The Last Frontier
INSPIRATION: When I started writing this column, I assumed that many
of the few who would read it regularly would know the inspiration for
the title. I realize now that this is not the case. James Hilton's Lost
Horizon, a cult novel well over half a century ago, is now barely read.
It was set in what was clearly Tibet, in a monastery called Shangri
La where the secret of eternal life had been discovered. The repository
of the secret was a Catholic priest who had reached the monastery a
couple of centuries previously. The hero (played in the film by I think
James Mason) suddenly realizes that he is dealing with the famous Father
Perrault of the distant past.
My mother, not a great reader of novels, had a copy which I read
avidly forty years ago. I cannot be sure that I remember it well, but
certainly from then on I had a deep desire at some stage to visit Tibet.
In those days one felt there was time for everything. It is only in
the last few years that I have been conscious of mortality, the need to
do now whatever seems urgent, the realization that one is not going to
see everything that seems desirable in this strange but wonderful world
in which we live.
One needs to prioritize, and in the last decade I have used as a
touchstone a book we commissioned for the pre-University General English
Language Training Course that Oranee Jansz and I used to run.
We wanted a simple text that also gave to students entering
university some of the General Knowledge that their peers elsewhere
would have, but which our bizarre education system deprived them of. We
thought a record of Historic Buildings would be of interest, and we
asked Goolbai Gunasekara, one of the most imaginative and exciting of
school history teachers, to produce a text.
She covered the Pyramids, the Great Wall of China, the Parthenon,
Hagia Sophia, Angkor Wat, Machchu Pichchu, the Taj Mahal and the Potala
in Tibet. In short, readily readable accounts, there was lots of
interesting history, as well as superb insights into political
strategies that are relevant even now (as with regard to how Shi Huang
Ti unified China).
I knew the other buildings, but not the Potala, which seemed yet
another reason to travel to Tibet. Being in China last month therefore I
thought I would stay on for a week, to get there on my own. The original
quotation from the travel agent our hosts put me in touch with was far
more than I could manage, but by dint of going down the scale of stars
for the hotel, and other economies, getting to sites on foot or on my
own, I was able to go ahead.
Despite one night of scarcely being able to breathe, along with a
splitting headache, the impact of the sudden increase in altitute (Lhasa
is 12,000 feet above sea level), I found the whole experience
enchanting. The monasteries are wonderful complexes, with several small
temples full of statues and colourful tankhas and manuscripts piled on
shelf upon shelf.
All those I visited still had several monks, who gathered together at
noon to chant until, at some signal, the younger ones rushed off
flapping their robes like large birds to collect their lunch. This was
doled out in the assembly hall in which they changed, chunks of bread
and what seemed a thick soup cooked in huge vats in an archaic kitchen
which we could inspect (photography charged extra).
The Potala itself was a superb sight, 13 stories rising sheer in the
center of the town, the White Palace on one side with the rooms of the
Dalai Lama, unfortunately closed for restoration. The Red Palace in the
middle was however enough in itself, including the tombs of several of
the last lamas, and statues of the king who had established the kingdom
in the 7th century, along with his three wives, one Tibetan, another
Nepalese, the third a Chinese princess of the Tang dynasty.
That last marriage seems to have been what brought Tibet within the
Chinese sphere of influence, though the relationship has continued
complex since then. The fifth Dalai Lama, who really established the
theocratic nature of the Tibetan State, seems to have derived his
legitimacy from a grant from one of the Manchu emperors in the 16th
century.
Then, as now, the Chinese seem formally to have accepted the autonomy
of the Tibetan State provided Chinese hegemony were acknowledged.
Unfortunately, in the 20th century, demographic developments as well as
improved transport facilities have shifted population ratios in a manner
that was inconceivable before.
One can therefore understand the worries of the Tibetans, brought
home to me dramatically when a woman trying to sell me souvenirs,
furious at my refusal to offer the price she wanted, accused me of being
Chinese. At first I misunderstood, and thought she was describing
herself, but she spat out, 'I Tibetan.
You Chinese,' as though it was the worst insult she could offer. In
all fairness to the Chinese government, I should note that they
understand the problem, and their policies - exemptions to minorities
with regard for instance to the one child principle - seem intended to
protect regional identities. But the incident made clear the
difficulties of nation building, difficulties we need to appreciate in
the far less complex situation of this country too. |