We're in Tibet! We're all very thrilled to be here. Since it's no secret that the Chinese government keeps a very close eye on everything in and about Tibet, I will be posting nothing that could be misinterpreted by the Chinese government in such a way that could make our trip more difficult.
We've already run into a little bit of trouble. Our travel agent told our Poet she'd be able to travel to Mt. Everest with her Chinese passport, but we now hear she needs a Chinese ID card, not a passport. Since one gets a Chinese ID card with residency, and she's a Chinese citizen but a resident of the U.S. she doesn't have one. We're hoping this will get straightened out.
We were also scheduled to perform at a popular bar in Lhasa, like you might have read on our itinerary. We practiced a whole bunch, and I even learned how to play the spoons! Here I am banging away on the spoons with the real musicians by the largest salt lake in China:
However, our show was cancelled. More about that later. Regardless, we are extremely happy to be here in Lhasa. It is a beautiful place and an awesome city. Why don't you have a look?
There are lots of monks here:
Some remote terrain, cheap and fine
Safe construction practices:
And there's some adorable dogs lying around everywhere. Dogs are sacred here in Tibet, and they're very happy about it. The next post might just be a compilation of all the adorable dogs we've seen.
Before I get too far into Tibet, though, there's some stuff we did right before we got here, which was just really fantastic, like visiting the Chaieimu sand dunes. Our Wiz Kid Videographer doing what he does best in Chaieimu:
Right next to where I shot the above picture, there was a beautiful copse of poplars fluttering in the breeze, on which we hung our prayer flags. Right beyond that, though were some glorious sand dunes piling up over a hundred feet high. Ariel, Big A, not too keen on climbing them stayed back with our guide, Helen to guard our prayer flags, while we raced up the dunes. Well, I did at least, and those dunes were just about the steepest slipperiest dunes in China. I was running up almost at the same pace as I was sliding down. I got sand in my socks and sand in my hair and sand in my shoes, and sand in my pants. When I got to the top, though, I made sure everyone else, thinking about turning back, got to the top to see some of the most beautiful vistas of this entire trip. There were dunes hundreds of feet high rolling off into the desert just as far as you could see. There were glorious mountains guarding the horizon around the biggest, most beautiful desert landscape I'd seen in my life:
In those last two pictures, do you see those little dots on top of that little dune covered in plants? Those are people. That's how big this space was. Compared to everything else, it seemed like me and the folks on top of that dune were pretty close by. First: our Mississippi Bluesman. Second: the Videography Wizard and the Poet
And when we got back down, (after a short watermelon break which some Chinese tourists offered us, and oh boy was that the best watermelon we'd ever had)
Big A wasn't as pleased as we were about the past three hours. He was a good sport about it, though. Big A, little drummer boy. Rum pum pum pum:
There were some good flags in this batch, including the ones made by our Poet's Mind & Matter class at Macalester about the intersection of neuroscience and geography of rivers explored through biology and creative writing. Ping brought the class up to the headwaters of the Mississippi to be a part of the Kinship of Rivers project. Lin Aanonsen taught the biology part.
We were hoping to have time to come back to those amazing dunes at sunset, but we decided to try and squeeze a trip to China's biggest salt lake, and the drive there and back took far too long to allow for another trip back to the dunes. The lake was alright, but nothing compared to those dunes. We only stayed for about 15 minutes. I tasted some of the salt crystalized on the shore. It tasted salty. I don't know what I was expecting. Since we had some extra time to do some shopping, though not enough time to run around on dunes, our Wiz Kid Videographer bought a fake Rolex. It still tells time two days later!
Finally, after a long train ride, during which we made friends with a Chinese musician who was supposed to perform with us last night, we got to Lhasa. Previously we've been riding in "soft sleepers," which have four beds and a locking door. We were all delighted that the "hard sleepers" with six beds and no door were more comfortable than our Wiz Kid Videographer had been speculating for days in advance.
These silvery-white scarves mean "good luck," "welcome to Tibet," and "everyone can tell you're a tourist from a mile away."
Our favorite restaurant where our bill for the five of us totaled under 50 Yuan
Some of the older folks who were praying here had callouses on their foreheads from all the praying.
The empty palace of the Dalai Lama
These curtains, depicting the eternity knot, are made of yak hair. Our Poet overheard a Chinese guide telling his troop of tourists that every year Tibetan monks repaint the walls using a mixture of Yak butter, barley, and eggs. Actually, the Chinese government contracts some professional painters to whitewash it every couple years.
The Sera Monastery is the largest Tibetan monestary. Before the Cultural Revolution, there were over 7,000 monks living there. The limit is now 400.
It takes about a week for four monks to make a mandala like this painting with individual grains of sand. Usually a sand mandala like this is destroyed after a month to represent the impermanence of everything.
Dragons, according to Tibetans, represent authenticity. I'm fascinated by dragons. Why I even wrote a social satire about dropping out of high school to hunt dragons, which was published by Cloud City Press! Interested? You should buy a copy! Buy my book
More stuff at the monastery. This buddha's not even unwrapped yet, and he's already raking in some cash!
The Wheel of Time
Om nom nom. That's death right there.
The main feature of the Sera Monestary is the arguing monks. The monks hang out in the courtyard and debate. The guy standing up plays the devils advocate, and claps his hands before he makes a point. Those monks really liked doing the hand clap thing. They all did it with a huge wind up and an even bigger smile.
The younger monks argue in the front and the older monks argue in the back.
They look pretty happy, don't they?
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