The great wall lived up to its hype. Pushing through early morning Beijing rush hour traffic we worked our way through the hazy morning smog of Beijing- so polluted that you couldnt even see a quarter mile ahead down the road, and past seemingly thousands of cranes (no, not the beautiful delicate birds) assembling new megablocks of skyscrapers that made Co-op City look like a quaint country village. Past demolished gray brick hutongs (traditional neighborhoods) now just piles of bricks, and then out of the great megalopolis of Beijing and into the "countryside" where we passed demolished traditional quaint country villages that were rapidly being converted into McMansion suburbs all in the name of The New China. If the cultural revolution can't stamp out the old, so-called Chinese-style capitalism clearly will. Past giant power lines we travelled, and through a village with a supermarket called "Playboy" complete with the bunny logo, a few army bases and assorted junkyards and factories.
Finally we arrived. We had signed up for the "Secret Great Wall Tour" which promised a 10k hike along an untouristed part of the wall, and were dubious about these advertised claims, but our van, after passing through a few great wall spots clogged with buses disgorging tourists, ultimately stopped at a completely abandoned and crumbling section and let us out to make the hike. The mountain air was somewhat better than Beijing, where the joke is that to get some fresh air you should smoke a cigarette, and the breeze was a welcome relief in the punishing sun. (And Yes, Mom, I wore sunblock!) Yes, the untouristed bit of the wall was also in a state of some disrepair it must be noted. After the slightly disappointing day at Tianenmen Square and The Forbidden City, my jaded self was truly impressed. The great wall is also insanely steep as it winds over mountain passes, and we slogged our way up some relatively intact steps, and then sections that were near vertical inclines with stones that crumbled and fell onto whoever was hiking behind, which made for a pretty Indiana Jones-esque experience. That and walking along sections with undergrowth, and in fact overgrowth- trees and bushes higher than our heads in places and sprouting out of the wall. A few hours later we'd hiked our little piece of the wall, and our eighteen year old fresh-faced guide declared "you are now true men and women having made ascend of great wall!" Busride back included some standard chatting with the various other expat English teachers, exchange students and gap-year Aussies who, all things considered, were pretty cool. Seem to be more Americans in China than most other places I've travelled besides Europe.
After spending some time at the hostel trying to nail down the last details of our Tibet trip, we headed back across Tianenman Square to a night market purported to have the best, or at least most interesting, street food in Beijing. And yes folks, I ate a scorpion. And a snake. I passed on the donkey penis, starfish and seahorses, and definitely did not have it in me to try to rat or the tarantula. Nor did I brave the heaping piles of tripe everywhere I turned. And I'll admit dear readers, that although I was looking forward to eating snake, I would not have tried the scorpion had Ben not fearlessly ordered a skewer of "medium scorpion please" first. Taste? Kinda like greasy chicken skin. And the snake, kind of like eel, though they loaded it up with spices so much that really the only thing objectionable was its surprisingly rubbery texture, but then, what other snake do I have to compare it to? Oh, but the pork buns? They would put David Chang at Momofuku to shame.
Back to the hostel for the best night's sleep in some time, then this morning up early to fly to Tibet. I can't deny it, I was pretty excited when the officer asked for my passport and then said "papers please" and we got to hand over the "Tibetan Autonomous Region Travel Permit" addendum to our visa that was months in the acquisition. Okay, I'll admit it, he just gestured and I said, "oh, papers please?" and he responded "yes yes, papers please." The flight itself was relatively straightforward, a brief stopover in Chengdu, a city of zillions somewhere in western china with a nicer and larger airport than anything I've seen stateside or even in Europe, and a bumpy but reasonable landing after flying not above, but next to the Tibetan Himalayas. The flight to Lhasa, interestingly, was about 95% Han Chinese, a couple Mongolians, and I counted nine White folks. This tells you something both about China and Tibet, where in Lhasa the ethnic Chinese outnumber the Tibetans 3:1, and Tibet has apparently become the new hot travel spot for young Chinese yuppies. We deplaned, gasping like fish for air, not because of the pollution as in Beijing, but the oxygen thin air of a 10,000 foot city (yes, 2x Denver). Our driver and guide/"minder" managed to meet us, and we had a nice drive into Lhasa, stopping to eat some grapefruit sized melon at a roadside stand. The outskirts of Lhasa could be any third world hellhole city- constant honking as we passed luxury cars and donkey carts, pedestrians leading yaks and bus drivers, and we gradually made our way down some giant boulevard past rows and rows of car dealerships, mostly selling Buicks, and then turning a corner and then, suddenly popping into view above the blue glass shopping plazas was the Potala Palace itself, as glorious as I'd imagined it to be. And okay, you know what? I'll do it, I'll use the adjective "resplendent."
And Tibet so far is actually far better and more authentic than I'd feared it would be in all the reading I've done. Certainly it is changed, and certainly the horrors of the cultural revolution left an indelible mark, but Tibetan culture seems indelible in its own way. (for more on Tibet History recent and older, that I won't or probably shouldnt get into here and now, check out The Road Home, My Land My People, Dragon in the Land of the Snow Lion, or Surviving the Dragon). Certainly its a country under occupation, as the hundreds of PLA troops I saw today alone would testify- stationed at every corner, and even not-so-discreetly under umbrellas on rooftops, holding their rifles and scanning the streets for trouble.
But we are staying in the Tibetan quarter, our hotel balcony has views of the Potala and we can watch the pilgrims making the circuit around the Barkhour temple below, dressed in traditional garb, chanting and spinning prayer wheels as they circumambulate the back streets of Lhasa, many having travelled thousands of miles to make this trip to the Barkhour and Jokhang temples. The army soldiers walk disrepectfully counterclockwise, guns in hand and knock shoulders with the pilgrims, but at least the streets are thronged with pilgrims and its not even a festival season. Barkhour square itself is awash in merchants blasting Tibetan hip-hop (straight outta Lhasa?), which drowns out the wails of pilgrims prostrating themselves dozens, hundreds of times in front of the temple. So the good news is that something of the original Tibet very very much thrives here in Lhasa today.
Tomorrow its off to the temples, then the next day the palace assuming we have adjusted to the altitude... More to come...
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