Lee and Clare, The road home

Yak stew and Tibetan Pilgrims

10^th November 2003

This place is fantastic. It's like we're no longer in China....

We left the big city of Xi'an on another night train bound for Lanzhou, then on our arrival at 6am we got in a taxi straight from the train station to the bus station (we heard Lanzhou was a bit of a dump so decided to skip it). At the bus station we had to buy "foreigners insurance" to travel on buses in this province (we're now in Gansu province), but the funny thing is that if anything did happen we can't claim anything on the insurance we paid for, it's just to protect the authorities from lawsuits. We had to buy it even though we have our own travel insurance, otherwise they won't sell you a bus ticket. Wierd.

Our 7.30am bus left at 9am, half an hour after the 8.30 bus. Our bus ride took us up through snowy mountains on the eastern side of Tibet. It's pretty chilly again now! We saw cave in the hills with washing hanging outside. We'd read that there were various minorities living in this area but nothing could prepare us for this place. First of all it seemed strange that there were lots of men getting on the bus wearing the white caps that Muslims wear and some of the older ones had stringy beards (no Chinese people have facial hair) and the women all had their heads covered. Pretty soon we were driivng through towns where all the streets were lined with these Muslim people - called "Hui" they are a large ethnic minority in this area. It was just like we were no longer in China, but somewhere in the Middle East.

But that was nothing compared to our arrival here in Xiahe (pronounced something like Shaha). Xiahe is the leading Tibetan monastery town outside of Lhasa in Tibet. We knew this but nothing could prepare us for this place. It's kind of like we've woken up in a different world. Tibetan people come here on Pilgrimage and they all dress in their best and most colourful clothes. Most of the people we see here are Tibetan, either pilgrims, nomads come down out of the mountains, or monks walking around in their crimson and magenta robes. Our book says that this place is 50% Tibetan, 40% Han (everyday Chinese) and 10% Hui, but we mostly only see the Tibetans.

The traditional clothes of the Tibetans are fantastic, kind of similar to Mongolian but so much more colourful. The men wear big woolen cloaks, we've seen some trimmed with snow leopard fur and they have big daggers hanging off their belts. The funniest thing about the cloaks is that the sleeves hang right down to the ground. They look like something from Dr Seuss. We haven't quite worked out why yet, but notice that most men have one hand inside the coat, with the sleeve hanging loosely down to the ground.

As for the women, they are amazing, so colourful. Almost all of them have two looong plaits down their backs, some of them even look like they have hair extensions. They have colourful trimming on their coats and bright hats.

They look completely different to Chinese people, and to Mongolian. They don't seem as strong and stocky as Mongolians and have very distinguishable facial features. Happily for us too, they love to smile! They are so friendly which is very welcome to us at this point.

The town is based around Labrang Monastery which is one of the six major Tibetan buddhist monasteries of the Yellow Hat sect of Tibetan Buddhism (yes, we're still trying to get our heads around that too!) The monastery is huge and all around it runs "The Pilgrims Way". This runs for 3km and the pilgrims go around it in a clockwise direction. It is lined with about 1200 prayer wheels and the pilgrims spin every one of these as they go around. A prayer wheel is like a big upright cotton reel on an axle. They are painted red with brightly coloured designs.

We decided to join the pilgrims on their way around the Pilgrims Way and spun every single prayer wheel. There were loads of Tibetans doing it along with us, often we'd have to stop and let them pass. They had no problems with us going along with them and most were happily surprised to see us and give us a big smile. It was so cool going around there, it's hard to explain. The prayer wheels creaking as they spun and the murmuring prayer of a pilgrim in front or behind you and just following people in their great outfits. Even knowing next to nothing about Buddhism we felt like we'd achieved something when we made it to the end.

There were also a few people who were prostrating themselves around the whole circuit. Instead of spinning all the wheels they would go right around the whole thing on their stomachs. First they would stand upright, then clap their hands above their heads, then down onto their knees, then right down on their stomaches, forehead touching the dirt and hands stretched out ahead of them. They'd draw a line in the dust with their outstretched fingers, get up walk to the line and start the process all over again. We're not quite sure how long it would take them to go 3kms like this, especially as part of the route goes up and over some rocks.

We were lucky enough to meet some other great foreigners here and it was strange to have people to hang out with for a few days after 8 weeks on the road and few opportunities for making friends. A couple of the foreigners we met even speak Chinese which has made restaurants and the like much easier after 8 weeks of hand signals, phrase book meals and lots of pointing at other people's food.

Yesterday we had a tour around the monastery here with a very devout monk. One of the guys with us was unlucky enough to lean forward and sniff one of the yak butter candles and the monk pounced on him and said that people who sniff the yak butter lamps go to a deep dark place and in their reincarnation turn into worms because they have made it impure by sniffing it.

We have of course sampled the yak meat that is on all the menus here. We are also quite addicted to Muslm Tea, which contains all sorts of flowers, berries and a huge rock of sugar. We went out with a load of people for dinner last night and (much to my dad's disgust, sorry dad) sampled some of the sweet and sour carp that someone else ordered. We have yet to try the yak milk shake or the yak burger.

We are at 3000 metres above sea level here and on our first day felt a bit strange from altitude sickness. Lee had a headache concentrating on his temples and I felt all wierd and giggly and was laughing at my own jokes still hours after I'd cracked them. Going up a small flight of stairs made us dizzy. One of the girls we've been with had to head back down the mountain early today as she hadn't slept much and was feeling very silly! Yesterday we felt fine, and we think we have aclimatised, which is good as the next place on our itinerary is still 500m higher than here. It's a place called Langmusi, where we may be heading tomorrow if Lee can kick a bout of bad belly that may thwart our plans for a few days.

Forgot to mention that it was snowing as we walked to breakfast yesterday, we've had lots of snow on this trip, but never been snowed on, so that was exciting. Got quite warm in the afternoon though. Even still we're looking forward to starting to head south sometime soon to warmer climes.

Outside this place a flat bed truck with loads of half beef carcases that the locals are buying up. Nice thing to wake up to out the window. They chop it up with a tomohawk on the dusty road. The view is doing wonders for Lee's stomach.

Must off now as hands are getting frostbite, can't type with gloves on.
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