DOUG: By the end of 1981, Shishapangma had been climbed five times. All the routes had, more or less, followed the one pioneered by the Chinese in 1964; and none of them had been accomplished in Alpine style. But this is one of the problems of climbing in China. To go ‘Alpine’ means to leave the base of the mountain self-sufficient and to move up the route continuously without further contact with the ground, i.e. without fixed ropes and support parties. The weight factor makes it impossible to use bottled oxygen. Therefore the team needs to be fully acclimatized, but in China this is a real problem for a low-budget expedition. Ideally, it would help to stay at such towns and villages as Zegar (4,280 metres) or Dingri (4,100 metres), but the cost of accommodation, which cannot be avoided, and excessive parking fees for retaining onward transport makes this prohibitive. To book smaller peaks on which to acclimatize before the big one is also time-consuming, entailing more expense.
One advantage of climbing on the South-West Face of Shishapangma, as opposed to the Northern side, was that the walk-in would start at about 3,800 metres and be sufficiently lengthy to help acclimatization. Another factor was the much shorter distance from a base at the foot of the South-West Face to the summit of the mountain; once acclimatized, such a route would be feasible in Alpine style, providing the technical difficulties were not too severe. There were also unclimbed peaks in the vicinity on which we could acclimatize and above all here was a mountain flank and valley that would excite our curiosity for no one had ever been anywhere near it before. We were at long last en route on a voyage of discovery.
We stared in wonder at the open, airy airport at Peking, all decked in marble and with none of the rush of Heathrow or the noise, bustle and humidity of Islamabad where we had changed planes. In the foyer we were met by Mr Chen Changren San, a protocol officer of the Chinese Mountaineering Association, who told us he had been to the summit of Shishapangma in 1964.
We were whisked along broad boulevards into downtown Peking and to the Chiennen Hotel, built, like so many of the others we saw, in the 1950s’ Russian mausoleum style. During dinner, we met various dignitaries of the Chinese Mountaineering Association (CMA) with whom we were to have a great deal more contact. At six o’clock the following morning we went out with a temporary interpreter to find that the broad pavements were full of people, mostly elderly, performing Tai Chi. We stood watching them making beautifully precise movements of their limbs. Such was their concentration that they seemed oblivious to the presence of gawking Westerners. We left them moving in slow motion, backwards and forwards, a kind of moving meditation exercise, and continued on our way to a nearby park.
As it was rush hour the streets were filled with cyclists going to work. All we could hear was the constant whirr of bicycle chains. Everyone seemed to be dressed in the same drab green or blue cotton Mao suits, young and old. Since the recent swing to more liberal attitudes it is no longer the law to conform to clothing models, but obviously old habits die hard. Despite the lack of motorized transport, which consisted mainly of overcrowded trolley buses, there seemed to be quite a pollution haze hanging over the town, either from the many factory chimneys belching out acrid smoke, or from the dust blown in from the interior. At the entrance to the park were groups of locals attacking imaginary adversaries with broad-bladed swords in the course of practising Kendo, one of the martial arts, of which Tai Chi is an offshoot. The park was crowded despite the early hour; opera singers were sounding off from a pavilion, individuals were doing their Tai Chi or sat around reading, couples were learning lines of verse and a few Westerners in shorts and T-shirts jogged, head and shoulders above the Chinese.
Then began three days of negotiations with members of the CMA. These negotiations in Peking and subsequently in Lhasa were to take up a great deal of our time – especially for Nick the treasurer, Alex the lawyer and myself as official leader. They precluded much in the way of sightseeing in Peking, but we did make the mandatory two-hour drive to the Great Wall.
I was expecting just another tourist attraction, but what an attraction it is! To stand on the Wall, knowing that the section we could see sweeping up and round on the very crest of the hills continued beyond for a total length of 4,200 miles, I found quite staggering. It is wide enough for two horsemen to pass each other and is between 30 and 60 feet in height. The Wall is one of only two man-made offerings seen by astronauts from Space; then I remembered that the other is the pollution haze hanging over Los Angeles.
There were few other foreigners amongst the throng of Chinese laughing and jostling along the ramparts. Groups picnicked on the turrets looking out across the plain to the north from whence Tartar and Mongol horsemen once came galloping, bent on pillaging the northern cities of China. Now, of course, that frontier lies many miles to the north and today the importance of the Wall is the boost it gives to the Chinese tourist industry, and to the Chinese pride in their heritage.
The gentlemen with whom we negotiated in Peking were themselves mountaineers and members of the CMA. They had begun climbing during the period of friendly co-operation with Russia. Alex, who took copious notes in his little red book during our discussions, describes them later. But as background information, the reader may be interested to know something of the principal characters.
There were several reasons why our expedition was involved in negotiations far more protracted than any other. No one had been to the south-west side of Shishapangma before and the Chinese could not be expected to foresee all the problems we old hands envisaged, so a good deal of time was spent going over problems concerning yaks, yak-men, porters, mail runners, food supplies, etc. Also, apart from always operating the law of ‘not parting with any money until the last possible moment’ when dealing with expedition finances, there were areas where we might legitimately cut our enormous budget. Al Rouse had given us a few tips on his return from Kongur, such as taking only one vehicle instead of the two recommended. We understood that camping was a possibility in Lhasa, thus saving enormously on hotel charges. So for these and other reasons, although we missed out on the sightseeing, we did have a first-hand, in-depth experience of the Chinese under negotiating pressure.
The star Chinese performers numbered six. The Gang of Six, as they became affectionately known to us, had all started their climbing in the 1950s. Chen San was not only the Protocol Officer for the CMA, he was also a climbing coach. He did not take a very active part in the debate but sat quietly, listening for the most part, putting in a word now and then. To me he epitomized Chinese climbing attitudes. He was very diffident when I asked him what he had climbed, not because he was under orders not to divulge such information and not because he had nothing to declare. He had, in fact, climbed Elbruz in the Caucasus in 1956, Peak Lenin in the Pamirs two years later and Mustagh Ata in 1959. He had reached 8,100 metres on Everest in 1960 and 8,200 metres in 1975. In 1964 he had been Deputy Leader and summit climber on Shishapangma. Not many Western mountaineers hold such a record of high mountain climbs under their belts. He may have been elsewhere, but these are all the facts I could prise out of him. After the Chinese climb on Everest in 1960, the Vice-Premier at the time, Ho Lung, ‘called on the climbers to sum up their experiences, conscientiously refrain from getting conceited, carry forward their style of hard work … to make fresh contributions to China’s socialist sports and high-altitude exploration’. Although I suspect that modesty may be a national characteristic of the Chinese anyway, this sound advice seems to have been adhered to impeccably.
The Gang of Six could not have done more. Mr Wu Ming, who was a geologist and hydrologist during the early attempts on Shishapangma and on Everest, did everything possible to meet our demands, as did the 1975 Everest doctor, Dr Li Shuping. They were at all the meetings and bore the brunt of the ensuing work, such as contacting the semi- autonomous Lhasa section of the CMA for their reaction to our demands. Wu Ming was a sort of Roy Jenkins character, quietly but firmly making shrewd compromises. Whenever we reached deadlock, however, Shi Zanchun, the Vice-Chairman of the CMA, was called in to arbitrate. He had been leader of the 1960 Everest Expedition. His name was absent from the list of climbers on subsequent expeditions until 1975, when he appears to have been leader again. In China I think ‘leader’ can be interpreted loosely and may well be a position shared with others. Shi was very much the politician, and not at all given to compromise.
Chang Chun-Yen usually attended all the meetings and functions the Chinese laid on for us. He was tall for a Chinese, about six feet and, at 51 with a family of three children, very fit and strong-looking. He told us a lot about Shishapangma, which he had climbed, warning us of the snow we could expect on the south side and genuinely admiring our intention to climb the Face with only four climbers and in Alpine style. They did seem to have grasped the concept of climbing in Alpine style.
At a banquet given in our honour, Hsu Ching presided. He had led his team to the top of Shishapangma in 1964 and he had also served as Deputy Secretary of the Communist Party Committee on that expedition. He had been deputy leader on the 1957 Minya Konka Expedition and on the 1960 Expedition to Everest, and had also climbed Mustagh Ata twice.
ALEX: We had received the most stringent instructions to be on time for the banquet, just this once. The system adopted for foreign expeditions in China rests on the concept of a single leader issuing clear instructions to his team, whose main preoccupation is to be available, wherever they should be, at the time they have been asked to be there, their main occupation being eating. Lacking any such leader, with no great grasp of time (no one had a watch), and possessed of the ability to be going in a multitude of different directions at once, we did not always measure up to the high standards set by our Japanese cousins. On this occasion, however, we did make it on time, except for Roger, who was lost somewhere in the city.
Much time was taken in stressing etiquette to us as we approached in the minibus. The Big Chiefs (Doug and Nick) would sit at the top table, the hoi polloi (Paul and Alex) would sit at the bottom. The hoi polloi took great delight in informing Elaine she would have to eat in the kitchen, but in the event she sat with Doug and Nick!
Sumptuous food was served in a bewildering array of courses, while young ladies kept the alcohol flowing – which it does liberally on such occasions. Periodically, dignified members of the banquet would stand and propose a toast on whatever appropriate pretext came to mind. This would be a signal for a ‘down-in-one’ of the liquor in front of you, which was promptly topped up again. Needless to say, the team took to this like ducks to water.
The negotiations, when resumed, went something like this: ‘Now, about camping in Lhasa … ’
‘There is no camping for foreigners permitted this year.’ ‘What? But, look, your regulations specifically refer to the possibility. They even give a price.’
‘The authorities in Lhasa will not permit foreigners to camp in Lhasa this year!’
‘Can we sleep in the back of the car?’
‘There is no possibility but to do according to the regulations and arrangements of the Chinese Mountaineering Association. There is no room for bargaining about the rest of your accommodation.’
‘But this is outrageous, absolutely outrageous. Just to sleep, just to put my head down, 90 pounds. Wake up in the morning, phew … 90 pounds gone … Ask him if we can keep walking all night!’
Our negotiations in Peking were vital to us. Barely three days away from the Forbidden City, just a week away from our first glimpse of Shishapangma, and a mere 24 hours away from the unthinkable, ignominious return to London – the most expensive sightseeing tour of Peking ever undertaken – wagging tongues, a thousand ‘told-you-sos’. In the main it was Doug who swept the debate on to the CMA. Twenty years of worldwide mountaineering experience sustained on inadequate funds (‘Inadequately funded climber savages Chinese Mountaineering Official!’ – Daily Express exclusive), against almost every major form of authority devised by our present-day world have left a hardened nerve and a tenacious, stubborn resilience that would compliment a mule.
‘The regulations are not made only by the CMA. The CMA cannot change the regulations.’
‘The CMA is representing China. We are talking to China!’ ‘Yes, we do represent China, but you should have had everything arranged beforehand.’
‘Look, this problem comes about because we thought we were going ‘economy’ after what our telex told us, and because you will not allow us to camp in Lhasa.’
‘We cannot understand your protest.’
‘About the ridiculous price we have to pay?’
‘If the price is too high, cancel it!’
The fundamental, absolute and feared bottom line. From time to time you may hear theories that this or that establishment body in one or other of the main climbing countries was the driving force whose cunning negotiations and political contacts opened China and Tibet to the world. This is not so; political change in that country opened the door. The climber is a source of foreign exchange. The reasons why we are allowed to buy our way in are in a stratosphere far beyond the ken or persuasion of the climbing world. You don’t need contacts, you need cash, and our lack of this fundamental commodity was a novelty in this land.
In all, we spent an unprecedented 14 hours in negotiation with the CMA. They are used to dealing with relatively docile, disciplined expeditions backed by a sponsor or sponsors more interested in the publicity, good relations, ‘mutual friendship’ and the quiet life. As we hadn’t found such a sponsor, our debate ranged far and wide, conducted with a passion through specifics and politics, pursuing points through a dozen polite, exasperated negatives, along a dozen obscure tangents, pushing on every door, probing for flexibility, fighting against the possibility of the often-commented-upon ‘inspired inaction’ of the Chinese system that would send us home or into heavy debt.
Our negotiations began in Room 311 of our hotel, a small sitting room in a double apartment. When it became apparent that life was not going to be simple they switched venues to a conference room in another hotel, the Tintan Sports Hotel, in a different, amorphous part of town, where they brought in a higher official, Mr Shi.
In the room of the Tintan Sports Hotel we spent 11 hours in crisis management, brinkmanship and tea-drinking. The negotiations developed with the pace of a brilliant, furious and finely balanced cricket match. Mr Wu Ming and Dr Li defended their wicket from a small settee set at the far end of the rectangular room, beneath a small portrait of Mao and, with studied competence, used every stroke in the Chinese bureaucrats’ book to quite deadly effect – the ‘anzhoo womendi guilu’ (according to our regulations), the ‘fuza’ (complicated), the ‘kaolu kaolu’ (we are looking into it) and the ultimate, impenetrable appeal to ‘Chinese-British friendship’ – an anagram for your paying them lots of money.
Doug opened the bowling at silly mid on, on a small armchair to their right, but soon squeezed into an impossibly close first slip, right up beside Wu or Li on the settee itself.
‘Bloody hell, Doug, if he sees you there he’ll do his nut.’
Towering over his spectacles, he would sweep back loose strands of hair, take a last puff of a rabid cigarette and, quivering at the apparent inflexibility of the defence, hurl another telling bouncer, well-aimed, but nevertheless swept for six. The remainder of our team took up positions in armchairs close to the wicket, Paul giving worried directions on position and strategy, Roger shouting the rising score (i.e. unbudgeted cost escalation). Nick ducked as the sixes whistled over his head and his neatly tabulated rows of figures crumpled before him. By lunchtime they had scored a double century and we were not going anywhere.
We had been given to understand from a telex from the British Embassy that the Chinese had agreed to charge us at ‘economy rate’. This, it turned out, was a mistake. Economy class was reserved for accredited students. Polite assurances to ‘do everything to help us economize’ had been misunderstood. The second blow was the information that all our foodstuffs, which were to have been purchased by the CMA and await our arrival in Lhasa, had not yet been bought but would be accompanying us airfreight – at our expense, naturally. My diary recorded:
Again, this is our mistake. The Chinese system does not volunteer information, it simply assumes you intend the consequences of your actions and they dictate those consequences. Why was it assumed in our budget that this stuff would go overland at minimal cost? Nick’s accountancy is screwing up because his assumptions do not fit a Third World system, and they certainly don’t fit this one. His lack of experience in expeditions shows in this budget of his.
Mind you, it must be said, if Nick had understood the system and accounted on that basis, we would never have gone in the first place. So perhaps we have to bless that budget!
‘Before you have come to China we want to make everything satisfactory.’
‘Well, you know what you can do.’
‘But we must abide by the regulations.’
To the rest of the team there were times when Doug’s sense of proportion seemed obscure. While we were reeling under the disastrous news of the air freight costs, he set off on a conversation about beans – which, it appeared, we could not afford to freight anyway. On being told there were no beans in China he rounded on the interpreter with cold eyes, speaking very slowly: ‘I don’t think Dr Li knows what I mean. Every country in the world has beans. I think you had better ask him again. Two months is a long time without food!’
There were also times when the Chinese must have perceived they were dealing with lunatics, such as when we insisted we would bicycle to the Great Wall. They were incredulous. (It took us two hours in a minibus.) But fundamentally I think it was the novelty of negotiating with someone who pleaded abject poverty from the start which stumped them.
Finally, they gave up the defence and threw the ball back. ‘How much did you plan to spend in China?’
Nick added and subtracted for what seemed an age. Everyone waited with bated breath. ‘50,960 yuan over and above what we have already deposited with you.’
Worried Chinese faces looked glum. We caught the mood and looked glummer. Dr Li ferreted around an inside pocket of his drab blue Mao jacket and produced two thin, neatly folded pieces of paper, put on his glasses and pondered. We pondered with him. Were we going home?
Clearly, our hosts were not happy. ‘How much have you paid already?’
‘15,940 yuan.’
In what amounts? On which dates? Did we have the receipts? It was moving too quickly now. Nick could not find the information or the receipts. London – here we come? A minute ticked by. A minute is a long time.
‘Pheewhee!’ Dr Li’s grinning face expelled air and sank back, relaxed. The payment had been located. There had been no instructions as to who had sent it, an anonymous donation!
‘Bloody hell, Nick.’
Suddenly business was in the air; we were all on the same side.
‘How much weight of equipment do you have with you?’
The weight estimate, perhaps a touch optimistic, drew some expressions of disbelief. We tried to explain lightweight, Alpine-style climbing to blank faces. ‘We climb like Reinhold Messner.’
That did the trick. Dr Li doubled back over his paper, scribbled on another, making swift calculations. We all had some more tea. He finished and sat back. ‘Mr Wu has a solution to your budget. As you have already arrived in China and with little money, and it seems you are quite strong and can bear hardship, we will try to help you spend less.’
And they did. Every effort would be made to change arrangements in Tibet; they would try to make sure we only needed to use one truck if it would take all the equipment; they would try to help us spend only one night in Lhasa; they would try to help us reduce our numbers of yaks and yak-herders. We would buy the bulk of our foods ourselves in Cheng Dhu and freight it from there, we should take big ‘hand baggages’; we should carry large loads to the Base Camp ourselves as an exercise for high altitude.
‘That’s a good idea?’
New regulations were produced. Certain things were cheaper this year, certain problems easier to deal with. ‘We now believe you can operate within your budget, but you must prepare yourselves for the rigours ahead. It is not as comfortable in a truck as in a Toyota! Now you are new friends to us and you are welcome to visit China in the future. We await good news from you in Peking. Your route is very hard, but we believe you are all stronger than Messner.’
To this there was general consent!
The system was flexible. The CMA in Peking had decided to give us the green light, now that we were already here. I sometimes wonder whether they did not sit and deal with past expeditions in almost total disbelief that, as another few 1,000 yuan slipped on to the budget, everyone smiled and talked of ‘Chinese-Somebody Friendship’. I don’t think a Chinese would fall for that one. During the three days of talks the telephone and telegram wires to Lhasa had buzzed continuously as we put up ideas for reducing costs.
‘We will make representations.’
‘Will you make strenuous representations?’
‘Yes, we will make strenuous representations.’
DOUG: On 8 April we flew to Cheng Dhu, tired from our negotiations but enlivened by our excursion to the Great Wall and socializing at the British Embassy. It was there we had heard of the gathering storm, thousands of miles away in the South Atlantic. Embassy officials had quietly given us a good deal of support behind the scenes, particularly John Everard who had exchanged dozens of telex messages with Nick before our departure. We looked forward to seeing them all again in two months’ time.
At Cheng Dhu we changed planes and in dense cloud flew on towards Lhasa surrounded by a quantity of hand luggage which amazed even us. Sitting on vacant seats were 450 eggs, a hundred pounds of sugar, sacks of vegetables as well as five thousand postcards, plus a good deal of our personal belongings. Nick took great delight in informing us that our plane was an ‘illusion’ (Ilyushin). It was certainly of 1950 vintage, shaking horribly as it took off and vibrating among the foothills leading up to the Plateau of Tibet. Through clearings in the clouds we could see heavily wooded valleys and snowcapped peaks below. The further west we travelled the more extensive grew the vista of peaks stretching away in all directions to the horizon. Such a sight certainly made a nonsense of ‘Munro bagging’. However, we all agreed that one peak we would like to bag was Namcha Barwa (7,756 metres), one of the highest unclimbed peaks in the world and the most easterly peak in the Himalayan Range. Tibet’s famous river, the Tsangpo, changes direction at Namcha Barwa, turning due south – from west to east – to flow down into Assam where it is known as the Brahmaputra. After three hours we had passed over the wooded country, over peaks covered in spring snow and glaciers winding in between. Now we looked down on to the dry, semi-desert countryside surrounding Lhasa. The Himalayan Range – Kangchenjunga, Everest, Shishapangma and all the others – disappeared into the distance marking the southern edge of the plateau. So here we were, coming into Tibet.
ALEX: We touched down into a parched, barren landscape at around 9.45 am. A single, wide, dusty strip obviously able to accommodate larger and heavier aircraft served as the runway. There was no taxiing, no request to remain seated for the long jerky ride through distant outfields to the terminal designate. The plane simply turned right after a brief trundle and halted near some parked vehicles. We waited while it discharged its other bustling, laden passengers and then proceeded to manhandle our hand baggage on to the tarmac below, blinking at the barren hills that surrounded our wide, flat valley floor, reeling from the rapid and immediate change in altitude, for we were now at a height of around 12,000 feet. Our eventual aim would be to climb at heights over twice this altitude, but for the moment it was a shock. How the tourist reacts, paying their 10 thousand dollars, I wouldn’t like to think.
At the edge of the runway, a few feet away from us, sat two clean white Toyota minibuses. We loitered and awaited some directions, our team, resplendent in scruffy, travel-worn hand-me-downs, contrasting with a party of Japanese who had travelled on our plane handsomely arrayed in bright colours of red and blue with various yellow golfing caps, all new, all expensive and all over which they insisted we wrote our autographs, scrawled in indelible black ink, while we photographed them photographing us signing them. A curious bunch of lads!
At a single instruction they promptly fell into a Toyota and disappeared. The other vehicle was apparently for us, and various attempts were made to usher and exhort the team into it, a far more difficult process than that we had just witnessed. At the runway we were introduced to our liaison officer, Pemba.
Rumbling down the last stretch of dusty road for the final 40 kilometres to Lhasa, the tourist system swung into action. After 20 kilometres we reached a small, newly-painted and probably newly-repaired monastery, at which we bundled to a halt.
‘The monastery is closed today, the monk is in Lhasa.’
In a spirited attempt to photograph the building to advantage, the roof of a neighbouring earth house was precariously occupied.
‘If a bunch of Tibetans turned up in Delph and began clambering all over my roof I’d do my nut.’
Doug and Elaine disappeared on the inevitable quest for the ever more illustrious, definitive photograph. The rest of us were treated to an example of how things should be done. Another minibus, full of West Germans, drew to a halt, the windows slid back and cameras clicked on motordrive. Some sweets were tossed out to scrounging children. A couple of more adventurous males dismounted and gathered around the doorway, photographing the children begging, then the whole caboodle vanished in a cloud of dust, down the road to lunch no doubt.
Our driver was unhappy. We had been more than five minutes; we would be late for lunch. Meanwhile, our shop steward had absented himself from view, a dream fulfilled, a Tibetan monastery in his foreground, Tibet in the background. Dolma, the tourist guide, Pemba and the driver were puzzled at this obviously unique situation.
‘Why can’t your leader no bring him back’
‘He is the leader!’
Time in Lhasa was precious to us and, at nearly 90 pounds per person per night, unforgettable. We could afford to spend only one night there and would have to leave on the back of a truck, a minibus would cost about £4,000 extra. As we did not have the money for these expenditures we were anxious that our liaison officer should understand our predicament. Much time was devoted on the way in to explaining to him our status as ‘a personally financed and relatively impoverished expedition’. Many smiles and sympathetic assurances that it would all be fine and he would help us to his utmost were forthcoming. However, as we got down to specifics over lunch, about the two vital items that Peking had promised to push on our behalf, it soon became painfully apparent that Pemba was going to be a disaster.
‘But Pemba, it is vital we only spend one night in Lhasa.’
‘Mayo, it’s just not possible.’
‘But why not? It’s OK by us.’
‘Mayo,’ and with that he would grin his toothy grin, shake his head and chuckle to himself. It was as if he felt he were dealing with errant children who would soon understand and do things his way – the liaison officer’s way.
‘And another point, Pemba, we are only going to use one truck. One truck is quite sufficient for our expedition.’
‘It is impossible.’
The afternoon wore on as we tried to get our liaison officer’s co-operation, which, we had been assured in Peking, was the vital factor regarding our requests. We sat in the courtyard of one of the hotel’s compounds, arguing and pleading with one of the most inarticulate, stubborn and unintelligent men it had ever been anyone of the team’s misfortune to deal with. He was not at all interested in our plight, except inasmuch as it affected him. There would be no bright new clothes or expensive Western trinkets. We would not be buying his affection, but rather would be expecting him to do a job.
‘Mr Pemba says if you don’t have enough money, go home as others have done before!’ Wu, our interpreter, spoke.
It was so simple for this man to say such a thing – to display such total lack of interest. Tempers frayed. Pemba produced his liaison officer’s paper of authority for all to see – stamped and signed!
‘Now look, we are a very small expedition. We will all easily fit on a truck.’
‘No, no, everything cannot fit on a truck.’
‘Ask him, Wu, how can he know that, he doesn’t know how much equipment we have.’
‘It’s very uncomfortable and dusty to ride on a truck.’
‘But we know all about riding on trucks. We have ridden thousands and thousands of miles in trucks. We have ridden in Afghanistan, Africa, Pakistan, India, Turkey … ’
‘It is forbidden for foreigners to ride in trucks this year.’ ‘That’s not true.’
‘Mr Pemba says he has a suggestion to help you halve your minibus costs. You can take a jeep, but everyone will not fit in the jeep.’
‘So someone will have to ride on the truck.’
‘Yes.’
‘So it can’t be illegal.’
‘But this is for Chinese-British friendship!’
The final rock-bottom answers; it was time to go to the CMA office. Liaison officer support or not, Pemba quite obviously wished to ride in a Toyota for his own comfort and, in hindsight, perhaps to do some profitable trading along the way, selling off supplies granted to liaison officers and interpreters for expeditions.
DOUG: The plateau of Tibet, in the heart of Asia, is 15 times the size of the British Isles and, at an average height of 15,000 feet, all of it is above 10,000 feet. Those of us who go to the mountains will recall reaching those heights above the level of the trees where there are grassy Alps dotted with Alpines below, the crags of ice and rock. It is at those heights, in the clear cold air, that spirits rise noticeably and cares and worries subside. So it is perhaps not surprising that the Tibetan plateau is steeped in religion or that until recent times one in seven of its three and a half million inhabitants lived and worked in the monasteries, the number of which has been variously estimated at 2,500 and 3,500. It is hard to imagine such an arid land being able to support the building and sustenance of monasteries on the scale of those we saw on our 500-mile journey to the peak of Shishapangma and back.
Thubtem Jigme Norbu recalled from exile the effect of his native Tibet:
The countryside itself helps perhaps. I know that those of us who have had to leave Tibet feel a real loss, not being able to see our mountains and feel our winds and breathe the clear cold air. It is a countryside that takes our thoughts directly to a state of existence far above our own. Its very size and splendour make a man’s thoughts turn inward. In Tibet we lived with the world around us, not just in it. In itself it seems part of our blessedness.[1]
Now we drove through an arid land of strong contrasting colour, a Salvador Dali landscape of windblown sand piled up against dark red rocks vibrant against the blue sky. Pemba was shouting out rules and regulations, Wu was interpreting, Dolma, the hard-working tourist guide, spoke English and was answering our questions. She was grey with fatigue. How many times already had she told Westerners that she was at school in Darjeeling before the 1959 uprising, and ‘yes, it was mostly Tibetan Red Guards who had damaged or destroyed the monasteries. Yes, they were repentant now. Yes, the Cultural Revolution of 1966-8 was a hard time for us all.’
To change the past into the present she pointed to a haze-covered hump on the flat valley floor: ‘You will see the Potala soon,’ she said.
As the bus rounded a bend on the stabilized gravel road we caught sight of the Potala in the distance through the superstructure and smoke of a cement factory.
We were driven straight to our hotel, still five miles from Lhasa. We ate a splendid lunch but ended up with indigestion through indignation at being told that the driver was not available again until the evening. With the prospect of only one day in Lhasa, we wanted to spend every minute actually in the town. Soon we were locked in debate with Pemba over our cost-cutting schemes once again. Alex gave it all his lawyer’s logic. Elaine took photographs. Roger strutted about, furious. Paul slept that one out. Poor old Wu was hard-pressed, interpreting. I was checking a pile of air-freighted equipment when I heard the debate reaching a crescendo, a babble of high-pitched voices that suddenly stopped. Our driver had changed his mind, and we were off to the CMA Headquarters in downtown Lhasa.
We drove down metalled roads, past Chinese-inspired buildings, into the compound of the CMA. Immediately, Pemba aimed for a group of similarly attired Tibetans. Their black leather coats, swarthy skins and dark sunglasses gave them a slightly sinister appearance, like members of some Mafia gang. It was obvious they were debating our proposed cut-down on time in Lhasa and the exclusion of the minibus. Elaine, speaking Tibetan, soon found the one man who could help. Jigme had been a national football coach and did speak some English. Elaine put our case to him and to another Tibetan sporting a ratting cap. He set off for the main office, where Alex and Roger had gone to organize the stamping and franking of our five thousand postcards.
ALEX: We waited in a small, clean office until finally an official arrived, a short, stocky darkish man of practical manner, a bearing that implied experience in the field, and a flat cap under which cropped black hair protruded. He motioned for us to remain seated and pulled up a chair opposite us. Dolma translated.
‘We would like to cancel the minibus and use only one truck.’
‘Yes.’
We nearly collapsed. I asked Dolma to enquire what position he held and whether we needed to meet a higher official to confirm this – this man bore no obvious air of authority.
‘He says he has authority on certain matters and can decide this.’
I turned to Roger. ‘Let’s not get too excited, some higher official will probably walk in and we will need to begin all over again.’
‘Can we pack this evening and leave tomorrow?’
‘Yes. And my men will help you pack.’
Unbelievably, within half an hour we could suddenly afford our expedition. The wealth of telegrams and phone calls from Peking, exhorting the Tibetans to facilitate our passage, had done the trick – Pemba notwithstanding.
DOUG: Meanwhile, in another part of the compound, the rest of us checked out the Thomas Cook Lhasa cache of camping equipment stored there for trekking groups. Roger Balson from Cook’s China and Searcher Office had kindly arranged for us to borrow eight Vango Base Camp tents, stoves and kitchen gear.
The mood amongst the leather jackets grew decidedly hostile. Pemba was, to put it mildly, not being a very good ambassador. His main grouse was nothing to do with us, although it arose from his realization that he was not going to receive a set of clothing, mountaineering and camping equipment from us; we were taking advantage of a change in the rules which allowed us to make a cash settlement to the CMA instead. They would then arrange for Pemba to hire whatever he needed from them, to be returned later. Because of this, and the lack of a minibus which meant an uncomfortable ride for him, and maybe also a lack of status, he was definitely turning against us. We were to suffer Pemba’s always unhelpful and at times hostile attitude throughout the expedition. Fortunately, in Wu we had a superb interpreter – highly intelligent, absolutely honest and one who managed to arbitrate between us and Pemba.
Opposite the Cook’s cache we checked our food order. That was also ready and complete. Suddenly the reek of rotting cabbages wafted in from an adjoining room. Mindful of our lack of fresh vegetables, we set off to investigate. To our delight, piles of carrots, sweet potatoes, onions and parsnips as well as the cabbages were stored under mounds of soil. We bought the lot. It was an invaluable addition to the rather spartan diet we were expecting. Another find was 10 cases of Budweiser beer, left by an affluent American expedition. We bought this as well. But I could contain myself no longer and set off with the others to see Lhasa.
It was like stepping back a thousand years into medieval Tibet. The whitewashed walls of three-storey houses sloped back and up to tiled roofs jutting out over the road and a jostling throng of Tibetans. What a crowd they were! A vibrant energetic horde of wild-eyed nomads, just off the steppe, weatherbeaten with a splash of turquoise, amber and coral colour strung around their necks, poking out of chunky sheepskin jackets, greasy brown. The smell of Tibet was all around them.
Down the centre of the road pilgrims were prostrating themselves, lying out flat, standing up, eyes fixed in front, oblivious of the crowd and the crowd not paying them much attention either. They walked a few paces forward to where their hands had reached, and down they went again with arms stretching out once more. They continued all day round the perimeter of the Jo Khang, the town’s cathedral. Buddhist pilgrims are said to build up merit in this way by prostrating themselves round the base of Holy Kailas – a distance of some 35 miles – which, of course, takes several weeks. One old man with a lovely toothless laughing face wore a full-length leather apron to protect his knees and carried clogs to put over his hands whilst prostrating. He hired himself out to those Buddhists who were too busy to build up their own merit and wealthy enough to engage him.
At the entrance to the Jo Khang there were about a hundred pilgrims prostrating themselves before making an entry. It was only in the last two years that the iron gates fixed here by the Chinese in 1959 had been taken away. Now Tibetans from all over the plateau flocked into Lhasa to worship at this ancient, sacred place. There was so much devotion in the air, far more than I ever expected after reading of the devastation brought to this country by the Chinese overlords. We had read the tourist brochure: ‘Tibet is no longer medieval.’ How wrong they were – certainly about this part of Lhasa.
After making some purchases from the many stalls laid out on the narrow pavements, dhal from a Nepalese trader, garlic, onions and beans of uncertain age from Tibetans, we returned to the CMA Headquarters to finalize arrangements for the mail and the stamping of postcards, which Dolma undertook to organize ready for our return. After a protracted argument with the bus-driver, we managed to squeeze in a few more hours that evening in Lhasa. I walked around with Wu, who was showing the strain of the last few days. He said that it had been a long day. I said that he could have 52 lying on his back at Base Camp, but added that we had never before had an interpreter work so hard ‘above the call of duty’. Alex was with us as a Tibetan lady walked by, with the traditional 108 plaits in her hair and wearing the traditional clothing, silver and turquoise ornamentation. He wondered whether she took it all off when she got back home at night, sitting down with her feet up and saying: ‘Ah well, that’s another hard day’s work done – looking traditional.’
‘I couldn’t live here,’ said Alex.
Although obviously still spinning from our travels, we were able to feel the calm of this place – like walking back down a time-warp with the Potala rising above it all. In 1966 the Potala had been within a few days of destruction and only the timely intervention of Chou En Lai prevented its being demolished during the Cultural Revolution.
How much I regretted the shortage of time and money that prevented our visiting other monasteries in the area such as Drepung Monastery, once the largest in the world with 10,000 monks in residence before 1959 – in 1980 there were 240. Neither did we enter the School of Tibetan Medicine with its magnificent tankas, nor the Summer Palace with its walls covered in murals, some depicting Tibetan history.
Back in the hotel courtyard we checked out all our food and gear. Everything accounted for, we marvelled at the Chinese efficiency in these matters. It would never have arrived so fast and so completely at Lukla (the Nepalese airstrip on the Everest approach). That evening we talked with a Tibetan who had returned as a tourist on a German visa after a 20-year absence in exile. He told us just how much of the old town had simply disappeared – pulled down as it began to disintegrate. The Chinese would not allow the Tibetans to repair or decorate their homes for 20 years after 1959. He had just met Heinrich Harrer who had recently revisited Lhasa. Ironically, the authorities would allow him only seven days in Tibet this time. Alex twiddled the knobs on the radio, anxious to know what was happening in the South Atlantic as the Generals in Argentina attempted to find external solutions to internal problems. They could do with some of the Lhasa energy beaming over Buenos Aires.
At dawn on 10 April we left our hotel. A cold, crisp, dust-laden breeze blew down the road as we drove away, wriggling around on the sponge mats in the back of the open lorry, trying to find a position that was comfortable on top of the fuel cans, kit-bags, boxes of food, etc. Just at sunrise we came to a bridge with the sun coming up behind it. Chinese soldiers came racing across from a nearby barracks and at bayonet point we got back on to our lorry and roared off down the road in a cloud of dust. Apparently foreigners were not allowed to take photographs here!
The dust was a constant feature and one that had Paul worried. He hoped to protect his lungs by wearing an industrial mask. The rest of us had white silk scarves, purchased in Cheng Dhu, tied across our faces. We were now on the Nepal Highway, which links Lhasa with Kathmandu. There were many other trucks trundling along, and we braced ourselves for the extra dust cloud joining our own. After crossing the Tsangpo River we began to climb slowly up a pass with the lorry engine spluttering to a halt about every half mile. During these halts Tibetan children would run across from nearby villages. Their parents would come along too and offer us chang from earthenware jars, very welcome in the dust; we would give them Chinese chocolate in return whilst the children were scrambling over the lorry, inspecting us and our gear. There were huge grins of delight whenever they put on our ‘Walkman’ headsets. Pink Floyd did seem to have them somewhat confused, but they responded very positively to the tape of temple music which I had bought at the hotel.
It was whilst Elaine and I were both plugged into the same cassette, listening to this music, lulled half asleep by the gongs, pipes, cymbals and drums as well as the wailing, singing and chanting, that I realized I was understanding the words of the singing for they were coming across in English in a Lancashire accent. Still half asleep half awake, almost floating as in a dream – but not the sort of dream you have in the middle of the night – I saw face after Tibetan face passing one in front of the other, brown, red, weatherbeaten faces, strong faces, pleading faces. Then I woke up with a jolt. The lorry was juddering to another stop – the fuel injection system clogged with dust.
Later that evening Elaine commented on the music. In passing she said that she had understood the words, for it had come across to her in French. Much later, on our return, we met a party of trekkers at Shigatse. Jo Sanders, the leader of the group, had been into the Tashi Lunpo Monastery where the music on our tape might well have been recorded. She had just spent two hours there and was looking dazed and somewhat distant. When I asked if she was feeling all right she explained that, whilst she had been sitting quietly at the back of the temple, listening to the monks, drifting in and out of sleep, she had understood the chanting for, to her, it spoke not only in English and French but in other languages which she understood. Sven Hedin the Swedish explorer had visited Shigatse in 1907. The chanting had a profound effect on him. He found it led ‘the listener away to the land of dreams and hope’. I had the certain feeling that something eternal and universal was locked away in the temple music.
After crossing a pass about 16,000 feet high, we came across the huge Yang Zho Yong Lake nestling in the brown-mauve hills. We came down to the town of Kampadzong and only after a fairly violent argument would Pemba agree to stop the lorry. His attitude was doubly irritating, for not only were we being rushed at an unreasonable speed through this fabled land and missing out on interesting places, but the vehicle broke down continually and always at some insignificant, boring stretch of road, miles from anywhere. Pemba would allow us to stay for only half an hour at Gyangtse, though fortunately on the return journey we did manage half a day there. Now we could see the ruined battlements of the fort to which Younghusband had laid siege with his howitzers in 1904. It was ten o’clock in the morning when his we limped into Shigatse. The vehicle would only go as far as a hundred yards before it spluttered to a halt. Then the driver got out, topped up the carburettor and we continued for another hundred yards. It was quicker to walk the last two miles into the town, the second largest in Tibet.
On 11 April we woke early to take advantage of our enforced stay here, for we insisted that the mechanic did not leave until the vehicle was in running order. At our hotel another interpreter-cum-local guide with the name of Chou had been assigned to us for our stay in Shigatse. He helped with our haggling at the market, where we bought more foodstuffs, turquoise necklaces and other bits and pieces similar to those that can be bought over the border in the main Sherpa town of Namcha Bazaar.
Up above the town of Shigatse stands the Tashi Lunpo Monastery, which was built in the 14th century by the first Dalai Lama. There were said to be 3,000 monks there before the Chinese ‘liberators’ arrived; now six hundred have again taken up residence. It is a huge complex of buildings covering some three thousand square yards, all very extensive and impressive, with gold rooftops and a huge prayer wall down which prayer flags are lowered during religious festivals. Part of the monastery was destroyed between 1966 and 1968, but it is being patched up by carpenters and construction workers busy everywhere. We decided to explore the monastery the following day.
Meanwhile we walked a mile out of town to the Summer Palace, where the Panchan Lama used to reside. Since Liberation in 1950 he has been on some Standing Committee in Peking. Despite banging on doors we were refused entry. Elaine, Roger and I wandered round the outside of the Tashi Lunpo Monastery and there came across a group of nomads and two monks sitting around campfires by their yak-hair tents. We were invited to sit amongst them and given Tibetan tea. If your palate is prepared for something like thin vegetable soup, then it is no surprise to gulp down salt tea with globules of rancid butter floating on the surface. Roger drank his from a human skull, a symbol of impermanence! It was in this circle that our heads stopped spinning from the ride; we seemed immediately to sense and feel the peace of these nomads and the monks who had joined them. One very handsome lad with strong features and a complexion weathered almost black gave us tsampa soaked in tea and butter. Tsampa flour reconstitutes in hot water as it is in fact ground roasted barleycorn, the traditional food of Tibet. The elder of the two monks was forever clowning around and had us in stitches of laughter; he was completely unselfconscious; months in isolation, locked away from all the cares and worries of the world, had certainly not made him introverted. I envied Elaine her knowledge of Tibetan, as Roger and I could only smile and gesticulate.
Early the next morning we met Jake from Calgary and a friend of his from Leeds; they had been in China for three months, having entered via Hong Kong. They were travelling outside the regular tourist system, with obvious advantages. They were staying in the same hotel as ourselves, but at local rates – 1.60 yuan per night, while we were paying 120 yuan. They had been 10 days in Lhasa at 1.50 yuan each - we had paid out 210 yuan per person a night! We all wandered down into the monastery with Chou, who had only slightly more tolerance than Pemba for our dawdling and interest in all things Tibetan. We did, however, spend a little time in a hall where about 80 monks in khaki velvet cloaks and blankets knelt chanting. We were all moved by the intensity of their devotion.
We watched a group of young novitiates renovating an ornamented door lintel, then questioned Wu carefully after he had had a conversation with an elderly monk. It seemed that novitiates were now being introduced into this monastery. There were four between the ages of 10 and 14 and 30 older monks between 15 and 30. Most of the other monks there appeared to be well over 50, but at least these figures illustrate that the monastery was being allowed to re-establish itself.
All too soon we had to go. The lorry had been ready for some time and Pemba was working himself up into a mad frenzy. At noon we set off for Zegar. The lorry was now in better shape and we easily crossed over a 4,500-metre pass, the Pola. We stopped there for a picnic by a walled adobe brick village, then off again. All around the pale blue moor was tinged with light brown; overhead in a blue sky dragon clouds floated by, as we passed a nomad encampment with yaks grazing beneath ruined forts and monasteries right on the edge of crumbling clifftops.
At Zegar we had a rest day on 13 April. As the town is at 4,280 metres our acclimatization had really begun. After so long in the lorry it was good to walk in the direction of the fortified monastery, built right to the summit of a thousand-foot hill – definitely one of the wonders of Tibet. During the Cultural Revolution most of it had been dynamited into rubble. From the hills above Zegar we caught sight of Everest, Makalu, Cho Oyu and maybe Shishapangma. The air was clear and the hills and mountains all around mauve with the wild mountain thyme covering their slopes.
At Zegar Elaine heard, from a villager, of an Indian pilgrim who had been found delirious, suffering from frostbite after having crossed the Himalaya to the north of Dingri. He had been taken to the local hospital where we went to make an offer of antibiotics. There we found a Chinese doctor with ample supplies of medicines, but working in the most atrocious conditions. His surgery was the patients’ room, a damp, concrete structure with water swirling around at our feet and a bucket overflowing with bloody bandages, swabs and amputated toes. But clearly the Chinese ‘bare-foot’ service works in Tibet, for this doctor was obviously dedicated to his profession and cheerfully doing all he could for the benefit of his patients.
On 14 April we left Zegar by the way we had come in. After a few miles we were back on the Nepal Highway, heading west down broad valleys through wonderful country of contorted twisted red rock high upon the mountainsides to the north; to the south, on lower hills, ancient castles were crumbling back into the slopes. Two hours later we rounded a bluff and the valley widened into a huge plain stretching right up to the very base of Cho Oyu and the Nangpa La Pass. On many occasions we had looked up from the south as we approached Everest Base Camp in Nepal and seen that side of this Pass. It is the main trading route between Khumbu and Tibet, and from our Sherpa friends we knew that trading had been resumed via this route. They had told us how they travelled up the glacier, over the 5,716-metre pass and down as far as Dingri. Suddenly we realized that the settlement we could now see on the east side of a large rocky prominence poking out of the Dingri Maiden (field) was Dingri itself. What a contrast this northern side of the Himalaya is compared with the southern slopes, where steep mountainsides heavily wooded with conifers and rhododendron forests plunge down to raging torrents. Here, far away from any roar of water, only the wind blows across the flat plains over the yellow grassy furze of vegetation. In the north the traveller can so easily reach the foot of the Himalayan mountains, a wall of snow reaching up to blue skies with white clouds hanging over them.
We followed the road west and north. After crossing the high Tsongla Pass at about 5,480 metres we could see Gauri Sankar and Menlungtse and, for the first time, were treated to a fine view of the north-east side of Shishapangma – a cockscomb of peaks above the plains with wisps of cloud wrapped around them. Driving south round sweeping horseshoe bends following the Po Chu River (Bhote Kosi in Nepal), we passed Tashigong on the other side of the river and drove down into the town of Nyalam.
1. See Norbu, p. 37.[back]