Tuesday, June 1st, 2010
The Philippines is the lone Christian country in Southeast Asia. The majority of their 75 provinces swiftly caved into Jesus when Spain embarked on a short–lived Asian experiment in the 1650’s. In spite of that, six of those provinces — within a secluded mountain–range jungle in northern Luzon — fiercely resisted Spain’s take on God. The semi–tropical Cordillera is the country’s most rugged and least populated region and is still a thorny place to plot a route and get a haircut. Native Ifugao, Igorot and other pagan tribes remained warring headhunters until the 1950’s.
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Tags: access, affluence, age, Alas, alphabet, ancient ways, angle, archetypal, background, backpack, barber, barefoot, basketball, beginning, betel, birth, block, Blue, Boose, booty, bread, breather, buddy, business, camp, cement, Chase, chest, chicken, choice, colonial, community planning, cone, Continuously, Cordillera, country, couple, crime, cum, customer, cynicism, dawn, day, decade, decree, department, destination, Detention, detour, devotee, dilemma, distance, divide, dog, Drift, driver, dueling, DVD, DVDs, electricity, elevation, end, English, familial, family, flung, forehead, frenzy, friend, front, fuel, full time job, garden weed, Grandma, granola, ground, Haircut, hairdo, hillside, hip, history, hitchhike, hook, hoop, hour, house, husband, Hygee, Ifugao, ifugao tradition, import, irrigation technology, jungle, kid, leftover, length, Lessons, life, log, look, machete, man, Marching, Mario, mayan pyramid, Meliza, message, meth, mile, Modernity, monkey, Mother, motorcycle sidecar, mullet, needle, night, none, norm, northern luzon, nose, number, nut, onality, overtook, pagan tribes, pause, performance women, pile, point, population, pound, Practical, province, Pula, punishment, purse, quarter, reconfirm, redirect, resolve, rest, retaining walls, rice, rice paddies, rice paddy, rice terrace, rock, room, rope, runner, rustle, saddle, School, schoolhouse, Seemingly, Semi, side, skull, something, sound, state, steep mountainsides, stereo, stone, stone staircase, stream, stripmall, suggestion, Tapping, teacher, terrain, thievery, time, town, Traditional, trail, tree, trend, trickshooter, trouble, turf, Uncomfortable, vertical garden, village, waist, walk, warning, wave, way, whimsy, whitewater, wood, Woodstock, WWII, year, zone
Posted in Philippine, Travel | Comments Off
Tuesday, June 1st, 2010
“You have to put up with a lot to get up onto the “rooftop of the world” – bureaucracy & permits, distance & flights, unpaved roads & long drives, poverty & filth, altitude sickness, headaches, nose bleeds, and dust… lots of dust. “But make it to Tibet and you will be rewarded with a surfeit of sensory experiences. A Tibet tour will delight and challenge your senses with smells, tastes and colors you have never experienced before. Good or bad, you’ll discover the fetid odor of yak butter and incense that smacks of hashish. You’ll taste rich, savory stews of spicy yak, crisp Asian pears, and sweet local melons …”
Mystical, magical, incomprehensible Tibet offers an overload on the senses: the gaspingly thin air; the overwhelming beauty of the world’s highest mountains; the haunting images of Buddhas, deities and demons; the intricate patterns of the colourful Tibetan art; the poignant devotion of the pilgrims circumambulating sacred images; the improbability of the ancient architectural wonders clinging to perilous hillsides; the tumultuous history of inaccessibility, mystery, struggles, determination and resilience. This is a country of extremes with one of the most adventurous, scenically stunning and physically demanding road trips in the world, as we followed the path from Tibet’s capital Lhasa, through gruelling conditions, past vast landscapes and glittering peaks, remote high altitude deserts, densely forested precipitous gorges and virtually unpopulated high altitude moor-land to the end of its borders and further towards the fabled city of Kathmandu. It was a journey of scenic and religious discovery!
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Tags: air, altitude, altitude sickness, architectural wonders, architecture, art, asian pears, beauty, beauty of the world, Buddhas, bureaucracy, butter, capital, childhood, Chinese, city, coaster, contrast, country, course, day, determination, devotion, discomfort, discovery, distance, dust, ego, end, experience, fabled city, fetid, fetid odor, filth, food, grin, hashish, haunting images, helluva, high altitude, highest mountains, history, improbability, inaccessibility, incense, incomprehensible, influence, intricate patterns, journey, label, lack, Laughter, lifetime, lot, majority, matter, meaning, mix, month, mystery, Mystical, nose, nose bleeds, odor, overload, overwhelming beauty, path, person, place, pleasure, poverty, reincarnation, resilience, road, roller, rooftop, sacred images, savory, savory stews, sensory experiences, sickness, smile, spicy, spiritual, spirituality, surfeit, thing, tibet tour, Tibetan, tibetan art, Tibetans, tour, trip, trip of a lifetime, tumultuous history, unpaved roads, verge, World, yak
Posted in Tibet, Travel | Comments Off
The Philippines is the lone Christian country in Southeast Asia. The majority of their 75 provinces swiftly caved into Jesus when Spain embarked on a short–lived Asian experiment in the 1650’s. In spite of that, six of those provinces — within a secluded mountain–range jungle in northern Luzon — fiercely resisted Spain’s take on God. The semi–tropical Cordillera is the country’s most rugged and least populated region and is still a thorny place to plot a route and get a haircut. Native Ifugao, Igorot and other pagan tribes remained warring headhunters until the 1950’s.
“You have to put up with a lot to get up onto the “rooftop of the world” – bureaucracy & permits, distance & flights, unpaved roads & long drives, poverty & filth, altitude sickness, headaches, nose bleeds, and dust… lots of dust. “But make it to Tibet and you will be rewarded with a surfeit of sensory experiences. A Tibet tour will delight and challenge your senses with smells, tastes and colors you have never experienced before. Good or bad, you’ll discover the fetid odor of yak butter and incense that smacks of hashish. You’ll taste rich, savory stews of spicy yak, crisp Asian pears, and sweet local melons …”