Anyone else following The Tiger Bus?

[KarlT]

Total bugger, Was she travelling with box?


I guess it answers that question.........

:We thought about Tibet/China but at the time it was a massive ball-ache, including chauffeurs, pre-booked hotels, extra insurance & driving tests!
Has that all changed now? Or is it still a "bar-steward"!!

[Sebastian S]

The latest from their Facebook page:

Crazy world! Sarah landet in Berlin, checked for her luggage only to find that is was still in Ulaan Bataar! She sent me the luggage number via SMS, we rushed to the airport, talked the customs guys into yet another crazy action within 48hrs: I got the gearbox out without the right name on the badge, without any further checks or even payment of taxes!! So status for today: Sarah in Berlin, application for visa has been filed, gearbox in Ulaan Bataar - except for the crown wheel, which conventiently traveled in Sarahs hand luggage )) *happy* The contrast to the past 24hrs couldn't be greater...

[PetenAli]

Looks like they are back together, got the gearbox out of customs and got it fitted. They are in Russia with no G gear and taking it a bit gently to get home. Just found a Facebook entry in English!

[HarryMann]

:We thought about Tibet/China but at the time it was a massive ball-ache, including chauffeurs, pre-booked hotels, extra insurance & driving tests!
Has that all changed now? Or is it still a "bar-steward"!

So the Tibetans self-immolating by the dozen in protest, (it is that bad under Chinese rule) isn't worth a mention then... suppose that explains pre-booked hotels & chaffeurs then, so they know you're not out there talking to real Tibetans, just the zillions of Han Chinese who've over-run the place and treat Tibetans worse than dogs

[KarlT]

No, I just wanted to keep the thread to travelling/overlanding & not get too political.

BTW..... As you mention it. Do you think the Tibetans had it good before?

[HarryMann]

Do you think the Tibetans had it good before?

Yes, comparatively, much better, monks weren't decimated in their thousands outside their monasteries by machine-gun fire, nuns weren't tortured repeatedly in freezing cold waterbaths.. wow, they were even allowed to 'sing' about their feudal lords' shortfalls in public and were known to be a very cheerful, smiling laughing people. We could go on... but nobody pours petrol down their throats and over their bodies and then sets fire to themselves, without believing that its the only way of making the world wake up to the dreadful existence that is being Tibetan in Tibet today... no yaks, no land, just a nomadic people forced into a concrete jungle of apartments with total suppression of race and identity (they are not a Chinese race or like them, despite Cinese propaganda saying they are, they're more akin to Mongolians actually). And to answer a second way, they were not asking to be invaded or complaining at the time much either... they even had a centuries old understanding with Beijing about being priest and patron, and never to fight.

No, the reason I bring this up, is because I imagine many of us given the chance would love to travel through Tibet, particularly by camper/syncro, under own power... and not have to succumb to a guided tour of the regime's 'narrow & fanciful window' on Tibet. Question is, how to gain reasonable access and see any of the old order, the people themselves and country off-piste...

[KarlT]

Many people do things in the name of religion/beliefs, things that you or I may find hard to understand. Cut & maim their young daughters, Blow themselves up with C4, Pour petrol over themselves, fly planes into buildings. All things that we might struggle to comprehend.

You could see it a different way. You could see it that you have a peasant people, kept ignorant, kept poor, believing stories of deities & demi-gods, and being forced to pay/support a huge order of self-appointed, un-elected leaders, with tentacles & members controlling every level of the community and decision making.

The choice is yours.

[HarryMann]

Don't be daft Karl, this is the largest state in the world, plying mass terrorism in another, previously independent country for 800 years.. they're the ones keeping everyone in the dark, over what they are actually doing. Raping the countryside is one, creating massive environmental problems both now and in the future (which we can already see, from the deforestation of the Brahmaputra tributaries.. just one example of Chinese destructive policies), and the confiscation of land from traditional Nomads, and that's not needed but there in abundance, and almost as wild as the dark side of the moon

The Brahmaputra river, called Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibetan language, originates on the Angsi Glacier located on the northern side of the Himalayas in Burang County of Tibet and not Chema-Yungdung glacier, which was previously identified by geographer Swami Pranavananda in the 1930s.The river is 3,848 km long, and its drainage area is 712,035 square km according to the new findings, while previous documents showed its length varied from 2,900 to 3,350 km and its drainage area between 520,000 and 1.73 million square kms.

Please Karl, the argument you make for an unhappy feudal race wanting to be freed by Chinese Communism, is total propaganda you have swallowed... The Chinese didn't even start spewing that rubbish until they realised they had a few problems with countries previously associated with Tibet getting very itchy that they hadn't intervened when they should have in 1950 and '59 (e.g. Britain), so they appealed to socialist and communist ideals here, which you' seem to be re-gurgitating.

Unless they've been bribed (fairly common) to spew that line, a vanishingly small minority of true Tibetans would ever want to be holed up in concrete tenement blocks, with all their inherited traditions and ways of life, including means to an income, land confiscated etc. however viewed by westerners (you just ticked the box), as a marginal or minimal existence.. in fact they had more than now by far, and an honourable life working the land and their livestock, as well as including a strong educated class in their society. Class itself is not a reason to kill, torture and destroy a race - or are you arguing for that?


Better end here, obviosuly their total garbage (and oh so obviously so) propaganda has been given more than 'nil points' by yet another

[KarlT]

And breath.
Blimey, I can see why you wanted to bring in the politics.
Sorry, the only one spewing & regurgitating is you.
I've an open mind on the matter.
While I have no allegiance to the Chinese leadership and their ambitions, I have very little time for living gods aswell.

[HarryMann]

If you think Living Gods (presumably you're referring to Buddhists; the Dalai Lama would not call himself that) are a good reason for torturing half a race to death in unimaginable ways then, count me out of your 'open minded' politics

[syncropaddy]

And tell me now, do these Living Gods and all have front and rear diff locks?

[axeman]

And tell me now, do these Living Gods and all have front and rear diff locks?

if they have diff locks i bet they dont have a decupler

neil

[ermie571]

I decoupled both living and mythical gods!

[KarlT]

If you think Living Gods (presumably you're referring to Buddhists; the Dalai Lama would not call himself that) are a good reason for torturing half a race to death in unimaginable ways then, count me out of your 'open minded' politics

Okay, fair enough.
If you really think 3million Tibetans have been murdered, fine. If you disagree with UNICEF that life expectancy has increased, okay.
But there is no need to be so aggressive with your opinions, you decide to drag politics into a travel thread & then attack me for having a unbiased/open view.

[syncropaddy]

I decoupled both living and mythical gods!

Was that before or after you discovered you were a virgin?