Tibet - Hello from the roof of the world!

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Tibet is located in the southwest of China; it is the highest region on earth, with an average elevation of over 16,000 ft. The Tibet Autonomous Region is known locally as the "roof of the world". It is without doubt one of the most remarkable places we have visited in Asia. It offers fabulous monasteries, breathtaking high altitude views of the some of the worlds highest mountains, as well as an insight into the remarkable culture of the indigenous Tibetan people.

A line of spiritual leaders, the Dalai Lamas, ruled a large portion of the Tibetan region at various times from the sixteenth century up until the 1950s. China gained control of central and western Tibet in 1950. Tibet is under Chinese rule today. China and the Government of Tibet in Exile, still disagree over whether the incorporation into China of Tibet is legitimate under international law.

Heading to Tibet was the first time that we’d been on a plane since leaving Ireland for Greece two and half months ago; and what ‘should have been’ a 37-hour train ride was two and a half hours by flight! One of the benefits of flying via plane is that you get to see some of the most breathtaking scenery from the air; baron land inter-mixed with lots of snowcapped mountains. The disadvantage is that you land in at an attitude of well over 10,000 feet and have your breath literally taken away. We’d been warned a lot about the Tibetan altitude and the sickness that can accompany it (something we’d both been laughing about a few hours earlier, thinking what kind of dummies picked that up!).

My body didn’t take long though to become aware that it was getting a lot less oxygen from the air at this altitude, and within two minutes of stepping off the plane I noticed that I had to breathe-in somewhat forcefully to get air. The oxygen is much harder to get at high altitude, and altitude sickness is therefore pervasive in tourists. The airport was quite small and we headed out to the road to be greeted by our guide, who was holding up a sign saying “Nicola Mary”, and who immediately placed welcoming Tibetan scarves around our necks. Then we jumped into the Land Cruiser and were off to Lhasa (the capital) 1 hour away by road. The guides English was not so great, and we found it difficult to understand him at times. We learned quickly that we needed to be careful with leading sentences, as we noticed we were getting ‘yes’ responses to lots of questions, that sometimes should have been “no’s”!.

The hotel we arrived at was a Tibetan traditional hotel with no English spoken. Luckily the guide organised check-in etc. We had some Tibetan Sweet Tea (about 20 glasses to be exact, as it was refilled for us every 2 minutes!) and some Tibetan food that resembled ‘Monster Munch’ accompanied by tomato sauce - surprisingly nice though! Five minutes later the guide stood up and told us ‘see you tomorrow at 9am’. This suited us just fine as we wanted to explore Lhasa ourselves. Our first few hours were spent getting used to the altitude. Lhasa is at roughly 3,700m above sea level, which is a bit of a shock to the system. You find yourself walking very slowly, and out of breath easily. Any steps are exhausting and you constantly need to drink water to stay hydrated. We saw no westerners whatsoever and we were greeted with numerous curious looks, followed by ‘hello, hello’ from most local people we passed on the streets. It didn take long though for the altitude sickness to set in, so we went into a restaurant to rest and have some food. I had Yak Salad - yum! There is a predominance of all things Yak in Tibet. A Yak is like a hairy cow and the main herding animal in Tibet, which is a food staple for the majority of the population. Yaks are able to survive at high altitudes and are a very common site in this country. Their milk is used for butter, cheese, yoghurt etc, Their long woolen coats are used for clothing; their meat is a staple food i.e. Yak Steak; no part of the animal is wasted and even their dung is dried and used as fuel to heat water for drinking and cooking.

While out walking around, my headache from the altitude sickness seemed to be getting worse and worse, and it wasn’t long before we had to go back to the hotel. This is where the pain really set in. Within an hour I was vomiting and had a splitting pain in my head. The pain was getting so bad that I think I could have passed out. Luckily Nicola got the hotel manager, who coincidentally was also a doctor, and knew precisely what to do. Surprisingly to me, (but probably not so surprising when you think about it), you can actually buy oxygen locally and the doctor had a huge tank of it on hand. Basically it’s given to you in what looks like a pillow case with a tube coming out for your nose. After I inhaled the oxygen for about 20 minutes, the pain eased for a couple of hours, and I fell asleep. But once I fell asleep my breathing became shallow, and effectively I was getting less oxygen again to my brain - Nice! Suddenly I appeared to be caught in a terrible cycle. The more I slept the worse the pain got, and I woke every hour or so gasping for air and with a horrendous pain in my head. This persisted throughout the night, and by morning time I had such a frightening pain in my head that the hotel manager and our guide recommended that I go to the hospital to get some form of injection.

Nicola arranged for the guide to reschedule the start of our tour until the following day. He agreed and brought us to the local hospital and co-ordinated everything there. I can only say that the hospital was in complete chaos. For a minute I actually thought that he had brought us to a busy train station, as there was such mayhem around, with people cramming around desks and doors! People would just burst into the rooms where the sick were being examined, to ask questions or push an ill loved one inside, but were quickly ushered out as fast. At first glance we wondered if there was even any kind of queuing system going on at all. After the long wait to be seen to, a quick examination concluded that I wasn’t bad enough to get the injection and the doctor said that I just needed to acclimatise for a few days. So basically suffer on… great! Needless to say over the next few days, I actually became afraid to go to sleep. The pain during the day was manageable once I took oxygen every few hours; it went away after a while, but came back if I did anything strenuous that required serious movement (like climbing hills!). The pain at night was unbearable, and like a child afraid of ghosts or the boogie man, I used to dread falling off to sleep.

Now apart from me suffering severe altitude sickness, there were plenty of other more interesting things going on in Tibet. Religion and spirituality are extremely important to the Tibetans and they have a strong influence over all aspects of their lives; ingrained deeply into their cultural heritage. We really felt the importance of the temples and monasteries that we visited in Lhasa over the next couple of days. Some of the most memorable visits were to Sera Monastery, Jokhang Temple, and The Potala Palace (Winter Palace of the exiled Dalai Lama) - below are the details of some of those visits.

After a false start the previous day and not feeling that much better today either; we were informed that today was the start of a major festival in Lhasa; the "Yak Yogurt Festival" - (snigger!). Honestly, when we heard this we were both sneering to ourselves (probably out of cultural ignorance), as it sounded so funny, and the guide was so serious telling us about it. We were brought to the Sera Monastery which was closed when we got there, due to all the thousands of pilgrims visiting for the festival; the majority of whom were heading up this big hill with us, all excited to see the Buddha mural hanging on the mountain face, with some people even chanting as they went. The Tibetan people are devout Buddhists and take their religion extremely seriously. Outside the monastery we saw people on their hands and knees in prayer. Everywhere we went we saw prayer flags and people walking around carrying prayer wheels. Climbing up this steep hill was the first time I truly began to understand what the words ‘thin air’ really meant, as my lungs didn’t seem to want to breathe at all. We had to break several times on the ascent, and many locals called out to us - "Hello Yogurt" - which made us laugh… it was a valiant effort to sell us yoghurt, but sounded so peculiar! After an arduous climb to the top of the hill with the throngs and throngs of Tibetan pilgrims, we eventually reached the summit. It took over an hour to get there in what normally should take 20-30 minutes. The sight of such devout prayer and worship was a privilege to see. There was nothing to say, and we just sat there on a rock and watched in awe, silently.

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The Jokhang Temple, situated in Barkor Square, is one of Lhasa’s most important sites. In fact, it is considered one of the most significant religious structures in the whole of Tibet. It remains the ultimate destination for the perpetual mass of pilgrims who descend on Lhasa from all over the country, many of whom walk hundreds of miles to get here. We walked through the Square, the scene of major riots in the past number of years; therefore needless to say, it is well policed by the Chinese military! The front entrance of the temple is accompanied by two striking 20m high prayer poles at either side. There were many people walking in a clockwise direction around the temple, which is a form of prayer known as The Kora. This was another glimpse of the Tibetan people’s fundamental spirituality, as throngs and throngs of pilgrims bowed and prayed on the flagstones just outside the temple doors. We watched in utter amazement as hundreds of visitors kneeled, then stretched out completely face down on the ground, and then stood back up - doing this sequence all day long from sunrise to sunset, while simultaneously saying their prayers. Our guide explained to us that some people do this for weeks on end, resting only at night. The temple was packed when we visited, with only a small number of gawking tourists, all frustrated that photography inside was not allowed. We squeezed past the lines of pilgrims (thanks to our guide, who had no concept of queuing) into the little rooms inside, where it felt entirely wrong that numbers were not restricted going in there. It was very dark inside; most of the heat and light came from the hundreds of Yak butter candles (yes, candles can also be attributed to the Yak!). Many of the people were paying homage and getting a blessing from the monks inside.

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Potala Palace was the former home of the Dalai Lama (unoccupied since his exile in 1959) as well as several thousand monks. The magnificent Potala Palace was built on Lhasa’s highest point and has over 1,000 rooms. Our guide filled us in as we climbed the hundreds of steep steps up to the entrance at the top. Because the palace used to be home to the Dalai Lama, it is now considered to be one of the centres of spiritual power for Tibetans. We had to register our passports and permits the day before, and we had to go through metal detectors on the way in. As we took a break half way up the monstrous climb, we were allowed to take pictures of the city as the views were speculator. Once again, no photos were permitted indoors. Inside you get to see many chapels, monk prayer and mediatation areas, libraries holding scriptures, tombs of former Dalai Lamas and much more. Funnily there are no pictures of the 14th Dalai Lama anywhere within the palace, and I believe the guide said that to have one in Tibet is frowned upon by the authorities. During the height of the uprisings in 1959, the Dalai Lama fled over the border to India, where he now lives in political exile. These days the Palace is home to a few Tibetan monks and what seems like many many Chinese policemen.

Our stay in Lhasa city also included visits to Drepung Monastery & Norbulinka Palace (the former Summer Palace of Dalai Lama), both of which were thronged with visitors due to the important yoghurt festival taking place.

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After four days in Lhasa we headed on an 800km journey though the Tibetan countryside. The journey took another four days and the route for those interested was: . Tibet has some breathtaking scenery and some of the most impressive I have seen anywhere up to now. We passed over the dizzy heights of 16,000 feet along the way, and saw one of the holy lakes of Tibet. The lake (Yamdrok-tso Lake) was so blue that it looked like it had been dyed! We also got to see some of the most remote parts of Tibet and probably the poorest places we’ve seen to-date. We stopped in many villages along the way for food, and got to go to many traditional Tibetan restaurants. Nicola’s favorite was the restaurant with the massive bucket of yak shit sitting slam-bang in the middle of the restaurant floor, which the staff were throwing into the stove as fuel! Mine was the lovely establishment that served the stuffed lungs and sheep head!! - Yikes; I was going to try the lungs, but I was starving and well… looking around at the hygiene standards…… okay, no I lie; actually I didn’t have the balls to order it! Next time maybe! So, due to some funny English / Tibetan translation (and an absent guide, on his new mobile phone, when I needed him) I managed to order dessert for my dinner - Tibetan Barley Cake. Not that bad actually!

Over the next few days on our journey to Everest Base Camp, we stayed in a few more local guest houses, ate their local cuisine quite frequently (Sampa & Butter Tea… especially tasty), and drank the local beer (‘Lhasa Beer’). At many times on the trip, the road was blocked by the police and our guide had to show specific permits. At one police block Nicola was caught taking a sneaky picture and warned very nicely - cheeky girl! We saw very few westerners en-route. It’s fair to say that the people in many of the villages where we stopped were absolutely google-eyed to see us. Tibetan people do tend to stare, but it feels much friendlier than the Chinese who seem to gawk somewhat. If you say hello to a Tibetan, it’s immediately responded with “hello, hello” followed by some innocent giggling!! We found it incredibly sad how some of the people we encountered were so poor and had so very little to their name; it would bring a tear to your eye. I wondered what they must think when they see the pair of us with our oversized backpacks! I feel guilty in one respect for prying in on their lives, but I guess that’s why we travel; to see real life. We both realise how truly blessed we are to have been born in a first world country; to have been privileged with a fantastic education, and to be able to travel the world and do what we do.

The rest of the journey was quite rough; you really need a good local driver to navigate the terrain which is extremely mountainous. The windy mountain roads are definitely not for those who suffer motion sickness easily. I have to give credit to our Tibetan driver; his driving was what I can only term impeccable. He drove us over some of the roughest terrain, including down the sides of mountains for short-cuts! On many occasions we could only laugh in the back of the jeep at what was happening, in awe of the dangerous maneuvers he was carrying out with such precision. We then went off road for several hours (the roughest part of the trip), over the Himalayan hills and through the most rugged areas of the country, in order to get us to Everest Base Camp and beyond!!

Yes indeed - this was going to be the one place in Tibet where myself and Nicola would become pilgrims ourselves, paying our respects to Mother Nature. At Everest Base Camp we stayed in a make shift hotel (a word used loosely up here) made with a mixture of corrugated iron and wood and about the size of a big tent. At over 17,000 feet above sea level, Everest Base Camp really didn’t help my altitude sickness… and during the night I was the sickest I have ever been in my entire life. The pain in my head was literarily unbearable for several hours, and all I could do was go outside and get sick. Thankfully, the following morning the pain had eased (after taking about 40 liters of pure oxygen throughout the night).

At 9am on a cloudy Monday morning we assumed our positions on a small mount in front of Everest and waited patiently for the mist to clear, along with a few other bright eyed trekkers. Sadly it remained foggy, and our much desired view of Everest in all its glory, was somewhat annoyingly obscured by mist. No matter, we had arrived. It’s at moments like this in your life that time just appears to stand still, as you look at the magnificence of nature. Again there was nothing to say; we just sat there on top of a rocky hill and looked on in awe - the almighty Everest.

After Everest we got on the road again, stopping off to visit Rongbuk Monastery (the highest in the world), and then it was a 10 hour drive once more over REALLY REALLY rough terrain, i.e. the back roads around the Himalayan hills; another off-road route that our driver seemed to know. For the first time in my life I learned to hold onto the hook rails above the jeep doors for support. Yes - the ones you normally hang your suit or jacket off. All of us (including the driver at times), had our hands firmly gripped as we drove down mountain faces (us in the back scared out of our wits and no longer laughing!) and on extremely narrow cliff roads, which one would assume would have been closed since they had rocks and small boulders all over them from landslides! However our driver was experienced and was well used to the driving conditions, and later that evening we finally arrived at a town called Zangmu, where we ended up staying in a dreadful hostel to cap off the week. Hmm, no complaining here I swear!

The following morning we got dropped off at the Tibet / Nepal border, and if you have never been to a border where you can cross by foot, I can tell you that this was some site to bear witness to. The place was manic. The place was over-run with locals trying to sneak back and forward, carrying their wares for sale. Queues were long and there were thorough bag searches; everything was opened and searched through by the Chinese police. All books and pictures with regards to Tibet were scrutinized and checked. Our guide had pre-warned us that we shouldn’t have the Lonely Planet guide book for Tibet in our bags, as it would certainly be confiscated. We finally got through customs and ended up on the edge of a bridge! ‘The Friendship Bridge’ was heavily policed by the military - and I was quietly told by a local man that no pictures were allowed, when he spotted me fumbling around with my iPhone hoping to sneak a quick picture! Incredibly, all we had to do now was walk across the bridge and we were there - in Nepal.

As we walked across the Friendship Bridge we looked behind us and thought about the extraordinary eight days we had just spent in Tibet, and wondered what mischief we would end up getting into in Nepal. We had no entry visa; no lift from the border to Kathmandu (the capital) several hours away, and no accommodation booked. Funny enough, two months ago we would have fretted about all of these sorts of things. Now it just seemed apart of every day life; learning to muddle through from one issue to the next. Rumor had it that the clock was going back two hours and 15 minutes, which was the thing I was pondering the most… so why the 15 minutes?

Bring on Nepal.... 😊

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Photos

Tibetan hotel
Sweet Tea on arrival

People coming to pray at the Buddha mural on the mountain side
Sera Monastery

Potala Palace
Former home of the Dalai Lama

Barkor Square
Centre of Lhasa

Me on a YAK
(tourist central!)

Nicola tries to count the prayer flags
Many, many!!

Everest Base Camp
At over 17,000 feet

Comments

[anonymous]

Tibet was always on my list, but not sure now, fot the altitude, and suffer from Hypertension... I hope you are all better now. Thanks for sharing your yourney to the world.