Day #4 - Thanka for the Painting

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At the end of the tour, our guide ushers us inside a shop making and selling “Thanka” paintings. These are highly detailed paintings depicting a Buddhist deity on a silk canvas that can take 3-6 months to complete, depending on the size and quality of the painting. The shop owners bring out several completed paintings and offer us looking glasses to admire the detail – and it was impressive. At the end of their talk on the paintings they offer some of the completed paintings for us to purchase. Whilst they were impressive, and I would have liked to have purchased one a souvenir, I had neither the cash nor a credit to hand to cover this purchase. I made my apologies I didn’t have the means to pay – but clearly they had heard this line before and were well prepared for it.

“Do not worry, you take away the painting with you now, and we come to your hotel this evening at 6pm to collect the money”. These guys would impress even a timeshare salesman. I agreed on the deal, collected my painting, and we headed back to the hotel. Later that evening at the appointed hour, the very nice chap from the shop came to collect his money. Nicely done.

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