debate at sakya

during our day at sakya, we stumbled across a relatively modest group of monks debating in the courtyard outside one of the main halls.

given the size of the monastery and its monastic community, the numbers seemed thin to me, but there they were, working to deepen their understanding of the material they were studying and opening their views to challenge by others, drawing on this centuries-old dialogic form of tibetan debate. i spoke with several of them and learned that all the debate classes were present at the same time. of course, this monastery begin sakya the commentarial sources differed from those more familiar to me from sera and other gelug monasteries, the major topics were the same... and so was the rough and tumble mix of playfulness and serious intellectual inquiry i knew well from other corners of tibetan culture.

the wild west

no, this is not the american southwest. it is tibet's far west, as we approach the seats of what is now most often called the kingdom of guge.

we spent about a week in this terrain, located two days of rugged driving in our six land cruisers from mount kailash heading further west.

out in this wild west we passed a few days in the town of tholing as we explored that site and neighboring tsaparang, followed by two nights in the valley that houses the two cave complexes of dungkar and phiyang. several of the shots from the campsites in the next blog entry are of that valley.

and then three more days to drive back

but perhaps i can just let these images speak for themselves...

sleeping under the stars

several of the sites we visited were too remote to have facilities for overnight stays. as a result, our trip included many nights of camping. quite a few of our evening lectures took place in the food tent, flaps shut against the bite of the wind. in all, nearly a third of our time in tibet was spent under the stars. we camped on the banks of lake manasarovar within view of mount kailash, we camped in pastureland and in clusters of forest. often windy, more often cold, but always in magnificent locales and in great company. here are some photos capturing some of those sites.
the image with the long view down a valley shows our campsite from the caves of phiyang in the other end of the valley; the tiny specks of color in the distant field of green are our tents.