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Published: February 14th 2007
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Ok, so i know i've been really rubbish with my blog for
a while but i fully intend to catch up in the next few
days. Since i last blogged i've been in Hampi,
Ragasthan, Agra, Dehli, Amritsar and now we are in
Mcleod Ganj in the Himilayas.
Firstly, it's bloody clod here. It snowed the other day
and is not far off freezing. That might not sound bad bu
t consider the fact that there is not heating here so it
is also about freezinf inside the bedroom. So you lot
can have a turn at laughing at me! Luckily we had picked
up yak wool jumpers in Dehli and the first thing i did
here was head out for wooly hat, gloves and socks, which
help. I am currently wearing almost all the clothes I
have, which is problematic as they are now very smelly
(had to wear them in bed too) but to wash them invloves
taking them off.
The reason we are here is becuase Mcleod Ganj is were the Dali Lama lives and were the Tibetan Government in Exlie operate
from. This means that there are more Tibetans here than Indias and lot and lots of monks. Incase you don't know Tibet was taking over by China and the Dali Lama who was Tibets spiritual and political leader had to flea in 1959. Thousand and thousnads of Tibetans went with him and people are still escaping over the mountians.
The plight of Tibetans in Tibet is really terrible. We have talked to a monk who was a political prisoner in Tibet just becuase he followed the Dali Lama. He has written a book too which Sam has read some of and he was tortured really badly in prison. This kind of thing has happened to loads of people and a stupid number of Tibetans have been killed since China took over. Anyway it's all rather depressing so if anyone fancies writing to their MP asking them bring it up in parliment that would be cool. China is also trying to stop the Dali Lama (and Desmond Tutu because he's mate with the Dali Lama) speaking out at UN meetings too.
Well apart from all that it's really beautiful up here. Today it started out raining but about 5
pm it cleared up and we could see the snowy mountians with the sun shining on them, all from out bedroom window. Really lovely.
The only downside is that Sam got Dehli belly on our first day and I was up all night throwing up so we haven't actually done a lot. We have visited the main temple which has a really good Tibet Museum though. Tomorrow i'm going to get down to the serious bussiness of shopping beofre we go home.
We may be here for a week more depending on whether we can cope with the cold. Then we head to Dehli and meet Racheal for her birthday before getting a super posh train back to Mumbai then homeeeeeeeeeee. Really looking forward to being back with you all agian.
Keep an eye out for other updates in the next few days.
Love Jen
This add on in just to tell you the story of our journey back to Delhi that left me very thankful to be alive. We got a ticket for an overnight bus from McLeod to Delhi which sounded ok. We found the bus a little way down the road and
rationalised that they are just to big to park in the village. We managed to get on and get our bags in the bus eventually. All was going well until 17km down the road we stopped for no apparent reason. After about 20 minuets we saw flashing lights and the police turned up. People got off to investigate at this point and it turned out that the bus didn’t have the correct licence to carry tourist. They had us down as a Tibetan tour party and apparently we were all called Tenzin. There was a ferocious policewoman in charge who started trying to intimidate people into giving statements. We eventually all got off and were promised replacement ‘government’ (crappy) buses. After hours some buses turned up but were already half full so we couldn’t get on. Some people did go though. After some more hours another bus came and we all pilled on. This was a normal public bus which meant people were squashed up and very uncomfortable. Luckily, seconds before we were due to go and Indian couple noticed that the driver was so drunk he couldn’t ever say his name. Now this is bad but it is particularly
bad given that the roads down from McLeod are hairpin bends with huge drops either side. We then broke the record for most people to exit a bus in under a minuet. I am pretty sure that if the bus has gone we would not be here to tell the tale. I am every grateful to those who noticed the driver. We decided this was the time to fight back and demanded that we got back on the original (comfortable bus) with the sober driver and get going. After being cornered and shouted at a lot the Policewoman gave in and we got back on the bus. By this time there were only 12 of us because the others had got on an earlier bus so we all had 4 seats each.
We got to Delhi unharmed in the end but learnt a lesson. Always check the driver isn’t drunk. The whole episode left me marvelling at the fact that I was alive. Still it’s a pretty good tale to tell.
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