I always had this notion that hitchhikers were creepy, somewhat psychotic, and very likely to injure my person. I can thank Hollywood for this. Hitchhiking in Tibet is nothing like that. First of all, it's so common. It's standard, if slightly illegal, practice to pick up foreigners and locals alike. Secondly, it's so much cheaper and more convenient for backpackers than hiring a private jeep. We had a series of lucky rides that made our journey from Lhasa to the border town of Zhangmu really easy.

The road from Lhasa to the border, called the Friendship highway, is "open." This means you don't need to buy a permit from the PSB in order to ride on it. There are police checkpoints along the way, but unless you're venturing off the highway you only need your passport and visa. You do need a permit to go to Everest, for example. We opted for the incredible, and free, view of Everest from the highway, especially since we didn't have the warm clothing necessary to comfortably stay at EBC (Everest Base Camp).

We only had two days left on our China visa, so we needed to make a dash for the border. It took about 24 hours of road time, but that includes time spent at a complete stand still because of road construction. Thank goodness we brought food with us because otherwise I might have starved. Most of the guidebooks will tell you this, and I'll drive the point home: Self-sufficiency is a must. Don't expect that you'll run into a grocery store on the way...come prepared.

We met an Australian on a minibus from Tingri (New Tingri, not Old Tingri - note to China: in the future don't name two major towns on the same highway the same thing. It's very confusing for tourists). He took the same ride all the way from Lhasa because he had to get to the border in one day...it still took two days, but I'm not sure if he had to pay a fine at the border. Another brave soul.

Posted by Nelle at 04:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (18) | TrackBacks (0)

What trip to Tibet would be complete without a visit to the legendary Potala Palace? Not ours. I think the best part of the palace was ascending the steep, never ending (so it felt to my thighs), historical steps around the outside of the 13 story, mountainside building.

You have to buy tickets to the Palace a day in advance and it is a process. It's kind of amusing actually. A young Dutch woman with a nose ring and a mischevious air about her let me in on the confusing ordeal. She had gone for days in a row without getting tickets, and having finally figured out how to get them, saved us the trouble!

You don't buy tickets at the entrance, you go behind the third stupa on the right and through giant red doors. There a man will write a number on your arm and inform you to return at 2pm. When you return you must make your way through countless bead vendors, pilgrims, and children playing Tibetan instruments very poorly before you arrive at a line of benches. The benches have seats numbered to 200, the quota of tickets sold to the palace each day. We were 126. You then stand on the benches for another hour, because sitting on the benches, well, that would be just silly. The line moves and maneuvers and occasionally people move forward or back displaying their number. When you get to the front, contrary to expectations, you don't buy a ticket. You get a piece of paper with a time written on it. Ours was 3pm the next day. That's when you go the Palace entrance the next day. When you enter the palace, you don't pay. You walk up those amazing winding steps for about 30 minutes in the brutal sun. It's really fun, actually. I enjoyed the outside most of all. When you finally enter a building  further up the mountain, you still don't pay...in fact if you're cheapity cheap, you could turn back here for free and still have an amazing experience, but I wouldn't recommend that unless you're flat broke. Finally your arrive at the ticket window. There was at some point a student discount, but someone crossed that out in pencil, so there are only discounts for the handicapped now.

Inside the palace is the most Buddhist of Buddhist temples. I wish I knew more about the religion before going in. After a while I experienced ornate, gold statue overload. Also, if you're Buddhist , be sure to bring loads of cash to throw at these statues. The floor, walls, and practically every crevice were covered in money. It really neat to see monks sweeping a money ridden floor as though they were cleaning rubbish. There were about 20 rooms open to the public, including the  incredible, gold encased, stupa tombs of past Dalai Lamas. There are really educational descriptions, helpful monks, and plenty of gift shops inside. The big downer is that no pictures are allowed. You can buy one of their tourist books with pictures for the low price of...oh wait, that price isn't so low...in fact that's highway robbery. Crap.

But for the casual Christian visitor, I don't think it's a big deal. Just visit Amazon later on and buy the same books for a fraction of the cost :).

Posted by Nelle at 04:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (18) | TrackBacks (0)

Ironically, even though Tibet is more remote and difficult to access, it was so much more tourist friendly than all of China (including Beijing!). There were American, Japanese, Indian, Mexican, and of course Tibetan restaurants. I don't really know how to describe the atmosphere...but I'll try.

A bit euphoric. Every western tourist I met seemed to exude the same pride in being there that I felt. It's so hard to get into Tibet, so you're a genuine adventurer if you make it. At least that's how you feel. It's how I would imagine it felt to arrive in California during the gold rush. There's golden opportunity waiting for you if you are willing the make the perilous journey to get there, and we did.

The Chinese influence on most of the city is intense, but there is still a part of town that retains its Tibetan feel and architecture, perhaps mainly for the benefit of tourism. In the center of this is the Jokhang temple, the most of beautiful Buddhist temple I've ever seen. It is surrounded by pilgrims all day prostrating themselves on the ground and circling the temple clockwise. These are the most devout people I've ever seen. I guess except for becoming a monk, which women can't do, this is the most religiously devout path you can take; a striking contrast to the Calvanist Christian work ethic that shaped the American psyche.

If you do become a Tibetan monk, make sure you are very comfortable holding hands with complete strangers and smiling a lot. Also, sit with your fellow monks on street corners, indian-style and say nothing. These are both very effective and subtle begging styles; much less offensive than yelling "GIVE ME MONEY" and shoving patrons into submission, the traditional Chinese child begging style. In Tibet we gave more alms to the poor than ever before. They were just so gosh-darn polite about wanting my money that I felt so much more inclined to give it to them.

There is so much to see in Lhasa that you could spend weeks there. Unfortunately, our visa did not allow this. However, I think that in only a few days, we got a good feel for the atmosphere and saw the major sights. The people are wonderfully docile and friendly. Most of them speak some English, French, and Spanish. I would recommend Lhasa to more experienced travel enthusiasts. Because of the hassles of entering and exiting the country, this trip requires either a lot of time or money...actually...both.

Posted by Nelle at 03:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (15) | TrackBacks (0)

For train enthusiasts everywhere, there's a new thrill to be had riding the Qinghai-Tibet Railway. This two day journey runs through desert, snowy mountains, and bucolic greenery of an Asian flavor - speckled with Yaks.

All Chinese trains have the same basic layout, but being on one of the new Qinghai-Tibet line trains is a totally different experience. First class is called "soft sleeper." It's about 1000RMB per bed. We didn't ride there, but it's equivalent to 2nd class on Russian trains. We rode in "hard sleepers" which are 6 to a doorless room. It can get cramped, but having the bottom bunk helped a lot. We met three other foreigners: a Dutch couple, and a surly Canadian with a penchant for sarcasm. When you're riding through passes of 5000ft and operating on less oxygen than usual, sarcasm is a much needed coping mechanism.

Every bed had an oxygen port on the wall, and tubes were handed out. I sucked down oxygen whenever I felt woozy. Everyone has a different strategy. Some preferred to deal with the altitude sickness as it came so as to acclimatize faster. Already symptomatic with my monthly peril and plagued with motion sickness, I was not ready for oxygen deprivation.

The restaurant car was good enough, although they had a tendency to run out of food...not a good strategy for a restaurant. Incidentally they never ran out of beer or cigarettes...gotta have the essentials, right?

There were amazing views from the train...I took so many pictures...sheesh.

We had watched some CCTV propaganda about how environmentally conscientious the construction of the Railway had been. Considering the fragility of the Tibetan tundra ecosystem, this was encouraging. Unlike other Chinese trains all of the windows were sealed. This means that the regular Chinese practice of tossing garbage out of the window was abated. The grassland around the train tracks was demolished in some areas, pristine in others. I was pleased to see that although the tracks were raised (increasing runoff potential), the concrete was arranged in a grid pattern with grass interspersed. This was the surface is permeable for rain. Clearly some intelligent and educated efforts were made to spare the environment during this construction. Then again, next to the railway is the old road to Tibet on which old diesel trucks carrying coal ran alongside us. Sigh...

It was a fun trip overall, although completely exhausting. If you plan on taking the trip yourself I guarantee it will be amazing, but be aware of the altitude sickness, the lack of privacy, and the constant noise that comes when your room doesn't have a door!

Posted by Nelle at 03:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

As a foreigner, arranging a trip on the new Qinghai-Tibet railway is not easy. One Canadian we met had a much easier time getting his ticket by paying someone that sought out and solicited him. Because there is not supposed to be foreigner pricing or mark-ups, this is illegal. However, the legitimate route, which we took, is incredibly difficult and frustrating. It seems like China doesn't want foreigners on the train so they create these Catch22 scenarios to stymie your every attempt.

First of all, you still need a permit to enter Tibet. We paid 350RMB for ours. It should officially be 200, but we didn't meet anyone else that paid less than 400RMB, although we did meet a Dutch couple in Tibet that hitched in without a permit...brave souls. Because the railway is so new, opened in July 2006, the travel agencies do not know how to issue those permits. Instead they repeatedly tried to convince us to take a plane instead. No thanks. One place said it would definitely issue us permits for the train to Tibet on Tuesday, and retracted this statement on Wednesday. Timing is everything.

Permits are the first thing you need, however (and this is a BIG however) you need to know your date of travel. That is, you need to have train tickets which are by no means easy to get even as a Chinese citizen. Here's the Catch22, you need to have a permit to buy the tickets. No permit, no tickets. No tickets, no permit. You've got to be kidding me.

We went to the train station three days in a row and were told all tickets were sold out. It turns out, this is just what the ticket agents at the station say to everyone later in the day because even though they're technically open all day, they only sell tickets in the morning.

We got a permit for 6 days in Tibet...doesn't sound like much, but you don't need a permit once you're in Tibet, so this is really 6 days to get into Tibet. With permits in hand we went to the train station an hour before the ticket window would open. Not soon enough. There were already 30 people waiting in line and dozens more sneaking into the front of the line. I spent the next couple of hours policing the line and stubbornly insisting that cutters move to the back. I befriended and enlisted the help of an actual police officer and we kept back 90% of the cutters. If nothing else we prevented the line from disintegrating into a mob. Two hours later we were at the front of the line and the police officer helped us get the exact ticket we wanted on the exact day we needed. Easy, right? So why did they say for days before that those tickets were sold out? Well, I explained that already, but it was a frustrating realization.

We still had another week in Chengdu to prepare for our ride on the famous Qinghai-Tibet railway! 

Posted by Nelle at 02:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBacks (0)