Meltdown in Tibet by Michael Buckley

Author:Michael Buckley [Buckley, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2014-10-07T00:00:00+00:00

LHASA, SEPTEMBER 2010: ACROSS FROM THE YAK HOTEL AT THE SHANGRI-LA Restaurant, a nightly dinner-dance show for Chinese tourists is staged. Here, nomads have been reduced to a curiosity. Performers present a medley of nomad folk songs accompanied by lutes and foot-stomping with boots to provide percussion—similar in concept to flamenco. The highlight of the evening is a yak dance, which is traditionally a welcome dance. Two Tibetans inside a yak costume take the stage, pursued by a herder cracking a whip. The yak suddenly charges off into the audience, harassing Chinese tourists seated at tables, drinking Lhasa Beer. The tourists are delighted, as this provides for the best photo opportunities.

Tibetan song-and-dance routines show up regularly on local TV stations: you get the idea that happy smiling nomads are like children living in a socialist paradise where all their educational and medical needs are taken care of. There’s an endless replay of choreographed festivals on TV: the yogurt festival, the walnut festival, anniversary festivals.

Because of my guidebook writing, I know of certain hotels with rooftop vantage points over the Jokhang Temple and Barkhor Bazaar. Good places to take photos from. But clambering up to these rooftops, I find these perches occupied by men in full military regalia, with binoculars—and guns—trained on the Jokhang and Barkhor below—the launching point of many demonstrations in the past. These snipers looked like part of a SWAT team. On the ground, soldiers sit behind sandbag bunkers every block or so in the old quarter of town. There are lots of checkpoints where identification papers are checked. Five-man teams patrol the back alleys; at least one of the men is armed with a machine gun. Video surveillance cameras are mounted at street corners. The core area of Lhasa looks like it is under military lockdown. And vigilance is tighter at monasteries like Drepung, which in the past has seen demonstrations led by monks. Visiting the monastery, I am surprised to find a new building inside the front gate. Looking up, I see it has surveillance cameras mounted on it. This turns out to be a Public Security Bureau office, cleverly disguised as a traditional Tibetan structure. The police are monitoring every single move the monks make.

* * *

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.