December 28, 2013. Outside Lhasa in a Rural Area and an Encounter with Cows.

Greetings from our last day in Lhasa –

So, first our health; we’re both still under the weather.. I think Mike more so than me. He has started taking the American antibiotic (that we had with us, instead of the Chinese antibiotics since no one was able to explain how often to take it or for how long) which seemed to make him feel better this morning.. but by late afternoon he felt really miserable again and we have to fly tomorrow. I’m still stuffed up and have laryngitis. I haven’t taken anything other than sudafed and aspirin.. and some Chinese nasal spray. I think we’ll live.

Today we met up with Pemba again after breakfast and decided that we really weren’t that interested in seeing the Buddha in the cave, but that what we’d like to do is see a little of the rural area and perhaps a small village to get a sense of how people really live. We know from previous trips to other countries that it’s often easier to get that in a small town rather than in a city.

So off we went. The drive took us up about an additional 1,000 feet on a well-maintained road that felt a lot like driving Highway 1 in California, except no ocean. It was mountainous and I assume in the spring and summer it would be lush green, but at this time of year it was all pretty dry and brown. As we reached a major peak in the road, the prayer flags (colorful banner- and ribbon-like fabric) were strewn all over the hillside and across the road creating a sort of arch of color that stretched and stretched. Then we drove the winding road until we reached a little village with some women spinning wool and piles and piles of yak “pies” (think cow pies) drying for later use as fuel for heating and cooking.

We got out of the car and Pemba spoke to the women who appeared to be about 70 or 80 years old (later found out just 49 years old) and one of the women said we could come to see her house. We followed her into her rambling “compound”… The house was made of some kind of Masonite painted in the traditional white with color trim.. We climbed a few stairs and were on her “deck” where more cow and yak pies were drying, and where she had a very clever, make-shift solar set-up to boil water… two metal arc shaped pieces that spanned about four feet and suspended between the two pieces was her teapot! She has a pump for water and a somewhat jerry-rigged electrical system, but she has cable television (no flat screen!) There’s a sleeping and sitting room, a kitchen, and a storage area where she keeps dry food for the animals. She’s widowed so she has to manage alone. She’s got cows and dogs and roosters. We walked to her “fields”.. and then for a while we got stuck in a passageway between her house and her field as the neighbors cows and bull were being walked to the road trying to use the same passageway. Oh, she also has a little meditation, prayer room set up with the typical yak butter candles.

We asked a lot of questions that Pemba translated and overall it was an interesting and very friendly encounter. We then headed back to town — talking a lot to Pemba about life in Lhasa and also the countryside, about the one child policy (which doesn’t apply in Tibet because they are a minority group), about education, the role of women (changing very very fast), cost of housing, cost of cars, who owns and who rents, etc. And he also asked us questions — like if we have animals on the road when cars are driving. He has learned everything he knows about the West from the tourists he shows around and from television. We went for lunch together and then Mike and I meandered around town for a few hours — probably stretching the limited strength we have.

After our jaunt into the countryside and lunch with Pemba — we trekked again to our favorite walking area in the Barkor.. always something new to see, always different alleys to walk, and always mobs of people circumambulating the Jokang Temple (many stopping to lay on the floor in prayer — amazing they don’t get stepped on by the crowd behind), and always everyone chanting and spinning the metal prayer wheels. And everyone with cell phones! We walked and naturally got a bit lost, but eventually all roads lead to outside the Barkor.. and we headed back to the hotel for our last night. Still a bit under the weather — but feeling like the colds (or whatever the hell we both had) are possibly breaking — we opted for Szechuan food (always believing that those spices can fight germs).

We are hopeful that we’ll be miraculously recovered by the time we reach Kathmandu tomorrow.

More from Kathmandu.

Fern