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Xiahe - feels like I'm back home!
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Xiahe is perhaps the second coolest place for hippies in China, besides Tibet. The Labrang monastery here is one of the largest Tibetan monasteries outside of Tibet itself, which is a bit difficult to get to, especially this month, as some Americans just pulled a cunning stunt. Apparently they planted a "Free Tibet" flag at the Everest base camp, whilst hiking in from the Tibet side. Way to screw it up for the rest of us travellers. At any rate, there are actually some white people here in Xiahe, which is a shock for us who just spent quite a few isolated days in Lanzhou and Linxia. The interested stares have disappeared, only to be replaced with a slight resentment from the locals. Still, there is an interesting mix of robed Tibetan monks, Tibetan locals, and Muslim Hui.
The temperature is a bit cold for jandals and a light sweater, so I kept up a good pace while exploring the very interesting mud-walled villages. We did a fair bit of altitude climb, which may explain why Tibetans are so rosy-cheeked and well adapted to cold, high altitude life. Of course, with the fluctuation in temperatures, I was definitely reminded of home for the first time since leaving Stewart Island in New Zealand, where I was last subject to cold temperatures and high highs. I am definitely not ready to go back to ski-climates yet.
Xiahe is pretty amazing - the prayer wheels surround the village, they are kept squeakily turning all day by the locals who walk by, turning each one as they walk by. At certain times of day, there is a pilgrimage around the village walls, where interesting people of all sorts can be met on the way. From young toddlers carted by their bundled up mothers, to smartly dressed maroon robed monks, to old hunchback ladies hobbling along painfully with their crooked canes and legs, one wonders at the numbers and diversity of these interesting folks. I'm sure I can be forgiven for sitting and watching passerby; the staring I receive as a tall white gwelio seems along the same lines of curiosity. Even the design of the enclosed-courtyard mud dwellings, small walking-streets, and the ornate temples were worthy of much attention.
Now, attempting to get onto the internet here proved a challenge, not because there is no access, but because it is so limited by the government. Locals coming to a Tibetan village are likely to be interested in certain information, and the government does its best to prevent that transmission from happening. The great firewall of China is alive and well. Even when the power was on, the water was flowing, and the computers not having brownouts every half hour, I had no end to frustration in trying hook up to the net, and I've used dial up for most of my life, so that's saying something. The proxy workaround is difficult, Wikipedia is virtually impossible to get to (my most favoritest and importantest site in the world), and reading/posting to blogs is touch and go. For a foreigner to hook up his laptop to the network is highly illegal and unheard of. For sometime I was pretty frustrated, and essentially gave up calling my family on Skype in favour of the next metropolis I got to.
Despite my western mindset getting in the way with my demanding my rights in a foreign country, I got over myself pretty quickly. I went for a walk up one of the small mountains which hug the town on all sides, checking out the large stacks of prayer flags ceremoniously but untidily dumped in various spots on the peaks of these steep hills. Tibetan culture shock 101. I like it, I think I'll come back when everyone forsakes me for home. More thumbnails ...
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| 76. | Xiahe - feels like I'm back home! - Xiahe, China May 16, 2007 (  24 ) |
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