paradise found

the road from zhongdian to xiangcheng was the roughest i've been on: 7 hours of a dirt track clinging to alpine mountainsides by its fingertips. all around, snow-covered peaks blasting out of the tibetan forests. unbe-fucking-lievable. apart from some issues with a weak bladder, i was pretty much glued to the windows the whole time.

two days after leaving zhongdian i arrived in litang, which is sometimes called 'the highest town in the world'. i'm not sure if that's true, but at 4014m, it left me breathless!

80% of the people there were tibetan, and i had to swap 'ni hao' for 'tashi dele', as many people spoke no mandarin at all. i'm proud to say that i can now read, write, and hold a basic conversation in tibetan!

...just kidding...who do you think i am? as if.

i want to relate three experiences that occured of a morning in litang:

1) the monastery. i went up to the litang monastery just after dawn (with a bunch a kids), and started poking around. before i knew it, 60 (almost mobile-phone free) monks and ondrej were sitting around in the cold morning light of an old tibetan prayer hall chanting mantra, sharing bread and drinking yak-butter tea. no other tourists to the horizon. mind-blowing. later on a naughty little monk (not like that unfortunately) took me on a tour of certain forbidden parts of the complex - onto the roof, special temples, etc. it was a real privelege. the monk experience ended as i was leaving and throngs of the holy men rushed out, surrounded me, and started asking me a million questions...about how to operate their new video camera.

down in front buddha! you're blocking the screen.

2 - the tibetan home. as i was walking home i was invited by an old tibetan man into his home, where he fed me tibetan bread, gave me tea, and also a gift of a buddhist prayer necklace (the equivalent of a rosary). i felt honoured, and out of respect i might sell it on e-bay.

3 - the fields, the bike. i stumbled out onto the fields of the high plateau that litang sits on to get a view of the snow-capped peaks that surround it. it really is gorgeous, and i'm not sure if it's the altitude, but you seem to see clouds from a different, and more beautiful angle than at sea level. i love altitude! before i knew it, i was with two monks sitting on the back of a motor-bike and we were zipping around the field with the wind in our hair.

it's difficult to convey how sublime, and yet how common, these experiences are. they fill my days. the knowledge, the connection, the experience of it all is the reason i travel. these people, and this culture is so different, and yet where-ever i go in the world i'm always struck by how all people are exactly the same. a paradox. it's life affirming.

you know how sometimes you sit back and you think: 'my god...what am i doing with my life...? am i doing the right thing...?'

i don't. but anyway - if i ever did - then sharing a mug of yak butter tea with a tibetan monk, or riding a motorbike at 4000m, or just sitting in the back of a bumpy bus breathless with awe at the scenery would be all it would take to confirm: hello ondrej! yes! the life that you're living is just right!

pic 1 - picture from the bus window from zhongdian to xiangcheng
pics 2 + 3 - people around the monastery

pic 4 - the monastery from behind with the litang plain/plateau in the background
pic 5 - typical tibetan-style house
pic 6 - the litang plain

pic 7 - kids on their way to school