Highway to Tibet: hitchhiking

A small compact appeared on the horizon and was swiftly drawing near to us. There hadn't been a single car for almost an hour. It was a moment to laugh. For the last two days I haven't seen an ordinary car but huge SUVs, caterpillars or 4wd transporters with high chassis. A lama ran out of when the car eventually reached us. He raised his robe, squatted, and with a huge smile on his round face watched us.

He looked content but I was lost in this (very awkward) social situation. Should I say hello, should I only smile back, should turn to leave him some privacy? It was the first time I saw a lama pooping, it turned out to be ordinary way. Then he spoke to us and broke this strange moment. I thus far pretended that this is completely normal to me and nothing is happening. But imagine this ridiculous situation of a pooping monk trying to communicate with two westerners in Tibetan/Mandarin what they actually want and why they are on road so late in the evening in middle of nowhere. Though, he was our saviour, he took us to the next village 20 km along the road so we had roof over our head this night.

What an awesome experience it was. We hitched a ride from all sorts of people : from a factory worker, tourists, through monks, to Tibetan workers on motorbikes. The latter was especially fun with a heavy backpack. The language barrier made it even more fun although a bit frustrating sometimes.

And people in the area? Although they have even more impenetrable poker face shaped by the heavy mountain wind they were super nice! Often the first car coming stopped to take us. I suppose often just out of curiosity. It was too easy. a