ENTRY 5: TIBETAN NOMADIC LIFE

Yak-dung stove in a Tibetan nomad tent. They are putting dried-yak-dung in. It really smells good.
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At the end of June, I

Wow, the freedom of the grasslands

moved from James &

Qinghai Tibetan grasslands
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Anna's place (the two

teachers whose place I

was staying at). The

principal insisted that

The school principal's sister's tent. The 4WD is the school's & I've been driving it often (on the other side of the road & sitting on the other side of the car!..and it's a manual!)
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he wasn't taking care of

me so he organised

a place of my own, -

with a proper sit-down toilet. I hadn't used a

You can't usu. get this close to a Tibetan Dog but he is r e a l l y old & lost his attacking spirit.
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sit-down toilet for a month. Living by myself

is better than I expected, as it was good

timing for both his family and for me, giving

us all a bit of space, even if they didn't think

Eating Zanba & drinking yak-milk tea with 2 English teachers & the principal (next to me)in the cool hat
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they needed it! (They told me to live at

the new place for 3 days & come back!)

There's no running water/shower here either,

but once a day water runs through a communal

Pretty eh? I mean the scenery.
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tap in the building, so I fill all my

buckets, do all my

boiling, & fill my

thermos’.

Nomadic children
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I have devised my own

'running water tap’

from something I saw at

a monastery once

Right there so you know it's fresh. One sheep is prolly worth AUD$70!!!
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(see my pic in My

review of Lodgings in

this journal entry). It's great cos I can turn it on

and off, AND control the water flow!  Everyone

Fresh yak's milk. The mask is for sun & wind protection.
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wants one now! My parents came to visit me for

8 days at the end of June. I was so anxious to see

them arrive at the airport, I bought them Hada's

(Traditional Tibetan scarf) and gave them a

Grasslands of the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, the scenery reminds me of New Zealand (I went to some places where The Lord of the Rings was shot & it's just like THUS)!
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Tibetan welcome. James said it was like I was

waiting to see a boyfriend. Ha!

We went to a few places in Qinghai, after they

saw what my life was like working at the orphanage

Teaching the students how to use a dictionary
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in Xining, & teaching in Tianjun. Places included

Qinghai's (province)

famous salt lakes,

where they say could

Showing my student pics of Oz (Australia)
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supply the world

4 THOUSAND

times over (but why

Qinghai remains so poor

Primary students playing a Phonetics game I made up
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remains a mystery to

me).

We drove along the Qinghai-Tibetan Rail, which opened

on July 1.

When I was teaching, I noticed that none of the students

in my Tibetan school had dictionaries, so we brought

some from Xining (the city), and I'm teaching each

class how to use one. I feel like it's one of the

greatest privileges to be able to pass on a skill as

fundamental as this. I only wish they see it too.

(click on "View More Photos" to see the students.)

The principal is really cool, he knows that I like

taking pics & experiencing all I can possibly

experience in my time

here. He also knows I'm

not 'delicate’ & want

to get right in there &

try everything. He's

taken me to see what

Tibetan nomadic life

is like.

Forget the commercial stuff, the tourist-traps..

I've had the real thing..

The other day, I was sitting in a Tibetan nomad tent

on grasslands by a cool, glistening stream, enjoying

Yak-milk tea, eating "Zanba", which is a mixture

made from barley flour, yak-butter, sugar, and a

substance, I think is cheese. They pour the

yak-milk tea over it, and when you finish the tea,

you mix the mixture my hand until it forms balls,

and then you enjoy it (eating with hand) by the

yak-dung stove, which is the best thing ever

when the temperature

suddenly drops 10

degrees and starts to

hail & blow a freezing

wind outside. Tibetans

usually eat Zanba for

breakfast, and it's true-

it so filling, it can last

you all day.

A friend from Oz

(Australia) said I had been here too long when I

told her that yak dung smells nice. It does! Yaks only eat

grass!

[There's no cows like Oz, only yaks survive at this

altitude]

You can't get fresher ingredients than on the grasslands.

The whole experience has them slaying a sheep and

cleaning it in front of you. They make use of every

part of the sheep. The wool, they use to make their

Tibetan coats warm and pretty, the head is......

skinned &.......eaten, then the skull with horns is

put in front of a

house or restaurant etc.

for good luck.

They even stuff the

stomach with the

meat and eat that.

I've never had freshly

stuffed sausages, neither had my parents when I

arranged for them to go to the grasslands. Tibetans

usually eat 4 types of sausage-

meat, flour, liver/kidney/heart, & blood... hmmmm

yum yum! When they're fresh, I can handle all of them.

Oh, almost forgot, alcohol is so normal and so essential

here, just as much as water is for most other people.

Qinghai people are famous for drinking & mostly

we/they drink white spirit, much like vodka or

Mou Tai, but made from barley, and 48-52% alcohol. It's

only polite to 'do your rounds' and invite each person

at the meal to drink at

least 3 cups of this

spirit. Then if it's

polite, then everybody

'does the rounds' and

pretty soon.......well, now I

have volunteered to be the

'designated driver' of the

school 4WD (so what if it's on the other side of the road

and I have to sit on the other side of the car &

drive manual?)

Then it's time for a bowl of freshy-made yak's-milk

yoghurt, made right there in the tent. It's soooo good,

I've never had yoghurt this good, but it's gotta have

sugar, even the locals can't eat it without sugar.

Tibetans usually eat yoghurt after the meal, and say

that it's not good to eat after it.

Only one thing beats riding a motorbike like crazy all

over the grasslands,

with amazingly scenic

mountains all around

you, the puffy, white

clouds against the

clearest, blue,

absolutely pollution-

less "Qinghai-Tibetan

Plateau" skies, Tibetan tents dotted around the green,

rolling hills & meandering streams.... that's riding a

horse like crazy on the grasslands, bare-back. Never

ridden bare-back, just got one question, where do you

put the horse's back-bone!! Ouch!

The Tibetan herders (in Qinghai at least) have been

given land by the government, each family whom

the govt. know as herders, get 2 (or 3) pieces of land,

one for summer & winter, one for spring & autumn.

When the seasons change, they take all their stock to

their other piece of land & let

the grass grow in this

one (the winter land is

always the lower one

cos it gets so cold in the

mountains).

They take their tents,

yak-dung stove, & all

the equipment &

food they need with

them, if not by jeep,

then on horse-back or

motorbike. Some nomads carry a mobile solar panel &

battery, enough to power a small radio or tv. One of

my student's family has even bought a wind

generator!

PLEASE CLICK "VIEW MORE PHOTOS" (near any photo)

for the rest of this entry's photos as they don't all fit

in the entry.

Love yous all.... Nima Tso (Jeej)

(My Tibetan name- Nima means sun; Tso means ocean)