LOST TREASURES OF TIBET LO MONTHANGS THUBCHEN MONASTERY

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Students and teachers of the Pema T'Sal School in Kathmandu constructed this sand mandala over three days using special tools to lay down colored sand. As with all sand mandalas, when it was complete, the monks destroyed it. They collected and blessed the sand then released it into a nearby river. This destruction serves as a Buddhist reminder of the impermanence of all things.
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Horses with saddle carpets await their next task in Jomsom, the jumping-off point for travel into Mustang. An integral part of this ancient culture, horses have been the only form of transportation in Mustang for hundreds of years.

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Their horns painted to aid identification, these goats brought south from Tibet will be sacrificed during the Dasain religious festival in Kathmandu. Held in October, this Hindu festival honors the goddess Durga's victory over evil.

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Near the village of Kagbeni, a rider crouches by his horse on the great Kali Gandaki River, which sweeps through one of the deepest gorges in the world. The river delineates a 2,000-year-old trade route between Tibet and India that is still in use today.

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Perched on the edge of the Kali Gandaki, the village of Tangbe is dwarfed by overhanging cliffs, which themselves are dwarfed by surrounding Himalayan peaks.

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Packhorses make their way along the Kali Gandaki. During Mustang's heyday between A.D. 1400 and 1600, Tibetans traveled along this river to India to trade salt for rice.


This home in the village of Chaili is typical of houses in Mustang. The walls are made of sun-dried bricks, and skulls hang over doors and windows to ward off evil spirits.

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Mani stones intricately carved with mantras are piled up on walls throughout Mustang. Travelers must pass to the left of these prayer walls.

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Aided by a breeze, a woman in the village of Samar winnows wheat. Barley, buckwheat, and wheat are Mustang's staple crops.


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Backlit by a sun-splashed cliff, Tibetan monk Lama Guru Gyaltsen stands just outside the Cave of Self-Emanating Deities. This sacred pilgrimage site features human-shaped rocks that Lobas—as the people of Mustang are known—say "emanated" from the rock walls of the cave.

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A monk strings prayer flags on a high pass in Mustang. Buddhists gain merit by hanging such flags, whose prayers are believed to take flight on the heels of Lungta, the wind horse. Lungta dispatches the messages in the four sacred directions.

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The largest mani wall in Mustang—and possibly in all of the Himalayas—stretches across a parched plain. Pigments collected from mineral deposits in nearby mountains are used to adorn the wall.

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Click and drag in the image above. Ghami is a traditional village four days' ride from Jomsom. This image was shot from a rooftop where brushwood is stored and dried for cooking purposes. Since wood is scarce in this virtually treeless land, sticks are generally used only to kindle fires; the fire is kept going with dried animal dung. In the distance, barley and wheat grow in verdant fields.

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Meditation caves lie all but unreachable high on a cliff. Sadly, erosion is slowly destroying such human-carved caves throughout the kingdom. Many of them once contained striking Buddhist murals and statues.


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A traveler passes a large mani wall with Buddhist prayers carved into stones and printed on flags. Buddhists circumambulate such walls, always keeping them to their right. The tall wooden poles holding the flags are a precious commodity carried from areas farther
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Click and drag in the image above. The village of Tsarang, the green oasis in the distance, is the second largest in Mustang and home of the winter palace of the Raja, or King, of Mustang. Both the palace and monastery contain 14th- and 15th-century relics. Prayer flags flutter in the incessant wind, and the Kali Gandaki can be seen meandering in a canyon below. Our cameraman Ned Johnston can be seen filming the village of Tsarang with the assistance of Rigzen, a teacher from the Pema T'Sal School, and camera assistant Kami Sherpa. (Note: this is not a full 360° panorama.)

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A blanket of green welcomes visitors to Tsarang. Mustang's subsistence economy rests on its agricultural produce as well as its livestock. Wheat is most prized, but barley and buckwheat fare best. Everywhere in Mustang you will find tsampa, an oatmeal-like staple made from ground barley.

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The richly colored façade of the monastery of Tsarang shows solid construction. Unfortunately, the building's interior has fallen into grave disrepair. Built by members of the Sakya sect of Tibetan Buddhism, the monastery used to boast several hundred monks, but today only a few dozen remain.

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Clad in the maroon robes of Buddhist monks and carrying brightly colored ceremonial gyalzens, young monks await the start of festivities at a religious ceremony in Tsarang.

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Click and drag in the image above. En route to the ancient cave temple of Luri, travelers must cross a dry plateau that looks out on the Annapurna mountains in the distance. Dubbed the "Plain of Deception" by our assistant cameraman, Pushpa Tulachan, who is from Mustang, this high plateau is deceptively flat. Although much of it looks level, there is a slight but unrelenting uphill climb across the plain that, because of the high altitude, has been known to tire the most intrepid of visitors. Our camera crew can be seen in its full, exhausted glory: cameraman Ned Johnston, sound recordist Jyoti Rana, and camera assistant Kami Sherpa.


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These spectacularly eroded cliffs bear conglomerates of rock, clay, and marine sands. Lying high above the village of Yara, they are scoured by an unrelenting wind.

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A chorten, or religious reliquary, greets travelers en route to Lo Monthang. Always passed to the left, they serve to remind travelers of Buddhist ideals. In Mustang, chortens are painted in bright colors.

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The fortified entryway to Lo Monthang, the royal city of Mustang, looks out over a tableland at 12,400 feet. The word "Monthang" has been translated "Fertile Plain of Medicinal Herbs." The British later corrupted the word into "Mustang."

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Click and drag in the image above. This panorama was shot from the ancient wall that surrounds Lo Monthang. Workers can be seen repairing a parapet wall on one corner of Thubchen Gompa, a 15th-century Tibetan Buddhist monastery that houses priceless 24-foot-tall wall paintings. Champa Gompa, the tallest monastery in the image, is the oldest monastery in Lo Monthang and is believed to date back to the 14th century. All monasteries in Mustang are painted in deep red, a color with religious significance. Mustard fields surround the city, and ruins of an ancient palace fortress can be seen on one of the dry hills in the distance.

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A Loba harvests wheat in a field outside the walls of Lo Monthang. Like many men of Mustang, he wears Western clothing, while most women continue to wear the traditional Tibetan chuba, a long black cloak ornamented with a dyed-wool skirt, homespun belt, and semi-precious stones.

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Spotlighted against a menacing sky, the crumbling walls of an ancient fortress loom over Lo Monthang. The semi-arid environment preserves these architectural relics even as the wind inexorably wears them down.

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This 15th-century wall painting in Thubchen Monastery depicts a Bodhisattva. Bodhisattvas—bodhi means "enlightenment" and sattva means "being"—are those who seek enlightenment not just for themselves but for all sentient beings. This image shows the wall painting as it appeared following restoration.

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This statue of Shakyamuni Buddha is the centerpiece of Thubchen Monastery. The Buddha was born as the prince Siddartha in India about 2,500 years ago. When he saw the poverty outside his palace, he abandoned his privileged life and began seeking a way to end human suffering. He reached enlightenment at the age of 35. Today Buddhism counts some 500 million followers around the world.







Links & Books


Lost Treasures of Tibet homepage



Links

American Himalayan Foundation (AHF)
www.himalayan-foundation.org
This nonprofit organization supports projects in health care, education, cultural preservation, and environmental conservation in the Himalayas. The ongoing restoration of the paintings in Thubchen monastery depicted in "Lost Treasures of Tibet" is one such effort. Visit the AHF's Web site to learn more about its work and the region.



Asian Arts
www.asianart.com
This is an online journal dedicated to many aspects of Asian art. The site includes highlights of exhibitions, and it provides a public forum for scholars and those who work in museums and commercial galleries.



Earthbound Exhibitions Mustang: Festivals in the Forbidden Kingdom
www.earthboundexp.com/trips/FRMMust.html
This Web site is mainly for those interested in traveling to Mustang, but it also offers a history of Mustang and a collection of stunning photos.



Tibet House
www.tibethouse.org
Visit the Web site of the premier Tibetan cultural institution in the U.S. and learn more about Tibet and its history. You'll also find a detailed calendar of Tibet-related exhibits and activities going on year-round in the States.




Books

East of Lo Monthang: In the Land of Mustang
by Peter Matthiessen. Boston: Shambhala, 1996.
This extensive travelogue of Matthiessen's journey to Mustang describes in fascinating detail the cultural landscape of Lo Monthang, the medieval town seen in "Lost Treasures of Tibet." Thomas Laird's gorgeous photos complement the text.



Tibetan Thangka Painting
by David and Janice Jackson. Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion Publications, 1984.
This book provides a step-by-step overview of the techniques and materials used to create Tibetan thangka paintings and includes chapters that introduce the basic principles of composition, color, and proportions.



The Face of Tibet
by William R. Chapman. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2001.
Photographer William Chapman conveys the subtle beauties of Tibetan life with a collection of 122 color photographs.