Shangri-La...start of the Tibetan Kingdom!
I think I figured out pictures! This is me in the Yi Village with the dragon. Anyway, back to the post.
On Wednesday (2/17), we had to wake up pretty early in order to make it out of Shaxi and to the Tibetan village on time. We left around 8 am and arrived around 1 pm, so it was a 5 hour drive to Zhongdian, the start of the Tibetan world in Yunnan. For Tibetans, their culture doesn’t stop just at the border of Tibet, but it expands into many other provinces since China’s borders do not match up with their cultural borders. So in their eyes, Zhongdian in Yunnan is Tibet! And you can see the influence in the town of Zhongdian. But after 11 days of Chinese food, we were craving some Western food, so we managed to find a pizza place owned by an authentic Italian in the middle of this town. The town of Zhongdian has also officially renamed itself Shangri-La after the mythical place in China. When we arrived, it had started to have small gusts of flurries coming down. That was quite a change compared to the tropical Xishuangbana! After we ate our delicious pizza, quite quickly if I may add, we hopped back on the bus to head to the Tibetan village Tangdui which was destined to be our next homestay. As usual, we had a welcoming party, but to kick it off, we had a basketball match between our TBCers and the Tibetans. The snow luckily had stopped for this event, but it was still bitterly cold. Of course their logic called for Bai Jiu, not just to warm us but to also show off their hospitality. Politely, I accepted. Impolitely, I poured it out under the table onto the ground. So we had three different teams meet three different Tibetan opponents. Although they were shorter than our teams (not taller than me of course), their advantage was the altitude. Our people were taller, but after 5 minutes, they were running around huffing and puffing and the Tibetans were quick. We still beat them, but it was all fun really. After the game, we all separated into our homestays, and this time I was grouped with Greta and Hanna. Our host-dad was pretty badass. He was the second oldest son of 4, and his father was the master potter of the village. So our host dad was also a potter, teaching his 15 year old son how to do pottery. He also had a wife, and a daughter who was our age, but they didn’t do pottery. Instead they farmed and cooked and cleaned for the other two. Their house was a beautiful large wooden one. They owned a couple of yaks, and some pigs, so they were quite wealthy. One thing that impressed me was their carved mantelpiece that held their pots and pans. It was quite gorgeous. After we dropped off our stuff, our host family invited us to have Yak butter tea. Basically, it is exactly like drinking butter, very rich. After Dali, I had learned my lesson with dairy products, and I tried to take as little as tea as was polite. There is also a sort of powder that you’re supposed to toss into your mouth before you take a swig of the butter tea (the powder tastes like cheerios), but because of the communication barrier, I was baffled by what I was supposed to do with the powder. So I took the powder and sprinkled it on top of some fried bread that they gave us. My host father and mother laughed up a storm, and I felt so embarrassed. My host dad even gave me a slap on the leg like I was one of the guys. After sitting their politely trying to make small-talk, we headed over to the basketball court to learn about the school. This little village had a textbook made exclusively for them. The premise of the classes is hands-on learning. The children are supposed to go around asking elders about the history, but also taking pictures, and drawing what they see their town as. Every few years, they will update the textbook to include the new additions made. This program was created in order to sustain the culture and foster community. After explaining the textbook, we saw the master potters at work. The village Tangdui is famous for their black pottery and they sell it to tourists. It is quite beautiful and unique. After the potters finished their creations, we got a chance to try. We didn’t have too much time because our host families invited us home to have hot pot, which was made from the black pottery. It was perfect for the cold day, and really delicious with yak meat and cheese, and vegetables including broccoli. It was quite satisfying. After dinner, we grabbed a few extra coats, and headed back to the basketball court for the town party/show. There were many dances and songs, some that were great by us and the Tibetans, but it was really getting frigid outside and miserable. As father Gene said, “this is what hell must be like”. Immediately following the party, we quickly returned home and had hot water while sitting by their massive stove trying to warm up. As usual, they insisted on feeding us more noodles. Then we were able to go to our room and curl up under blankets and carpets in all of our clothes and fall asleep.
When we woke up, we understood why it was freezing at the part-in the night it had snowed and stuck. Since Yunnan has been in drought, the family was quite happy for their farmland to get some water. Surprisingly, it was quite warm under all of the carpets. I guess to Tibetans have figured out how to keep warm. In the morning, we were again asked to drink yak butter tea. I declined, but they threw it back like it was water. We then gathered our stuff, said goodbye to the daughter and mother, and followed our host dad to his pottery studio. There we could see his father and brother with the pottery. Someone had made a book about his father and published it on the process of making black pottery. After we had a look around and some made some purchases, we hopped back on the bus to head back to Zhongdian. After a fiasco with rooms and in a random guesthouse, we returned to the pizza place to enjoy the Western food we all missed so much. After lunch, we went to the Thangka Center, which is a non-profit organization educated underprivileged kids the art of Thangka painting. They explained a lot about spirituality, but not much about the place itself, but it was pretty interesting. Next we headed to the Dabao temple to see a Buddhist temple. We were each given a prayer flag to write our prayers flag, and we created a long chain of our TBC flags. According to Buddhist belief, whenever the wind blows a flag, that means that the prayer is being sent to heaven. The temple is situated on top of a hill, so it was really windy on top, the perfect place for the wind to pick up the flags. Also, there were thousands of prayer flags all around which was cool. Also, if one throws barley into a flame, it also sends your prayer up to heaven. So hopefully, heaven heard something, probably something equivalent to TBC screaming. On our way down, we were able to spin a lot of prayer wheels. These wheels are only to be turned clockwise, the other day would be bad luck. After the temple, we went to a Tibetan orphanage where they fed us dinner. They were really cute with hopeful faces, all very shy but still curious about us. After we ate, I was able to talk with a few of them and we chatted a bit. When we began our party, the orphans blew us away with the difficulty and coordination of their dances. Also, most of them looked like they were having so much fun. One of the best dancers was a 13 year who I was able to talk to before the party. When I smiled at her, she beamed back. After the party, we gave them toys, candy and a donation, so hopefully the orphanage can be maintained. The place was opened by a Tibetan woman who was adopted by a family to Switzerland who came back to help her community. She has an inspiring story, and she put her whole life’s savings into this project. After all the ceremony was over, the 13 year old girl came up to me and grabbed my hand. She was so genuine and sweet, but looked a lot younger than she actually was. She escorted me outside, and said good bye with a beaming smile. We walked back to the town early hoping to get back into before they turned off the hot water at 10. In my guesthouse, my electricity \was totally out, so there wasn’t any hot water. Garrett and I walked around the town a bit, but it was freezing. Garrett ended up getting a scarf made out of Yak hair (which is really warm), and every time I smell it, I think of the Tibetan homestay. When we returned to the guesthouse, they finally got the electricity on again. It was pretty cold and miserable in the guesthouse although the blankets were electric. I was a lot more uncomfortable than at the Tibetan homestay with their thick blankets. The Tibetans really know how to keep warm.