Saturday, September 15, 2007

Dhankar


Wake up to the sound of ... rain. Crazy.

Got out of the bus two klicks out of Sichiling, and had one of those what-am-I-doing-here moments as I stood alone and watched it going away. Next moment a jeep stops, and Sonam from Tabo pops out his head. As they prepare to go away , another jeep stops to talk with the other .. which turns out to be Kesang from Kaza. More two-hand handshakes.

Dhankar perched high on the ridge , some six hundred meters above : I set out feeling a bit queasy. Halfway up I meet Yechung Dolkar , who assumes responsiblity for my ariiving in a civilised hour.Despite my feeble attempts to say that no , you , don\t have to wait for me. Relentlessly she pushes me up the mountain , by just standing there and looking at me until I get moving again.

We part as we we come in to Dhankar Village , and a flight of swallows dive out of the trailside grove. I dive in to the first house with a welcome sign, and get a guestroom, and sit in the kitchen as the evening meal is prepared. I wind up with a toddler on my lap, as the men go slowly about making dinner. By the time the rest of the household appears, the dinner is finished.

Denial becomes impossible at this point and I start waltzing between the kitchen and the toilet.
Evening ends with a double dose of Cipro , and drinking hot honey wter brought up by Suchung-le. Nice chat over a fifteen minute candle stump.

next day , still a bit wobbly in the knees. Go up to Dhankar Gompa. The entrance hall to the dhukhang holds some interesting images of monasteries , and between them elaborate images of .... shoes , with comments. The two lay monks , teenagers in jeans and baseball caps , are unfortunately not in the same league as Sonam in Tabo : the monansteries are " in Tibet" , and all paintings are eight hundred years old.

3 comments:

Mridula said...

But did you go to the Dhankar Lake? It is such a beauty and usually empty. I liked Dhankar the best this time around. Have a wonderful time.

vistet said...

Thanks - I had thought of Dhankar Lake , both after reading your blog and Andreas W:s photos , but without the ongoing internal warfare in my stomach , a minimal ack and a guide . The guide in the guesthouse was out there , and inertia won. Still had a wonderfu time , partly from meeting two frenchmen from Sorbonne who gave great insights , and very good illumunation to Dhankar Gompa. Will post some photos later , from a non-jaundice suffering 'puter.

vistet said...

Ctrl+Z : the meeting and illumination took place in Lhalung.