A boy and a girl
From the China's Tibet collection. See the link for all photos and the book.
_____________________________________________________
Two Tibetan children appeared as specks on the horizon as they approached to observe my jeep when we stopped for a break in this fertile expanse. They just stared at us. There had been encounters before in the larger towns where tourists might stop travelling through, the odd begger or sleeve puller but this really was a chance stop on an almost 1000km drive through an extremely sparsely populated plateau. They were very young and far from their homes and although i doubt it strongly, i am somewhat hopeful I was among the first handful of white people these kids saw. Their stare suggested it.
The mountain behind is over 7000m and marks one of the last natural boundaries before the descent to the holy city of Lhasa. This was the morning, and by evening we were there.
Some rights reserved
Uploaded on Dec 14, 2009
3 comments
Windowpanes, Tibet
From the China's Tibet collection. See the link for all photos and the book.
_____________________________________________________
Local man in a dusty little market in the backstreets of Gyantse, Tibet.
Some rights reserved
Uploaded on Dec 9, 2009
7 comments
Tibetan children are not shy
From the China's Tibet collection. See the link for all photos and the book.
_____________________________________________________
On a sunny evening in another endless Tibetan landscape I took a pre-dinner walk. I bounded up a rocky outcrop to get a view of the strip town of Lhatse, this was not an easy task at 4000m.
I managed to sustain myself for the minute or so it took me to scramble to the top, the jagged rocks reminded me of craggy ridges I would climb as a child. In ireland these rocks were stripped bare by the thrashing sea but in Tibet they rose out of the green landscape like sharp teeth dotting a beach-flat valley - rising in layers and lumps until they were distant mountain walls. The slight height gave me a great sight advantage. Sitting on a brick box with twigs entwined with prayer flags propped up like flowers in a vase, listening to the sounds of nearby bulls I decided I had to gather a few stones from the ground. And I did. Wonderful cloudy white shards that I held onto and gave to people I thought would want them.
And there I sat for thirty minutes waiting for my oxygen deprived muscles to work again. And every minute I was up there a boy below on a nearby road was pacing back and forth, talking to himself, kicking small rocks and glancing up at me. I walked back down eventually, tripped over a cows jaw in the scrub and hopped a small stream and decided to make a friend for a while.
Probably the best travel experiences are honest interactions with people. Some places you go it never happens, other places they're just trying to squeeze some cash out of you. Tibet is one of the few wonderful places where you can be pulled from farm to farm, taking photos of peoples babies for them, having a look at their biggest yaks and nodding along while they assumedly wax lyrical in Tibetan on the beasts, discover against your will what Yak butter tea tastes like and even, if you are really lucky, get to watch a young boy try to impress the strange foreigner by punching and kicking dried cowshit from a wall.
Its not the same boy, but this video is very funny. Just in case you thought there were some sacred places not influenced by western culture - they do indeed listen to Europop in Tibet and they did discuss the death of Michael Jackson!
_________________________________________________________
Well, I've been busy with college work and haven't updated in a while but I finished some work, decided that was it for the night and I'd do a good upload, sorry its so long!
Some rights reserved
Uploaded on Dec 2, 2009
2 comments
New Gyantse
From the China's Tibet collection. See the link for all photos and the book.
_____________________________________________________
Rickshaw driver in the leveled ground behind the old town in Gyantse, Tibet. Seems like they are building rows upon rows of new houses in all the bigger Tibetan towns, you can see them in the background here.
Some rights reserved
Uploaded on Nov 25, 2009
3 comments
The butcher glow
From the China's Tibet collection. See the link for all photos and the book.
_____________________________________________________
This was inside a rotten old concrete building that was used as a food market in Gyantse, Tibet. You can see the entrance in the last picture. It was big like a warehouse and even though it was just the afternoon the thin strip of yellow streaked windows kept the space dark and clammy. I was drawn to the ominous red glow of the butchers in the back
Some rights reserved
Uploaded on Nov 18, 2009
5 comments
