Tibet - part II

The air is thin, crisp and cool. The thick clouds around me will mean that no photos will show the beauty of my rock's viewpoint, as most of the mountain tops are covered by these monsterous clouds of hundreds of shades of white and gray that I fear will never show in the photos below, while the thin, whispy fog moves quickly over the mountain's surface, visibly passing beside me.



The sun is out at last, warming the back of my neck, while the hard, white rock I'm sitting has been strangly comfortable for the past hour or so. I can hear birds all around me, their singing carrying across these deep valleys.


The valley in front of me contains three farming villages, with a multitude of green shaded crops that light up the ground in front of me against the barron, brown mountain slopes (see below).



The long, sweeping valley to my right is the lowest of them all, with thousands of little streams and waterways joining and dispanding as they quietly flow through this mountain path.

Behind me is a small Buddhist village situated on the top of a small hill, which is being engulfed by thick fog as I'm writing in my diary. Between the village and my rock, yaks pass time by, grazing amongst the steep, grassy incline.

On my left are a number of mountain peaks that we've just climbed along with two buddhist pilgrims. At 4,500m above sea level (thats a lot!), each mountain peak strangely contains blue, yellow, green, red and white flags used by Tibetan pilgrims to send their prayers to the gods. Also at each peak, the two pilgrims would re-stock a basic fire with dry branches and leaves, setting it alightto create a wonderful smelling smoke that rises from the top of each peak. The two pilgrims pass me having finished their task. We exchange a little conversation in Tibetan and say goodbye as they walk back to the Buddhist village behind me.

I feel really special to be sitting this high up, to be surrounded by such beauty, in a place that so many dream about, but never find the opportunity to visit.

I feel peaceful, calm and relieved that I'm writing this all down. I'd like to sit here for longer, waiting for some of the thick clouds to pass by, allowing me a glipse of the mountain tops they hide.

Now it's time to move from my rock on a Himalayan mountain peak, to explore the Buddhist Village behind me.

In the middle of this Buddhist village are a magnificant red temple and a white debating courthouse. This Buddhist village belongs to the same group as the debating monks in the previous post, so there was another opportunity to see a much bigger debate within the monks present.

I slipped out half way through, to see a few monks and a chef cooking the monk's lunch, dumplings cooked over a fierce, flaming fire with potatoes, onions and rice. A simple meal.

After the debate, the monks wandered off to do their own thing, they really do seem to be incredibly relaxed, thoughtful and also delighted when a foreigner speaks basic Tibetan to them. One of the monks in the red temple even took time with me to teach me some extra words!

It was worth getting up at 6am, it was worth pushing and fighting with a mob of Tibetans to get onto the bus, it was worth not getting a real seat on the 90min bus and it was worth the direct, hard trek up the steep incline, because this really was an incredible experience with Tibetan monks and incredible views, high up in the Himalayan mountains.