After my journey through the wilds of India, my path led me to Tibet.
There was something magical about the entire story. It started with my inner spiritual desire for self-knowledge and a spiritual path, years before this journey. I explored spiritual practices that I discovered on my own, studied, and intuitively sensed and used for self-discovery and personal growth. It was an interesting period of my life.
Tibet came as a consequence—strange and spontaneous—through an elderly woman who lived alone in a mountain monastery. I visited her with some friends, and she took a liking to me. She connected me with the guide, and the guide with the group that I was meant to join on this journey. The group was special—I had to be accepted. After meeting with them, I was welcomed, and I waited with excitement and sleepless nights for the day of departure.
China. Then, Lhasa, the capital of Tibet. Another world... The thin air intoxicated like a drug. Severe headaches often accompanied the days and nights. Sudden shortness of breath at night. Slow, steady movements—there was no energy for anything more.
I’m grateful to have seen the still-existing old part of Lhasa back then—the Tibetan ghetto, which is now only history. It has been swallowed by new buildings and malls, erased from the land and the world’s history forever.
We had 4 days to adapt, climbing to one of the high monasteries, then descending to 3,656 meters. On the way to the sacred Mount Kailash, we visited several well-known lakes, watched the sunrise over the towering 8,000-meter peaks lined up like silent sentinels guarding ancient secrets. We ascended to Everest's first base camp and slept in primitive, less-than-clean places, but you accept it as part of the journey to Kailash.
The pilgrimage around Kailash—the sacred kora—is a challenge. Many set out, but only a few make it to the end, let alone complete the entire circuit! At 6,638 meters above sea level, it’s grueling, especially if the conditions are tough—ours certainly were. Darkness, cold, wind, and ice.
One of our nights was spent in monastery rooms that resembled pigsties—dirty, dusty, and stinking. You wrap yourself in your sleeping bag and don’t move all night long. This journey is not for everyone, but for me, it was incredible, light, and deeply magical.
I had an initiation in the world’s highest monastery, conducted by the locals... I also had extraordinary personal experiences. Tibet—a mystical land, once a power, now only a legend, erased by the destruction of thousands of monasteries.
But if you have the opportunity... go! Feel it! Maybe it still has something to tell you.
