Amidst the foothills of the Himalayas in Tibet, I find myself mid-air between the horse and the mountain, having just been unceremoniously thrown eight feet in the air; oddly, my main concern is that people understand that this isn’t my fault.  I’m a much better rider than this…It’s amazing what goes through your head as you are flying through the air! I start to reflect on the beginning of this trip…

Tibet is turning out to be a series of incredible challenges.  To even get to the mountains we have to pick our way through the devastation of an 8.0 magnitude earthquake in Szechwan provence that has left 4 million homeless.  We had forgotten the astonishing seismic event that these people had endured last year. The Chinese government admitted to 70,000 dead and over 300,000 injured, though the numbers may be much higher.

As we drove through the province, the full impact of the damage became apparent.  Whole towns and villages were swept away.  Landslides had destroyed much of the road and infrastructure along the way.  The stakes were immediately raised on our journey.  We were now in a land where life and death were the daily issue at hand.

Our van snaked its way through town after town on what was left of the highway system. More often than not, we were driving on dirt paths or no road at all.  We began to notice that, even though these people had major devastation to deal with, they actually went about rebuilding cheerfully.  We were humbled by their good nature and attitude as they went about reclaiming their lives from the rubble.  Clearly, we were being given a new perspective to work with. Our lessons had already begun.

This was  the enormously challenging beginning to what became, for all of us, a transformative trip.  Each of us was being asked to put some real stakes on the table in our personal bids for growth and power.  The trip already demanded that  we give up comfort and security.  To say that our routines and patterns were disrupted is an understatement, but Tibet would continue to demand more of us. Were we able, as a group and as individuals, to rise to a level of challenge and sacrifice that would yield the transformation that we sought?

Back to horses.  I did land, eventually, flat on my back.  My pride was hurt, but not much else.  I dusted myself off and looked around.  All of our belongings are piled on top of these horses, and we are piled on top of the belongings.  Like Pashas atop our elephants, we sit high up on these tough Tibetan mules, and we sway with every step.  It is hard to imagine that these horses can negotiate the angle of the mountain.  It can only be described as “straight up”.   We climb for over an hour, navigating treacherously narrow paths.  From behind me I hear “Don’t look down!” and I think, “That’s the right advice.”

We don’t die.  An emerald green lake greets us at the top of the mountain, and we are near the site where we will make camp.  Our guides have not stopped singing from the moment we climbed atop the horses, and they show no signs of letting up now.  As we dismount, dazed, disoriented and a little buzzed from the altitude, they erect first the cooking tent and then the two sleep tents that we will occupy.

Everything is taking on a surreal texture.  The air is different at 14,000 feet.  The light is unusual, as though we are a little too close to the sky. It is hard to grasp that we are here!  And now that we are here, what exactly is it that we are going to do?

next entry: the beginnings of transformation