Tom: Enroute to Lhasa (July 02)

Enroute to Lhasa (July 02) · Jul 14, 04:37 AM

In the morning: errands. Dominic from Catalan sits in a plush faux-leather seat watching us come and go—the internet, the pharmacy, the convenience shopping. Golmud is a pleasant place with broad tree-lined avenues and flowers everywhere to celebrate the new train of cultural annihilation. The streets are lines with streams and paths and stone bridges running through long narrow parks—strange public art.

We buy our officially permitted tickets at eleven—no sign of Heidi, but Dominic will join us. At three a car arrives to transfer us to the Tibet bus station where yesterday’s crew still hangs out. First there is no bus till four, then no bus till six, then would we like a room because there is no bus till tomorrow. We stubbornly refuse to budge from out spot on the steps or from out departure date. Katie and Ida make an excellent fuss. When we call the CITS lady back, she has some loud words around the corner with the bus guy. And apparently there is a bus. It leaves at seven. It’s a sleeper, but the bunks are smaller than yesterday’s bus here. Dominic and I stake out a five bunk upper-level platform at the rear of the bus as people crowd on. I disembark and secure our position with the driver when a Chinese man settles in to one of our bunks. He’s relocated. Katie and Ida return from the internet. A Tibetan family moves in below us. We wait. The bus leaves at eight, and we drive off into the dusk. It’s (warning: understatement) a little bumpy, and my stomach isn’t settled at all. I’m also taking strange Tibetan herbal altitude pills. Our stuff occasionally falls down the back. The downstairs neighbors shout up hello and hand stuff back as it falls onto their heads. At midnight we stop for a meal break; I eat a single steamed roll.

Ida has the right window. I’m beside her with my feet extended into the aisle. The middle bunk is piled full with our stuf, separating Dominic and I. Katie has the far window. It’s not too comfortable. You learn—when the bus slows down for a buckle in the road—to lift yourself a little off the seat to avoid being thrown into the ceiling at the subsequent jolting. Alternatively, you can brace against the low ceiling. Cracks in the wood probably indicate where sleeping riders have had their skulls cracked.

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http://tom.spacing-guild.net/2006/07/14/lhasa-july-04

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