Back in flavor country... I mean internet country... nevermind

Because so much has happend over the past week I will post my adventures over the next three days.

After my last blog entry I set out with my international friends, that I had made on the bus, to hike up, big suprise, a moutain. We were supposed to meet up with the rest of our party at the city's monastary at 12:30. We (the Canadians and I) arrived at the predetermined meeting place 30 minutes late, and only by chance ran into the two girls from Holland. We decided that before the hike we would try to find the Belgium/Chinese couple who we assumed were in the temple. The Holland girls set out searching while the Canadians, and myself, tried to find shelter from the high altitude sun. 5 minutes later, and a balloon hat, an older tibetan man approached us and made, as I understand it now, the sign for wedding, asking if we wanted to go check it out. He motioned us towards a house and then continued walking on up the hill. The Canadians and I exitedly walked down towards the house and stood in front of the open gate until someone gave us the signal to come in.

Immediatly we were offered cigerettes and candy. Then we were literally pulled into the main building, up some stairs, and into a large ornately worked room with some of the most amazingly dressed people I may ever seen in my life. We were introduced to the groom, bride, and family who poured us pepsi for a toast to the wedding. In true form I whipped up a balloon flower and gave it to the now married couple. We were encouraged to eat, drink butter tea (which I was starting to get really sick of at this point), and sing. Feeling slightly obligated I agreed to sing a song to the newlyweds. I chose a song by a Santa Cruz local musician named Oliver Brown called "I love the way winter ends". I have to admit I have never been so nervous singing in all my life. I was completely surrounded by upwards of 40 people, many of which were dressed like tibetan kings and queens. I felt as though I was performing for some ancient court. Of course we were entertainment for the wedding and so playing it up was part of the fun. After the singing we sat down and ate. Crisis was narrowly averted when I almost spilt pepsi all over the groom's robes, and one of the Canadians spilt butter tea on the Ginseng.

After 15 minutes of tibetan wedding fun, in walked the rest of the fellowship (Holland, Belgium, and China). Apparently one of the Duestch girls had glimpsed us as we enetered the wedding hall from the Temple. After running into the Belgium/Chinese couple, they wandered too close to the wedding and were also pulled in by a number of eager tibetan party goers.

30 minutes later, full of butter tea, pepsi, steamed ginseng, and dumplings, we finally "escaped" from the wedding and began our hike up the moutain.