The last years I just uploaded our travelpictures as the pictures could tell their own story. This time, I need to tell you a bit about our trip in order to understand the Amnye Machen Kora pictures and the tragedy behind.
And as we have so many friends all over the world, I´ll try my best to write in English.
For many years I had the Amnye Machen Kora in my mind. Mt. Amnye Machen is a holy mountain in the northeastern region of Tibet, as Mt. Kailash is in Westtibet, and it´s the highest mountain in Amdo with 6282m.
Tibetans circumbulate the holy mountain to attain religious merit and in the buddhist sacred year of the horse 2014 it is the most auspicious time to do. They perform the kora by walking or repeatedly prostrating themselves and the hike takes 6-10days, in prostration 3 month, covering a distance somewhere between 120 to 200 km depending on which way you walk in an average altitude of 4100 to 4600m.
The scenery is supposed to be breathtaking: Unspoilt nature, glaciers , high altitude pastures, rushing rivers, wildflowers, rich wildlife, nomads- and just no disturbance of modern civilization- that´s what we thought.
After researching and contacting 5 different local Tibetan Tour Agencys for price offers including to hire a 4x4 car, driver and guide we got several comments about the ”construction side” at Amnye Machen. Travelling in the Asian world we thought of workers with “small” building machines and shovels and axes along the road with no major influence on the trek.
After arriving in Xining we met someone who just returned- the description was a nightmare. And also the guide advised us to skip the first 4 days walking along the construction side and rather take the car to get to the starting point at Tsanak Kamdo.
The morning we started it rained. And after the first km we could already guess the mass. Huge factories were all along the valley, the noise not to imagine and the dirtroad a mudpool.
In between the pilgrims- walking or in prostration – trying to find a way between lorries and mud and all.
Our guide told us, they started 7 month ago, and in the middle of the next year a highway will be finished around the whole mountain. Tibetans were protesting the last 3 years and going to Bejing to stop those plans- with no success. They tried to convince the Chinese government to at least postpone the start until the end of the sacred horse year- no success.
And it will not only be a highway- that`s the official version – it will be just the preparation to start mining as the area is rich of mineral resources….
The tragedy we witnessed diverted our attention from the fact that the weather was miserable. In total we had rain, and hail, and snow and a snow storm, and 1 hour of sun. The mountain showed his beauty für 10 minutes- which was indeed more then breathtaking.
After Amnye Machen we continued overland to Chengdu, crossing the Qinghai Plateau and partly following the Yellow river. The highlight was Larung Gar-
the biggest Buddhist University were more then 30000 monks and nuns live-
illegal.
