The temple smelled of Christmas

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04-DEC-2007

I wake up with the worst headache of all time and my stomach hates me. I've not had a drop to drink. But to be completely fair, Xigatse is at 3900m (12,870ft) and my home in Delaware is at about 2m (6.6ft). Big difference. And we've surely not had much time to adjust. But I do not have altitude sickness- ha! I can't get out of bed, but once I manage to do so, my sleeping bag takes a good 1/2 hour to roll up. We're treated to a nice breakfast with sweet bread and jam, but my hard boiled egg is green and tastes a bit off. So I eat mine as well as my neighbors- why not. All the other jeeps have left, and mine is waiting for me to return from the bathroom. Appropriate.

It's only a short drive to the next town, Gyantse, a couple hours or so away. We have about an hour to grab lunch before another monastery tour. Due to choice or not, jeep two has our first yak butter tea. Could be better, but certainly has a bit of a bad reputation. Salty tea may not float everyone's boat, but if you tell yourself it's soup broth or something, it tends to go down quite easily... unless it's cold. At the teahouse, we can only order food that someone else has ordered, by means of pointing. We do not know a word of Tibetan (except for salt), and they do not know a word of English. Every meal is a challenge and adventure.

After food, we jeep it over to the monastery where a street child rips Tahmeena's bag of snacks right out of her hand. In response, I tie my hat strings together because I wish to keep it- I love that thing. The first temple we enter is absolutely huge- the monks' beds are lined up in rows in the center of the large room. Since it just so happens to be a holy day, half of Tibet has joined us at the monastery with yak butter offerings for the gods. The statues and wall paintings are amazingly elaborate, and there is heaps of Chinese Yuan scattered about. My favorite temple smelled like Christmas and was warm, that's probably why it was my favorite. And everything is colored red or bronze- very majestic.

I hit the shops downtown for yet more sweets/biscuits (we can't go hungry now), herbal belly medicine (Western medicine is nonexistant), and a thin sweater for $4 with 3/4 length sleeves... or maybe my arms are significantly longer than all of China. The sweater was a necessity as I hadn't exactly brought any with me from home.

The sun is so warm! It's below freezing in the shade, but in the sun you could close your eyes and imagine yourself on a summer holiday. So I sit next to a large mirror-lined satellite dish replica heating a pot of tea. I managed to lose everyone I know, but quickly came across Andy, Oliver, and Caleidh before stopping for the best meal in Asia yet- square dumpling noodles with vegetables in broth... so tasty.

Later on, I managed to finally run into Tahmeena again and we hit up the shops for warmer clothes but to no avail. My arms are just too damn long. After the sun sets, we're desperately in need of some heat so with Steve head to this Western food place where they have a wood fire cooking up a pot of noodle soup. I need banana pancakes... and we each take the plunge and treat ourselves to a bit more than a full beer each. We're so apprehensive about doing so at this altitude, convinced that we'll stop breathing in our sleep from a single drink. And then you have my asthma. But we need to feel warm, so it's quite the delicate balance.

After heading back to the hotel, we're pleasantly surprised that our room has managed to retain some of the heat from the direct sunshine earlier- 10degC!!! Unfortunately, the bathroom door is locked. This is a problem. We track down the woman who was supposed to be at reception to unlock it, but she does so with the room door wide open, letting out our precious, precious heat. And though I so terribly wanted and needed to take a shower... the sun was down. No sun, no shower. I will learn eventually.

Tahmeena doesn't take her cold medicine because she doesn't want to die in the middle of the night, and I can't disagree. That would probably put a damper on the remainder of the holiday- for both of us. But my blankets are so warm here!

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Photos

Monastery
Not the one we visited