Before we headed out for our Monastery tour in Lhasa, I dashed around to laundry I found last night. It was still closed with a roller door. Keen to get my laundry done, I knocked on the door. Some minutes later the man opened up revealing his partner still in bed in the front of the laundry. He took my laundry and got frustrated not being able to find his calculator to show me the price. In his frustration, he was shouting at the person in bed and finally slapped them on the head to get them out of bed to help with the search. It turned out to be a young boy and not his wife as I had thought. I'm sure it was a start to their day not appreciated, but I did get my laundry done and picked up in the evening.
Back at the hotel we met out Tibetan guide, Kungchok and then headed off the the Drepung Monastery. This was about 8km outside Lhasa on the side of a mountain and almost a town in its own right. It was originally the largest Monastery in the world accommodating 10,000 monks. There are now only about 400.
One of the main roofs of the monastery hosted a large number of pilgrims who were chanting and performing what looked like line dancing.
Another fascination was the massive kitchen with monstrous cauldrens and other cooking pots and utensils to create meals for thousands.
The second monastery visited was the Sera monastery. This was the main teaching monastery and we were fortunate to witness a typical philosophical discussion in the "debating garden".
These monastery visits were bought to life by Kungchok's great knowledge and love of his country. He had spent 2 years of his earlier life as a monk.
We got back to the hotel in time for me to get to the laundry where they were meticulously ironing everything which could possibly be ironed.
During the evening we did a bit more exploring around from the hotel and finished up with dinner in a rooftop restaurant where we were opposite a couple of rooftop soldiers monitoring the square below and ready for anything with their automatic weapons.
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