I often hear from people wanting to visit Tibet. They usually want to know what places to visit, what to avoid, when is a good time, and if they could work with some local group as a volunteer. I think these are good questions. And then there are stupid, or should I just say, bad, questions.
Here is one of the bad questions people ask: what kind of things, such as pencils and photos of the Dalai Lama, should they take as gifts for Tibetans, especially for poor children. Giving gifts randomly is a bad idea, especially if it is something the government prohibits, such as pictures of the Dalai Lama. Giving candies, pencils, etc., randomly to children reminds me of throwing bread crumbs to fish in the lake, or to monkeys by the roadside. At parks here in Canada, I see signs restricting people from giving food to animals -- it habituates them, changing their normal way of life. Same thing, but only worse. Tibetans are humans! A friend said it quite well: Tourists should not demean children by treating them as beggars and coming across as a rich almsgiver.
If you are interested in visiting Tibet, read How Not To Be A Tourist in Tibet.
The inspiration for writing this blog actually came from reading this news piece. If you are able to decipher the statistics explained in the article with strange English, please explain in the comments section below. The gist of the article as I understand it is this: A lot of tourists are pouring into Tibet, much more than last year, especially from within China. The rise in the number of tourists is not surprising. The number of tourists last year dropped radically after the March 14 Uprising, and the martial law, and the shutting-off of the Tibetan Plateau, and all the sensitivities surrounding the Olympics.
What really got me thinking was the last sentence which is clearly meant to entice more tourists. I quote a section of the sentence: "in the second half year, more tourists will be attracted as some large-scale activities such as "Miss Asia" Tibet Division Contest, 4th Namtso International Hiking Convention and the annual Shoton Festival will kick off."
Miss Asia? Surely Miss Tibet should be invited. OK, I am being facetious here. But more seriously, it is deeply disturbing that the government promotes certain Tibetan festivals such as the Shoton because of their tourism prospects, while at the same time they tell Tibetans not to celebrate other festivals such as the Buddha Purnima, Sakadawa in Tibetan, the most sacred day for all Buddhists. The government has instructed Tibetans to celebrate Chinese (or is it Korean?) Dragon Boat Festival instead. I highly recommend a close reading of this blogpost by a Tibetan expressing his/her feelings about this in a clever way. Read the contextual introduction of the blogpost by High Peaks Pure Earth carefully as well, and you will know what I am talking about.
Read more on this article...
Showing posts with label dalai lama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dalai lama. Show all posts
A delightful surprise to the people of Phagri
Monday, March 9, 2009
People of Phagri (ཕག་རི་), near Shigatse (གཞིས་ཀ་རྩེ་), have some wonderful visitors this year. Xinhua reports that a flock of Black-necked Cranes have chosen Phagri, instead of their usual spot in Nyalam (གཉའ་ལམ་), as their resting site this winter.
[Photo: Xinhua]
The Black-necked Cranes, also known as Tibetan Crane (scientific name: Grus nigricollis), is well known among the Tibetans. Trung Trung Kenag (ཁྲུང་ཁྲུང་སྐེ་ནག་), more popularly known as Trung Trung Karmo (ཁྲུང་ཁྲུང་དཀར་མོ་ / "White Crane"), is a bird immortalized by what is believed to be the final and the most popular poem composed by the legendary sixth Dalai Lama, Tsangyang Gyatso (ཚངས་དབྱངས་རྒྱ་མཚོ). A story goes that the poet Dalai Lama was sitting on a mountain top, looking for inspiration. Just then he saw a White Crane flying in the sky. He spontaneously broke into a song: "Oh White Crane, lend me your wings. I shall not fly far. From Lithang, I shall return."
The 6th Dalai Lama's last poem is believed to contain signs of his next life as the 7th Dalai Lama was born in Lithang. Here is a video of a man and a girl singing the song:
The Black-necked Crane is also popular among naturalists and environmentalists. According to the International Crane Foundation, Black-necked Cranes were the last species of crane discovered and described by ornithologists (1876). With a declining trend in its total population, which is only about 5,000-6000, the endangered Black-necked Crane is listed as "Vulnerable" in the IUCN Red List of endangered animals. The Black-necked grows to a height of about 4 feet (115cm) with an amazing wing span of nearly 8 feet (235 cm) and weighs about 12 pounds (5.5 kg).
Climate warming is known to drive animals and plants towards higher altitudes and latitudes (comparatively cooler regions) as temperature becomes too hot in their natural habitats. Migratory birds are worse off as these animals must travel long distances, covering different regions with very different environmental conditions. Related to the topic, BBC has produced a four-part documentary series called "Animal Migration in a Climate of Change" . As the Himalayas get warmer and the glaciers melt, the lakes and marshlands in areas around Phagri have become larger, and the surrounding meadows and shrubs have become greener. All these changes have made the area into an ideal winter hibernating site for the Black-necked Cranes, according to the Xinhua article.
Read more on this article...
[Photo: Xinhua] The Black-necked Cranes, also known as Tibetan Crane (scientific name: Grus nigricollis), is well known among the Tibetans. Trung Trung Kenag (ཁྲུང་ཁྲུང་སྐེ་ནག་), more popularly known as Trung Trung Karmo (ཁྲུང་ཁྲུང་དཀར་མོ་ / "White Crane"), is a bird immortalized by what is believed to be the final and the most popular poem composed by the legendary sixth Dalai Lama, Tsangyang Gyatso (ཚངས་དབྱངས་རྒྱ་མཚོ). A story goes that the poet Dalai Lama was sitting on a mountain top, looking for inspiration. Just then he saw a White Crane flying in the sky. He spontaneously broke into a song: "Oh White Crane, lend me your wings. I shall not fly far. From Lithang, I shall return."
The 6th Dalai Lama's last poem is believed to contain signs of his next life as the 7th Dalai Lama was born in Lithang. Here is a video of a man and a girl singing the song:
The Black-necked Crane is also popular among naturalists and environmentalists. According to the International Crane Foundation, Black-necked Cranes were the last species of crane discovered and described by ornithologists (1876). With a declining trend in its total population, which is only about 5,000-6000, the endangered Black-necked Crane is listed as "Vulnerable" in the IUCN Red List of endangered animals. The Black-necked grows to a height of about 4 feet (115cm) with an amazing wing span of nearly 8 feet (235 cm) and weighs about 12 pounds (5.5 kg).
Climate warming is known to drive animals and plants towards higher altitudes and latitudes (comparatively cooler regions) as temperature becomes too hot in their natural habitats. Migratory birds are worse off as these animals must travel long distances, covering different regions with very different environmental conditions. Related to the topic, BBC has produced a four-part documentary series called "Animal Migration in a Climate of Change" . As the Himalayas get warmer and the glaciers melt, the lakes and marshlands in areas around Phagri have become larger, and the surrounding meadows and shrubs have become greener. All these changes have made the area into an ideal winter hibernating site for the Black-necked Cranes, according to the Xinhua article.
Read more on this article...
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