The End

Well good news and bad news:

(let's get the bad over with and end on a happy note, shall we?)

bad: I'm no longer in Japan... so I must end the fantastically popular and world-wide appreciated "Jax in Japan".

good: For the time being, I've started a new page, oh so cleverly named "Jax Back", which you can find by clicking the link (or visiting www.umyayay.blogspot.com on your own). Feel free to laugh at the lame-ness of the names, but I'm quite dead this week due to overextending on several different levels... and didn't want to leave y'all hanging.

Come on over!!

Road Trip: Day 1 Lhasa to Gyantse via Yamdrok Lake

Anne (UK), Michael & Hannah (Sweden), and I left “the Yak” with our driver, Dawa, in the morning and with an introductory lesson in Tibetan (“Good Morning” = something like “Shopa-delay”) hit the road. After leaving Lhasa, the Land Cruiser just started climbing up and up and up. Before we knew it we were already at 4990 meters above sea level at the Kamba-la pass(only 200 meters below Everest Base Camp and only our first day!)! There was an amazing view of Yamdrok-tso, an incredibly turquoise lake that is one of the four holy lakes in Tibet, below us but we were quickly exhausted by the equally unceasing wind and beggars. The lake winds through a valley for what must be miles and we had plenty of chances to take more photos as we went.

We stopped at the tiny, tiny village of Nangartse for a tasty but pricey lunch. Then we were back on the road for Mt. Nonjin, a 7191 meter peak that had been looming in front of us all morning.
The mountain is capped with a glacier and Dawa proved his skill on gravel for the first time (of many) getting us as close to the base of the mountain without having to actually climb it. When we stopped we were again barraged by men and children waiting to beg tourists for money. One girl in particular was painfully pitiful with horribly bloodshot eyes. She kept pointing at her eyes and our sunglasses, breaking our hearts.

In the afternoon, we reached the small town of Gyantse, elevation 3950 meters. We got two double rooms at the Jianzang Hotel and quickly wandered through the almost empty streets to Pelkor Chode Monastery and the Gyantse Kumbum. The Kumbum is a huge stupa/chorten that is made up of six floors of separate chapels until you reach the top level with four sets of eyes gazing out over the valley. It was fascinating to explore our way through and look out over the town and to the ruined fort on a hill across town.

In the evening we found that the Chinese restaurant recommended in our guidebook had grown a bit big for its britches (too pricey) and were quite content with a similar but anonymous place a few doors down. It was an early and rather chilly night for all of us.

Road Trip: Day 2 Gyantse to Lhatse via Shigatse

Though I had managed to sleep all the way through the night for the first time since leaving Tokyo, Anne complained that she’d slept really poorly. We scraped her out of bed and piled into the car (with only one reminder of “Shopa-delay” before we got it right) and hit the road for an hour and half drive to Shigatse. In Shigatse, the four of us visited the beautiful and almost entirely preserved Tashilhunpo Monastery. As with the other two major monasteries I’d already been to (Drepung and Sera), the monastery complex was constructed into the side of a mountain and thus was impressive even from the moment we pulled up to the gate at the very bottom. The day was sunny, as usual, and the gold of the buildings was so bright that it was almost impossible to take photos. We spent over two hours winding our way through the tiny pathways between the chapels and assembly halls. One very impressive building was the one constructed recently for the previous Panchen Lama who passed away in 1989. It was massive with a golden chorten studded with jewels guarding his remains. Around noon we were disappointed to realize that most of the chapels were closing for the afternoon. Then we realized that we were simultaneously lucky because we were just in time for the afternoon prayer service in the main assembly hall. We waited for what seemed like ages for all the yellow robed monks to gather (punching each other and generally but surprisingly acting like the young men that they most undeniably are) in the courtyard and then, as if at starting a cross-country race, dash into the hall all at once! Once they got settled and, having completely filled the room (there must have been several hundred monks), started chanting, we tourists had a chance to walk quietly down the main aisle and view the inner chapel. It was quite nerve-wracking to wander through the room; I’m still undecided as to which group was the more curious regarding the other.

Afterwards we climbed back into our jeep and hit the highway for Lhatse. About an hour and a half out of town we stopped for a smoke-break for our driver. I’d been asleep but when I woke I noticed how distraught Anne had become. She had an awful headache and felt like “bloody hell”. She spent an agonizing ten minutes consulting us and the drivers and finally decided to catch a ride with a jeep stopped across the street but heading back to Shigatse. She was worried that if she continued she’d feel worse due to the altitude and not be able to return because of the lack of public transportation. The remaining three of us were crushed to loose her company and shocked that she’d chosen to bail. We were also really disappointed to loose her ability to speak to our driver for us (she speaks Chinese)! We were pretty quiet for awhile and watched the scenery out the window change as we hit the gravel roads in a picturesque valley.

We were surprised when we saw a building perched up on a hill in the distance and realized, with irony, that our driver had taken us on a detour to Phuntsoling Monastery, which Anne had mentioned wanting to see before she left us! It was an amazing sight and a nice break for us to stretch our legs. The much longer ride to Lhatse (than had we taken the original route) was a bit much but the scenery was great. Lhatse itself (4050 meters) turned out to be the Tibetan version of a ghost town… literally the end of the world as far as we could see, so it was probably good we’d stopped.
We stayed in the “Lhatse Tibetan Farmers Adventure Hotel” (yep, really) in a triple. I was thankful my Swedish friends were willing to share with me… we really “enjoyed” our funny Tibetan room with blankets smelling of either Yak or sweaty Tibetan man (depending on who you ask), too. We had dinner in the best that my Lonely Planet offered which turned out to be… very, very marginal. We laughed a lot though, bought some water and snacks for the next day, and headed back to our lovely room. We completed day 2 by exploring the “wonderful” hole in the floor… ahem… bathroom and brushing our teeth with our store bought water. It was our second day (of what ended up as 4) with no showers.

Road Trip Day 3: Lhatse to Basum via Shegar

Day 3 was a remarkable day because we spent much of the day in view of the mighty, the massive, the “Oh my word is that HUGE” Mount Everest, otherwise known as Qomolangma (pronounced Cho-mo-LONG-ma as far as I can hear). No less impressive were the 8000 plus meter Cho Oyu to the right of the highway and Lhotse and Makalu to the left of our view. The Great Himalayas are truly great. Our first and every view of it took my breath away. Since we were now constantly above 4000 meters (higher than everything in the entire country of Japan!), that was both a figurative phrase and literal reality. It is truly the biggest thing ever. We were very content to just sit in the car, bouncing over the truly awful gravel “road” (actually the Friendship Highway connecting Lhasa to Nepal but surely not a road in any developed sense of the term), stopping every few moments to either “picture” or “pee”- helpfully the two English words our driver completely understood.

During the day we passed over 5000 meters twice, the first marked with a massive sign as the entrance to the Qomolangma National Preserve and the second being our last barrier between us and the mountain (which really doesn’t do it justice… it is such a monster!) and we watched it all afternoon. We passed a couple of checkpoints where we had to show our newly purchased permits to enter the nature preserve and our passports.


We’d intended to sleep in the tiny village of Tashi Dzom (4600 meters) but when we arrived, after WAY too many hours on the gravel highway Dawa convinced us to go 10k further to the city of Basum. Basum is as far as private vehicles are allowed, and tourists, climbers, etc. must pay for a seat on a bus to Rongphu Monastery. We decided to see if we could get a room there so that we could get on a bus for Everest first thing in the morning. This was a lot more confusing than we expected.

The first place our driver brought us too was nothing more than someone’s home. The owner spoke no English and Michael and I were thoroughly underwhelmed by the “bedroom”. I had also developed the beginnings of a headache- there was a squiggly line everywhere I looked and the ibuprofen I’d downed immediately wasn’t working yet. I deferred to him. He became convinced that we were not actually in Basum yet and that if we went further down the road we might find the guesthouse listed in the L.P. He kept repeating “Basum Pembah Guesthouse” slowly and clearly hoping someone might get it and point us in the correct direction. They showed us the other “guesthouse” which was identical to the first place and finally he demanded we drive to “Big Basum” because he (I should say “we”) was convinced we were in “little Basum”, even though the owner of the first place we’d seen corrected him that we were already in “Big Basum”. This was exactly as funny as it sounds and even with my headache, I couldn’t help laughing.

Dawa basically through up his hands and we piled back into the Land Cruiser in search of the “real” guesthouse. What we found was what I call The Snowman from Hell (I think the name was really only “The Snowman”), a dark, cold, bare, and empty hotel-ish place whose owners also ran the buses for Everest. It was basically our only option and they knew it so they totally took advantage of us- ripping us off for the beds in a cold (wet carpet and concrete walls) and poorly lit (one awful fluorescent lightbulb) room. We grumbled for the rest of the day (Michael, unconvinced we’d found Basum kept asking the poor English speaking representative of the pathetic staff if we weren’t actually in any of the other villages mentioned in the guide. One by one the guy shook his head and repeated that yes, we were really in Basum. I gave Michael hell for this later, but it was really frustrating and confusing at the time. And we were so tired!).

There were NO heaters at the place, the bathrooms were even worse than in Lhatse (for your benefit, I will NOT describe them) and there was absolutely nothing to do and nowhere else to go. We were in bed before ten, depressed about our awful accommodations but excited to head for Base Camp the next day. The fact that the staff stayed up all night drinking and partying in the very-next-room *almost* didn’t bother us.

Road Trip Day 4: To Base Camp or Bust!

Okay, so the plan for the day was this: Wake up and take the first bus to Rongphu Monastery (4980 meters- the highest monastery in the world!) then slowly hike our way the final 8k and 200 meters to Everest Base Camp. If it was nice, we felt all right, and didn’t think we’d either freeze to death or keel over due to the altitude, we would spend the night in one of the tents. We left plenty early so we still had the option to sleep at the monastery guesthouse or to take the bus back down and get out of dodge if we wanted to.

This is how it played out: We woke up late, but it didn’t really matter because we were the only ones who had stayed in our little dump of a hotel and the hung-over drivers were even slower getting going than us. After waiting around for almost an hour, the three of us and three guys from California (who’d arrived while we were waiting) finally purchased our 80 yuan round trip tickets. My funny eye squiggle was back and I quickly downed more advil hoping that would solve the problem. I hadn’t hardly slept at all and realized too late that I’d been looking right into the intense morning sun without my sunglasses. Feeling less than confident in myself, I squeezed into the “bus” (a Dodge Ram van that had certainly seen much happier days) and we tumbled off for the monastery. It was an awful hour-long ride. The van hadn’t even half the shocks of our cushy Land Cruiser and I had managed to sit on the side of the van with the sun. Hannah lent me her wide-brimmed hat and I just focused on the scenery hoping my head wouldn’t implode. Even more disappointingly… it was cloudy. We were only “sort of” sure which mountain was Everest until we stopped.


The van stopped outside what we assumed was the monastery. We were instantly freezing cold and the monastery looked absolutely dead so we forgot our plan to get some tea before hiking. The American guys went off in search for the horse carts to the top and Hannah and Michael started moving before we could even talk about our plan… they were shivering it was so cold. I’d been distracted talking to a Japanese couple that had come running down the road with no gloves or socks! They’d spent the night at Base Camp, but I was totally convinced by their utter lack of preparation (or common sense) that they were even slightly sane. I would have talked to them longer but my Swedish friends were getting further and further up the road so I ran off to catch up.

And then stopped dead. My lungs just wouldn’t cooperate. I was instantly dizzy and felt like my lungs had frozen. With a wave at the Swedish two-some I decided it would be smarter to go my own pace, which turned out to be, by necessity, slow motion. I really had no problem with that and the Hannah and Michael would stop and wait for me every couple of minutes. We tried to take it easy but it wasn’t easy at all, especially when those American *(^%%$s passed us in their individual horse driven wagons. We took pictures of them and the mountain and then broke out our emergency morale boosting Snickers. That’s when I noticed that my eyes were getting all funny again. Everything I looked at was kind of blurry like I was drunk. When I bent down to get into my bag and then stood back up the hills twisted and swirled in front of me. This was added to the dizziness and shortness of breath that I’d already decided I could deal with. I wasn’t feeling well. I took a bite of the Snickers and thought about my situation. Before I really thought at all, I realized that my tongue, roof of my mouth, and fingers of my left hand were numb. I couldn’t taste the chocolate at all. My mind was made up for me- there was obviously no way I could continue. Before I even had a chance to get disappointed, I stuffed the half eaten Snickers into my pocket, pulled my gloves back on, explained the problem to my friends and did a U-turn down the trail. Though the Swedes had offered to walk me back down I told them to keep going and to meet me back down at Basum, I would be fine.

Then I made myself turn around and start walking. I was quickly more than a little scared about my condition and my predicament. I knew I needed to get down from the mountain as soon as I could but I had no idea if there would be a van at the monastery or what I would do if I couldn’t make it back. I briefly looked around for another horse cart but there was nothing and no one around. One step after another, forcing myself to go slow while I wanted to sprint, I inhaled and exhaled my way back to the monastery. It sucked. I was terrified and I prayed to God that I’d make it back before something awful happened.

Fortunately, I did. I walked up to the monastery and sat down on a boulder near an empty van. Some peasants walked up to me and I pointed at the van while asking (begging!), “Basum?”. The woman, using my watch and her gestures, indicated that the van wasn’t leaving until 12:00 (it was only 10:30am), but another closer to the monastery would leave at 11:00. After she left I was sighted by a five-year old begger. I rolled my eyes, if ever- this- was not the time to have to deal with beggars. She was, however, relentless. In a really surreal dizzying exchange, I was soon joking with her as she tried to sell me her necklace and/or her filthy baby brother. As much as I didn’t have the energy to deal with her, it took me over ten minutes to be able to pull myself up off the rock and into the refuge of the monastery.

There I waited with an American couple for the van to leave. It was an incredibly anticlimactic and disappointing ride down. I felt better- my eyes were all right but I’d been left with a whopping headache. The rest of the day; from about noon until after 7pm, I spent waiting back at our bleak little guesthouse for Hannah and Michael. It was definitely the lowest point of my trip. There was really nothing I could do about it –obviously I had to go back- but I spent the day wondering if I had taken it slower at first, if I had taken a horse cart, if we’d stopped for tea like we’d planned… and on and on.


I was thrilled when Hannah and Michael returned and we got out of the Snowman for a lovely little guesthouse (identical to the ones we’d snubbed the previous evening) in Tashi Dzom for the night. They were exhausted and I was disappointed, so after a delicious home-cooked meal we all crashed in our cute little mud-walled, candle-lit room.

Road Trip Day 5: Tashi Dzom to Shigatse

We woke up in Tashi Dzom with renewed and/or refreshed spirits (depending on to which one of us you’d be referring). After playing around with the assorted dirty kids and sketchy kids roaming the empty streets, we piled into the car (a “Shopa-delay” from each of us without the reminder) and began our very long trip back towards the real world (as it were). We spent the Entire Day in the car. The bright spots were the fabulous views back at Mount Everest, which had finally decided to clear up. My panoramas didn’t quite turn out the way I’d hoped… but it was really a magnificent view. Basically Day 5 was just a really long day with a LOT of bouncing up and down interspersed with photos, bathroom stops, and a can of Pringles (what was left of them after my long afternoon in the horrible hotel the previous day, anyway).

Summary:
The road trip was worth every minute. I am still very sorry I didn’t make it to Base Camp, from the pictures I saw it wasn’t at all what I expected, but it still would have been awesome to be there. It isn’t quite as fun to say I *almost* made there, or that I *coulda* died up there, or that I *technically* was over half way to the top. But every day of the trip was amazing and a really unique cultural experience. The company was fun and the other sights were fascinating. And after six full days in the car we were supremely happy to get out of it. Tibet was a true adventure. One I would love to repeat someday (politics aside). Get there while you can (oops)!!!!

Road Trip Day 5: Tashi Dzom to Shigatse

We woke up in Tashi Dzom with renewed and/or refreshed spirits (depending on to which one of us you’d be referring). After playing around with the assorted dirty kids and sketchy kids roaming the empty streets, we piled into the car (a “Shopa-delay” from each of us without the reminder) and began our very long trip back towards the real world (as it were). We spent the Entire Day in the car. The bright spots were the fabulous views back at Mount Everest, which had finally decided to clear up. My panoramas didn’t quite turn out the way I’d hoped… but it was really a magnificent view. Basically Day 5 was just a really long day with a LOT of bouncing up and down interspersed with photos, bathroom stops, and a can of Pringles (what was left of them after my long afternoon in the horrible hotel the previous day, anyway).

Summary:
The road trip was worth every minute. I am still very sorry I didn’t make it to Base Camp, from the pictures I saw it wasn’t at all what I expected, but it still would have been awesome to be there. It isn’t quite as fun to say I *almost* made there, or that I *coulda* died up there, or that I *technically* was over half way to the top. But every day of the trip was amazing and a really unique cultural experience. The company was fun and the other sights were fascinating. And after six full days in the car we were supremely happy to get out of it. Tibet was a true adventure. One I would love to repeat someday (politics aside). Get there while you can (oops)!!!!

New- With Photos!

Okay, I promise to go back and write about the days of the trip that I've skipped over tomorrow afternoon. You will all have to handle the suspense for another half a day. To bide the time... check it out!! There are now real pictures!!! I'm back in Tokyo and spent this evening downloading my Four Hundred and Eight photos. I've gone back through the Tibet posts and added some relevant and favorite photos so you can finally have an idea of what I saw. You can click on the photos to see the larger version. Amazing, isn't it? Now just hang on and I'll get the rest to you as soon as I can.

Just so you don't think I'm just sitting around relaxing after my adventure, I will have you know that I arrived back from the airport at 12:30am this morning, slept, then had breakfast/chatting time with Tom and his mom, then we all left for our Japan engagement/wedding party which lasted until almost 9 pm!! It was a blast and really, really wonderful to see everyone one last time. There were around 40 people and we got flowers and presents and served everyone really great food. Then a smaller group of us went out for karaoke. This whole "party for us" thing is quite nice! ;) Okay, I'm kidding (sort of).

From China to China

Yesterday's flight from Lhasa to Chengdu was a domestic flight, but it sure didn't feel like it. "Now I'm in China...", I immediately sighed as I watched the commuter traffic from my bus window on the ride into downtown. It's probably not wise to get into the politics while I'm still physically in China. I'll leave it alone, but say that this is definitely not "One China".



Anyway, I reached Chengdu yesterday evening and am back at Mix Backpacker's Hostel, where I stayed on my way out. Somehow I managed to have almost the same amount of "issues" using the buses to get here as I did last time... even though I knew where I was going.

I met and chatted with an Israeli woman, Osnad, over dinner last night- we're sharing the same room and both have the top bunks so our conversation carried over much like a slumber party. She's traveling through China for a month and a half and I'm, of course, fresh out of Tibet. We both have traveled all over the world (she South America, me all over Asia, etc.), but what did we talk about? Well, getting married and weddings, of course!!!

Another guy in my room is a retired, Japanese delivery man who visited Tibet twenty years ago and actually took the ferry to China from Japan! I've met so many more interesting travelers, its hard to believe how nervous I originally was about doing this trip alone. A key has definitely been staying in the dorm rooms at the hotels and hostels. I'm kind of surprised I've not used hostels before, but they've been a lot more fun, easier to use, and cheaper than I'd thought.

Don't misunderstand me though, I will absolutly be ready to have my own room back.

Kali-Shua, Tibet

(posted with a 24 hour delay due to server interupption in Lhasa)

This is my last post from Tibet. My flight leaves in a few hours. I just got back from my last swing around the Barkhor kora. I left my camera in my bag and just walked around absorbing everything; the shy but curious stares of the pilgrims, the sneaky grins from the little kids, the confidant greetings of the eager vendors, the spicey scent of the temple incense, the red-blue-yellow-green-white-pink rainbow of scarves, sweaters, jewlery and everything (blenders! baseball caps!) else being sold. What a magical place!



My bag is packed but I'm not ready to go. There are plenty of places I wasn't able to visit in my short stay here, but more than that I really feel like I could (and would love to) stay here in Lhasa for days yet- just watching the people and searching for more tucked away pockets of old, original Tibet. I know much of Tibet and Tibetan culture has been flushed away and destroyed by the Chinese, but what remains is inspiring and beautiful. My stay here has been too short, but its been a very cool introduction.