China 2007

Tuesday, the third of July. It would be a long day of walking, shopping, listening, praying, getting sunburned, and going on wacky adventures with Mrs. James and Mr. Kozden. After a Western buffet on the roof, we boarded the bus and headed off to Tibet's version of a Summer Palace. Just like Beijing, it had become more of a summer park, the building essentially a museum. We walked through a tunnel of trees, and Nutu pointed out pieces of fur attached to various branches. They were placed there by people who had saved an animal from death, and taken a piece of their fur for a blessing and encouragement to others. We could see similar pieces at various monasteries. Mrs. James was feeling pretty good, so she pointed out a piece of an orange trashbag in a tree and asked, "Did somebody save the trashbag's life?" And then cackled, giving it away. But our guide, being downright awesome, laughed along and replied with a pointed, "Yes."

The place was full of flowers and fountains with no particular purpose but to be decorative. We crossed simple bridges over ponds full of ducks, and beside simple little buildings reflecting on the water to seem grand.
Finally we entered the main palace building. This place once housed the Dalai Lama, and pilgrims still came here to pay homage. We observed a gigantic mural of the history of Lhasa, from a statue being cut out of a tree (which we would see later as the holiest place in all of Tibet) to a palace being constructed over a lake. We saw the first monastery being built during the day, strangely destroyed at night, caught in an endless cycle until a great diety arrived and gave peace to the land.

Careful to give priority to the scurrying pilgrims, we moved on through the Lama's rooms of meditation, study, and public audience (separate rooms for local and Western audiences).

Mrs. James asked how China was controlling the religion in Tibet. Sadly, our guide claimed that the Chinese were taking yet greater measures to limit the people's practice of Buddhism. Walking around certain monuments in the clockwise fashion was prohibited, and prostration was sometimes persecuted. Seeing our interest in the subject, he continued on about the movie Seven Years in Tibet and subsequent films that emphasized the good qualities of Tibet, and how all those involved in the films were blacklisted for entry into China. From information he received from another student group, he told us about Students for Free Tibet. If we showed any adoration towards the region around Chinese, we would get "free coffee", a euphemism for deportation. We were soon silenced as we passed a guard, and couldn't talk about it for quite some time.

For some reason, our group likes the pain of climbing thousands of stairs. Although the next monastery we would visit wasn't on the itinerary, Mrs. James made us cough up the money, claiming we couldn't miss it. On the first part of our climb, we encountered whole bundles of fur from saved animals. We just kept climbing and climbing, occassionally entering chapels that all looked the same. One thing this city doesn't lack - good views. We had a panorama of the city below us, music faintly drifting up. One of the protector-diety chapels was for men only, and we took pride in our privelege. It wasn't much to see, however.

Whereas previous monasteries had cared for the stray dogs of the city, this particular one seemed fond of cats. In one of the main halls, a cat sat lazily on the throne of a statue. A monk was waving one of the decorative scarves on the statue above the cat, either trying to get it to move, or to amuse it.

We got on the bus once more, navigating through crowded streets. Within a few minutes (everything in Lhasa seems close) we were in the Baakar district, ready for lunch at a place called Lhasa Kitchen. The first impression wasn't that great: a hot and smokey room, Mrs. James running after us, madly shouting, because she had lingered behind buying a t-shirt and we didn't wait for her. When we got sight and scent of the food, however, our attitudes changed. The appetizer was tomato soup, that tasted as though it should have little spaghetti letters in it. Then, pita bread and cheesy pizza. Checken curry, yak meat, and lentil soup. I even talked the waitress into a free refill, something normally unheard of. We left the restaurant satiated, and with some free time on our hands.

I set off shopping in the giant plaza ahead of us. Little stalls with persistent owners (a few grabbed me, other just yelled a lot) covered every patch of ground, mostly selling little trinkets. A few sold monks' robes, a few tourist clothes, and one stall was completely taken up by a giant plastic blender, at least four feet tall. I found some permanent stores, hidden behind stalls, in which the vendors were not quite so obnoxious. I found a traditional sweater, made partly from yak, and an equally traditional shirt for summer wearing. I treasure the style of traditional Tibet: vibrant, random colors in patches and stripes that don't seem to have any fashion consideration.

Our appointed tour time for the Potala Palace was 3:20, so at 2:15 we met to walk over there. The palace is gigantic, with over one thousand rooms, of which two were built in the seventh century. The central "Red Palace" is flanked by two white stretches, displaying hundreds of windows, row after row, seemingly for eternity. Thirteen stories high doesn't even count the switchback after switchback of large Great Wall-like steps, ascending up the hill. It took much of our spare time to reach the inner palace, where we stopped to rest and watch the workers renovate, chanting and pounding. Other workers carried huge poles up and down the stairs, and still others beat things with sticks. They worked for free, their reward being the blessing of the palace grounds. Brown walls everywhere were just layers and layers of bundles of sticks, painted brown on their circular faces. Gold-ornamented roofs and rooms that stood out as second-story islands in courtyards make the place a maze beyond reckoning.

Construction on the Portala was begun by the fifth Dalai Lama, the first to hold power religiously and politically. Church and state, as Nutu put it. When he died before the palace was complete, his highest minister kept this a secret for twelve years, so that the people would not lose faith and could complete the palace.

We wound our way through rooms inside and outside, hallways, chapels and sanctuaries for meditation and prayer, seeing many outstanding things. Among others, the tombs of three Lamas were present. At least twenty feet high and of solid gold on sandlewood, these urns held just a handful of ashes. We calculated the gold alone to cost more than seventy million US dollars, no doubt understated, but they were also adorned with more than one thousand precious jewels and gems.

In one room, a statue was presented alongside a giant pearl quite important to the religion: believed to be extracted from an elephant's brain. In the Lama's chambers, many rugs covered with swastikas could be spotted. They were a symbol of permanence, our guide explained, and a blessing that the Lama would remain forever on his throne in the palace. That didn't work out so well for the current Dalai Lama.

Mrs. James declared the best engagement present to be anything with a swastika. Any Western spouse would most certainly appreciate the gesture.

After a long and exhausting walk (although the tour was only allowed to last one hour) we had finally descended to ground level. We were surprised that scriptures inscribed in rock, just lying outside on the path down, hadn't been taken. Somebody had offered an egg. Nutu once told us that even water could be offered to the many statues present in every monastery or holy place, as long as the donation was sincere.

We returned to square in the Baakar area, where the most holy monastery of all was located. This was the last we would see our bus for the day, and in getting all my stuff off and packed well enough to tour a monastery, I completely lost the group. So I had some fun exploring until I caught up with them at the entrance.

The place was flat, and just a few stories high, with every balcony, window and railing decorated with greenery and flowers. Once inside, it was crowded and dim, low voices chattering over the general murmur. Mrs. James had her first prayer in front one of the holiest statues in Buddhism: one of the three that just came out of a tree that was cut open. The other two are located in Nepal and India.

There wasn't much to see at this monastery besides the usual monks, cats, candles surrounded by butter and giant vats of wax, and statues. Nutu never failed to name each and every statue, getting the story pretty well pounded into our heads.

After the monastery, a visit to a government art gallery was required. We spent nearly ten minutes wandering through, not buying a thing because it was too expensive or too big. There were huge paintings of a female Buddha, and more statues, prayer wheels, and jewelry.

Then we were free, until dinner, again on the roof. I rushed back to the hotel along with many of the group, to rest and upload a fraction of my still photographs at the business center: 75 cents and hour for snail-paced internet.

Dinner? Spaghetti! There was a mix of Western and Chinese options in the form of a buffet, but I decided on the Western. It was a delicacy in these parts.

Mrs. James wanted to rent a bike and ride to the palace to people-watch, but the deposit was too much so we took a rickshaw, along with Mr. Kozden and my roommate. The square across from the Portala is the antithesis of any holy palace: a giant Chinese flag waves high, and in the background a sharply angled monument celebrates "the peaceful transition of Tibet to Chinese control." Kozden remarked, "The only thing the place needs is the Chinese National Anthem blaring over loudspeakers."

We walked down to a little lake behind the plaza, where five little boats were parker. Our first thought: paddleboats. But no, they were motorized, and they also had a little watergun on the front. Mrs. Kozden didn't want to go, but Mrs. James and Will hopped right in. The were pushed away from the dock, with explicit instruction (via sign language) not to go under any bridge or hit a buoy. Mrs. James immediately steered into the hanging branch of a tree, so that it scraped across the boat's roof, and the man in charge ran over shouting and pointing. I was laughing so hard that I couldn't tell Mrs. James to stop - she had plowed right into the thing so purposefully, then loudly said, "Awkward." The man was furious, and he kept repeating some phrase in Mandarin and pointing at the tree.

Meanwhile, Will was at the gun. Whenever he pressed the trigger, it began to play a loud, cheesy song. So when I finally stopped laughing long enough to warn Mrs. James, she couldn't hear me above the monotonous beeping and screeching. Suddenly, one of the buoys that Will had pointed the gun at exploded with water, showering the boat. Mrs. James screamed so loud, the whole palace across the street must have heard. Another boat embarked from the dock, and Kozden and I soon had a turn in Mrs. James' boat. After much reluctance I let him steer, and I had to listen to the tune drone on and on, occassionally setting off the buoy when the other boat was near.

When our twenty minutes was up, we took a rickshaw to the Baakar area. We were immediately caught up in a stream of monks, nuns and pilgrims circling the monastery clockwise. Dusk was coming on, and we watched the masses prostrate in front of the temple and half-submerged rooms full of candles.

As we walked through less populated streets and alleys, a monk stops us and asks to take our picture with his cell phone. Mrs. James proposed we take his picture. We then mused - having seen pictures of Lamas all around monasteries - that one day a picture of us would be there, the rare foreigners.

Will shopped for a door to ship back the the States while the rest of us watched the young and elderly walk around and prostrate. We came upon a booth where a little gun was set up, and a corkboard holding many small balloons. For a few cents, one could play until he or she missed a balloon. What a simple, amusing way to enjoy an absolutely amazing city.

Crossing the street back to our hotel, we played Frogger with the traffic. Even on a crosswalk, nothing would stop. As we avoided the big trucks and smaller cars, pausing in the middle as traffic whizzed by within inches, we almost got hit by a bike. What a joke.

Our final plan for the day was to get some chocolate cake, cheesecake or apple pie as served by the bar next to our hotel, called Dunya ("world" in ten different languages). We went in, to find a friendly Dutch expat who could speak English perfectly. The chocolate cake didn't look so good, so we all ordered apple pie, along with Mollie and Christina, who had joined us just after we crossed the street. And that's when I saw it: right in the middle of the menu, a Yak Burger. Yak meat. Burger. I was in heaven. I escaped alive with my burger and consumed it (the fries had attracted swarms of Webbies). Beautiful, beautiful yak meat, in an amazing burger. It can't be described in words - it was the most succulent, flavorful meal I've ever eaten. The apple pie with ice cream topped it off, and I had already eaten dinner. I'm becoming a hobbit.

To end on an unfortunately note, the sun of Lhasa is brutal. Even with sunscreen, much of the group went to bed with glowing faces, necks and arms... especially me. After such an exciting day, though, I couldn't complain.