I wake up at 5am, more tired (and hungry) than when I fell asleep, pack my things and start the walk out of town before the town fills with people (and police).

At 5:30, I'm on the outskirts of town where every house has a savage dog and most aren't tied up. I arm myself with rocks in case one of the dogs becomes brave and continue walking past the snarls.

The sun comes up and I'm safely several kilometres from the town. People start driving along the roads and I try to hitch a lift unsuccessfully.

A bike stops several hundred metres in front of me and I run towards it. When I arrive, I ask if I can hop on, the guy says no and drives off.

Several hours pass and finally a truck stops and offers me a lift to Chamdo.

The scenery along the way is breathtaking and distracts me from the fact that I didn't have dinner the night before, or breakfast this morning.

We pass Quniydo and Toba (with an unmanned checkpoint) and continue on to Chamdo.

We arrive at Chamdo to find a manned checkpoint and the all to familiar panic sets in. The police are inside their office so I could grab my bag and make a break for it. Jeeps and cars drive under the boom gate so I could try and negotiate a lift in one.

All these options sound unappealing and my only option is to sit in the truck and try and not be seen (without the driver or other passenger realising what I'm doing). I look down at my camera, turn my head and look out of the window and still we wait. The drivers gets out his wallet and goes to talk to the policeman who's now come out.

I count in my head 1... 2... 3... anything to pass time before the policeman comes to talk to me. The policeman leaves on a bike and the driver sits outside the office and waits.

As no one is looking at this point, I take a snap of the checkpoint (the driver is sitting in the plastic chair). I can't see behind the truck so I don't know where the policeman is, or whether there are more in the office so decide this isn't my chance to make a break for it.

The policeman comes back to talk with the driver. At one point, out of the corner of my eye I see they've stopped, the officer looks into the front of the cabin, where I am sitting and he stares. A bead of sweat rolls down my cheek but still I sit firm and wait.

Eternity passes, the driver comes back into the truck, the boom gate is lifted and we drive through. The driver acts as if nothing out of the ordinary has happened and we continue into Chamdo (past another two unmanned checkpoints within two kilometres.

We drive down the main street and I'm turning my head this way and that to avoid looking in the direction of police officers (we pass half a dozen cars and close to twenty officers standing in the streets. As we reach the end of the main street, the driver stops the truck, points ahead of me and tells me that's the way to Lhasa.

I thank the driver for the lift, put my balaclava back on (I was wearing it as a beanie in the truck) and start walking at a fast pace. Passing several more police cars and officers, I come upon a problem.

In front of me, another checkpoint and there are police standing around. Cars are driving through, but the officers' presence is nevertheless there. I contemplate my options, walk back to town to try and get a taxi (walking past all the police again), trying to hitch a lift through the checkpoint, or walking through it.

Every taxi that passes has passengers, and no one will stop for a lift. I've been standing here for too long and people could get suspicious so I decide I will walk past the officers in disguise. I walk past the checkpoint and around the corner, taking a quick snap of the other side of town.

Walking out of sight of town, I climb up a small hill where I can't be seen from the road and stop for a break. It's 30 degree heat outside and I have spent the past hour walking in a jacket, gloves and balaclava with my pack at rapid pace.

I am completely drenched in sweat, have gone for over thirty hours without food and have just finished the last of my water, not a good situation to be in. To make matters worse, I've just stepped in some gum.

I refuse to entertain the possibility of turning myself into the police and so put my disguise back on and continue walking in the heat, managing a lift for a short part of the trip, he offers to stop me outside a police station for some reason. I tell him to keep going so he does and drops me off on the side of the road.

Four hours later, the heat has subsided so the walk is easier, however I am thirsty, hungry and tired from a long days walking.

I reach a convenience store and have the best instant noodle soup I've ever had, stock up on some nuts, fill up my water supplies and continue walking as it's getting late and I haven't yet figured out a bed for the night.

I come across some watermelon farmers who suggest catching a bus back to Chamdo to find a place to sleep. I ignore them as I devour an entire melon.

Hunger satisfied temporarily, I renew my walk with vigour and still no one stops for a lift. The sun starts to set and it's getting dark when salvation comes, a minivan packed with Tibetans and their luggage stops for me, I tell them the name of the town I'm heading to, they tell me I passed it a long time ago (where the police station was, in retrospect, next door was the bus stop). The Tibetans are headed to the next town and I tell them it's fine with me as long as their is a cheap hotel.

Highest point in journey to Jitang town, adourned with prayer flags.

We pass through an unmanned checkpoint and I'm dropped off outside a truck-stop hotel. I stock up on more supplies at the convenience store and run a reconnaissance mission before I go to sleep. I find a checkpoint just outside the hotel, and no easy way around it.

I pass out exhausted on the bed in my clothes and still wearing my shoes.

I wanted to go to Tibet as part of my trip to China. Problem is, to go to Tibet is expensive. You need to be a part of a group, have a jeep and a guide. You also need to pre-plan your itinerary and book all of your accommodation in advance. The PSB needs to know where you are at all times.

I decided to ignore all of this unnecessary hassle and expense and head into Tibet illegally, without a permit, guide or any idea of where I was going. Getting in was easy, the borders of Tibet are huge, it’s impossible to guard them all so the PSB stick to the main highways.

Having come in via a row boat to a monastery and hiked for two days over a mountain, I’d just arrived at the highway far beyond the checkpoint and was greeted by a group of Tibetans who gave me baba bread and beer.

While we sit and wait on the side of the road (I assume the group are coming with us and that I’ll be hiding in the back of the truck with them), the man sitting next to me tries to buy my possessions. After I tell him how much I paid for the camera, he nearly has a heart attack and offers me one tenth of the price.

Another member of the group is taking photos of his kids while I sit, eat and drink. I don’t even notice a van pull up or that my companion has left and is now sitting inside the van. The guy who was trying to buy my camera alerts me to the fact that if I don’t hurry, the van will leave without me.

I grab my beer and bag and run to the van and climb in the back, positioning myself comfortably on a sack of potatoes. We’re about to depart when one of the group run to the van and stop it. The man returns my camera, which in the rush I’d completely forgotten about.

The man was taking photos of while I was resting and eating. These are his children.

The van drives us to some town between Dege and Jonda and after paying the driver I get out and start walking up the road trying to hitch a lift to Jonda. As I walk, a group of soldiers approaches from the opposite direction. I have nowhere to run, no disguise and have no choice but to continue walking. I pass them thinking they will arrest me or kick me out of Tibet, however, nothing happens. They look at me with mild curiosity but continue about their business.

I continue walking and it starts raining. I stop at a small shop to get a drink and hide from the rain. The owners offer me food which I gladly eat and I play pool with one of them, a driver who offers me a lift to Lhasa. Given my permit situation and the price,  I decline and decide to continue my walk once the rain stops.

I hitch a lift with a Tibetan on a motorbike and I’m very worried about being caught by police as we reach the next town. When we make a stop for a rest, I put on my disguise, balaclava and gloves and continue the journey like this, telling the driver it’s cold on the bike.

We arrive in Jonda and go right through a police checkpoint as the boom gate is still up. He drops me off in the centre of town and I walk into the first shop I find asking them for the location of a hotel.

As I’m crossing the road to the hotel, I’m almost hit by a police van and once again, my heart is racing. The first real test of my disguise proves successful, they don’t stop and end my journey.

The hotel (a very cheap one aimed at truck drivers) is conveniently situated opposite the police station and given the day’s ordeals, I don’t even think about negotiating the room price.

Once inside, I lock the door and decide to stay inside the hotel until I’m leaving, forgoing dinner. I’m lucky to get wireless signal within my room and find road maps of Tibet which I put on my camera.  While doing research on getting into Tibet, I read that the police in this town are very good at spotting foreigners and that I should outside of the town. Too late now.

I fall asleep hungry and exhausted.

Leaving the weird Tibetan at the crack of dawn, I have fourteen hours of daylight in which I can walk. Having seen the peak the day before, I figure it’s about 1-2 hours walk to the top, then hopefully a long downhill stint.

A quick snap of the amazing view.

After two hours of walking, I finally reach the peak I’d seen before. Unfortunately this peak is not a peak, it’s actually the start of the steepest part of the mountain. As I begin the ascent, it starts raining and the only shelter is back down the mountain, but I won’t give up the hard-gained ground so easily.

An hour into this part of the climb, at a point when I still have no idea how far until the peak a fog descends around me. Through the fog I continue climbing, incredibly exhausted, with no idea how much I have left. At this point, I’m seriously considering turning back, I know I can make it back to Sichuan by the end of the day, catch a minibus and forget this whole Tibetan experience.

As snow starts falling, I have one last piece of magic to rely on, the iPod. Music distracts me for the next hour of the climb.

Hungry, tired, cold and wet; I arrive upon salvation. A group of three houses together. Everyone who sees me stops what they’re doing and stares. I walk towards one of the houses where the whole family comes out to greet me.

Dad in the middle, mum second from the right at the bottom and a lot of children (there’s no TV or electricity up in the mountains).

After a fine feast of Tsomba, you can see the bag of barley flour in front of dad, the family are very excited by my camera and pose for a photo. I snap their family portrait only to have them pose in groups for more photos, I give the camera to one of the daughters so she can take photos and rest for a bit from the past few gruelling hours.

The older daughters appear from the house (I didn’t notice they’d disappeared), one with brushed hair, the other with shells and beads in her hair. Father asks me to pose with them for a photo. Although incredibly flattering, I’m not looking for a Tibetan mountain wife at this point, but I thank him for the offer.

I ask father how far it is to the next town and he says it’s just over the mountain and down the bottom, points in the direction and eventually, reluctantly, I take off.

See where the fog is obscuring the rest of the mountain? Somewhere up there is the top.

Half an hour later I see a boy standing by a tent. I ask him where his parents are (mama? baba?), he says nothing. I ask him for something to eat or drink (using gestures), he says nothing, just stares. I take out my camera, he keeps staring.

I take the boy’s photo, while he … stares. The lack of oxygen at this altitude must have had some effect on him and decide our interaction is over. The fog here is thick and I hope I’m not taking the most difficult route.

Fifteen minutes of walking in the fog, I hear voices, lots of voices and they’re laughing, sounds like a big fog party (maybe the little staring boy wasn’t invited, hence the staring).

I walk towards the voices to find a small huddle of tents grouped together. The reception I receive is amazing, everyone comes out to talk to me, and shake my hand. When I show them a camera they line up together for a photo.

After the first photo, groups of people start posing for photos. The alpha of the tent party realises how tired I look and invites me to his tent for yak butter-milk tea and a feast (hooray for Tsomba). I give the Tsomba a pass but happily drink lots of tea while everyone else crowds around inside the tent and at the opening, watching my every move.

Turns out there’s a single girl here also as the whole group pull out one of the girls to sit next to me. She’s to be the only girl that pours more butter-milk tea for me, a big honour as it means she can play with the hairs on my arm, still an amazing thing for most Asians to comprehend. She does a great job pouring tea and one day will make someone a good wife.

When I’m ready to leave, one of the other girls jokingly picks up my bag, pretending she’s going too, says goodbye to everyone in the village and starts walking up the mountain.

When she stops, I motion for her to follow me, which she does with glee, at no point giving up the bag. Some of her friends join her, including husband/boyfriend who doesn’t think twice of the fact that she’s carrying my bag.

The group escorting me up to the top of the mountain. It’s steep, but it must be close.

Along the way we take regular breaks for the group to hunt for the magic man-power worm we’ve found for sale everywhere in Western Sichuan. Beginner’s luck shines on me and I manage to spot a tail poking out of the ground, point it out to one of the group who pull it out and give it to me.

Since my man power isn’t lacking, I have no use for the worm and give it to the girl carrying my bag. This puts a big smile on her face (the whole community spends their time finding these worms and they periodically send one of theirs to the markets to sell the group’s worms.

Today happens to be that day, the boyfriend of the girl carrying my bag (wearing the cowboy hat) has a locked box full of the worms, which he gladly shows me.

We reach the peak one hour later and each of us adds a rock to the pile of rocks at the peak.

It’s freezing cold, windy and also snowing. This doesn’t phase the group who happily sit with me up at the top. While the guys smoke and the whole group looks through the photos on my camera, I try to forget how cold it is.

My toes have gone numb, which is the signal for the group to say goodbye, they wave to me as I head down the other side of the mountain, with the worm selling cowboy joining me.

We emerge from the fog after half an hour to see the most beautiful sight I’ve seen in a long time.

Chengdu-Lhasa highway, northern route, somewhere between Dege and Jonda.

At the top right (just out of shot) is a traffic jam while heavy machinery is clearing the rock fall. Our mission is to make it down the mountain before the vehicles pass us. To tell you the truth, it’s not easy, my legs are fatigued, muscles exhausted and it’s sheer willpower that keeps me going.

Every step is painful as I half jog/half stumble down the mountain. I reach the bottom (well behind my companion) almost an hour after seeing it and just miss the first truck.

Sitting on the side of the road, waiting for me is the welcome party, most certainly dispatched to congratulate me on successfully entering Tibet and reaching the highway. They know the journey behind me was tough and that the journey ahead will be even harder, so they do the only thing they need to do.

The group hand me some baba bread and a beer as we celebrate my achievement.

Leaving the monks in the morning, I begin following their directions (between the mountains and take the left fork), I’m still within sight of their monastery when it starts raining, heavily. The next hour I sit under a tree pondering my decision to go hiking to the next town, by my estimate some 100km away.

When the rain clears I continue the walk as the scenery is breath taking.

I reach a small village within a couple of hours walk and am offered food (more Tsomba) and yak butter milk tea. Not grasping that I don’t speak Tibetan at all one of the teenagers writes something in Tibetan for me to read, thinking my English is a different dialect of Tibetan.

After half an hour’s rest and eating (while one of the monks takes photos with my camera), I bid farewell to my new friends thinking that it’s far too early to call it a day.

Half of the village came to wave goodbye, very excited to have their first foreign guest.

The weather is hot and no one is around, so I decide to wash up in the river which is a relief after several hours of fast paced walking into the mountains. Tiger Leaping Gorge is a walk in the park compared to this.

Several hours after the bath in the river, I sit in the countryside looking at wildlife, resting and chatting with a Tibetan (we don’t understand each other at all).

Evening is approaching, I’ve just passed another village and it’s starting to rain. By the time I reach the next houses it’s raining heavily and I am soaked.

The houses I see belong to one family, they all consist of one room with bed and stove, stockpile of yak manure and room underneath for livestock.

Eventually, the family understand that I’m looking for a place to sleep for the night and the guy next to me says I can eat and stay at his place. He likes my camera and poses for photos every two minutes. Lunch/dinner consists of Tsomba, again.

I wait outside for evening to approach while the two guys next to me go to round up their yak, goats and horses for the night. The young boy (black and orange jacket) is full of energy and incredibly aggressive. When he’s not posing for photos, he’s throwing rocks at goats or trying to hit me with a big stick.

As night steps in, things get a little weird. A couple of friends of the guy I’m staying with arrive and as I’m returning from the bathroom, I catch them going through my bag (small compartment with no lock). I tell them off and make sure to keep the bag in sight at all times. Next the guy asks to use my camera and proceeds to take photos of himself and his friends posing. Things get really weird as one of his friends starts removing his pants while the guy takes photos of his pubes and man bits. At this point I take back the camera and wish I’d picked somewhere else to stay for the night.

When it comes time to sleep, the guys setup a bed for me outside, where the mat is in the photo. I fall asleep on the hard ground (with bag next to me) a little pissed off at how the night turned out, the guy has the audacity to ask for 20 Yuan for the bed.

I wake up several hours later as the wind is howling and snow is falling on me, notice that no one else is inside so I go inside and take his bed thinking he’s gone to his friends for the night.

The guy comes back several hours later to find me sleeping in his bed, I tell him it’s not cool to sleep outside in the snow (which has stopped now), so he helps carry the bed (jackets, pants and other clothes to keep warm) inside. As I’m falling asleep, I realise that it’s him, the friend who was stripping down and the little aggressive boy sharing the bed and it saddens me a little that they have to live with so little, even though he is a jerk.

I wake up at the crack of dawn, incredibly sore and tired from little sleep that night, eager to get away from this weird Tibetan.

Deciding against backtracking to Manigango before going on to Sershu, Gregor and I decide to follow a rarely used road that hugs the Tibetan border (on the Sichuan side) since it’s possible to follow it to Sershu.

We hitch a lift with some Han Chinese who believe all of the government’s propaganda about the Tibetan spiritual leader. They also have no idea about the significance of the day (it’s the 20th Anniversary of the massacre at Tiananmen Square), we notice nothing to indicate that anyone in the town knows about the date. We ask to be dropped off where the road diverges towards Sershu, but instead are dropped off right at the border.

The bridge is all that separates Sichuan from Tibet. The checkpoint that would have cost 300 Yuan to cross consists of nothing more than the red and white booth with one police officer asleep, I could easily cross the border in a taxi or one of the many other cars that pass by.

After entertaining this fantasy for a couple of minutes, we start walking back towards the road that leads to Sershu, passing a group of soldiers marching towards Tibet.

Twenty minutes of walking later, Tibet begins to beckon, she whispers there are no police in this spot, come on over, who will know?

In the foreground, Sichuan and our road. Across the river, Tibet and glory.

Looking around to make sure that there are no people watching, I find a suitable spot to cross the river.

It’s incredibly cold to walk across but incredibly easy to swim. The problem lies in getting my bag across. Gregor suggests putting it in a taxi and having the driver drop it off at the other end. I’m reluctant as there’s nothing preventing the driver from driving off with everything and leaving me without my belongings and clothes.

I come out of the river to find two motorbikes have stopped. One of these containing two monks tells us there is a monastery several minutes away where we can spend the night and that they have a boat to cross the river. We continue walking with extra enthusiasm and eventually a truck stops to give us a lift.

After a few minutes drive, we pass a bridge, completely unguarded and I decide that this will be my entry point into Tibet come nightfall so I don’t have to trouble the monks for their boat.

When the driver drops us off, just past the bridge, he tells us the monastery is 4km away. As we’re walking, I see a police car coming around the corner towards us, I shout police and instinctively Gregor and I run off the road into the trees for shelter. We’d heard from Elise that several people were stopped by police just outside Dege and driven back to town saying they’re not allowed to be there. The police car hadn’t noticed us and we’re able to come out of hiding and continue our walk.

Four kilometres pass, as do many more and there is still no monastery, it’s now too far to return to the bridge at night however there is still the option of the monks boat so we press on, stopping for some water at a hydroelectric plant. As we’re walking out Gregor notices another police car and walks straight back in and takes some more cookies saying we’re hungry. The people inside think nothing of it and several minutes later we’re back on the road.

It’s late in the afternoon and we still haven’t reached a monastery so we begin to get nervous about we’re we’ll be spending the night. Eventually we come across a Tibetan guy who tells us that the monastery isn’t far (heard that before) and that it’s on the Tibetan side of the river, the next one on our side of the river is twenty kilometres away.

Unwilling to walk another twenty kilometres, we decide we’re going to the monastery on the Tibetan side, the man follows us. We reach the bank and wait for the boat to come pick us up.

The boat is operated by a deaf and drunk Tibetan who has to battle with the current. He rips us off.

We stop by the first shop we see in the village for a celebratory Pepsi and are greeted by two drunk Tibetans who offer us a bed in their home. Preferring to stay in a monastery, we decline the invitation and start walking from the shop to the monastery.

One of the drunks decides to give us the grand tour of the village, taking us to every house shouting something to all the Tibetan women he sees. He stumbles around and makes sure to spin every prayer wheel within sight. He takes us inside one of the monasteries, which really pisses off one of the monks since the man is drunk and we get the feeling we may no longer be able to stay in a monastery. The drunk doesn’t get the hint that we’re trying to get rid of him.

Eventually, a Chinese speaking monk comes out and Gregor asks him if we can stay at the monastery we’d seen from the river. The monk says this isn’t possible since that’s where the senior monks go to pray however we can see the outside and stay at his place. We agree to this and the drunk takes this as his cue to leave us alone, first turning around to pee, almost getting it on his shoes, then almost stumbling over into it.

As we’re doing the tour, this time with the monk, more come out to join us and we take a few pictures before going inside for a late lunch/early dinner.

Lunch/Dinner consists of Tsomba, only this time one of the monks shows us a different way of making it, laughing at the mess we make on the floor.

After spending the first night in Tibet, Gregor takes the boat back across the river to go to Sershu, while I decide to hike into the mountains to see if I can make it further, I’m told the next village is a day’s walk away.

While in Dege, Gregor has the brilliant suggestion of calling a counterfeiter to organise a set of fake permits (for myself only). Finding one is not as difficult as you’d imagine. In most Chinese towns and cities I’ve come across, there are phone numbers painted on walls. These are the numbers of counterfeiters who can make fake passports or work permits (Hekou) to allow Chinese to work in other cities. All we need to do is walk around Dege to collect some of these numbers and begin the process.

After a 15 minute walk around Dege, we have a collection of ten numbers to try, so we return to our hotel room to begin calling. After trying the numbers, we have four potential leads, with one quote being a third of the other three (which I consider too expensive for forged papers).

We call the man again, telling him we’ll take one set of forged permits for 200Y (40AUD) and he asks us to show up outside the post office and give him a call. After we call, he asks us to drop the necessary information (Name, Passport #, Passport Photo) into the post office box.

This is where things become a little suspicious. First of all, I’d never heard of anyone needing a passport photo for the permit and secondly, how is the man to remove the documents from the post office box, I highly doubt he works for the post office.

We tell him that this isn’t necessary and that we’d like to meet with him, see some sample documents prior to giving money, he says this isn’t necessary and that he needs the passport details in order to make a permit and that we can give them over the phone.

Nervous that I’m dealing with the PSB (police), I ask to meet him first to see a sample, he declines this request and says he cannot proceed without the information. After much hesitation, we send him a text with my name, passport number, country and d.o.b.

Half an hour later we receive a text that we should wait outside the post office the following morning at 9am and give him a call to pick up the permit.

The following morning, Gregor calls the man and tells him that I will come alone to the post office, inspect the permit and if I find it of acceptable quality, will pay the money for the permit. Since I don’t speak Mandarin, I will simply call him from the post office, which is his signal to meet me.

At this point, I’d found plenty of samples of the permit on the internet (after circumventing China’s great firewall) and was now semi-knowledgeable in the field of Tibet Travel Permits (for travel into Tibet, required for Lhasa and a few areas around it), Alien Traveller’s Permits (for areas outside of Lhasa) and Military Permits (for areas close to the border with India e.g. Mt Kailash). I’d contemplated making my own permits but decided against it.

I arrive at the post office at the required time and call the man, only to hear a reply in Chinese, I tell him (in Mandarin) that I don’t speak Chinese and that I’m calling about Lhasa and Tibet (Xi Zang). He hangs up and I figure he understood. I sit at a spot with several exits, should it turnout that he’s police and I need to make a quick getaway.

After several minutes, he’s sent several text messages. After fifteen minutes, I decide that he isn’t coming and head back to the hotel (taking a route where I know if I’m being followed). Gregor reads the messages and calls the man.

Gregor says the man wants us to pay the money up front by delivering it into the post office box, I laugh and tell him there’s no chance that’s happening, which he’d already told the man. We decide that this number was a scammer and that there’s little chance of getting the permit, so we head out to breakfast.

While out, the man calls again, saying this isn’t America and that this is how business is done in China, money first, then documents. We tell him we’re not giving money until we see the documents and if he can’t handle this, we’re not doing business with him. The man sends several more text messages to the effect of money first then you get the documents, we ignore these and decide that the fake permit is a no-go (the other prices were too high).

On the way back to our hotel, we pass the minivan drivers who offer us a lift to Ganzi/Manigango (where we’d come from). I tell them I want to go to Tibet but have no permit. One of the drivers says he’ll get me past the border checkpoint for 300 Yuan. He’ll fill the van with Tibetan passengers and I’ll hide in the back under their bags. As interesting as this sounds, I tell him I don’t have that kind of money (since I still have to organise my own transport to Lhasa and may still be caught by police). We ask the man about the location of the checkpoints and he tells us that there is only one checkpoint between the border and the first town in Tibet and gives us the distance to the checkpoint.

We thank him for the information and pack our bags for the trip to Sershu, I decide against going into Tibet. I’d heard of one of my former travelling companions (David from Israel) being unable to make the trip disguised as a Tibetan monk.

Gregor and I eventually decide to explore Dege town and pay a visit to the Scripture Printing Lamasery, an old school printing press for Tibetan prayers/chants.

Wearing my disguise, Gregor and I make our way to the lamasery and first perform a Kora (clockwise lap around the place) to scope it out. With Gregor some distance behind me, I make a move for the interior of the lamasery, walking past the ticket seller to get in for free as a Tibetan. It doesn’t work, he calls out to me and I’m forced to buy a ticket.

Lamasery entrance with Tibetans walking the Kora around it.

Nevertheless, I decide to persevere with the disguise and walk around without removing it. The disguise partially works, people more than 10m away don’t pay me any attention, however when someone does see that I’m a foreigner, they call out to the others who stop what they’re doing walk up to me and peer at my eyes/mouth under the balaclava, confirm I am white and say hello.

Busted by the workers and sweating heavily in the heat, I remove the disguise deciding it was fun but won’t really work and meet up with Gregor to tell him the news about the failure.

Although the lamasery has a rule against photography, the Chinese tourists inside are happily taking photos and the workers pay them no attention. Feeling brave, I take out my camera and take one photo. As soon as I do this, one of the workers approaches Gregor and I, looks at the photo I took and takes the camera from me. The man then proceeds to take photos of all of his colleagues and the work they do.

To make a print, the workers, always in pairs, take a clay tablet containing the scripture, coat it using a naturally made ink and press a sheet of fabric to it to print the scripture on it.

To get an idea of how much scripture there is, imagine two storeys of six rows. Every row has a shelf and in each shelf lie hundreds of these tablets, it all adds up to a lot of work.

The photographer and myself (out of disguise).

The view from the second floor.

Dege, located 40km from the border with Tibet, is a town where you can’t use the playground equipment since it serves as a clothes line for the nearby residents.

This doesn’t stop me from finding out how much strength I’ve lost over the past few months; less than 10 pullups :(.

The local minibus drivers are always trying to get fares so I ask them how much to Lhasa. After they quote a price, I have Gregor translate for them that I have no permit. This normally scares them off and they stop pestering us about a lift. One driver however offers to take me for 600 Yuan (120AUD) in two days and takes Gregor’s number, saying he’ll call the day before he goes to confirm it.

I start planning my assault on Tibet and decide I need a disguise to look as Tibetan as possible, which is difficult since I’m taller, hairier and whiter than all of the Tibetans I’d seen prior.

The disguise consists of gloves, worn by every truck driver I’ve seen (2 Yuan a pair), a balaclava, popular with Tibetan motorbike riders (10 Yuan) and a cheap bag to disguise the fact that I’m a backpacker (15 Yuan – two bags).

We spend the day not doing much more and I decide to try my Tibetan disguise the following day at the Dege Lamasery (Bakong Scripture Printing Lamasery).

Gregor and I eventually decide to move on after a great time hanging out in Da Tong Ma (Elise left the previous day). When we climb onto the bus to take us back to Ganzi, the floor is covered in sunflower seed shells, everyone on the bus has been spitting them on the floor (as is fairly common in China/Tibet). To pass time we bet on who will throw up first. Gregor wins easily as one of his girls is queasy from the start and is throwing up within half an hour.

I introduce the woman sitting next to me to the wonderful world of western music, giving her a sample of music from the sixties to the present day. She likes it, a lot.

When we eventually arrive back in Ganzi, we meet up with Zhouma who takes out to KTV (karaoke) as a goodbye. KTV is conveniently located upstairs from a whorehouse, and given the place’s general seediness we don’t dare to guess what else goes on here. While waiting at the whorehouse for the KTV place to open, we see one of the prostitutes that had come with a truck driver to Zhouma’s motel the day before. I wave and tell her I’ve seen her before but she doesn’t understand English. I ponder the fact that most people in Ganzi don’t have showers every day (since few, if any, houses have them) so they head to a communal shower “hot springs” in town. Do the girls in the whorehouse shower between clients? I don’t think so. There’s something to keep in mind if you decide to take a prostitute in a small town in China.

Zhouma and her BFF at KTV.

Following Ganzi, we hitchhike along to Dege. Although it is very illegal to hitchhike in China, this doesn’t prevent us from flagging down a detective on his way to see his son perform for Children’s Day (a Chinese holiday where children where new clothes, receive lots of spending money and put on performances at school for their family).

The second lift we receive is heading all the way to Dege, at a snail’s pace. We do most of the trip in first or second gear.

Just out of Manigango, we pass Yilhun Lha Lake.

We travel only slightly faster than this Canadian mountain biker we pass. Our driver is so impressed that he stops to chat with her (using Gregor as intermediary). Our driver also stops to tell us he’s having a nap and proceeds to sleep for the next 20 minutes.

Along the way, we head over Chola Mountain Pass at an altitude of 5050m. Gregor has prepared for this pass by purchasing the coloured prayer paper our driver used on the trip from Litang to Ganzi. We throw it in the air while our Tibetan driver chants.

It’s just after sunset (9pm) when we arrive in Dege and after a chat with some monks, Gregor and I are staying at a very cheap motel where it’s us and several monks who are very excited to speak with Gregor about our trip. One of the monks shows us a DVD of his brother (a famous Tibetan musician) performing some of his hits.

Eventually, we make it up the mountain in Da Tong Ma for an amazing view of the town.

The place we’re staying in, opposite the monastery has some really cool dogs.

There’s the little pup that always rolls onto his back when I come to play with him.

The rasta that loves to dance.

And the friendliest of all, this big boy that they say will bite you. The pup in the background is a stray, but loves to hang out with big boy.

  This girl, also a stray, along with little pup stays around big boy a lot, he’s very handsome.

We eventually make it to the town’s monastery where one of the monks gladly offers us some tea and cookies. Another monk joins us and the original is on the phone to his friends in no time, asking Elise, Gregor and myself to say a few words to each person he calls.

Left monk is the one that offers us tea and calls his friends, inviting the middle monk, the only one of the trio that speaks Mandarin to translate what Gregor is saying. The monk on the right is the one that joined us while we were drinking tea and took the most photos of us on his camera phone.

Walking around town, we hear the chants of children in Tibetan and decide to investigate, schools are always interesting places to visit.

The school, still under construction, already has a satellite dish.

The school is a monk school, when we arrive, all of the boys are busy chanting in Tibetan.

When class finishes, the young monks in training are the same curious boys you find everywhere.

The monk/teacher is as curious as the boys.

We find out on our second day that two Tibetans were killed the previous day, one shot for picking worms in the wrong field. The other is killed in a knife fight, quite common in Tibetan communities (every guy we see is carrying a knife). So much for small towns being safe. We’re told the sky burials here occur after the body has been buried for one year.

The day we leave Da Tong Ma, it snows. This, however, does not slow down our bus driver.