut butter. I like peanut butter more than I like eggs. The first morning I decided to skip the eggs, they made them and toast for me anyway though I hadn’t asked. I did my best not to waste them because there was no one to pass them along to and Randal had already been given his. Later on, as we traveled with Ronnie and David, they were happy to polish off what Randal and I couldn’t eat. (During our drive from Lhasa to the border we’d stop for lunch and somehow what Randal and I ordered came in large portions and what David and Ronnie ordered came in small portions.) I really enjoyed the great breads and tea and having someone else do the work! Our room had an electric kettle and Randal and I always travel with tea bags and coffee packets. We also still had the ceramic mugs that we’d bought in China to use on the train. (We finally left those mugs in our room in Kathmandu because packing them for the plane would have been difficult and most hotels that provided a kettle provide some kind of cup and some form of tea. Singapore also provided a coffee mix. ) Sometimes, at night, too tired and not very hungry, we just bought some instant noodles from the small grocery store down the way and had that with Minute Maid orange juice for dinner in our room. Breakfasts were always so huge and our lunches, when we usually shared a yak burger with fries and salad and more veggies, were also large, so by dinner we just weren’t hungry.

Our room was comfortable with lots of extra down comforters if we needed them. We had TV with a few stations including the English Language Chinese Channel available all over Asia. But most important, we had cable Internet access so we could use our new netbook. It was a very comfortable hotel and the staff was helpful and friendly though not all of them understood English. But if one couldn’t help us, she always called a staff member who could. The hotel had reasonably priced laundry service so we gave them our jeans and heavy stuff to wash. Because of the very dry climate I could hand wash almost anything else and it would be dry in no time. During our trip to China back in January and February, it was so damp that nothing dried, just molded. So there was at least one benefit from the dryness that destroyed the inside of my nose.

Early morning photo looking across and down the street from the hotel.

Usually there was enough traffic that you had to take care crossing the road. Notice that the buildings aren’t tall because of the height regulations not to obstruct the view from the Potala Palace. Behind those buildings were the neighborhoods that melted into the Barkhor so we were only a short walk from it all. One of those storefronts fairly close to the hotel is the small noodle restaurant where we ate dinner quite often. Actually, if we left the hotel for dinner, that’s where we always ate. No one spoke English so it was always interesting getting food. But the staff wanted to be helpful so we never had a problem. The first night we ate there, the day we’d arrived, another newly arrived westerners said he ordered the noodles because he’d seen someone else eating them. Randal and I pointed to his noodles and that’s what we also ate. The enormous bowl of fresh made noodles came in spicy hot broth with chopped vegetables. It tasted wonderful. One night we used the restaurant’s menu which had a few pictures. We ordered something that turned out to be cooked celery with some yak meat. It was good and there was lots of it. It came with that white doughy bread you get at Dim Sum places. Not my favorite. We also ordered something that looked like spaghetti with meat sauce because we saw one of the locals eating it. Randal really liked the spaghetti stuff so I took a photo and we would show them the photo when we went for dinner other nights. One day while we were walking through the Barkhor I bought a kid’s picture book of fruit and veggies with their Chinese and Tibetan names written next to them. (I’d left my traveler’s picture dictionary on the boat thinking we wouldn’t need it because we really hadn’t needed it anywhere for a long time.) That night at the noodle restaurant Randal used the camera spaghetti photo to order his spaghetti dish. I pointed to a picture of an eggplant in my book and they cooked me a giant plate of eggplant. It went quite well with Randal’s spaghetti. We used the book again during our stay in Shigatse where they cooked us an entire giant head of broccoli!

Next some back streets near our hotel back off the main road.

These streets were lined with all kinds of small shops that opened onto the street.

I’m guessing that there were shops on the ground floor and living space above.

A shop selling traditional Tibetan dresses and aprons.

This shop sold clothing for monks and nuns. I remember in Rome being surprised to see shops selling clothing for priests. I honestly don’t know in either case if you have to buy your own or you’re given them when you join the religious life.

Our hotel room had 4 of these huge down quilts so they must sell by the hundreds. They’re wonderful.

This shop sells prayer flags. I read in the Erickson book that they weren’t allowed during the Cultural Revolution. Now we certainly saw them again all during our travels.

Yak butter which is used for food and for the butter candles in the monasteries and nunneries.

Yak meat which we really liked and I’m not really a meat eater but it was the novelty of it all. Absolutely every part of the yak is used: meat, butter, milk, wool, skin, tail, horns and “dung.”

Yak wool hats? Or some kind of wool anyway.

Georgia O’Keeffe would have loved Tibet. These horns actually look smaller than the ones on the live yak I met. You can buy the skulls all over the Barkhor.

A stove for burning yak dung. The dung is dried and used as fuel in the stove. I don’t remember it smelling bad, but it was smoky.

Yak dung drying on the outside of this building. Usually it’s on the roofs.

These quilt like covers are placed over doors to keep out the cold. They are made from cotton material and not yak. We saw them everywhere.

There were lots of decorative doorways to very simple areas behind. Lobsang said Tibetans liked decorated doorways.

Randal and I are always confused about what is considered the 1^st floor or the 2^nd floor. This sign explained it. We visited the art gallery and they did have some wonderful paintings that captured the amazing faces of the Tibetans and their way of life. We just looked. I really do prefer watercolor and these were all oil.

One of the newer main roads that were built by the Chinese. Lobsang told us that 20 years ago there were very few cars and few roads for them. You can see rickshaws which I saw used more by locals than tourists. The taxis had meters they didn’t use, but the fares were reasonable unlike in George Town. You can see the Potala Palace up above it all.

Randal gave a donation to his new friend. Buddhism encourages the asking for and giving of alms.

It was around lunch time and this group of adults and kids were having lunch. I don’t know if the adults were parents or teachers or what. It was just nice to see them all eating together. I love the interaction between the woman and small boy in the center and how they are focused on each other.

We only saw a small part of Lhasa and none of its night life so ours is a very limited perspective. I was very taken by it. We left Lhasa and our first stop was Shigatse where we stayed overnight before moving on to Everest Base Camp. It was during this overland trip that we saw the most amazing scenery. We also encountered many Chinese checkpoints which we weren’t allowed to photograph but we could use their toilets. That was helpful since I was the only one in our van who couldn’t just pee along the side of the road along this totally tree-less route.

Puteri Harbour Marina

Johor, Malaysia

Hi All,

  We received an email from Ronnie Lindberg, one of our Tibet tour friends.  He and David are in India and but will be in Africa at the end of the week!   They have posted some of their photos and a video taken during our Tibet tour.  http://www.project-7.se/ is their website.

   Randal and I visited a carpet factory in Lhasa.  Not all that interesting, but here are the photos.  I have one or two more emails about our time in Lhasa and then will finally begin to share the amazing images of the Tibet landscape.  Baseball is taking its All Star break so I have lots of time to work on email.

Ru

DoraMac

Tibet # 11 Carpet Factory

“Tibet is the home of traditional carpet making, though the industry suffered a decline after 1959 from which it has only slowly begun to recover. Today many “Tibetan” carpets are in fact made in Nepal in factories run by Tibetan exiles. For the visitor, a little caution is needed when buying Tibetan carpets in Lhasa since the majority of pieces displayed in stores in the Barkhor and in front of the Potala are in fact imported from non-Tibetan parts of China, and many of the designs on display have no connection with Tibetan tradition; Turkomen and Afghan designs being common! In some workshops you will find a few carpets on looms for display purposes, but the carpets in the showroom will mostly have been shipped in from elsewhere.

So how to find authentic Tibetan carpets? By all means visit the factories and their showrooms. Look closely at what is being woven, and make sure the piece you are buying matches what you are shown on the looms. Check the smell of the carpet: authentic Tibetan wool has a high lanolin content and a distinctive odor: cheaper wools from Qinghai and Mongolia are dry by comparison.

A few older carpets can still occasionally be found on the Barkhor and the shops around, though good, old carpets are much sought after by collectors, so prices tend to be surprisingly high even in Lhasa. “

http://www.chinatravelguide.com/ctgwiki/Lhasa

http://www.toranahouse.com/carpetmaking.html is the website of Tanva Carpets located near Lhasa. It explains why using wool from specific long-hair sheep matters and shows how the rugs are made. Pretty interesting. Unfortunately we just went to a show room but did see a quick demonstration of how the weaving is done.

Not sure if this was an outlet or a factory or what. Everyone was at a late lunch though Lobsang, our Tibetan guide did manage to find someone to open the showroom

I managed to miss the “No Photos” sign and took this one though the clerk asked me not to take any more and, of course, I didn’t. We aren’t in the market for rugs so they quickly lost interest in us. We could tell the really good carpets from those less good, but that’s about it. The good ones feel like really good wool. One day we’ll have nice carpets in the boat. Now we have more practical industrial carpet covering our lovely teak floors.

Lobsang managed to find someone who found this young woman to show us how the carpets are woven. It was something Randal had really wanted to see so it was nice that she left her lunch hour to come to show us. We were told afterwards that it took 2 people 90 days to weave one rug.

It was all “show “and very little “tell” so we’re not really sure how the sides are actually finished.

You can see the pattern that she is following tacked up on the loom

The back side of a really well made rug looks nice too. It felt good on both sides and seemed almost reversible. I read that the pattern and colors on the back should be very clear as they were on this carpet.

Randal came away thinking that this was just a demonstration area and that most rugs were made by machines and some of the ones in the showroom didn’t seem handmade. I’m sure I looked, but I don’t remember the prices. Actually, it didn’t seem as if “tourists” were expected so we didn’t stay very long.

It wasn’t the most interesting thing we did in Tibet, though a real, handmade Tibetan rug would be something to treasure. And we certainly did see herds of sheep on our way to Everest and through the countryside. Maybe if we’d had a home to ship it to, we would have been tempted by a rug; but that won’t be for many, many years so we’ll just wait. In a few years, when we cruise around Turkey, maybe we’ll find one we both love.

Puteri Harbour Marina

Johor, Malaysia

Hi All,

  Well we all know who won the FIFA games.  At least Randal and I do because even we got caught up in it.  It’s impossible not to when everyone else in the world we live in follows the game.  Randal and I were actually hoping The Netherlands would win because we’d enjoyed our time there in 2000. 

  My emails seem to have more commentaries attached than usual.  I guess it’s because Tibet has many political questions connected to its recent history starting in 1951.  With Chinese soldiers in Lhasa and lots of checkpoints of Chinese soldiers along the way; it’s impossible to ignore. 

  On a lighter note, about those skirt ties….Women who prostrate themselves on the ground need something to keep their skirts in place so tie them with the ropes.  The ropes keep the skirts from flying around ending up around their hips.  Way back when, rubberbands around your pants legs would keep them out of moving bicycle parts.  Now, of course, we have spandex except when we go for a bike ride around Lhasa and have to wear our jeans and then you do need rubberbands to keep the material close to your legs and away from moving bicycle parts.  Hope that clears up the rope around the skirt mystery. 

Ru

DoraMac

Tibet # 10 Barkhor

The Barkhor is the center section of the old part of Lhasa city. In its center in the Jokhang Temple. I came across the following wonderful description….

“The Jokhang, Tibetan Buddhism’s most sacred temple, stands broad and low in the heart of Lhasa, the locus of daily visits and once in a lifetime pilgrimages. From earliest dawn to last light, Tibetans arrive from nearby neighborhoods and the region’s far mountains to worship at the Jokhang. They circumambulate the temple on a sacred path known as the kora, burn juniper as incense, leave offerings, and perform other rituals in order to earn religious merit for the next life. The area around the Jokhang, known as the barkhor, is the heart of Lhasa where Tibetans live, socialize and shop. Houses and stores fill the spaces between the temple buildings, incense kilns and prayer poles, transforming the holy kora into an enclosed lane of constant movement, a clock-wise flowing stream of worshippers, residents, vendors and shoppers. Mornings, however, are the most sacred in the barkhor, when a quiet purposefulness of worship permeates the protracted dawn. Faith is an essential element of Tibetan character and identity, if anything reinforced by the political turmoil of the twentieth century. From young to old in Tibet, faith is as strong as ever.” By Amina Tirana http://www.asianart.com/exhibitions/barkhor/index.html#3 where there is also an exhibit of her wonderful black and white photographs. All of the photos in this email were taken by me.

A warren of streets that surround and make up the Barkhor.

Behind heavy wood doors were courtyards of the older Barkhor buildings that were shared by many people. In the older buildings people live in separate apartments but might share a source of water and toilets. In those that have been renovated there is electricity, running water and possibly a toilet though plumbing can be an issue. Apparently pounded earth is used in the construction. We saw pounded earth floors at the monasteries and they seemed like stone.

“The local government is also upgrading old houses in the city, and the Lhasa Environmental Protection Bureau has placed housing renovation at the top of its list since the Cultural Revolution, because, officials said, many of the old dwellings are becoming unsound. They are dark and damp, and the supporting pillars are rotting. Around the Barkhor and the Shol (below the Potala,) the government brought in heavy equipment to pull down the old homes (bringing on complaints that China is destroying the charm of the old city,) and crews of Tibetans worked at rebuilding. By 1992, the TAR (Tibet Autonomous Region) government had spent more than $1 million on upgrading housing stock, bureau officials said. But some residents of the new Barkhor buildings have complained that the roofs leak and that the new houses, built with concrete instead of the traditional pounded earth and wooden poles, are poorly insulated. These houses are too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter, they say – but one Barkhor resident told me that you can get better quality construction if you bribe the right official.” P.73 Tibet: Abode of the Gods, Pearl of the Motherland. C. 1997 Barbara Erickson

This is an interesting book that speaks rather than screams about the issues in Tibet. I had started to read it before our trip but it meant nothing so I put it down. Now I find it very interesting, and of course, wish I’d read it before our trip.

Morning and evening hundreds of “pilgrims” make the circuit around the Barkhor walking clockwise as dictated by religious practice. At the center is the Jokhang Temple. Along the way are lots of stalls selling, prayer wheels, flags, and all sorts of colorful souvenirs. This was during our first, we’re lost, evening trip when we were given directions to the wrong Mandala Hotel taking us into the very center of the Barkhor. We had been there that morning with Lobsang so we weren’t totally clueless and eventually found our way out to the newer main road where our Mandala Hotel was located. We actually did fight the “traffic” as we walked through the streets.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6112107 NPR Weekend Edition

“September 24, 2006

Lhasa, Tibet’s capital, is struggling to maintain its ancient identity. Many parts of the city look much like cities across modern China.

But the spiritual epicenter of Tibet is still alive. It can be found along a circular street surrounding a 7th-century temple, where throngs of worshippers pray before a gold-and-jewel-encrusted statue of the Buddha Sakyamuni.

It’s the Barkhor, a neighborhood lined with shops and homes, most featuring the stone construction, trapezoidal shapes and black-outlined windows of traditional Tibetan architecture.

People from all over Tibet walk around the Barkhor in prayer: Monks and nuns in maroon robes; Khampa horsemen with long knives; nomads clad in sheepskin robes. Everywhere you turn are the historic homes of famous priests, merchants and noblemen.”

Many carried prayer wheels and beads.

For some it might just be a walk to work rather than a religious experience.

Suddenly a person would drop to the ground and prostrate themselves. Often they worked their way around the entire circuit doing this. Many had what were called wooden gloves but looked a bit like paddles to protect their hands.

The center point of the Barkhor is the Jokhang Temple which was crowded with visitors the morning we actually went inside.

A large stone incense burner in the Barkhor.

The base of a prayer flag covered pole.

Not sure if you can tell, but those look to be the newer stile concrete building in the photo.

And then there were the stalls selling stuff….

Lookie, Lookie, very cheap…. Is what they would all say. Then, usually with a smile, they would mimic my “Just looking,” which I’m sure they were tired of hearing.

I would have liked some of these shiny pots and pans.

Prayer wheels and turquoise colored stones. Turquoise and red “mountain” coral  are used to decorate traditional Tibetan dress. Hard to know what’s real especially when it was sold so cheaply. We bought very little because it was hard to find anything sold here that you can’t find sold in China, or even some things down on the Market in Roanoke. Except for maybe a prayer wheel. My souvenirs were the stones I picked up along the way as we traveled from Lhasa to Everest. And my red (Lucky Red Sox) bead I bought on our way to Everest.

Yak hair broom?

The Tibetans are avid horsemen and here are some stirrups for sale.

Randal negotiates for a souvenir prayer wheel.

Tibet has yak and sheep and lots of wool products. Here a Muslim woman in pink and Tibetan or Chinese women in floppy hats knit in front of their yarn stalls. There is a Mosque and a Muslim community in the Barkhor area. We walked through it our second evening after a late dinner.  We were altitude stressed, so hadn’t planned on going walking, but were revived by spicy noodles.    It was the only time I didn’t have my camera. We never made it back to that area so I have no photos. It was quite charming and the people were very friendly and the food stalls tempting.

Looking down on it all from the roof top of our “regular restaurant” just around the bend from the Jokhang Temple.

After giving up on the jam packed, smoky Jokhang Temple tour, Randal came up here to watch the world go by, drink a Lhasa Beer, and wait for me. Behind the umbrella covered stalls are the wagons that stall keepers use to transport their goods back and forth to the Barkhor.

Chinese soldiers with guns were stationed on the roof just across from our roof top restaurant.

Roof top of the Mandala Restaurant where we ate many times.

It was nice to sit up here with the sun shining and look out over the center of Lhasa and listen to the same music played over and over. Luckily I liked the pretty Tibetan melody though less so by the 100^th time I heard it. On our last visit to this restaurant, I stopped at the “western” toilet one steep flight down from the roof top (where the choice was an open air squat toilet.) I went to fill the bucket to flush the toilet and there was no water. Then there was no water in the sink out in the hall. I asked one of the waitresses and she said that there was no water. I went up to the roof and told Randal and washed with my water bottle but wondered about a restaurant with no running water. We ordered a yak burger which was huge and came with fries and salad and was big enough to share. Not sure about running water issues, but we had no problems. Our hotel lost electricity for about 15 minutes one afternoon but we were more concerned about the Internet connection which came back on with the return of the electricity. We always had lots of running water and hot water when we wanted it.

Yak curry with naan bread.

We ate several meals at the Mandala Restaurant, the first being this yak curry. But I like the yak burger best. The vegetable masala was good too.