The Mona Lisa is Moving Pictures

As announced at San Diego Comic Con on the Halo Universe Panel, The Mona Lisa is being animated. The stop motion comic will be released in parts on the Halo Waypoint channel on Xbox Live.

My partner in crime Jeff VanderMeer shot me an email to draw my attention to the clip. The subject of said email was a line that, much to my dismay, was cut from the story. I shall now take this opportunity to resurrect this line of dialogue.

"Fucking fuck fuck!"

I just about peed my pants.



Dude. Dude. Dude. Dude. Dude. Dude. DudedudedudedudeDUDE. They all look way more badass than I picture them.

(Cannot wait to see Henry in action.)

Seven Years in Tibet - Heinrich Harrer (translated by Richard Graves)

buy - author wiki

In comparison, this book was exactly what I wanted it to be.

(Well. Apart from the introduction by Peter Fleming, which was so full of British arrogance I nearly tore the pages out.)

Another treasure I discovered in City Basement books, this is from the sixth print run, only a year after its initial publication. It is 56 years old, and has that old book smell about it. There's a gorgeous map in the front detailing the long route Harrer and his companion Aufschnaiter took from the internment camp they escaped at Dehra Dun in India to Lhasa in Tibet, and years later, his flight from Lhasa back to India with the invasion of Red China. At regular intervals are selected photographs that Harrer took during his stay in Tibet, which have changed since last I looked at them. Rather, my eyes have changed.

I believe this story is fairly well-known; with the outbreak of the Second World War the mountain climbing party that Harrer and Aufschnaiter were part of was detained in India and imprisoned for what was supposed to be the duration of the war. They weren't really okay with that, escaped (after a number of unsuccessful attempts), and hemmed in by both Nepal and India, neither of which offered any real refuge, pushed on to Tibet, the most neutral country in the world, with long term goals of maybe finding employment in China and making it through to Japan.

That didn't happen.

After the various accounts I've read of navigating Tibet and my own experience, I have to wonder if anyone is ever prepared for Tibet.

It is a tale quite simply and wonderfully told. Harrer falls well and truly in love with Tibet and its people, and while he does not attempt to sell this to the reader, that love saturates every sentence and paragraph. He cannot help but colour the narrative with his affection for the place, and so the reader, this reader, cannot help but fall in love as well.

This is the Tibet that people want to visit. I can't describe it as anything other than that. It's the mythical, mystical, magical holy city that exists in the minds of wondering outsiders. It's a land packed full of miracles, everywhere a miracle, and a people who are as warm, kind and welcoming as we hope them to be. Harrer had a singular opportunity to study and immerse himself in the country from an outsider's point of view, and this book is but a glimmer of the insights he gained into the character of the nation during his time there.

It's enchanting, enthralling and fascinating. Like Tintin in Tibet it's enough to plant that desire to go and insert a root system so deep that desire will never be uprooted.

And then, Red China "liberates" Tibet, and it ends.

This book was what I wanted, and at the same time, what I needed. A reminder that the Tibet that exists in this book and that I yearn to explore no longer exists. Every day that passes with Tibet beneath Chinese occupation the chances of that Tibet ever resurrecting diminish.

By the time you, I, reached that point in the book, in history, I was well in love. Harrer's heart broke with the invasion and so did mine. The terrible things that happen in war were only hinted at; China is well advanced in military finesse. Tibet is a nation that truly embraces peace, all aspects of it. The resistance, the Tibetan army, such as it was...

It's impossible to write about a book that within my mind is not the shape of a book.

Verdict: When is a book not a book? When it is this book.

A Mountain in Tibet - Charles Allen

buy - author wiki

Lonely Planet Tibet contained a list of recommended reading, with this book as being for those specifically interested in Mt Kailash. Unfortunately, this books is out of print. Fortunately, I have special luck when it comes to travel-related literature and City Basement Books (which is where I stumbled across Journey to the World's End), as I located this pristine copy amid a stack of books on the carpet for a mere $6. Unfortunately again, City Basement Books is no more.

Upon starting this book I was a touch put off; it wasn't quite what I wanted. The focus was not upon Tibet, and although the various narratives related within the pages take place within Tibet's borders, the focus is not really within Tibet either.

The book concerns itself with the surveying of the Kailash region, specifically in regards to finding the sources of such rives as the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, as well as the Indus and Sutlej, and the majority of such surveying attempts stem from the British Raj in India.

After what felt like a very dry history lesson regarding Kailash's cultural, religious and geographical significance, the book goes on to detail each foray into the region which results in some of the white areas in the map of Tibet to be unveiled as each occurs in history. A lot of time is spent skirmishing around the foothills of the Himalayas at the mercy of the hill tribes. An equal amount of time is spent looking at the politics of the Raj and the wider world (Tibet played a significant role as a buffer between British India and Soviet Russia during the years of the Great Game) as well as the smaller politics and scraps between academics and scholars regarding who discovered what first and the validity of any claims made by any explorer returning from that most mysterious unknown land.

Once reconciled to the fact the book wasn't what I wanted it to be, I had an alright time with it. Although I'm certainly it wasn't intended to be a comedy, the absurdity surrounding some of the expeditions mounted by the Raj had me laughing out loud. I became particularly enamored of the Pundits, the surveyor-spies trained by the Survey of India. Cartography at its most badhorse.

The final chapters deal with one Sven Hedin, a Swedish explorer who was much maligned by the Royal Geographic Society and, in turn, not presented by Allen without bias.

Hedin became the highlight of the book. In both his failures and successes was a...I don't know that there is a single word that will serve the purpose. At once reckless and determined. His expeditions were frightening things which demonstrate either ignorance or deliberate heedlessness, his first expedition across the Taklamakan being a perfect example. He was presented as a conflicted man, doing great things but demanding recognition equal to his deeds, his own character sabotaging the good will of those who would provide such recognition (the fact that he was a Nazi supporter didn't help either) and thus poisoning his own view of his achievements.

He was a flawed man with a magnificent ego. Yeah. I empathise.

Despite, or perhaps because, being so unfavourably presented I fixated upon him of all the explorers, and went on to buy his own accounts of his travels. Possibly because of all the explorers, he went out of pure personal desire, not political.

It is interesting to see how history treats the people that come to shape it. Later, in my further reading regarding Tibet, the accounts in which he feature painted a very different picture of the man.

At any rate, I read this several months ago, and details have blurred. Although it wasn't what I wanted, it did give me a fantastic lesson in Tibetan geography which I used not only around Kailash but the whole country.

Verdict: Dry, not without academic bias, but yes, very good for those interested in the geography around Kailash.

Why are you worth knowing?

The Elephant and the Tortoise

The program for the Melbourne Writers Festival was released today. In the week leading up I tried to work up some enthusiasm, and got out my diary and pen when flicking through the schedule today. I jotted down a couple of items, and then...scribbled them out. That wasn't enough, so I whited them out too.

I kept asking myself why I was looking, why I was even thinking about the writers festival, when I am not writing, and therefore not a writer.

It hurts.

At the top of my thoughts is an obese flaccid white elephant that I'm doing my best to ignore and failing miserably. At some point during my slow fitting of the identity of writer I ruled that I would not be a "writer" by intention only. Writing is an act, and if nothing is produced then you're not a writer, you're a wannabe. A poser. Worse than someone with no luck and no skill, you're not even bothering to try. And in all honesty, there are better identities to fake than that of the shut-in-spending-all-day-in-your-head-making-shit-up home body, which is also easily confused as 'nutjob'.

Here I am. I'm not writing. I haven't opened my manuscript since returning from Tibet, nor have I given it a great deal of thought.

I'm scared.

It hurts, it still hurts, it hurts enough that I don't want to type, I don't want to type anything at all. Every now and then I try. I get brave and ballsy and start a blog post. They look long. Longish. Long enough you need to scroll even without photos. And they hurt. I wince and flinch and stop too often to flex and stretch and take the edge off.

I can't write like this. I can't immerse myself in anything if all I'm thinking about is how much my wrists hurt and how much more they'll hurt by the end.

I'm afraid to try and work on my manuscript, because I'm afraid I won't be able to at all.

Do.

Or do not.

There must be something else. This white elephant just sits there, not saying a thing yet all the while asking, "If you're not a writer, then what are you?"

I have to be something else, I have to do something else, I have to. Writing shapes my whole life. Everything I do, decide, consume, no matter how random or trivial or unrelated to anything of significance, it's all collected because I might need it later. It will out in a story, inevitably. That is the purpose I have given my life.

It is not enough to merely live.

Whenever I tackle the elephant the possibilities I feed it aren't big enough to fill the void that writing will leave. Sometimes I wonder if it is defeatist thinking. There are many who have had their dreams thwarted only to discover alternate ones that are just as rewarding, but.

Always the but.

The only thing I can think of that would consume me, shape my every waking thought and colour my whole existence is to have children.

Which is a whole other elephant I don't want to acknowledge.

I just spent $500 on ergonomic equipment. I'm using it now, and have lasted longer than I would have before, but that may simply be rum taking the edge off. This sweet little tortoise of hope peeked out of its shell when the packages arrived, because maybe this will make enough of a difference that I won't have to tackle the elephant at all.

This tortoise has peeked out before. This tortoise has been crushed before.

I don't want to do this any more.

Someone's jawbone, Kharola Glacier Pass, 5560m with snow

Somewhere between Paryang and Saga, a town that refused to give up its name.

Tibetan Goat Skull; roadside between Tingri and Rongbuk

Happy Birthday, Jetsun Jamphel Ngawang Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso.

The Dalai Lama turned 75 yesterday.
He hasn't been home in more than 50 years.



The above video, Leaving Fear Behind was made by Tibetans in Tibet, giving their views on the then upcoming Olympic Games to be held in Beijing 2008. Some were too afraid to show their faces. Others had to show their faces.

I break down every time I watch this.

The film maker Dhondup Wangchen and camera men were arrested shortly after the tapes were completed and sent out, and are still imprisoned. See Filming For Tibet for further.

Perhaps consider donating to the cause of Tibetan independence (Australian Tibetan Council / International Campaign for Tibet) as a birthday present for the most patient man on the planet.

Tintin (and Sir Tessa) in Tibet (and a swish bar)

The one book on my required reading list for Tibet was, wait for it...



Being more of an Asterix girl myself, this is the only Tintin comic I own. It's well-thumbed and falling apart. I loved this comic so much that in Grade 4 I wrote and illustrated a 31 page EPIC which was plagiarism as only children can get away with.

This comic is why I have been determined to visit Tibet for the better part of my life. At 8 years old the mystery of a country inaccessible by both geography and choice was powerfully tantalising, and the need to explore that mysterious country for myself dug down into my subconscious and has stayed with me ever since.

On rereading it, I was surprised at how little of Tibet actually features. Tintin and Captain Haddock spend most of their time with Nepali sherpas and lost in the Himalayas; a landscape that shapes nations, but otherwise pays no attention to the those nations. The few encounters with Tibetan Yellow Hat Monks and the Yeti/Migou were apparently enough to win me over.

(I did not see any Migou in Tibet, and while I did see plenty of monks, none of them were levitating.)

monks debating at sera monastery

Having established this as the primary driving force behind my desire to see Tibet, I felt a little silly. This was erased upon flipping through the Lonely Planet Tibet and reading the brief bio of author Robert Kelly:

His interest in Tibet can probably be traced to early readings of Tintin in Tibet...

I feel further vindicated on discovering that Tintin was the first fictional character to receive the Dalai Lama's Light of Truth award.

On June 1, 2006, Tintin became the first fictional character to be awarded the Dalai Lama's Truth of Light award. “For many people around the world Tintin in Tibet was their first introduction to Tibet, the beauty of its landscape and its culture. And that is something that has passed down the generations,” said the International Campaign for Tibet's Simon van Melick. During the awarding ceremony copies of Tintin in Tibet in Esperanto (Tinĉjo en Tibeto) were distributed among the attendees and journalists.

Which is more than most of us can claim.

I found some Tintin in Tibet t-shirts in Kathmandu, but unfortunately they were all so bad I could not bring myself to buy one even for the novelty factor.

On our last night in Beijing a handful of us decided to hit up some bars, and were directed to Beihai Park, which wikipedia portrays as a lovely place to have a picnic. I'm sure it is during the day, but at night all the bars and lounges lining the shores of the lake open up and the place goes off.





Quite upmarket, some great places there. We stood out being severely under-dressed and, yanno, European, and were mobbed by people trying to guide us to bars and get a finder's fee.

Being as Tintin was floating around at the top of my thoughts, I nixed their efforts by squeeing in my pants at the sight of this:



YOU'RE DAMN RIGHT IT'S A TINTIN BAR.



YOU'RE DAMN RIGHT I WENT OUT AND BOUGHT THE COMIC WHEN I GOT HOME.

Sadly, being as the company I was keeping at the time consisted of a German, an American, and an Englishman, only the Englishman had even heard of Tintin, and he did not share my enthusiasm. Despite that, being I was the only one of us who had picked a bar from the many on offer, we went in.

It wasn't an opium den. FYI.

I think opium dens would be cheaper.

The decor was quite chic, with incredibly high-backed chairs fashioned like lotus petals in red leather, and bar that was so well stocked the bottles took up two whole walls. Mildly disconcerting was the live music, consisting of a couple of African-Americans (they must have been a hit, they were the only black people I saw the whole time) singing an odd selection of covers, which ranged from "Everlasting Love" to "What a Wonderful World" and clashed with the general vibe of the place.

The cocktail menu made me squee all over again. Cocktails based on the characters? Hell yes.

most people focus on the blow job here

I figured Captain Haddock would be pure whiskey with more whiskey and a shot of whiskey, couldn't imagine what Snow[y] would be, and went with Lotus Blue. Definitely blue curacao and malibu, not sure about the rest. Tasty, and not too strong.

It's interesting the different reasons which drive people not only to travel, but where they travel to. When in Japan I was drawn to places that where the host of not only major historical events but entirely fictional events as well, and in South America I felt distanced for having only a thin bank of literary associations to draw upon.

Stories are the ruling force in my life. Everything I buy, read, do and choose may have at the time entirely circumstantial reasons, may look on the surface as though I'm going about my daily life, but in the end it is all because it feeds my mind, and everything that goes in makes the knowledge I can draw upon richer, and it will all out again in the stories I write. I cannot help but pay homage to the narratives that have sustained me, because I hope that one day someone will stand in a real place and be delighted to be at the scene of something I made up.

They may be "only stories", but they make me who I am, and who I am is what I do.

The Apocalyptic Gulf

This has been linked widely in my reading circles.

There is nothing to say.

COOKIE. CUTTER. SHARK.

Higgs Boson: sounds like science fiction (no really)

God particle signal is simulated as sound

Their aim is to develop a means for physicists at Cern to "listen to the data" and pick out the Higgs particle if and when they finally detect it.

Dr Lily Asquith modelled data from the giant Atlas experiment at the LHC.

She worked with sound engineers to convert data expected from collisions at the LHC into sounds.

...

The team is only now feeding in real results from real experiments.

...

But Richard Dobson - a composer involved with the project - says he is struck at how musical the products of the collisions sound.

"We can hear clear structures in the sound, almost as if they had been composed. They seem to tell a little story all to themselves. They're so dynamic and shifting all the time, it does sound like a lot of the music that you hear in contemporary composition," he explained.

...

"Its so intriguing and there's so much mystery and so much to learn. The deeper you go, the more of a pattern you find and it's fascinating and it's uplifting."

The article comes with three samples of what the Higgs boson may sound like, and what strikes me is that we've been hearing these sounds for years. I'm fairly certain the harmonic signature features in the Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy radio play.

The Higgs boson also sounds like it hasn't yet had its morning cup of tea.

Make sure you always keep your boson onside.

Snow Lion! Raaar!

I didn't buy much in the way of souvenirs in Tibet. There is plenty available which would serve well - prayer flags, prayer wheels, rosaries, yak bells and so on - and the streets around the Jokhang and Barkhor Square in Lhasa and the Tashilumpo in Shigatse were lined with stalls. The opportunities were there (and saying, "Hello, hello, hello, hello,").



Most of what is on sale are cheap imitations imported from China and Nepal, as stated in the Lonely Planet and confirmed by both our tour leader and Tibetan guide. There is a stall selling religious items inside the Jokhang, the holiest of holies in Lhasa and Tibet, and there I found a gorgeous wooden rosary. Being quite expensive and found inside the Jokhang, I assumed it must be genuine Tibetan.

I did that thing I do when shopping, and walked off to do something totally different. When I returned, the display had been disturbed slightly, and the maker's certificate in the box below was now visible, with a massive MADE IN CHINA glaring at me.

Point taken.

You know me. I don't like being thwarted. It became a quest to find something that was Tibetan and made by Tibetans, which in Lhasa is trickier than you would think. The Lonely Planet guide came to my aid, however, and one afternoon I took myself off wandering through the back alleys behind the Johkang, around to the Muslim Quarter, up some more back alleys and through some courtyards - they have different ideas about space there - and found Dropenling; a shop that specifically sells goods made by Tibetans, the profits of which go back to those same artisans.

(And for those of you who recall some of my adventures in Japan; can you believe I did not get lost doing this? Not a single wrong turn, not a single instance of heading in exactly the opposite direction! I was gobsmacked too, considering the alleys I was walking through had no landmarks to speak of.



I shouldn't call them alleys. They're streets. They're organic Lhasa.)

And that is where I bought my awesome little snow lion.

As soon as I saw him I fell in love. The big manic eyes, batty happy ears, massive toothy slavering grin - how can anyone resist? When I proudly showed him off to my traveling companions, they didn't see the love. They said he was scary and ugly.

Wikipedia has the following to say on the subject of snow lions:

The Snow Lion resides in the East and represents unconditional cheerfulness, a mind free of doubt, clear and precise. It has a beauty and dignity resulting from a body and mind that are synchronized. The Snow Lion has a youthful, vibrant energy of goodness and a natural sense of delight. Sometimes the throne of a Buddha is depicted with eight Snow Lions on it, in this case, they represent the 8 main Bodhisattva-disciples of Buddha Shakyamuni, the historical Buddha. Associations: main quality is fearlessness, dominance over mountains, and the earth element.
-- The Four Dignities, Rudy Harderwijk

The Snow Lion is an archetypal thoughtform confluence or personification of the primordial playfullness of 'joy' and 'bliss' (Sanskrit: ananda; Tibetan: dga' ), somewhat energetically comparable to the western unicorn, though without a horn. Though paradoxical, the Snow Lion does not fly but their feet never touch the ground; their existence is a playful 'continuum' (Tibetan: rgyud) of leaping from mountain peak to mountain peak.

Later, when I proudly showed him off to my mum and told her he was a snow lion, she said, "There's no such thing as a snow lion!"

If that is true, then the world is not as awesome as it should be.



The postal service has brought unto me more objects of delight! Copies of Weird Tales #355: Steampunk Spectacular, huzzah! I haven't read it yet, but don't doubt it'll be as tasty as all the issues gone before.

There are four spare copies I'm giving away, and actually while I think of it, I also have a couple of copies of issue #354 lying around as well. For the second year running Weird Tales has been nominated for a Hugo Award, with voting closing on the 31st of July. Interested in sampling this mighty magazine? Leave a comment, first in first served.

I only ask that you please post something about what you find between the covers somewhere, even if it's just a throwaway comment on twitter.

The magazines weren't alone; in their company was a copy of Ann & Jeff VanderMeer's The Kosher Guide to Imaginary Animals, and my snow lion got his paws all over it.

On flip through it's a delightful little book with some delectable illustrations. I made a very careful check and double-check of the table of contents. Snow lions are not listed.

Ergo, they are not imaginary.

Ergo, they are real.

And the world is significantly awesomer for it.

This week several people around me confessed to having dreams about sex. Some of them had more than one in a single night.

Yesterday I dreamed that a hostile foreign army filled the woods around my lovely summer palace and proceeded to slay everyone around with a torrent of arrows. I had to learn to fly to stay alive.

This morning I dreamed that assassins were out to get Michelle Obama, but instead of shooting her, they shot me. In the butt.

I'm getting the short end of the stick here.

Can I get a swapsies? Who do I speak to about this?

From Somewhere Else

The post office worker handed this to me, and I boggled.

"Is that sealed with tar?"
"...No, wax I think. Proper sealing wax."

As a birthday present to myself I did end up ordering a selection of books from Asian Educational Services, namely Sven Hedin's account of attempting to explore Tibet, plus a couple of others that looked too tasty to pass up. Given I selected seamail I wasn't expecting to see these for another few weeks.

The packaging was almost as much a gift as the books.

It's wrapped in cotton, sewn at one end and sealed with something that could very well have been tar at one end.

I've never received anything like it. Of course it's from another land, it's from India, but, it's from another land. Exactly like getting mail from Wonderland.

And, as is law in the multiverse, was still a right bitch to open.

Red Hot Elephant Socks

An unexpected parcel was waiting for me when I visited my parents. Unexpected parcels are always mildly alarming, as some part of me instantly assumes I'm going to be asked to pay for something I didn't order. Given this has never happened to me, this fear is entirely irrational.

It still hasn't happened to me. Instead, THERE WERE SOCKS. AND ARMWARMERS. Damn HAWT ones if I do say so myself, cue gratuitous camwhore shot;



I burst out laughing when I saw the socks, in lieu of who they're from. I had the exact same pair given to me seven years ago in New Orleans, on my first solo jaunt overseas which wasn't really solo at all given the purpose of trip was to meet some people who were and still are magnificent co-conspirators.

Thank ye, Jaimesis. <3

The armwarmers are especially appreciated. Hands are aching with the return to computers, and the cold isn't helping. The line "write every day" has been sitting at the front of my thoughts, and is almost instantly followed by "except when you're hurting", which has also been every day. As such I've been looking for some gloves that wouldn't interfere with typing too much, and these are perfect. Double mwah-mwah.

Because he matched the presents so well it had to be fate, that photo is also the introduction of a finger puppet I bought in Kathmandu. Readers, I would like you to meet Ganesh, short for Angry-Ganesh-Doesn't-Like-The-Spicy-Bone-Filled-Curry-Stomp-Crash-Raaar.



He wasn't named after a personal experience. No. Not at all. Ever.

Western Tibet

THAT SAID:

If you intend to travel to western Tibet and particularly Mount Kailash and Lake Manasarova any time in the next couple of months, you should know that the road (there's only one) is fucked.

It's undergoing some serious roadworks. They're so serious it doesn't look like roadworks at all. It looks like they're building the damn thing for the first time. There is no sealed road from Saga onwards, and if you hit a stretch that has had the rocks cleared you'll start cheering. Some stretches have been leveled, but they're rare treats. They appear to be putting in drains or something similar, which involves digging up the road every couple of kilometres and around which you must detour. You will be catapulted from your seat, you will hit your head, you will get very tired and grumpy, and you will not go far fast. If you have boobs, you will need to get some seriously hardcore sports bras.

Our itinerary was originally to drive from Sakya to Saga, and then Saga to Darchen where we would start our three day kora around Kailash. We got word from a group going before us that the 9 hour drive between Saga and Darchen was actually 16, with them starting the trek the next day. We had to do a lot more time in the 4WDs to stay on timetable (one plan that was thankfully jettisoned involved leaving at 3 in the morning) and not screw ourselves over.

I recommend an mp3 player with some sort of travel battery, and a light long-sleeved top. The air up on the plateau is icy, but the sun is incredibly enthusiastic, and when you're out of the wind it is hot. You won't often be able to put the windows down due to dust. After a particularly long period of time going through roadworks up a mountain pass, we pinged the temperature inside the 4WD at 36.7C degrees. Then we stopped, opened all the doors and the temperature dropped 20 degrees.

These are long days, by the end of which you will be in a bad mood. Suck it up. There is no other way to get out there, and it is worth it.

Slowing the Memory

In addendum to my last post about my recalcitrance to share Tibet because I am selfish and greedy and I won't share my lunch with you either, this same selfishness also manifests as a sort of anti-consumption as well.

Since returning a fortnight ago, I haven't watched any movies, nor read any books, nor even thought about starting back in my own fiction. I haven't read or watched anything of substance on the internet, be it articles, essays or clips. I haven't corresponded with any real depth.

Tibet had an effect and infected me like no where else I've been to date. This pile of books about Tibet I have I am famished to read, but am afraid to go near. I avert my eyes from news about the country even as I seek it out. I want to know more, more, more.

But to do so will overlay the time I spent there. Should I expand my knowledge of the place, I won't be able to consider my own experience without viewing it through the filter of that knowledge. There is nothing more to do with life but learn and none of us should ever shy away from it, but, but, but.

I want to carry the space Tibet made in my mind as long as I can. It's a delicate thing, vast and inexplicable, and by simply going through each day that space gets smaller. To do what seems so frivolous a thing as read a novel would only hasten that contraction. I want to savour this rare silhouette of an emotion. Putting things in or turning my mind to other matters is a distraction I don't want.

Inevitably, Tibet will sublimate as Melbourne's own idiosyncrasies change the colour of my thoughts.

Until then, I stay still and silent.

The Dream Woken In, And Left Behind

"Enough of washing machines! Of your domestic issues we care not! What of Tibet?"

Very well.

I could tell you that the trip I went on was Tibet Encompassed, and that the following photo was taken on the Qinghai-Tibet Train: I fell asleep surrounded by washed out hills subdued by generations of farming and sky lost in haze, I woke up to find the land rippled with unblemished snow, and watched the sun rise in clean heavens over this so long distant and magical land.

Or, I could tell you that the trip I went on was Blue Harvest, and that the following photo was taken at moisture farming station on Tatooine, shortly before we were attacked by Tusken Raiders and nearly trampled by banthas.



A friend pointed out quite rightly that I am selfish with my photos. Perhaps because I do not go on holiday. When I travel rest and relaxation are not the point. I go out into the world to be confronted and challenged, to learn and be surprised and learn again, to wash out the clutter in my head and heart, and I come back exhausted, wrung out, and bewildered.

It isn't a holiday. It's personal. I'm selfish because what I went through is mine; my life, my mind.