Flora Hotel (Huashen Luguan) Lhasa

... It's also Yom Kapur on Monday, and the first time that that has ever meant so much to me.

Missing you all, missing internet even more, and wondering... where's the air? My brain is dead half the time.

Twitpic is the only way I can show you pictures, so keep your eyes there. Check back a few entries for a link. This connection is too slow and unreliable for me to be doing all the work for you. And I'm knackered, as I may have mentioned.

:)

... crossing itself was another matter.

The Chinese border guards searched every bag from top to bottom. Were the looking for drugs? No, Bombs? No. They wanted to make sure we weren't smuggling in pictures or writings from the Dalai Lama. Just a little bit insecure...

The last couple days we spent touring Lhasa itself. Picture a modern (if ...

Gestern hab´ ich das nicht mehr geschafft.... weu i woa hiiiiiiiiiiiiiii !
Aber eins nach dem anderen.

Der Morgen hat eigentlich ganz gut begonnen - hab eine Kleinigkeit zum Frühstück runtergebracht , und um 10 war Treffpunkt im Yakhotel mit der Gruppe - am Programm der Potala - also sicher eines der Highlights meiner Reise.
Wären die Chinesen vor 50 Jahren ...

... It has a painting of the protectors - a Lion and a Tiger at the bottom of the staircase. The first room we went into on the 2nd floor had a mural of the King, Buddha and Potala Palace. There is also a mural of monkeys which tells the legend of the history of the Tibetan people. Here is the Coles Notes version of the story - a monkey hooked up with a demon after receiving a blessing from Avalokiteshvara. They had 6 sons and left them to grow up in the forest. They ...

... alot of attention. Some Americans arrived late on yesterday after getting the first train into Tibet that they let foreign tourists on. Bumped into an old German lady on the Barkhor kora. The German lady need needed a bit of steadying on her feet. Her nose and hands were going a bit blue so we told her to go and sit down and take some ginger and garlic tea (local solution to altitude sickness). She was so elated she was almost in tears telling ...

... and built like a fortress. Here the monks held an all day service to commemorate above event and here we could witness the auditory onslaught of tantric buddhistic ritual instruments. There were horns (some of them like long straight Alphorns), cymbals and drums, beat to the rhythm of recitation from the old sanskrit texts (the music comes out when Sanskrit is read, whereas most lithurgy comprises Tibetan translations of the old texts with Sanskrit only being used ...

... nouvelle lune, ciel degage, semblait etre a portee de main! 1er octobre toujours sur la route, nouvel angle de l'Everest. Le paysage est monotone, gris/marron, sec. En revanche les gens sont de toutes les couleurs et leurs sourires illuminent les montagnes. Apres midi nous redescendons, et la, magnifiques vallees, innombrables cascades, rivieres folles! Super beau! Au soir nous arrivons dans un village ...

... roots in a real place. For nomads, villages, waterholes and guideposts vanished and reappeared, as if created by memory, by stories written or retold. On that kind of map, there always had to be a perfect place, a Shambhala. In falling darkness I found the southern gate of the city, slipped into a tunnelled staircase and came out atop the city walls. Digging in a hidden spot, I buried Rinpungpa's letter. 'Take this message and go to my father in Shambhala.' I tapped down the loose ...

... com/2007/11/ 04/homemade-bread-cheap-delicious-healt hy-and-easier-than-you-think/ Tsampa bread Put 1 cup of warm water plus one tablespoon sugar in a mixing bowl. Add two tablespoons of yeast. Let sit for about five minutes. 2. Add three cups of flour (one third to one half tsampa), 1 cup of milk, dash of salt, 2 tablespoons of sugar, and 3-4 tablespoons of oil or melted (and cooled) margarine or shortening. Stir 50 times ...