Tibet, The Roof of the World

Occupied predominantly by ethnic Tibetans, this autonomous region of China is a world of its own.  It is the home and mother to Mt. Everest, and most of its land is on the very high-altitude Tibetan Plateau.  The weather this time of year is very dry and cold. The dryness wreaks havoc on the sinuses and makes the insides of our noses feel like prickly pear cactus. I cannot imagine what the weather must be like in December or January.  

Life outside the main cities is brutal; the land is barren, mountainous, and cold. Still, some people make that part of Tibet their home, living on the products of goats and yak or Tartary ox. Like bulls and cows, a yak is the male beast and a dri is the female.  The geography and the weather are threateningly menacing, not just for the barren, rugged, rocky mountainous land, cold temperatures, and high winds, but also for the threat of surprise earthquakes.  The last quake was in 2015.  It is about time for another. 

Tibet became a part of the People’s Republic of China in 1951.  It was not an easy assimilation.  An uprising ensued.  Amid increasing violence, the 14^th Dalai Lama fled to India.  Years of chaos followed until the Cultural Revolution began between 1966 and 1976.  This too was not easy; people were not eager to change, as they saw Tibetan institutions and Tibetan Buddhist monasteries being destroyed.  It was a hard time in Tibetan history.  Today, Tibet clearly is Chinese.  Their roads and new buildings are modern, their hospitals are first class, their restaurants serve Chinese dishes alongside traditional Tibetan ones, and Chinese government propaganda signs reminding the people how they benefit from their government are posted on every new improvement, yet most Tibetans still speak the old Tibetan language and know very little of the Chinese language. 

The highlight of this 8-day visit to Tibet, of course, was our visit to Mt. Everest North Face Base Camp.  The mountain, Mt. Everest, is everything anyone can imagine in size and in majesty.  The first sight of this huge rock on this, our planet Earth, makes a person drop to the knees.  But make no mistake, getting to a place to see it is no joy ride, and once there, only a few lucky ones get to see it as it is often shrouded in clouds.  We saw that glorious thing, though, in all her glory!  But the wind was fierce; oxygen was rare, and the temperatures were hovering around zero.  She was spectacular!  I simply cannot imagine, though, the desire to climb that mountain.   

At one point on the journey to the base camp, we were able to see a row of five Himalayan peaks that each reach over 8,000 meters, which is 26,246 feet tall each.  Those climbers who reach the granddaddy, the top of Mt. Everest, must gnaw their way up, 8,848 meters (29,031.7 feet).  That’s a long way, baby.  Some have done it multiple times without the aid of oxygen. 

I must share a bit about toilets in this part of the world. Every country, from India to Tibet, uses the squatty potty for women and for men who need a toilet. There is rarely any paper. Women quickly learn to carry their own. Some of the in-floor porcelain thrones are flushable, but others have a nearby bucket of water with a small pitcher attached. The user dips a pitcher full of water and tosses it into the “trough.” Voila! A flush. Primitive toilets are just that, extremely primitive . . . a long, concrete trough that runs under a line of privacy stalls, or it can be simply a stall over a hole in the ground. Now in hotels, it is a different story. The bathrooms are luxurious and smart, but not as smart as Japanese toilets. Tibet hotel toilets sense your approach and open the lid. The seats are heated. When all is done, the toilet automatically flushes and closes the lid. Very proper.

This wraps up perhaps the most exciting, soul-belittling adventure we have ever encountered.  We are indeed lucky to have done so.  We are lucky too, to have visited so many temples, monasteries, and stupas where we heard lesson after lesson about the kind, “take care of the world and each other” Buddhist philosophy.  It’s a nice way to live and a lot to think about. 

Peace be with you. 

Farewell, enchanting Tibet.

This video sums up our time in Tibet