Happy Monk Bowing Away

Walked around the outskirts of the monastery and did the tourist shopping thing. A common site is one of a Tibetan mother carrying a baby child on her back begging for money. I handed her candy. I walked around and ended up at a park facing the monastery while I waited for the rest of my group to show up to head back to Lhasa.

As I hung out at the park I saw a young male monk sincerely bowing. I wanted to make an offering to support his practice. I knew he needed water in a hot day like this. But I only had candy on me. I decided to sneak up quietly to place my offering next to his shoes without disturbing him, he turned to smile at me in gratitude. I saw his young face. He was happy person who had a beautiful clean face. What a sight, a happy monk, happily practicing. That was so nice to see.

Three Tibetan Female Elders

I felt better and rested. This was our last official day together as a group. I wondered when we would all come together again. What are the chances of us getting together like this here? Of all the people in the world, we got into a group here in Tibet at this time. I started to get sentimental for some reason.

We were dropped of at Tashi Rombusi a monastery. It is one of the larger ones in Tibet. I decided to go in while the rest of the group decided they would just walk and shop. As I walked, I heard prayers, recitations coming from the buildings. It was nice to see people practicing as monks. It was lunch time and the monastery shuts down for lunch. All tourists are asked to leave the monastery. Some monks eat in some eat out at the local vendors right outside the monastery.

I followed to the crowd to exit. I ended up following three Tibetan elder women. As we approached the exit, they called me over with their hands to sit by them. I asked if I can photograph them and they declined by pointing to their bad teeth. They were very beautiful and full of grace to me. They had me sit by them to keep me company thinking I was alone waiting for other fellow travelers in my group to catch up. They didn’t understand that I was alone. One of them recited for me as she spun her hand held prayer wheel. All three of the women were reciting at this time. I felt a release in my front of my belly. I realized it was my third chakra out of balance. It was my female energy that was in need of a tune up. I didn’t know that I had a discomfort until the absence of it. Interesting huh! I recognized the strength in these elder women who barely had any teeth left and was barely still walking in their old age. I put my palms together and thanked them for giving me a healing without requesting for one.

They showed me they had bad eyes, they were discolored, they were old and well worn. I did a transference wishing their eyes were clear and wished for their wisdom eye to be wide open for them.

One of them wanted to know where my recitation beads were. I had to showed it to them. They checked it out and nodded their head of approval. Then they finally figured out I was alone we all proceeded to continue to exit the gates. I snuck a photo of their back because I really wanted a photo of them but their declined the frontal part of their body from photography but the back wasn’t discussed. And yes they knew I snuck a photo of them. These people didn’t make it to their old age by being dumb.

Our Complex Regard For Our Parents

Last night I was so tired from oxygen deprivation and rest I went to bed at 6:30pm and stayed in bed till 10am the next day. They all partied till 12pm that night and drank beer. I could hear them but I didn't join. There was a mirror outside my window and everyone checked themselves out whenever they passed by. It was fun to see from my side through the windows. We ended up getting ourselves going around 11am, and we headed for Xi’gze Farmer Guest house. We like the Chef there and the 25y a bed per night.

On the drive I realized my chest congestion and pain had to do with my relationship with my parents. It was about the complex emotions related to how I saw them and how I saw myself in our relationship with each other. It involved sadness, dedication, love, gratitude, regrets, etc…. I also noticed that it was our similar regard for our parents that brought all of us together in this car. This was our affinity. We all had this in common.

Rupert had asthma as a child and his father refused to stop smoking in his presence. His father’s health was ailing and had multiple surgeries but he refused to help himself in anyway to heal but continues to go against the doctors orders. His father did not change for himself and also not for Rupert. Rupert shared this very private and story with lots of humor but there was so much pain, sadness, loneliness, frustration and love behind it all.

I had stuffed vegetable buns called momo. I didn't know it was stuffed with curry. I just wanted ginger for my lungs to clear it. I mistaken the green pieces of onion as chile, it was green onion. I didn't have any actual pieces but the juice was strong and I knew it would bring trouble to my body. During dinner I really didn’t have the energy to carry out conversations. I must have seem very not with it and anti-social. Afterwards we ended up watching more TV. We saw badminton competition and we also saw more Family Guy and Wedding Crashers. We slept in the same room as before in the same beds.

Pull Over, Road Construction

Then we headed off for Everest Camp after gigantic breakfasts. I have learned that if I ate a lot in one meal, it usually means I won’t be able to eat the next meal because I won’t have access to food. After breakfast, Stef and I decided to clean up the old school style with a pan and lots of hot water. It was so refreshing. I am so grateful for access to hot water to drink, for food, and to wash up.

We were suppose to leave at 7:30am but we didn’t leave till two hours later. Our driver complained to us about being behind schedule. The road trip has turned out to be a beautiful one. We passed by gorgeous sceneries. We stopped by a frozen river and took pictures of yaks and mountain goats. Seeing all the animals at the farm and on the road reminded me how sad it is to be an animal. In the Bay Area, it’s not too bad to be a pet animal. Sometimes pets get better treatment and care than humans. But here, the animals do not have such luxury. They have it rough in work and weather conditions. They barely get enough to eat, care, and they will all lead to a human meal or death at work. It was sad for me to see this.

On route, there was road construction, the road was getting paved. We waited for about an hour and half parked along with rest of the traffic of tourist buses, local public buses, and trekking 4X4s like us. During this time, Rupert pulled out his "The Family Guy' again. Then the driver decided he was going to uses his 4 wheel drive and go off road towards the riverside because the mountain side was too pebbly to pass around the construction. He said it would take all day just to do 1/4 mile on the road and it would take all day before they clock off.

We were the frontiers who lead the way of paving a new way but then our car got stuck on a river rock. The muffler pipe was caught. We had to wait for another car to tow us out. They couldn't tie the chain to the right part of the car because it was caught in the bank. Somehow someone decided to chain it to the front axle. We all held our breath because that's got to bring problems later. Well, it did. The car could not get out of gear shift. It was stuck on one gear. So we had to park the car aside while the driver along with others who drove by stopped to lend a hand and equipment. The whole thing took 5 hours by the river. I really enjoyed watching how people helped each other out from this experience that was so very nice to see. We did loose 5-6 hours but it depends on how you look at it. We were now including morning delays seven hours behind schedule. It was a good thing we all had an enormous breakfast.

Nepalese Chef at Our Request

We stayed in Xigaze the first night instead of Gyangze by the recommendation of our driver which is different than our planned itinerary. He took us to his friend’s guest house called Tibet Farmers Guest House. The lodging was 25 yuan a bed negotiated by our driver. They told us they gave us a discount because they are friend with our driver. There was a room with four single beds and we went for it. Lang was nice to let us choose and decide. He let us know that if we didn’t like what we saw then we would drive us around until we were satisfied and happy with our lodging.

There was hot water for shower but we were all too cold to bother with it. It would involve walking across the courtyard in the cold afterwards. There was no light in the toilet we had to wear our head lamps to use the rest room. Plus the restroom doors did not shut properly so someone had to watch the door for better privacy so we would make our pee breaks in pairs.

The chef in the Tibetan Farmer Guest House was a good chef from Nepal who loved the art of cooking and up for any challenges of making any dish you ask for. He’ll even make whatever he hasn’t made before if you’d give him the recipe.

After dinner we spotted our driver on a date at this place with one of the girls who work here. I guess this is why he was so eager to recommend this place to us. All the girls here call me sister and treat me like a queen for some reason. They say they like my face, I don’t know what that means but I had fun exchanging words with them. Lang as it turns out seem to be quite a hit among the girls wherever we go. As for a modern Tibetan man, he's actually got class and he's an honest nice guy.

Rupert brought his lap top and he played "The Family Guy" on his lap top, it was our movie time before bed. I spent the time writing in my journal.