Shi Ka Xue Shan: Foothills of the Himalayas

When I was just a boy and my brothers and sisters were only just boys and girls, our family often traveled across Nebraska, through northwest Kansas, into Colorado to Colorado Springs where my Aunt Katie and Uncle Conrad live. For seven people in a Ford Country Squire station wagon, that time often proved to be about four hours of joy, followed by four hours of sleep, followed by four hours of bickering with one another. However, as our car crept along the interstate and two-lane highways approaching the Springs, the horizon would grow from a thin, dark line into verifiable mountains, and while I cannot fully know what my siblings were feeling, I could feel my eyes widening with wonder and my mind searching out what adventures we might have in these jutting masses of rock and dirt.

During these long road trips, we busied minds with a simple game we called "Slap Dash." We all starred out the windshield of the vehicle seeking the first glimpse of the green mile markers that lined the highway. The first person to catch a glimpse of these reminders of how slow the trip was going slapped the dashboard or the back of the seat in front of him. However, once we crossed the border into Colorado, my mind and eyes strained further into the distance, trying to gain that first glimpse of the mountains. And even after someone of us claimed to see the mountains, they never seemed real until we pulled into my aunt and uncles driveway.

However, for some reason, one of my older siblings (honestly, I cannot remember who it was, but something tells me it was Daryl or Cheri) took delight in reminding us that "those are just the foothills, not the real mountains." I hated hearing this. Even though it filled my mind with hope for what "real" mountains looked like, I still could not help but feel a little disappointed and cheated by my older sibling. I thought to myself, "Of course these are mountains; just look how tall they are." By the time our station wagon crept into our relatives yard, the sun had set and these "foothills" looked like a dark cloud on the immediate horizon, and my disappointment at my family member's statement had dissipated, returning to wonder at what adventures those "mountains" held.
Shi Ka Xue Shan, the snow mountain towering over Zhong Dian rises to the towering height of 4500 meters and can be seen from just about anywhere inside and outside of town. I believe I used the above shot in my entry about the Bhuddist Llamissary, however, it is one of best long-distance shots of this beautiful "snow mountain" (xue shan). So here it is again.
A cable car lift carries its passengers from the valley floor up the craggy face of Shi Ka, and drops them off at an observatory deck, from which one can climb even higher. A trail also winds through the surrounding canyons, eventually making its way to the same observatory. I would have loved to spend the day plodding up this dirt track, however, time and company would not allow this option. So seven of us piled into to cable cars and snapped photos of our surroundings and yawned periodically as the pressure in our ears built up.
The Chinese proprietors of the cable car would not let us go up the lift without buying at least one canister of air, certain we would need it because of the thin air. However, because 4500 meters is only somewhat over 14000 feet, we found ourselves using the air canister as a prop for photos that had each of us pretending we were gasping for air. I admit that climbing the stairs to the secondary and tertiary observation decks above the terminus of the lift caused me to breathe hard and feel my heart thumping behind my chest. Even so, I still had little trouble catching my breath.
Our group consisted of Camille, Jenny, Zou Ma, Robbie (back row), myself, Suli and Jeff. Zou Ma is a local woman of the Tibetan minority. She showed us around and pointed out surrounding mountains, like Meili Xue Shan sticking up on the left horizon of the above photo. Camille teaches first grade; Jenny teaches Secondary ELD; Robbie is the schools librarian. Suli and me you know; and Jeff, Jenny's husband, is an arborist who travels around China consulting businesses on the planting of trees. Some of us had more mountain experience than others, but even so, as we marvelled in the valley at Shi Ka's majestic beauty, as we crested its summit, we were faced with a humbling realization: these are "just the foothills, not the real mountains."
Stretching north and west of Shi Ka lay the heart of the Himalayas. I think my Uncle Conrad, a post-Vietnam rock-climber and mountaineer, settled in Colorado Springs to be near the life he loved so much. I think he may be the only person in my family who can appreciate the height and breadth of these stunning, jutting rocks. As I looked from Shi Ka into Tibet and Burma, I faced what could be viewed by some as my insignificance. However, as I gazed toward the horizon wondering what taller mountains lay beyond, I realized that every mountain begins with foothills, and before them are the valleys and plains. Then I turned back to look at Zhong Dian from 4500 meters. I dawned on me, for a person living in the mountains the valley stretched out like a sunny, welcome respite from the harsh vertical environment towering above it just as much as the mountains rose mysteriously full of adventure to the person living in the valley.

I truly have gotten over that "foothills" comment that used to hurt so badly--I have even heard myself say it to other, forgetting how much it had dashed my own spirits. Now I enjoy finding His beauty in all my surroundings, from the river valleys, to the great plains, to the soaring mountains, and yes, even to the foothills.

Zhong Dian Llamissary

The Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference had a rule when I played my college soccer at what is now Bethel University in Saint Paul, Minnesota: an athlete could not maintain his eligibility having graduated from the undergraduate program. Because I had transfered from Wheaton College (Wheaton, IL) during the '89/'90 school year, I held one year of collegiate play beyond my 1992 graduation date. Therefore, I held off taking my Senior Seminar course in literature and stuck around Bethel in order to complete my last year of playing NCAA soccer.


During that extra semester, school rules required me to be a full time student (12 credits) in order to be eligible to play. Therefore, along with my seminar course in literature, I took Asian Thought, a course on Eastern philosophies and religions. As Professor Paul Reasner might be able to recall, I often dozed off in my desk in the front left corner of our tiny room situated in the bowels of the AC building. I passed his course, but I probably should have been listening better when we studied Bhuddism. Now I live in the "East," and I only remember a couple main points and a riddle the professor shared with our class. Even so, that final semester and that one philosophy course provided me a glimpse of what I experienced of Tibetan Bhuddism while in Zhong Dian a week ago.
I took this shot of Zhong Dian's roof tops more in an attempt to figure out my camera's timer feature, but when I looked at the photo closely, I realized that the llamissary for which the city is known sits nestled at the foot of the hills in the background. This smaller version of the enormous llamissary in Lasa (Lhasa) is a short, ten-minute, bus ride from Zhong Dian's oldtown. The number-three bus stops at the entrance to this monistary, where all the outsiders pay thirty yuan to enter, then it proceeds right to the foot of the stairs winding up the hill into the religious compound.
During my travels in Europe, I found that most cathedrals do not mind if pictures are taken, as long one does not use a flash or take shots during mass. With this in mind, I turned off my flash and started taking pictures of the the mostly vacant Bhuddist temples. I took this image of a woman kneeling to pray as I entered the lowest of the many places of worship. The temples themselves were colorful but dark. They smelled of dust and incense and sounded like the echoing basements of the Baptist congregations I attended as a child. While I have a few more shots of these temples, a monk did ask me not to take photos. So, for the most part, I refrained from upsetting these men by taking mostly outdoor photos.
With Zhong Dian situated at about 11,000 feet, one can imagine that the air tends to be rather dry. During December, while snow can be expected, the weather tends to be sunny. Cold at night (well below freezing) and warm during the day (in the 50s), the people of Zhong Dian seek out the morning sunlight to take off the bite of evening's chill. These two monks sit below the wall of one of the larger temples, facing east and warming in the morning's sunlight. Approximately 600 men take up residency in this llamissary, the largest Bhuddist monistary in Yunnan province. While the distance of this photo does not show it well, one monk sits with his hand on a bottle of Pepsi Cola. Whether or not the bottle actually contained cola I do not know, but it passing I smiled at the strangeness of seeing corporate America in this quiet place.
Tibetan Bhuddism varies from traditional Bhuddism a bit. Because of my limited language abilities, I did not receive very much information from the locals, but it seems that this form of Bhuddism is wrapped in a fairly large blanket of regional animism. Many of the gods painted on the temple walls bear a resemblance to a variety of animals--pigs, bulls, birds and others. Even while these temples hosted an array of brilliant colors, similar to those painted on Swedish, wooden horses, darkness filled these places of worship. Some of this darkness was literal, in that very few lights or candles stood as the source of illumination. However, each time I walked into one of these temples, I also received a creepy feeling, something less than holy. When I stepped back out into the sunlight, the feeling left me. While the temples themselves left me wondering what actually was being worshipped, outside, with the sunlight and the mountains surrounding me, I realized the power of the Creator.
Here I am trying my best to rotate the large prayer wheel that stands on a hill overlooking Zhong Dian. Tibetan Bhuddism uses prayer wheels--from small, hand-held versions, to this large merry-go-round version--to store prayers. The inside of these wheels is filled with prayers printed on paper. Oftentimes, the inside walls of the prayer wheels themselves have prayers written on them. Therefore, spinning them lightly, without giving thought to what one is doing, could be a problem. This giant wheel was erected as a monument, and stands over three stories tall, and I actually did not get it spinning (three people on the opposite side were also pushing). I offered up my hopes and dreams to Him who I know can answer me. I simply ask that you do the same for China.

When I started my undergraduate schooling at Wheaton, I had no idea that I would one day be living in China. Therefore, I chose French to fulfill my foreign language requirement, rather than the difficulty of Chinese. However, I thank Prof. Paul Reasner for giving me a little background in Asian Thought. Until one experiences it for himself, one cannot fully understand the difference between eastern and western logic. I apologize to my professor for dozing off too many time (I think it was the 08.00h starting time more than anything). It amazes me how His plan to add one semester to my schooling actually pointed to my life in China.

Xiang Ge Li La

Each society fosters its own fairytales and legends about places so beautiful or so mystically powerful (or both) that they become sought after by generations of people searching for something better than what they view the world has to offer. Coronado spent his last days seeking the "fountain of youth." Dr. Livingston criss-crossed the African wilderness looking for the hidden source of the Nile River. People from all over the world travel to Cambodia each year to experience the splendor of Angkor Wat. Sadly, what most people find is that the grass is not necessarily greener on the other side of the fence; it is simply a different shade of green. I suppose in some small way this is more wisdom than we deserve, to recognize the beauty of our own surroundings through the differing beauty of another.

In China, the legend of Xiang Ge Li La--what most Westerners refer to as Shangri-La--conjures pictures of green-beyond-green valleys hidden amongst snow-capped peaks so daunting in their size that the valleys are rendered inaccesible. Within these valleys, the hidden people live beyond time and beyond care, spending their days planting and herding, much as they have for millenia, and dancing the nights away, the moon and stars the only witnesses to their simple, glorious lives. As the modern world grinds through each day, the modern person sits at a desk dreaming of this simple life. Well, it exists, but as always it exists in just another shade of green just beyond a real "fence."
The "fence:" Approximately a one-hour flight transports one from the relatively low hills of Kunming--at just over six-thousand feet--over the initial northwestern range of mountains to a small city named Zhong Dian. With only 50,000 inhabitants, this city rarely shows up on most maps, and being sequestered amidst the towering peaks on the borders of Burma and Tibet, few people wander into its limits. However, as secret as this destination may seem--kind of like my own hometown of Whitefish, MT--it harbors an international airport and is relatively easy to access. And unlike the ponderously hugh Chinese cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Chengdu, one need not hire a guide, or even use a map, to navigate its quaint stone streets.
Set at the widening end of a remote valley, Zhong Dian marks the entrance to the mystical land of Xiang Ge Li La. The wide valley appears to be some former lake-bed, with sparsely vegetated hillsides that lead up to towering peaks. While the weather during the winter can be rather harsh, my own journey found the nights to be dry and frigid and the days to be sunny and warm. During the sunlight hours, only the shady side of trees, hills, and buildings held a nip of the nighttime chill. And while I listened to stories of heavy snowfalls during January and February, wet rainy seasons during June and July, beautiful flowering hillsides throughout May, and October's golden, autumnal foliage, mostly what I feasted on was December's brownness with blue-beyond-blue skies where the sun's brilliance called for sunglasses and caps to shield one's eyes from blindness. Above, this seasonal lake/swamp marks the northwest exit from Zhong Dian into Xiang Ge Li La as one begins the five-day trip to Lasa (Lhasa), Tibet.
For those of you who have read my blog over the last year, you may recall a trip I took to another small city not far from Zhong Dian named Lijiang. Lijiang, formerly the seat of government in Yunnan Povince, created its charming Oldtown (gu zhen) based on the cobbled streets of Zhong Dian. Not long ago (remember that in a society that is several thousands of years old, "not long" becomes a relative term) a fire destroyed much of Lijiang, and during the rebuilding process, the city's elders decided to give it a little character. As Suli and I, and a number of other teachers, wandered the street of Zhong Dian, we recognized the similar architecture, and during the evenings, wished that the stoned streets of Zhong Dian could be made somewhat smoother, like the ones of Lijiang. The central strip of larger, rectangular stones offered the only consistent footing in the dark.
The legend of Xiang Ge Li La exists in China, as well as throughout the rest of the world, where as the name Zhong Dian finds only a slight understanding from the Chinese people, and little or no recognition from people outside of China. Therefore, in 2002, the Chinese government officially changed the name of Zhong Dian to Xiang Ge Li La. While most maps still carry the name Zhong Dian, the world's largest Tibetan Bhuddist prayer wheel stands as a golden monument on a hill near the Oldtown, celebrating the official name change. While one person can, with a great deal of effort, bring the wheel into a spin, two, three, or four make for much easier work. The wheel itself portrays Lhasan images, pictures of the giant llamissary in Tibet, and how the Chinese military liberated the Tibetan Bhuddists from their nationalist oppressors. A person does not need to be a revisionist historian to enjoy the beauty of this enormous landmark. However, its beauty does not compare with its natural surroundings and the hospitality of the area's people.

Each night, in the Oldtown's square, locals gather from 19.00-22.00h to dance to traditional Tibetan music. Anyone is allowed to join in, and for those who remain for the entire three hours, a drawing takes place at the end of the evening, the winner of which receives a prize for his or her efforts. The tribal dances reminded me somewhat of the native-American dances; proceeding in a circle, the dancers perform spins and kicks, and used intricate hand and arm motions. I suppose it could also remind one of western line-dancing, but I prefer the more rustic example of tribal celebrations. These Tibetan women dance around the town square (always in a clockwise direction), and lest anyone think they put on these costumes for the dancing, these same outfits are worn all day, every day here in Zhong Dian.

We only spent five days in Zhong Dian, but as you may be able to guess, the mystical powers of such a beautiful location made us feel like we had been away from Kunming for a lifetime. Personally, I gain my strength, my power, my portion from a source beyond this world. However, I still enjoy the beauty His creation provides on Earth. Xiang Ge Li La really exists, and its beauty flows from the power and majesty of the Creator. Therefore, it is no wonder that a visit to this remote corner of the globe should tend to fill people with wonder, the kind of wonder that forms fairytales and legends. However, back in Kunming, I still find the greenness of the grass on this side of the fence, and thank Him for the opportunity to experience all shades of beauty.