Mountain Peaks at Eye Level

IMG_1641, originally uploaded by punkkafari.

About two weeks after I arrived home in Chengdu from my Indochina stint, I decided (with the help of a special donation!) that I would drop everything that I hadn't yet picked up, and run off to meet my flatmate Enz and my friend Asan who had just left to DJ in Tibet.

After the two weeks of wanting to go, but not going, and then going, but not going, and waiting for a permit, and not going, and going and then abruptly leaving at 7 am this last Tuesday morning, I found myself over tired and a bit excited on a plane heading for Lhasa.

I wasn't expecting it, but as I looked out my window at the not so unusual blanket of clouds covering the expanse of the world below in the early morning sunlight, I stopped breathing as I saw a mountain at eye level. As the clouds began to clear, the Tibetan landscape opened up below with red and blue and gray and green and white mountains, hidden lakes and snaking rivers, and scattered villages that seemed impossibly close at our current flying altitude, I almost cried.

I have been traveling and living abroad for so long that it's getting harder to avoid a complete saturation, reaching a point where nothing can break past the confines of the mundane. But at that moment, 5000 meters above sea level on my way to one of the most treasured places on our planet to meet friends, to be welcomed not as a stranger but as a guest and someone missed, my eyes swelled up with the feeling of a dream surpassed.

The Tibetan plateau is one of the most beautiful sites I have ever seen.

Thank you Mom, Dad, Grandpa, Cousin Jay and everyone. From the Top of the World, you are forever in my heart and mind and soul.


My Tibet flickr set page:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/andrewgardejoiaphotography/sets/72157619582843030/