7 days on Tibet

Helloooo my dires...sorry, I mean my dears,
I bet you all are quite ravenous for more news from the turtle riders, but as you might guessed there are some connectivity problems from China, let's call them censure-ship or integrity, whatever team you are on. Nevertheless, here we are again, thanks to our belgium freelancer.
Some days have passed since we left Kathmandu, which I did not like at all, I'm still scratching and hoping not carrying anything with me that don't belongs me, but oh well, as they say "c'est la vie".We deparrted from that clean, full of facilities, hot water shower (...NOT!!!) minus 5 stars hotel at 5:15 AM. We were short of cash counting not need to pay anything since our tour had been paid long before in Pokhara, but of course, there were few nights we still had to pay. We were informed of such inconvenience at our last day, last minute before departure, not even counting that we paid a night we were out trekking...ARGH!! (breath out deep breath in, breath out), we paid some of the balance at the reception desk and were able to convince the receptionist to come with us to the nearest ATM to get the rest, that we had to be at Thamel in 2 minutes.
Moving on we got into a full of tourist bus that was meant to take us to the nepali-tibetan border. After our great experience on the roof of a local bus that was sweet. There were persons of UEA, Germany, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Israel...a nice "pupurry". Ferran let his authism to get into its maximum potential and started to dislike the group pretty fast, but I have to agree that there were some nice specimen.
The nepali-tibetan border is full of nepali bussinessmen, for which I mean one tone heavily sack weighted persons, male and female no difference, who keep going into the China border to bring goodies on their backs, and then back again, I guess for the whole day or until their backs say "no more". They form a continous and quasi-infinite line that likes to 'jump' over the security restrictions and checkings chinese officials keep.
On the other hand, there are 'we', the 'tourist'. We passed just five or six security checks. One for the flu (I was coughing and had running nose, and probably some fever, and of course I said I was alright), second for weapons on X ray, third was military inspection for Tibet political books, which include any Lonely Planet with monk pictures or Tibet map (Hah!), fourth was visa check, fifth another X ray, and finnally policemen check the books thing again, just in case the militars did not do their job properly...funny, but a bit time extended for my own taste.
Now the good news. As we were promised we got land rovers waiting for us on chinese border, so we got into them and started our journey through Tibet. We lunch near the border and found a non-existant ATM on the first town, thanks goodness, since we were short on cash as I stated before, and dinner lunch and drinks were not included on the package (I call it non-existant because both our guides told everyone that there were no any ATM until the third day of the tour).
Hmmm I should get it faster, because if I stick on every little thing this post will be longer than a novel, and of course if Ferran wants to say anything else about these past days he is free to do so, although is not our policy to go back into the past.
Tibet is beautiful, not the same beauty as Nepal, can not say if more or less, but different. We have not gone under 3.500m. The landscape on such condition, as you can guess, can not be the exhuberant green of Nepal, but the mountains touch the sky, and the sky kiss the mountain pics, in a quiet peaceful fusion that gets into the soul, maybe that is the reason buddhism had to fall here (although some want to kick it out).
You have tundra and plateau all around, small rivers, if they can be called like that, flow all over, freezing during the night and getting into life soon after the sun crowns the highest highs in the world.
The nights are cold, and I mean COLD. You damn your pee needs everytime during the nighttime, and I prefered to sleep clothed most of them. I have to say that we passed the first two nights in guesthouses, and we are still waiting to spot our first heater in the room. Breakfasts consisted so far in bread and omelette, no exception.
Other important thing you have to know is that there are more than good chances you will suffer high sickness, consisting in headache, stomach disorders and similar things. Most of us (tourist) got some of it during our journey.
About the political thing, there is a heavy China army presence, in most cases the army helps to build roads or such things, but they have weapons, and are a repressive force (for good or bad). Just today we have seen like fifty trucks and excavators, or maybe more, movilizing, I wonder if spanish army have such number of trucks in whole country. The repression can also be perceived on internet censure, similar to the one we found at Iran.
The locals, from my point of view, are social and not dislike the human touch, expressions such as hugging and body contact playing are more common than in Europe (I guess the cold has not said its last word). Some of them like to sing and carry a smile with them. They are shorter than 'us' and darker than eastern chinese...but anyway, this is getting too long, sorry, but many days and many things, wish it could have been three posts and not one. I will let the pictures and Ferran talk (when we were able to upload them, maybe at HK) the rest of it.
Best wishes,