When you think of Tibet, along with various ideas of altitude and mountains, you think inevitably monks, monasteries, a dimension of great spirituality. Although my visit was limited to Lhasa in Tibet and surrounding areas, I can say that I have seen the major monasteries and tasted different and sometimes conflicting emotions.
The first day we went to Drepung monastery, not far from Lhasa, on a hill. Every Tibetan knows why this monastery once a year a giant thangka covers half the mountain, with its pilgrimages and festivals.

A bit 'out of breath because the first steps we see the first Tibetan monks and the first "rotating things" (I always forget the name). In these objects is usually inscribed "Omma ni paimai hom" and must be facts rotate in the clockwise, as if you read them continuously. The meaning is something close to "bring me luck / health" and "protect me".

Two things are particularly alive in the memories of this first encounter with the Tibetan culture: the first is a mirror. Yes: simple, po'ricurvo, hung in one of the thousand temples of Drepung. Many Tibetans in a row, we can one po'perplessi to cogitate on the narcissism of these people. Our guide enlightens us: look inside themselves, as tradition has it that your future will be clearer, crisper image in the mirror. I wear religiously line up and wait for judgment. I see myself in the mirror, staring for a few seconds. A little old lady behind me says something, I believe that protested politely telling me to move, but my guide tells me instead of compliments because my image is razor sharp. Well, good future! I leave happy, with my friend Tas a po'invidiosa because of her poor vision. All right, will my red sweatshirt or being higher with relative angular benefits, however I take it and take it home.

Meanwhile we see something else common to many other places in Tibet: burning mirrors to boil hot water. Continuing the journey through the streets of the monastery you will come across many local pilgrims, monks busy and many tourists.

Commenting on the place feel a megacampana call the hour of meditation. Inside the monastery, a hundred monks begin to pray reciting ancient Buddhist phrases ( Video, 3.79 MB, DivX Player 6 required ). This is the second thing I will not forget Drepung: the thrill of hearing them, respectful to sit in a corner, feeling guilty to steal a video or photo without the flash ... and above all to remain there, listening to them is something astonishing. It 'so much spirituality that shines through in these places, and sympathy for these people can grow and become annoyed and angry because of too many tourists, especially Chinese, who see everything as disneyland, noisy without disturbing than anyone, often only to show the companion of adventures in their new billion-megapixel camera, you can not use regularly.

The last image I carry inside of this monastery is part of the history of Tibet. When the Chinese liberated peacefully used the monastery as a hospital. Near a staircase in one corner stands a sign that more or less says "Long live Mao who came here not to go anymore." Amen.

Being single, relatively straightforward and not particularly involved in an intense social life (translation: do not go out often) offers a wonderful opportunity to think, that the risk of thinking too much, depending on interpretations. Not enough, I'll go first in Tibet, and then I let myself be seduced by a brick yet another DVD (mildly roommate every time I watch a DVD), this time on a great Ghandi. If, then, I delight in meditation on the great questions of man, why do not you smaronare well (here, again nothing published on the Sun)?
I thought, maybe I'm looking for perfection? Because as Don Claudio taught me years ago, while housed in his house a horde of college, perfection is not of this world, let alone a human being. Incidentally, those who usually seems free from the dark side is often the one who designed the Death Star (and for those who have never seen Star Wars, get a culture). A relationship expert like my friend S. I teach among other things, that the perfection tired, while A. I indicates the way in the first person is tired of cliches and he knows how to lovingly ripped off. E'solo that sometimes I come across people like alternatives that I wonder who or what the hell the end is perfection.
One answer given when I thought essermela Case for Blacks still singing from Fiorello, centering everything on myself instead of a prime objective and abstract: What is perfection for me? Problem is that subjectivity does not always solve, because when you think you already know the answer other than the way you were when you started chiedertela, maybe then that quality, experience, did not matter that much, maybe even that flaw was so important . But eventually mature, and like it or not you slow down, and slowly narrowing that time frame. In fact, I would not say you mature, you're just lazy.
Thus, an idea of ​​what I seek is increasingly blurred. Finding it is another matter altogether. One thing is certain, whatever does not find the front of this laptop, too bumpy. Then get up the thoughtful members of this chair and I go out, that no matter how busy I have no social life, and that perfection is not what I folgorasse tonight, a few laughs and a Black Russian raise always a busy week.

Very few believe that the question "do you like to travel" respond with a No dry, sometimes those who hesitate are those traveling on business can not take anymore of a nomadic life, couch potatoes or pathological. Whether traveling across the world or looking for a restaurant behind the house, like to travel to the human kind. Of course, when going to these motivations are varied: disconnect from the routine, the feeling of adventure (real or pretend to be) perhaps visiting exotic places, realize a dream that has for so long (never thought "maybe a I can afford my day around the world?), meet interesting people, experience outside the lines (these are the "Hello dear, pass two months in Africa") ... and many others.
That said, affianchiamoci my journey by train:

I start from Shanghai, the only reasonable hope that someone has a ticket to Beijing, even accepting a standing ticket for 48 travel (then fortunately turning into a seat "hard seat"). The only sense to try crap like that fulfills a sense of adventure.

Seeing my friends in Beijing, go to a land shrouded in meditative charm, the same travel by train from the very feeling of disconnect from the routine and take a nice vacation in May.
For the first 24 travel, traveling west, the landscape becomes more desert, passing through the walls of Xian (the town of terracotta warriors) and Liaoning, eventually coming to Xinning, capital of the province north of Tibet. We expected the second night ( Video heap of humanity, 1.94 Mb, DivX Player 6 needed ) and then at 5.30 am we arrive at Golmund (the "gate of Tibet" if you saw the movie "7 years ..."). We are now in Tibet, and from there it goes up to about 4000 meters across the "Plateau": vast desert, beautiful sunrise.

Me and Olaf, my traveling companion, we planted in the dining car from Golmund, enjoying every minute. After a few hours of lunar landscapes, views too large for a photograph, Yak scattered among the green desert and it's lunchtime, which is also the Tanggula pass, 5000 meters of inebriation. The oxygen machines, running from the gates of Tibet, pumping non-stop, without specific symptoms of too high an altitude not resist from trying the stick disposable. After a few hours here we are at Lake Namtsu, phenomenal spectacle of giant high-altitude water, a mirror on the sky. The joy of discovery combined with breathtaking landscapes is one of the reasons I wanted the train at any cost.

Not enough, we add two factors: the Chinese train and feel like an adventure drive to learn. In our compartment, we were the only foreigners, I do not remember having talked so much about Chinese life, and this added to the Chinese culture where privacy is an unknown concept, as the questions to ask or not to a stranger ... Well, everyone knew everything of us, all they told us all about them and the ceremony of two days has inevitably ended with the ritual of visiting cards. So, the neighbor who tells you the scppatelle with his wife, the cop drunk at a restaurant that plays with you with "the cards of the revolution" (regular poker cards with the highest combined with pictures of Mao propaganda), the group of phantom actresses from Hong Kong who go on holiday in Lhasa, the conductor that just could not find a hole to sleep, but we offered him a beer the same (in the photo is not him, but his deputy) ..

This is an experience, and I thank my year in Beijing for teaching me the basics to communicate with this crazy, "random" people of phenomenal cock (yes, that word sputtana the article, you will be unable published on the Sun). Had I not known I would live half of the Chinese experience, however, talking with the Russians in Vladivostok in perpetuity beer, Greg who is traveling throughout Asia during his sabbatical, Anne, who teaches English in Xian, and two great Italians who working in Beijing, one in the Italian Chamber of Commerce in China that was my first experience semilavorativa here. The small world after all, and for foreigners in China, sometimes even more.

It is eight o'clock in the evening sunset. Finally, unfortunately, the journey is over. We are in Lhasa, in a station built pharaonic "Tibetan-style" (?), Our guide welcomes us to take us to the hotel.

It 's time to join the Society, finding those who arrived by plane. The trip Beijing - Lhasa say, I'm glad I did and would do it, it definitely was worth the effort. Probably not I'll just make it, but we are in Lhasa, we did it! Start my first trip to Tibet.