Another great day! This morning we went to Norbulingka - the summer palace of the Dalai Lamas which is another world heritage site. It is a beautiful park with trees surrounding small palaces, some of which were surrounded by water. Here the Dalai Lama studied and learned to meditate. We then had a fascinating lecture from a traditional Tibetan medical doctor who explained their medical system to us. It has been around since the 7th century and we were impressed ...

Day two and we have seen several monasteries and are now thoroughly confused by the numerous Buddha images and their specialties. What we did learn is that there are now far fewer monks in Tibet. For example, the Drepung Monastery used to have 7700 monks, but now has only 300. Another has gone from 5500 monks to only a couple of hundred. An interesting sight we saw was two nuns who were living in a cave at the monastery and who had been there for 20 years. Their...

Lhasa - a fascinating city! On our drive in from the airport - a 60 km drive - we were struck by the barreness of the immense mountains surrounding us. There is absolutely nothing growing on them. As we entered the city, we were shocked at the modern buildings, with wide streets and high-end stores - not what we had expected, but this is the Chinese addition to Lhasa. Fortunately, our hotel is in the old part of the city and is charming, if somewhat neglected. Th...