tibetans in exile VS tibetans in China

kadambari45

Although my post revolves around travelling in China, there are obvious reasons as to why its here on IM. Would love to know what apne log have to say...


"The back road from Xiahe in Gansu to Langmusi, is definitely worth experiencing, instead of driving down the ultra modern highway,which can get awfully monotonous. The risk factor, be warned is high- the rivers were frozen, ice blankets on the dirt roads, us two and a mad tibetan driver, sliding our way on the icy roads, getting stuck in broken ice, we had to push the "Maruti Van" type of thing, out of the ice, with nomads, with gold teeth(its where they keep their scarce wealth) who got off their horses to help...all in the middle of no mans lands...Temperature: way below zero. Altitude: way above 3000 mts....mental, crazy, mad experience. And all the driver could say to us in consolation was "Mei shi, mei shi" --doesnt matter!!


Langmusi in winter is indescribable.Summer covers the grasslands in a blanket of vivid green speckled with yellow wildflowers..but now, the absolute lunar, arid landscape, is something out of this world. It leaves you at a loss for words, and leaves me raving in delirium with excitement and altitude sickness.The nomads here, remind one of Peruvian/Bolivian farmers in the Andes. Wrapped in sheep skins, straight off their horses, bringing the yaks and sheep to town. Each time I look at them, it feels like they've stepped out of a time machine..everything about them seems so ancient and utterly, beautifully out of sync with time.

Having spents months on end in Dharamsala in India, to me, it seems that the Tibetan refugees there come nowhere close in authenticity, in terms of religion and culture. Kelsang, who runs Langmusi Hotel, here in Langmusi, seems disdainful of the Tibetans in India, who according to him choose to live the life of "parasites" under the tag of "refugees". He asks,for how much longer will they shun,castigate and demonize the Chinese and live lives of dependancy ? His is not an attitude of a defeatist, but that of someone who looks at the bigger picture and chooses to cooperate, blend in, yet remain distinctly unique.
So long as Tibetans preserve their identity, no political boundaries can deprive them of their independance.

I ask myself, do the Tibetans in India truly believe that Tibet will be free someday?To me, it seems a far cry.Not for any other reason beside the fact that Tibet simply does not begin and end in "Xizang"..ethnographically ,its a known fact, it stretches all the way north of Xizang. Where will the scores of Tibetans here retreat to, if Xizang is free? How would they sustain themsleves without the support(meagre, but steadily present)) of the Chinese? What matters to them is not a free country, but being able to lead lives of basic comfort and the freedom to practise what they believe in. AND this is already burgeoning .
No doubt, to theTibetans in India the hopes of freedom are somewhat justified.They are but a fraction of the Tibetan people still in china.They have lived in Mcleod Ganj for decades and have grown up on anti chinese sentiments, fanatically fed to them by their then-persecuted grandparents/parents. Times have changes and so have people. The view on this side of India and Xizang seems different. How viable is the "Free Tibet" movement when the real nomads of Qinghai, Gansu and Xizang have things such as eking out a basic living, and bettering the quality of life on their minds? "

sudheer poppa

Excellant thought and sensible thinking. I know more about the actual conditions in modern day tibet than what is being spoken about as past extrapolated to present day..

Anyhow not being aware of both sides of the story, I leave it at that. But certainly would like to hear more from our members who have been in Mcleaodganj for a long time.

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vistet

Some immediate reactions :
whether we like it or not , language forces us in to positions. Using only the Chinese terms becomes a statement , intended or not.
Xizang (" the western treasurehouse") ...to me it implies an external, colonial wievpoint. I can`t remember exile Tibetans using or referring to the term ... but last year in Scotland I met Chinese who seemed oblivious to the word Tibet but immediately recognised the term Xizang.
Of course you may draw a paralell to the western use of Tibet , which the Tibetans dont use themselves.
Then again , you are right in raising the point of who/where the Tibetans are. In Tibetan there is Bod (roughly equivalent of the present TAR) + Amdo and Kham which in present political discourse is dubbed chol ka gsum : the three provinces.
I remember seeing a web pag made by an Tibetan cartographer at some US university who made a mapping of the Tibetosphere within PRC based on census figures , a good illustration of the difference between TAR and other Tibetan areas within PRC.

As for the artificialness of exile culture .. well , yes exile culture always live with a threat of stagnation. One of the books I am presently reading * mentions aspects of this , like the nervous streamlining to Lhasan culture. On the other hand Dhasa is continously being replenished with new refugees who still take considerable risks to go in to exile - something which hardly can be attributed to being fed tales by formerly persecuted parents.
I spent some time with two freshly arrived refugees last time in Dhasa : one had just spent four years in Drapchi Prison , the other , very young monk had crossed over the Nepalese border on foot for the chance of education and seeing the Dalai Lama.
The newly constructed border police station - highest so far in Tibet - to bottle up Nangpa La also attests to how seriously the CP takes the refugee issue.

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*"No Peace Of Mind - The Tibetan Diaspora in India" Dissertation in Cultural Anthropology , Uppsala University 2001.

kadambari45

Its not uncommon to meet newly arrived refugees in India..I myself have spent months with young refugees,who scaled mountains for 24 days to make their way through to India. But- I have also met Tibetans here in China, who escaped to India, studied for four-five years and have somehow returned to Tibet/China. Why? So that they can , in their own little way, work toward the upliftment and education of the nomads, 90 % of whom are illiterate.
Isolating themselves from the reality in Xizang/Tibet/Qinghai,by escaping to India will hardly bring them closer to their aim of liberation.

bijapuri

what, are you new???

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