Shigatse is Tibet's second largest city, after Lhasa, and home to the Panchen Lama, the Buddhists incarnated leader of the moon. The Dalai Lama is the sun and there is another Lama of the stars.
Our first experience of Shigatse was an expedition in search of a working ATM (always bring cash if you go travelling, it's much easier!) and then a delicious Yak burger.
The following morning, we departed for a big monastery. This was a city of temples and monks and left us with a very different view of things than we thought we would.
Apparently, after Tibet was "liberated from oppression" in 1950 and the Dalai Lama was exiled in the 1980s, the Chinese infiltrated this place with spies to weed out those still faithful to him. According to our local guide, many other guides and monks disappeared overnight and have never been seen since. Our guide, when he was 16, walked to Dharmasala (where we went at the start of India) where he learnt English and got an education for 5 years before he was told by the Dalai Lama to go back to be Tibet. On his return, he was then jailed by the authorities for 1 month because he had experienced a privileged life.
Inside the monastery, there were hundreds on monks doing any 1 of 3 things. The first was cleaning and the second was counting piles of cash from offerings. Those that were doing neither of these things, were playing on their iphones. A group of 3 monks that were counting notes, sparked up an argument with our guide claiming we all had no right to be there, despite paying the extortionate entry fee. This place seemed like a money making factory as pilgrims were throwing cash at gold idols. This seemed completely alien to our experience of Buddhism previously.
After this experience, we left and went to find some food. We went to a traditional Tibetan restaurant in search of some local cuisine. We were given a picture menu to choose from. So we went for potato croquets, a cucumber dish and cubes of meat. What came out wasn't quite what we had imagined. The chilli cucumber was really good. The potato croquets had potato and mince meat in them and the and the cubes of meat, well. They actually turned out to be sections of chicken spine with succulent bone marrow to suck out. Needless to say, this was disgusting and after trying to eat as much as possible to avoid insulting the chefs, we left!
Shigatse really was an experience. Glad we did it once, but not sure it's one that we want to do again.
So off to Lhasa!
Our first experience of Shigatse was an expedition in search of a working ATM (always bring cash if you go travelling, it's much easier!) and then a delicious Yak burger.
The following morning, we departed for a big monastery. This was a city of temples and monks and left us with a very different view of things than we thought we would.
Apparently, after Tibet was "liberated from oppression" in 1950 and the Dalai Lama was exiled in the 1980s, the Chinese infiltrated this place with spies to weed out those still faithful to him. According to our local guide, many other guides and monks disappeared overnight and have never been seen since. Our guide, when he was 16, walked to Dharmasala (where we went at the start of India) where he learnt English and got an education for 5 years before he was told by the Dalai Lama to go back to be Tibet. On his return, he was then jailed by the authorities for 1 month because he had experienced a privileged life.
Inside the monastery, there were hundreds on monks doing any 1 of 3 things. The first was cleaning and the second was counting piles of cash from offerings. Those that were doing neither of these things, were playing on their iphones. A group of 3 monks that were counting notes, sparked up an argument with our guide claiming we all had no right to be there, despite paying the extortionate entry fee. This place seemed like a money making factory as pilgrims were throwing cash at gold idols. This seemed completely alien to our experience of Buddhism previously.
After this experience, we left and went to find some food. We went to a traditional Tibetan restaurant in search of some local cuisine. We were given a picture menu to choose from. So we went for potato croquets, a cucumber dish and cubes of meat. What came out wasn't quite what we had imagined. The chilli cucumber was really good. The potato croquets had potato and mince meat in them and the and the cubes of meat, well. They actually turned out to be sections of chicken spine with succulent bone marrow to suck out. Needless to say, this was disgusting and after trying to eat as much as possible to avoid insulting the chefs, we left!
Shigatse really was an experience. Glad we did it once, but not sure it's one that we want to do again.
So off to Lhasa!
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