By Sunita Dwivedi

It had rained all night in Lhasa and the earth was wet and cold. From the mountains a pleasant breeze blew as I drove towards Nyingchi on the Tibet-Sichuan Highway. My destination was the famous Lamaling temple and the confluence of the Brahmaputra, known as the Yarlung Zangbo in Tibet, and its tributary, the Niyang river.

The highway ran between paddy fields along the bank of the Niyang. Small villages lay in the foothills of the high mountains rising on either side of the river like sentinels. Smoky clouds nestled on the hills. Rows of green houses made of plastic had been set up along the road for growing special variety of dwarfed tomatoes.

Tourist huts had been erected for night stays on the river bank. Light canoes and yak skin boats lay by the side of the river waiting for tourists. Here and there, all of a sudden, milky streams gushed forth the mountains and joined the river. The Tibetan women drew water from streams in large bamboo baskets for irrigating their fields.

Dazi county is a big town on the banks of the river. The mountains here are grassy and green. Large scale plantation have been carried out to form a dense foliage along the highway. The scenery is picturesque with herds of black yak wandering on the hill slope and tourist huts occupying the base of the hills. The county is a sanctuary for wild animals and all kinds of birds. Villages with stone walls and prayer flags fluttering in the wind looked ancient.

The Gandan temple town appears to have been recently built with new structures surrounded by vast fields. The gompa on top of the hill and can be reached by a circuitous route lined by prayers flag and Mani stones. As I neared the Moshu Gongka county the mighty river appeared swollen from the rain and gushing streams. For several kilometers on both sides of the banks there lay green meadows.

A huge gate announced that it was the birthplace of King Songtzen Gampo, the famous Tibetan emperor and whose palatial residence had been preserved carefully. Here women holding long poles were clearing a stream. Some others were grazing their horses. Black leather yak skin tents belonging to nomads had been set up the meadows.

The chief occupation of the nomadic tribes is animal husbandary. They usually encamp in a meadow near the banks of river where they can easily find fodder for cattle, gather some dry wood from the dense forests and eke out a living from collecting forest produce. One of the most famous forest produce is a kind of medicinal fungus called caterpillar fungus which is in high demand.

In the Ridou township as soon as I stopped for a short break several women came up to me with large quantities of this caterpillar fungus.

At the Kongpo Gyamda township groups of men played chess by the roadside while women sat picking fat caterpillar fungus for sale.

Soon I came upon the Mihla mountain entrance to Nyingchi where I stopped for the most beautiful view of the mountains and snow clad peaks. A thick growth of wild purple flowers with an intoxicating smell covered the low hills.

At the Song Dou and Jiangxi townships the river calmly flowed at the level of the road with a wide embankment and clear blue waters. At many places the altitude fell to a great depth and the river and caused it to swell like a blue sheet of endless width.

At Zhong, a row of small houses having red roofs stand out in the meadows. I stop at the Bahe countryside restaurant for a light meal.

Near the Kong bu Jianda county bridge I leave the highway and turn right to take the detour to Bayi town. On way is the beautiful Boksom lake and the famous Island monastery where Guru Padmasambhava is said to have meditated. The lake is called the bright pearl of Tibet. The wonderful landscape formed by high mountains and dense forests is reflected in the clear blue waters of the lake. Black and orange fish swim in gay abandon. A stone pathway on the island in the middle of the lake leads to the ancient Tsodzong monastery built in the mid 13th century. The main idol here is that of guru Padmasambhava. Beautiful paintings adorn the wals of the monastery.

The highway continues further to touch the Bayi town. Here in the suburb, just next to the river, is the model village of Guangzhou on the main Tibet-Sichuan highway. Interestingly this village under the leadership of the village committee has been developed into a “telephone village” and a “car village”. It has only 19 households having 90 persons with a farming area of just over 17 hectares. The village boasts of 11 Dongfeng-band trucks used as transport vehicles and 17 households with telephones. It is also an educational model with 100 percent enrollment in schools.

It is a beautiful village with splendid natural scenery, rare and ancient trees and an ancient Buddha worshiped by the villagers. A clear and milky stream passes through the village.

In the Bayi town is the ancient temple of Lamaling. Here beautiful wall paintings adorn the temple and a huge image of Padmasambhava sits inside the main hall on the first floor. The upper hall has an image of the Avalokiteswara.

On leaving this town, fifty kilometers later, the Niyang river joins the Yarlong Zangbo or the Brahmaputra as the Indians call it. I climb up a high mound to get a good view of the river which enters the Tibet border just about 300km down south after taking a huge U turn, called the Grand Canyon and piercing through the mountains to enter India. The highway runs for over 2000 kilometres before joining Chengdu. It goes upto Shanghai through Wuhan covering a journey of over 5000 kilometers from Lhasa, forming a part of the prestigious Highway Number 318.

Inside Tibet the road 318 passes through eight countries, circling through formidable mountains and along grand rivers before pasing into the neighbouring Sichuan province.

It is only one of the major national highways in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China. Others being the famous China-Nepal International Road, the Qinghai-Tibet Highway, Xinjiang-Tibet Highway and the Yunnan Tibet Highway. These form a network in and around Lhasa and all major towns while their branches cover every village.

(Xinhua News Agency August 21, 2006)