My Photo Shoot with a Tibetan Monk

We were hiking up past the monastery in Litang to the grassy hills behind it when we were approached by a monk. He was smiley and friendly and couldn't speak a lick of English. From his wild hand motions in the direction of my camera, I could tell that he wanted us to take his photo. Ok. I was the tinsiest bit apprehensive as most people who request to have their photo taken (other than Han Chinese who want to pose in photos with us) ask us for money after we have gone ahead and taken their photo. But Litang has been different in so many aspects, and this seemed to be another one. So I took his photo.

He wanted to see it. He was mildly pleased, but wasn't completely satisfied. He wanted another. He posed. I snapped. Who am I to turn down such a fantastic photo opp? A monk's saffron and maroon robes set against the colbalt blue sky? Click. Click. He posed more. He pretended to read my little notebook. He pretended to meditate, to pray. It was entertaining. Mostly for myself and the monk though. Not so much for Jonathan, as he was left to fend off all the salivating stray dogs on his own, while protecting all the monk's belongings that the monk had dropped into his arms.
The real question was, why was the monk so adament that I take a slew of photos of him? We were finally able to slip away and go on the hike that we were intending to go on. On the way back down the hill, however, we were spotted by the model monk and chased down. Quite literally. He wanted more photos. After each time I took a picture, he would inspect it. He rubbed his greasy fingers all over the screen and pointed out various ways I could improve my shot. He kept pointing to the sky 'tuga,' 'tuga' he said over and over. That's what it sounded like anyways. Finally I got the idea that what he wanted was a photo of him and just the sky. I tried to convince him that because we were standing on a hill, with the ground rising up behind him, that a photo of his whole body surrounded by blue sky would be impossible. 'Tuga!!' So we went further up the hill. He framed the shots with his fingers to try and show me exactly what he wanted. Nearly a half hour later I finally managed to take a photo that he was happy with. But the question remained: 'what did he want me to do with this acceptable photo?' I tried writing down my email address and giving it to him so I could email him the photos. That didn't seem to be what he was going for. He wrote something in Tibetan in my notebook. I don't know how familiar you are with the Tibetan language- but it might as well be morse code with all the incomprehensible lines and dots. Did he want me to mail him the photos? I couldn't see how well that would go. I copy the Tibetan down on to the envelope and just drop the package in the mail? How far could it possibly get? Do I write, 'Tibetan monk, Litang Monastery, Middle of no-where, China,' on the envelope? I began to wonder if he wanted the camera. I got the idea that perhaps he wanted me to take my camera down to the village and somehow bring him back up prints. Apparently he wasn't aware where he was. Yaks were the main traffic. There was no Walmart photocentre. There were barely flush toilets. I brought his message down to the owner of our guesthouse, who was also Tibetan in hopes of shedding some light on his mysterious message. 'This doesn't make any sense,' she told me gravely, shaking her head. 'He doesn't write Tibetan very well at all.' So, maybe he wanted the photos to be displayed on our blog? That must be it.

Sky Burial

Warning: This entry contains dead bodies and vultures. Seriously.

Today in Litang (Sichuan Province) we awoke at seven and then ventured out of town to attend a Sky Burial. It is a Tibetan ritual where the deceased is hacked up by 'duoden man' and then fed to the awaiting vultures. It indeed sounds gruesome to our Western ears, but it is important that this ritual takes place within an Eastern, specifically Tibetan Buddhist world view of life and death. Buddhists believe (and after what we witnessed today, I can say they deeply believe and take very seriously) in reincarnation.

Here, it is believed that the soul of a person leaves the body upon death and is reincarnated or reborn into something else; another body, an animal, etc. Buddhism thinks of the body as a shell that the soul animates. Without the soul, the body is of no worth, sentimentally or practically.

Still, it was an uneasy thought (and sight) that such a completely utilitarian view of the human body was so strongly adhered to. There is no way that someone could accuse Buddhists of not having deeply held convictions in their spiritual systems!

The sky burial itself makes practical sense for Tibetans. In Tibet, even if the land wasn't frozen most of the year, and could be dug up, the Tibetan landscape is scarce. There is no dirt to bury their dead and there is hardly a tree to be cut for a cremation. Every bit of wood needs to be used for domestic heating and cooking.

For the event itself a man, wearing a full body blue, plastic apron, walked up to a face down, naked body that was roped to a stake in the ground so to keep the birds from dragging the body around the mountain side and began taking off the flesh with a knife. All the while, five, maybe four other men surrounded the working man to keep the vultures at bay. The skin of the body was very pale, completely unlike the warm, reddish browns that we see in the faces of most Tibetans we greet in town. The children in particular all seem to have the most rosy of cheeks. Given the green light, the vultures ambushed the body and it disappeared from sight behind a spherical wall of feathers. On occasion we could see the body being pulled this way or that by the hungry fowl. In especially dizzying yet vivid moments, we could clearly see the flesh being pulled off and apart. What do the families of those passed do while all this is taking place, you might be wondering? They sit on the hill, sometimes sipping tea, chatting and vaguely watching. Its not the sad, devastating occasion you would imagine. Within thirty minutes of being given the body, all that is left as the curtain of vultures parted, was the red skeletal remains of whomever that used to be. At that point, the birds were shoved away so that the duoden could go back over and begin breaking the body apart with an axe at the major joints, hips, shoulders, neck, etc. Then, with the butt end of the axe he proceeded to crush the bones up, while mixing in a powder with the increasingly pulverized bones. The powder is then used to feed the crows that are also lurking nearby, waiting for their turn to take part in the feast. This wasn't the only action, though. There were three bodies being given a sky burial the morning we were there.

We had heard that these events could be quite good times for the deceased's family and friends, with much laughter and fun. While it certainly wasn't the solemn event that most funerals are back home, it wasn't the rip-roaring fun that we had heard about. We really weren't that surprised.

We were invited over to a circle of monks and laity and were asked to share in some yak tea and Tibetan bread. I could have done without the distinct 'yak' flavour of each item, but the genuine kindness behind the gesture was greatly appreciated. Smash, smash, smash went the axe butt onto the bones. 'Where are you from?' asked the monks nonchalantly as if we were sharing tea and bread at a cafe somewhere. Completely surreal. We choked down the yakky-yak tea and shoved our generous rounds of hard (stale or frozen, it was hard to say) bread into our pockets for 'later.'

The sky was a magnificent blue, the clouds were as marshmallows and the mountains impressively chiseled in every direction we looked. All in all this will be a memorable day for us. It gives a new perspective to the age old 'ashes to ashes, dust to dust.' bit heard at many Christian funeral services. Mulling over that well known phrase, I couldn't help but keep a short poem from creeping into my (Jonathan) head:


Sky Burial

Ashes to the vulture,
Dust to the crow,
With a fowl bowel movement
You will help the flowers grow!

K: Last summer I read a fantastic (and completely non-gory) book called Sky Burial. I couldn't put it down. Its short- a day on the dock would do. And I would highly recommend it. Sky Burial is the story of a Chinese woman whose husband, a colonel in the Chinese army, was called to help 'liberate' Tibet three months after they were married. He never returned. This woman spent her entire life looking for her husband. And this is her story. Look it up.

ps. Happy Father's Day!!
pps. Happy Birthday to Bryan, Adam and Jer!!

A Slice of Tibetan Life in Litang

Litang is China's Tibetan wild west. Although not officially in Tibet proper, this small town, sits just a couple mountain ranges to the east, and 80% of its population is Tibetan. The difference is obvious and immediately noticable. It feels different, it looks different, the people are different, the language is different, the food is different, the architecture is different. Litang is colourful, friendly, lively, devout - and crawling with police. Yup. We are practically in Tibet.

Tibetan people are fantastic. They are, hands down, some of the friendliest people we have encountered thus far. Whereas the Chinese are definitely friendly, they are much more likely to stare with blank faces than to produce the wide, genuinely welcoming smiles, as the Tibetans do. You really can't help dancing down Litang's main street, grinning silly, high on life from all that good cheer. We caught on to the Tibetan greeting Tashi Delik pretty quickly- and using the Tibetan language produced great results when interacting with the locals. They just loved it.

Tibetans look tough. The women aren't tiny, dainty things like many Chinese women. They were built for living the rough, nomadic life high in the mountains and over the endless stretch of grasslands. The whole place is straight out of a National Geographic magazine. Wise elders have dark, weathered, warm leathery faces that seem to be permanently etched into huge smiles. The men wear cowboy hats and the women, colourful aprons. Young Tibetan teens zoom their colourfully decorated motorbikes around town, their music blaring, their long, black hair flowing behind them. They wave and shout greetings enthusiastically. 'Tashi Delik! Ni Hao! Hello!' Sometimes we respond with a bonjour, just to cover another language. And thats the extent to which we can communicate. Saying 'hello' in multiple languages. This doesn't seem to deter anyone in the slightest.

The Tibetans are incredibly devout Buddhists. Anyone over the age of forty is constantly fingering prayer beads. They spin their prayer wheels continuously, no matter what else they are doing. (Prayer wheels are cylindical silver boxes that are attached to a small pole and have a little ball attached to a cord to the box, so that when the silver wheel is spinning, so is the little ball attached to it- its hard to explain). We went to visit the town's massive white stupa, and were warmly welcomed, again. All around the stupa, in a covered walk-way are huge versions of these golden prayer wheels. People walk around the circuit, pushing each wheel around, making it spin. We hopped on the circuit, much to the delight of the locals and fumbled through, trying not to interfere or do anything disrespectful, spinning the prayer wheels with all our might. We were dizzy after the first round, but everyone else just kept going- round and round...

Tibetan kids are wonderful as well. You can set them apart from the local Han Chinese by their huge, rosy, red cheeks. Even the younger kids aren't intimidated by us, as most Chinese kids are (we know this because one look starts them wailing in horror like we have just been beamed down from a looming spaceship to abduct them). Not the Tibetan kids. They shout their greetings, if they are old enough to talk, or waddle on up to us to play. Like I said - Tibetans are tough.

The Tibetan's traditionally nomadic lifestyle is evident in their cuisine. Yak is largely featured, along with other, substantial, no-nonsene, frill-less dishes. From what we can tell, the food's purpose is to fill the belly and provide energy for the long day's work- not so much for its tastey-ness. Take Tibetan butter tea, for example. It has 'butter' it. In my books butter= delicious. This, unfortunately, is not the case, I was disappointed to discover. (Twice). The tea is savoury, rather than sweet, and very 'yakky.' Of course, they make a 'sweet' yak tea for tourists sake- but I think its the 'yakkness' that is the aquired taste. You wouldn't know the distinct 'yak' flavour until you've tried it- but after you know- and its everywhere. In attempt to give Tibetan food a few chances, we started ordering anything on the menu that was vegetarian. We had no idea what we would get, but that was half the 'fun.' We ordered tsamba. In Indonesia, Samba is a sort of spicy chilly, lime, garlic chutney. Yum. Tibetan Tsamba arrived, grey-ish, chunky and the consistency of cookie dough. I thought it had a slight taste of Guinness, which I didn't mention, because it would have sounded weird. Jonathan looked it up, I think because he didn't quite believe that it was actually vegetarian. In Tibet, tsamba is a barley porridge. It required a whole lot of sugar- that's all I'm saying. Finally, we ordered 'momos' because they had a funny name. Now they were a hit. Essentially, momos are Tibetan perogies - big crunchy/doughy pockets stuffed with (in this case) potato and spring onions- and served with spicy dipping sauce. Delicious.

Litang looks like what we imagine Tibet to. The sky is big and perpetually bright blue. The air is crisp and chilly. Snow topped mountains surround the valley and can be seen from every point in the city. Other than the distant mountains - everything is green. The grasslands stretch from under your feet and roll into the foothills of the mountains. Its spectacular, and a landscape unique to anything we've seen before. Yaks dot the hill and fill the valleys. Yaks are just like cows- only more fun. They are massive and super hairy with huge, sometimes crooked, horns. They wander at will, it seems, and especially like to take themselves for walks down the middle of the main highway. Only the middle will do. Pigs like to go for walks too. That's something I didn't know. Piglets especially enjoy wandering to and fro, scampering in front of speeding taxis, sniffing gutters and eating plastic.

Litang is at the wheeze-inducing height of 4,100m!! (That's about 13,000 ft for all you Imperial junkies). It's high. Breathing was sometimes hard, and walking on level ground felt like a workout. Litang's monastery sits up in the hills behind the town. Its quite the sight, especially in the late afternoon light when the warm maroon walls and gold roof glow in the sun. Locals circle the monastery three times, walking clockwise only. Not only are you already at 4,100m, but everyone then hikes UP to the monastery, and UP around behind it! We were bent over, gasping for the limited oxygen every ten steps and the elderly Tibetans would cruise past us, mumbling prayers, working their way through the prayer beads in one hand, and spinning their prayer wheel in the other! Of course, they would stop to greet us, smile and chuckle at our state, but they would then continue on, up the path like they were on some sort of relaxing Sunday stroll.

We were adventurous one afternoon and attempted to hike up the hills behind the monastery. It was a lot harder than it looked when we started out. Just when we got to the top, huffing and puffing, a black cloud rolled out overhead. Great! It's going to rain, we thought. That would suck. But no, all the way up here it didn't rain- it SNOWED! We laughed and laughed as the huge snowflakes melted on our jackets. Snowing!

We stopped in at the monastery in the early afternoon and had the pleasure of watching the young monks 'debate.' It doesn't look like you would think. The monks are paired up. One is sitting on the ground, cross-legged, book in hand. The other is performing a complicated, beautiful set of movements, which, from what we can tell, end in that monk posing a question to the sitting monk. The deep maroon robes of the dozens of monks 'debating' set against the spectacularly blue sky, high on the roof of the monastery was just magic.

As we watched, a couple of the young monks noticed our presence- more likely- they zoned in on the one thing that people all over China are united in loving- Jonathan's beard. The cluster started showing interest a ways away. But they were shy. They inched closer. Eventually, beging pushed forward by the increasingly intrigued group, one of the monks ran forward, tugged on Jonathan's beard, laughed and then ran back to his group. It was like kids tugging on Santa's beard to see if it was real. Since the brave, young monk hadn't been bitten (J: I tried!), or been the victim of any other serious injury from the scary, hairy guy, the group deemed it safe to inch even closer. Jonathan smiled and invited them to sit next to him on the ledge. That was all it took. The group rushed over and took turns tugging on Jonathan's (overgrown) red beard, laughing and discussing how much Jonathan's beard looks like an unruly Chairman Mao's (as interpretted by myself). Other monks saw all the fun and rushed over to crowd around. And again, almost instantly, Jonathan had grown a fan club. Who needs to be able to communicate when you have a big, bushy beard? The facial hair is large, unruly and red enough to be a personality all on it's own. Although, lately, this particular beard is also growing a bit of an ego. Apparently it's looking for it's own blog entry- The beard- a bridge between cultures. Wonder what a little scissor action would do to it's confidence?

Wandering up the hill, through the traditional Tibetan village on the way to the monastery was so eye-openingly Tibetan, and absolutely fantastically photogenic. Unfortunately yanking my camera out seemed completely inappropriate. There was no way this village was in AD 2011. The buildings were stone but ornate with the window and door frames colourfully painted. Older people, without teeth, dressed in colourful, but sensible clothes sat under stone archways, working their way through their prayer beads, watching children with wild black hair play in the dirt. It was so authentic. Everyone smiled and waved. The kids shouted their greetings until we were out of sight. At one point, in front of a particularily peel-y, atmospheric white building with colourful Tibetan curtains about twenty older people sat together, watching the world pass them by on the street, all smiling toothlessly, chanting and swinging their prayer wheels. Wow. I don't even know how many times I pretended my eyelids were the camera shutter, and squeezed them shut trying to etch the images into my brain. It really was just fantastic.

Just outside town is a cluster of Tibetan houses that have hot springs. The water comes from underground, so its maybe not that naturally aesthetically pleasing, but the water is warm, and its relaxing. The people have built huts with cement baths that you fill with the steamy water by unplugging the tap yourself, before hopping in. We went with a great Czech couple, Petra and Uricra to the hot spring of the friend of our hostel host. After we had soaked for a significant amount of time, listening to the wind howl outside the door we figured it was time to move on. It was an hour and a half walk back to town and we wanted to get there before dark. As Murphy's law would dictate, it started to rain literally the second we started to head back. Apparently the rain also made the already aggressive stray dogs even hungrier for blood. They chased us back to the house by the hot spring. The young Tibetan girl smiled and led us inside to the wood stove where who appeared to be her mother and grandmother sat on cushions, sipping Tibetan butter tea. I could pick out that smell anywhere. haha The older woman had an especially warm, weathered face and thick soft hands, which she reached out to grab mine in, and hold until our nice host came to rescue us.

Sure, the kids play with live wires and the pack of stray dogs are eyeing your calves like a tastey snack- but massive hairy yaks families wander down the middle of the street without a care and the tiniest piglets scamper about oinking and wagging their tales. If we don't actually get the opportunity to visit Tibet proper (and the increasingly high Chinese hoops are doing a job of insuring that) we will feel just as privileged to have had this opportunity to experience this slice of real Tibetan life.


PS. There are more photos in our photostream
P.P.S: Happy Birthday Daddy-o, Mom Mooney & Bryan!