Zhongguo Shiyi (China Eleven)

Our adventure continues! But, first a word about Peter Tam, our tour guide from Zhaoqing.

Peter is 24 years old and has been a tour guide for about 2   years. Peter loves his job, and that love makes it difficult to remember that he is a tour guide and not a member of our group. Peter is always smiling. He loves to sing English songs. When he was in college, he had a professor from Canada who taught him many. He is always singing, and he inspires us to sing with him. I feel embarrassed because he has to teach me the words to many of the songs! He wants to learn more songs, and so he is constantly after us to teach him. It stretches the mind, but it helps to pass the time on long train or bus rides. His English is very good, but he is anxious to learn more -- particularly slang and idioms. He is always wanting to teach Chinese too, and much of what I have learned of the language I owe to Peter. He is as excited about traveling as any of us, perhaps more so. He always has his camera with him, and his eyes are wide as we take in the sights. He listens attentively to the local guides and adds his input where and when it is appropriate. Amid all this he is still very professional in doing his job. He carries a bag, almost like a purse, that has all the "stuff" in it for our trip, including loads of money (I have yet to see any Chinese write a check; everything is on a cash basis). That is why we say of him, "Ta shi da fu hao" (literally, he is the big rich man, but translated as "he is the big wheel"). It is a pleasure to travel with him, and I am happy to count him as one of my friends.

Now, on to Xian! We caught the 5:10 PM train from Beijing to Xian. There were now eleven of us, including our relatives from back home and Peter. Rita and Yvonne (Rita's mother) had a berth in the soft-sleeper car, and the rest of us were in the hard-sleeper. Rachel, Jen, Vicki (Robert's mother), Pam, Denise and I had one berth, six bunks to a berth. Peter, Robert and Mark (Robert's brother) were a few berths down. Unfortunately, because it was an evening train, we didn't get to see much scenery along the way. However, it was still another fun adventure. I like riding the Chinese trains. This was my third time, and I was already getting to be an old hand. I quickly climbed the ladder to stow our luggage on the overhead rack, and everyone handed their backpack up to me. I claimed a top bunk, and nobody put up an argument. They are hard to get in to, but I like them because during the night one is less likely to be bothered by someone walking by or by light coming through the windows. So it was Jen and myself on the top, Denise and Rachel in the middle, and Pam and Vicki had the bottom two bunks. Everyone got comfortable. There was some card playing, chatting about what we had experienced in Beijing and what we were going to see in Xian, some exchanges with the Chinese, and a lot of junk food eating.

The fun didn't start until the middle of the night. At about 10:30 they always shut off the lights on the train except for a couple of floor lights, so it gets pretty dark. At about 4, I awoke and checked my watch for the time. Denise saw me stirring and, in a whisper, asked what time it was. I whispered back "4" and went back to sleep. She apparently had to get up to go use the restroom. By the time she came back, I was already asleep again. I was awakened by a panicked whispered wail of "Gordy!" Denise could not find our berth on the way back and had started to climb into what she thought was her bunk only to waken the man who was in it. It turns out that she missed our berth by one, and it provided some amusement (although it was not funny at the time) for the rest of the trip.

Here I am on page two already, and we haven't even gotten to Xian yet! We got to Xian around 7:30 (Sunday, November 7) and George, our local tour guide, was there along with James, his driver (the drivers don't speak English, so we usually dub them with the English name of James, as in "home James"). The exception was our driver in Beijing, who, by virtue of wearing a jacket with Reebok on the back, was given the name Reebok.  It was a cloudy (looked like rain) day. In fact we never saw the sun while in Xian, but I only recall one short drizzle. George took us to our hotel where we had breakfast and then an hour to shower and get ready for another day of great adventure.

Xian is a fascinating city. It is currently the capital of Shaanxi Province, but it served as the capital of China for 11 dynasties beginning with emperor Qin, who was the first to unite all of present day China into one empire in 221 BC. Qin is also famous for the construction of the Great Wall and the Terra Cotta Warriors. So, Xian's history is much longer and richer than that of even Beijing. During the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD) Xian was the largest, and most prosperous city in the world!

Our adventure began with a visit to the city wall. Xian is one of the few cities in China in which the city wall is still visible. It is almost entirely intact! The current wall was built in the mid 14th Century upon the foundation of the wall from the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD). The wall forms a rectangle around the city with a perimeter of 14 kilometers (almost 9 miles). It stands 12 meters high (about 40 feet) with a width at the top of 12-14 meters. There are four gates (one at each compass point) to the wall, and other holes have been punched in the wall to allow traffic to flow in and out. There was a foot race (I'm guessing a 14 kilometer) around the perimeter, and we met a 93-year-old participant!

After the wall we visited the Big Goose Pagoda. The Pagoda was built by Gao Zong (the 3rd emperor in the Tang Dynasty) while he was still crown prince in memory of his deceased mother. It was built to house the Buddhist scriptures that were brought back from India by the monk Xuan Zang, who then translated them from the Sanskrit to Chinese into 1,335 volumes. It gets its name from an ancient Buddhist tradition in which a group of monks in India were starving and praying for food. As they were praying, a flock of geese flew overhead and the lead goose dropped dead from the sky. The Pagoda stands 64 meters tall (210 feet).

After lunch we had a free afternoon. Denise, Jen, and I decided to go exploring. We ended up finding the Palace of Emperor Qin. It was not on our itinerary, and we soon discovered why. Most of the things that are on the tour have been renovated or restored for the modern foreign tourist industry. This was not. It is not even listed in any of the tourist guide books on China. There were a few Chinese tourists, but no foreigners, and no signs other than in Chinese (almost every other place we go has some English around). But, this also provided the palace with its charm. This was the home of Emperor Qin. From the looks of it, it was used as a movie studio for several years. Inside the main palace were photos and signs from, what we gathered, were some of the films shot there. We even dressed up as emperor and empresses and had our pictures taken. What a hoot!

After dinner it was an early night, as many did not sleep all that well on the train the night before, and Monday (November 8) was going to be a big day of touring for us. We began the day by visiting the Banpo Village Museum. The Banpo Village is an archeological dig where they built a museum right around it. The village dates from about 6,000 years ago and is a typical village of the Yellow River Region that was a matriarchal society (run by women). One can see the ruins and outlines of houses and how the village was designed. The museum also houses about 10,000 tools and other artifacts. The Yellow River Region was the birthplace of the Chinese civilization, and we were fortunate enough to see one of the villages!

After the Banpo village we stopped at the Huaqing Pool. The Huaqing Pool is a hot spring where during the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD) the Chinese built bath houses for the emperor and his court. There are 60 pools located here.  During the 1930's the Chinese were not only fighting the Japanese invaders, but they were in the middle of a civil war as well (Chiang Kaishek vs. Mao Zedong). Because of the civil war, China could not deal with the Japanese very well. In 1936, while headquartered at the Huaqing Pool, Chiang's own generals took him prisoner and forced him to negotiate a peace with Mao to fight a united campaign against the Japanese.

From the Huaqing Pools we headed to the Museum of the Terra Cotta Warriors. Before Emperor Qin died (207 BC) he began construction on an enormous tomb. Being an emperor he wanted to be prepared to rule in the afterlife. So, he had artisans make an army of between 7,000 and 10,000 soldiers (the Terra Cotta Warriors) that he could take with him. It took nearly 40 years to build the tomb and prepare the army. As I mentioned above, Qin was not a popular ruler. In uniting the seven states that are now modern China he, obviously, made lots of enemies and killed lots of people in the process. He also had 100,000 scholars put to death (he did not want free-thinkers, but only subjects that would do what he wanted them to do). Every worker associated with the building of the tomb was also executed, as were the executioners (he didn't want any one to know the whereabouts of his tomb to protect it from being robbed -- and of all the tombs in the area around Xian, there are only two which have not been robbed, his is one of them). When he did die, there was a peasant uprising. They found the entrance to the Terra Cotta Warriors, and destroyed many of them. They also set fires inside the warrior pits, but they could not find the entrance to the tomb itself. The uprising was led by Liu Bang, who in 206 BC, proclaimed himself emperor which began the Han Dynasty which lasted for over 400 years (206 BC-220 AD). The tomb was quickly forgotten, and was left undisturbed for over 2,000 years, when, in 1974 some peasants were digging a well, and they brought a head of a warrior up in their bucket! Excavation soon began, and it can truly be said that this was the archaeological find of the century!

The museum is divided up into 3 pits. The Chinese constructed buildings around each pit to protect them from the elements. The first pit is the most famous one (it is the one Bill Clinton had his picture taken in). It is fully excavated, and you can see the warriors both as they were found, and as they have been reconstructed. But, we started in Pit 2. Pit 2 is the other large pit still being excavated. The Chinese are moving slowly in the excavation of this pit for two reasons. The obvious reason is because of the care necessary in any archaeological dig. The other reason is to keep the excavation going so that people who come to visit in the future can see an archaeological excavation in progress (of course, they were not working while we were there). From Pit 2 we moved to Pit 3, which was the smallest of the three pits. It was the headquarters and was filled with officers and bodyguards. They are also finished excavating in Pit 3. This pit sustained the least damage of the three. One can see the clearly defined walls of the pit, and the body guards lining the halls. Finally, we entered Pit 1! In all its glorious splendor we found about 3,000 warriors, some as they were found, and others restored and placed back into battle line. Truly a remarkable sight.

We have had an ongoing discussion since we arrived in China about restoring buildings and artifacts. The students' biggest complaint during our travels is that many of the things are too "touristy." During the late sixties and through the seventies, under the leadership of Mao, China went through a "Cultural Revolution." Many things were destroyed or damaged by the Red Guard that represented China's ancient culture, religions and heritage (the only things worth preserving were things representing the Communist Revolution). Since the death of Mao, China has been busy restoring and rebuilding many of these things it only recently destroyed. I think Deng realized that foreign tourists were much more interested in spending their money to see Buddhist temples than statues of Mao. With all the new paint, however, it does become difficult to remember that one is looking at something hundreds of years old (perhaps it is only twenty years old). The barrage of souvenir vendors, who don't wait for you to come to them, but rather attack you as you get off the bus creates a circus environment such that you no longer feel that you are visiting something of cultural significance, but that rather you are merely at a place where people can get your money. And so, many of the students would prefer to visit these temples, palaces, Great Walls, and other sites in the condition they were found and not restored.

Rachel brought up this question again while we were visiting the Terra Cotta Warriors. As I mentioned above, many of the warriors were damaged after the peasant uprising following Qin's death (they were all equipped with real swords and spears which the peasants took for their own weapons). Should they be left as they were found, or should they be restored? Rachel's particular concern with the Terra Cotta Warriors is the glorification of Qin (who, I mentioned above, was not a nice man), and the number of people who were killed in connection with the making of the TC Warriors (not to mention the 100,000 political prisoners who died in the construction of the Great Wall). She struggles with the issue, but somehow feels that it glorifies Qin at the expense of those who died, and that, perhaps, it would be a better monument to the workers if the warriors were left as they were found.

I vote for restoration. Knowledge is virtue. When restoration adds to our understanding of who people were and who people are, then it is good. For all the bad that Qin did he did help shape and mold what has become modern China. In order to better understand China, one needs to understand Qin and the China he ruled. In order to understand Qin and his China, one, I think, needs to see things as he would have saw them, not as they are 2,200 years later. Just as I don't think turning a concentration camp into a museum is a glorification of Hitler, neither do I think that turning the find of the Terra Cotta Warriors into a museum is a glorification of Qin. Now, with the Terra Cotta Warriors, they have not restored all of them, but have left many where they have found them. Perhaps this is a nice mix. But, I think there is something to the "Awe" of seeing things as they would have appeared when first made. So, whether it is the Terra Cotta Warriors, the Great Wall, temples damaged during the Cultural Revolution, or even the Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, I am glad that people go to the trouble of preserving and restoring cultural artifacts so that we might learn from them. I also think that it is a tribute to China that they have gone through so much trouble to restore so many of the buildings and temples which were damaged and destroyed during the Cultural Revolution.

But, this digression has taken us to page 5, so, on with the tour. The museum was an amazing site, and it truly did live up to our expectations. On our way back to our hotel we stopped at what is called the Stele Forest. The Stele Forest is part of the Shaanxi Provincial Museum, which was once a Confucian Temple. Steles are enormous stone tablets (some over 8 feet tall) that are actually books. There are about 2,300 of these in the museum, and it is said that it is the heaviest collection of books anywhere in the world. Some date from the Han Dynasty (206 BC-220 AD), and most of them document the history of the Silk Road.  Xian was a major point along the trade route connecting China with the Mideast, and ultimately Europe. There is a large Islamic influence in the city, and the silk trade is one of the reasons that Xian became the largest city in the world during the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD). The Steles show the history of Xian, and its importance to China for over 2,000 years.

On Tuesday, November 9 we visited the Qian Tomb and the Tomb of the princess of Yongtai. In the Qian Tomb is buried both the Tang Emperor Gao Zong and his wife the Empress Wu Zetian. Gao Zong became emperor in 650 AD when his father died. Wu Zetian was a concubine of his father's but Gao married her and made her empress. Gao died in 683 AD, and the following year Empress Wu dethroned his successor, and ruled as an absolute monarch until her death in 705 AD.  The tomb is buried into the side of a mountain -- like most tombs in the area are. On the mountainside are many stone sculptures of animals and officers of the imperial guard. There are also 61 statues representing the minority peoples of China and the foreign dignitaries who attended Gao's funeral. There is a "Wordless Stele" standing 6 meters high. The blank tablet represents the Empress's absolute power which words were unable to express.  Princess Yongtai was the granddaughter of Gao Zong who was put to death in 701 AD by Empress Wu. She was buried with honors by her father when he became emperor at the death of Wu in 705 AD. We could actually walk down into the tomb of Princess Yongtai. The tomb featured many paintings and engravings. It was interesting to actually see the inside of a tomb and see the detail on the carvings on the sacorphagus.

That ended our tour of Xian. We had finished our tenth day of our 2 week trip. In Beijing we had seen the capital of China since about 1400 onwards, and Xian we had seen the beginnings of China -- from the neolithic peoples of the Yellow River region, to the formation of China under the emperor Qin to the height of Chinese culture during the Tang Dynasty. Now we were off to Lhasa, Tibet -- the rooftop of the world, and the center of Tibetan Buddhism.

We left Xian by plane early on the morning of November 10 (Wednesday). We landed in Lhasa at about 11:30 and had about a one and a half hour bus ride into Lhasa to our hotel. We had lunch, and then took the rest of the day to rest to adjust to the altitude. Lhasa sits 3,600 meters (1,108 feet) above sea level. Denver is the mile high city. Well, Lhasa is 2.25 miles above sea level. The air is very thin, and one can get very sick if one tries to do to much before one has adjusted. Most everyone just laid around most the day. Mark (Robert's brother) took off walking -- I think in search of food, since in Beijing and Xian he was living on McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken. There is no American food in Lhasa! I did some walking too, although at a much slower pace than what I would normally go -- I did not want to risk ruining this part of the trip. The afternoon was glorious!

Bright sunshine (no air to filter it), and the temperature had to be in the low 70's. What a shock! During our whole trip we kept expecting to run into cold weather, but we were truly blessed. It would be a little chilly in the morning and the evening (okay, it probably got down in the low 30's), but after the sun came up, the temperature quickly shot up every day. Our first day was no different. We had dinner that night and went to bed early eagerly looking forward to more great adventures in Tibet!

Thursday morning we headed to the Drepung Monastery which dates from the early 15th Century and lies just east of Lhasa. It was the home of the second through the fifth Dalai Lamas. Tibet, until 1951, was a theocracy (a country in which the political power resides in the religious sector). It was granted autonomy in the 15th Century by the emperor of China who bestowed his power to reign in Tibet upon the first Dalai Lama. One of Mao's arguments when he "liberated" Tibet in 1951 was that the Dalai Lama was not ruling well and that he had the authority to take the control back from the Dalai Lama. In its heyday Drepung monastery was the home to over 7,000 monks, and it was arguably the largest monastery in the world. However, due to certain events in China (namely the Cultural Revolution), over 40% of the monastery has been destroyed. There was a time recently when there were no monks there, but the number has climbed back to around 700.

The first thing one notices upon entering any monastery in Tibet is the pungent order. The monks burn lots of candles that are made of yak butter. Every one in our group was choked by the smell. I was probably the least affected (all those years of working in pig and horse barns finally paid off). Everyone else covered their noses and mouths with either tissue or gloves. It did get your attention! But, if you can get past the yak butter, the monasteries are amazing places. They are filled with tankras (wall paintings which usually tell an historical or mythical story), statues of gold, sacorphagi (stone coffins), and other artifacts.

That afternoon we visited the Ramoche Temple. It is in the heart of the business district of Lhasa, and it seems out of place there. One expects Tibetan monasteries high on a mountainside, but not in the heart of the city. But, there it was, just inside the gate. And, there the street vendors were ready to greet us as we got off the bus (in Tibet vendors and beggars are everywhere). The temple was very simple, but a working monastery where monks studied Buddhism. We got to see monks going about their daily business, but perhaps more interestingly, the monks were treated to view a group of foreigners. It was interesting watching the monks watch us! One reads about Tibetan Buddhism and how, through meditation, they can tune out the outside world. These monks were tuned in, and there were eyes watching from every window in the temple.

From the Ramoche Temple we headed to Norbu Lingka, the former summer home of the Dalai Lama. There was an enormous garden area which needed a lot of TLC, as well as many chapels and residences. We were able to tour the residence of the seventh Dalai Lama, and see just how the Tibetan elite lived. The architecture was impressive, and it was handsomely decorated inside with every wall covered with tankras. However, the Dalai Lama did not live an extraordinary lush life. His study and his bedroom were both quite simply equipped. So, while the building was extravagant, it did not necessarily imply that the resident was also.

That was the extent of our first day of touring in Tibet. We had moved slowly and did not do very much because of the lack of oxygen in the air. Some were feeling the effects of the high altitude, and it turned out to be a very quiet night back at the hotel. Peter (our tour guide), Mark (Robert's brother), and myself went out to look at stars but were thwarted by the city lights.

The next morning (Friday, November 12) I got up early and went out to look at the stars. Wow! The city lights were off, and it had almost been a new moon so the stars lit up the sky. I have never seen so many in my life. Because of the thin air, there were stars that are not visible back home in Minnesota, nor in Zhaoqing. I could hardly find the Big Dipper because there were several stars inside that you normally wouldn't see (the North Star was hidden from view by the mountain range to the north of the city). Orion was out, but again, it was cluttered with stars. I have never seen the Milky Way so clearly and distinctly (wouldn't Descartes be proud). It was breathtaking, and I made it a point to get up every morning to go star gazing, for I might never have this chance again!

We visited the Potala Palace which is also right in Lhasa, but it sits atop a peak that juts out of the plateau. To call it an imposing building is an under-statement. It rises 13 stories above the peak and contains thousands of rooms, chapels and shrines. From the outside one can see two parts -- a red and a white one. The red part of the palace was used for religious purposes, and the white part was for governmental use. Construction of the Potala Palace began in 1645, and it took nearly 50 years to complete. It was the home of the sixth through the fourteenth Dalai Lamas (the religious and political leaders of Tibet) until the fourteenth went into exile in 1959. The Potala Palace escaped damage and destruction during the Cultural Revolution because of the strict orders of Zhou Enlai (Mao's right-hand man).

Today the Potala Palace stands mostly as a museum, although pilgrims travel from far and wide to visit it. While China holds the political power today in Tibet, the Tibetans still look to the Dalai Lama as their leader. So, as we toured the palace, we were constantly struggling with the traffic of pilgrims as they made their way through the palace. Fortunately, we did not have to climb the peak, but our bus took us up to the entrance. From there our local tour guide, Emma (a Han Chinese who moved to Lhasa four years ago), lead us through the maze of rooms and chapels pointing out the numerous relics and saphorgi of the deceased Dalai Lamas. Finally we made it to the rooftop of the palace and were treated to a spectacular view of Lhasa and the surrounding countryside. If this is not a holy place, I'm not sure what would be!

After our descent we had lunch and that afternoon we visited the Jokhang Temple. The Jokhang Temple is 1300 years old and is one of Tibet's holiest shrines. As with any tourist attraction in Tibet, you are greeted at the entrance by vendors and beggars, and upon entering one meets the familiar (but not likable) smell of yak butter candles. The temple was built in honor of the marriage of the Princess Wen Cheng from India to King Songsten Gampo. As a dowery, the princess brought with her a huge statue of the Budda Sakyamuni (the Chinese name of Sidhartha) that was originally sculpted during Sakyamuni's lifetime and is made of pure gold. We also got to see monks at prayer within the temple, along with the numerous pilgrims who had journeyed here to pay tribute to their Buddhism.

Leaving the Temple we found ourselves in what is called the Barkhor. It is a market where numerous vendors have set up shop selling all sorts of Tibetan souvenirs (most made in souvenir factories in China and Nepal). We spent an hour meandering around, mostly dodging the beggars who followed us all the way back to the bus. When you enter the bus and close the door, they hang at the windows pleading for money. It is really sad to see the poverty in Tibet. As we were driving back to the hotel, I was noticing the apartments where people lived, and I was thinking that the neighborhoods do not look that impoverished. But, no sooner did I think this, then the neighborhood changed, and Emma, our guide, pointed out that we were now in a Tibetan neighborhood (apparently the nice apartments are where the Han live), and here you could see the poverty, and why Tibet is considered one of the most impoverished regions of the world.

The next day one could notice the effect the high altitude and yak butter was having on everyone. We went to the Ganden Monastery about a two hours drive outside of Lhasa. Lhasa sits at 3600 meters (11,808 feet) above see level, and the Ganden Monastery is at 4,300 meters (14,104 feet) above sea level. The monastery was founded in 1409 by Tsong Khapa. During the Cultural Revolution the monastery was used for target practice by Chinese artillery, and was completely destroyed. The Chinese have rebuilt most of the monastery over the last twenty years, and it is definitely worth seeing. Because it is so much higher than Lhasa, Mark (Robert's brother), Rita and her mother (Yvonne) stayed behind -- Yvonne had been struggling with altitude sickness. After driving up the mountain on the switchback road (that also seemed to suffer from the artillery practice) Vicki (Robert's mother), Pam, and Jen decided that they didn't want to climb the stairs, so they waited at the entrance. Rachel, Robert, Denise, and myself decided to take the tour. Because of the reconstruction, there wasn't a lot open to see, but we did get to see some monks working at their lessons. The tour was fairly quick, and Emma brought us back down to where the others. My slogan in Tibet had been, "To the Top!" As the Monastery sits about 200 meters from the peak of the mountain, I asked Emma if we could go up there (pointing to the Top!).

She said okay, and so we were off. This time, however, we lost Denise, so it was just Robert, Rachel, Emma, and myself. Emma had never been to the top either, so she had to stop and ask a couple of monks the way. As we were climbing, I noticed Emma's shoes -- Dress boots with about a three inch platform -- not the type of shoes I would ever go mountain climbing in. But, she navigated her way up the path and over the loose rock just as sure-footed as any mountain goat I have seen. At one point while we were climbing I finally was hit by the lack of oxygen. I could feel a tingling in my legs and arms, and fortunately, before I could say anything, Rachel asked Emma if we could take a break. Emma turned with an expression on her face of "a break already," but politely said yes, and waited for us to recover (she never even unzipped her jacket). Being older than the sum of Robert's and Rachel's ages, it made me feel good that I was not the only one suffering. And in going over the question in my mind of whether I really wanted to go to the top, the answer came back a resounding "Damn Right!" It was time for "Struggling Guts", an old high school wrestling term employed when, toward the end of the match and you have no gas left, you reach deep down to keep on going. We made it to the top, and boy was it worth it. A spectacular view for miles around! Here we were, about 4500 meters (14,760 feet) above sea level -- higher than any point in the continental United States. Women shi yingsheng! (We are heroes!). Yet, at the same time it was rather humbling, as the only things that impeded our view were other mountains, many of which were higher, and the thought that not too far away sat Mt. Everest, twice as high as where we were now standing!

After taking numerous photos we headed back down, only to be confronted with the question of where was Peter (our guide from Zhaoqing)? As we were looking around, we noticed a figure dashing down the side of the neighboring peak -- it was Peter! He had set out to master that peak, and he was as equally excited about his adventure as we were about ours!

Driving back down the mountain on the switchback road there was about a ten-year-old boy who was racing us down the hill. As we would pass him, he would dart down the slope to meet us at the next part of the road with his hands extended (he was begging). It made for a nice distraction (took our minds off the bumps in the road), but it also touched Denise's heart. She wanted to give him something so bad, but we kept her from doing it.

Finally, about 3 quarters of the way down, she opened the window. Just like on cue, the bus driver stopped so the boy could collect the 5 Yuan that Denise offered, and then the driver reached into his pocket and pulled out a wad of small bills that he, likewise, gave to the boy. As we drove off, the boy stood and waved, having won our hearts, and coming away with a little cash for his efforts.

This was our last night of our trip, and most of us ended up celebrating by playing cards in Robert and Mark's room. There isn't a lot to do in Lhasa after dark. The only businesses that are open are the many brothels that line the street. There were about six just outside the hotel gate (don't ask me how I know). The next morning we were up early to drive the one and a half hours back to the airport. We flew to Chengdu together, but then those of us heading back to Zhaoqing had to change planes, while the rest flew on to Beijing where they would fly back to the states on the following day. It had truly been a great adventure! We saw a lot. We learned a lot.

And we came back with lots of stories to tell those anxiously awaiting our return at Zhaoqing Institute of Education.