Rudy Jaafar
MALD ’05
Tibet: Land of the Gods
Tibet. Land of the Gods. A land with spectacular mountains, endless deserts, glacier blue lakes and unending green steppes. In short, a land of striking contrasts and beauty, towering over the rest of the planet. Tibet’s inaccessible, inhospitable nature has left a vestige in western imagination; a vestige from which is born a desire to explore, discover and overcome this land that had been forbidden to man for so long. Emotional, romantic thoughts, you might say. Perhaps. Nevertheless, it is those longings, coupled with a desire to witness the consequences of half a century of occupation and dispossession that took me to Tibet in the spring of 2001.
My first discovery was the complexity of the logistics involved in traveling to Tibet: individual and group visas, Chinese government-sanctioned guides and itineraries, travel permits, and the like. Second was the extremely harsh nature of the terrain. Coming from Katmandu in Nepal, we had to climb up the Himalayan wall and cross into the Tibetan plateau. Roads blocked by mudslides and falling boulders, altitude sickness and sand storms were all daily occurrences. Then again, as soon as one overcomes these obstacles, one is struck by the natural splendor of the land. Magnificent lakes, mountains and valleys abound. The most significant discovery, however, arises from one’s first contact with the Tibetan people. I could not recall ever witnessing smiles so contagious, kindness and warmth so radiating. How strange, I thought, that in the most inhospitable of places, one encounters the best of human qualities. I was offered food, shelter and love throughout my journey.
I visited countless monasteries, or what remains of them, and encountered numerous Tibetans with the same silent acquiescence of their condition, all placing their hope and faith in the figure of the Dalai Lama. Indeed, the Tibetan air is so infused with religion and spirituality that walking in Tibet, one feels one is walking with the Gods. On another note, the only serious problems I encountered were from fiercely nationalistic and xenophobic Tibetan dogs, or should I say mastiffs, which could pick out a foreigner, namely me, from miles away, and hound him until he ran up the roof of a house or the top of a big rock….
My travels to Tibet were the first part of a journey that was to take me to Beirut, on the Mediterranean coast. On the heights of the Tibetan plateau I saw natural wonders and experienced human compassion in a land that has suffered subjection for the past two generations. In this context, I would like to offer some optimism for the future by echoing the words of Lebanese poet Khalil Gibran, “The more sorrow has burrowed your heart, the more happiness it will contain” - a universal call to all people under occupation.
