Thanks to all of you for my wonderful b-day greetings! My special day started with an alarm waking me out of a deep sleep at 5:20am. Lori and I are determined to meet the Dalai Lama and have confirmed he's currently in town. We were told he occasionally makes an appearance at the Buddhist temple around dawn. So off we went half-asleep to the temple. I'm sad to report we didn't have a Dalai-spotting, but we did find how the Tibetans spend their early mornings.
There is a small, winding path that runs 1 kilometer around the temple and living quarters of the Dhali Lama. It's a beautiful trail that looks out over the valleys and mountains and contains prayer flags, prayer wheels, as well as Buddha stupas and gift offerings. The Tibetans walk clockwise around the path at least once and carry their prayer beads and say their morning prayers. It was so beautiful to join them and a great way to start my day.
After leaving the temple area, we gabbed some coffee and had breakfast on our deck. I found a phone and called my whole family back home so they could all sing me happy birthday. (If you think this is obnoxious, you should see me when I'm actually IN the country.)
We plan to spend a few nights in this town. We have a great guesthouse overlooking the mountains and it has a huge deck that just begs us to drink large, cold beers on it. Plus, it was no easy task getting here. After starting the journey without a seat, I realized I had seen my worst nightmare come true: Sitting on the floor of a public bus in India! Shortly thereafter a seat opened and all was good.
Tonight we'll find a nice rooftop restaurant for a celebratory birthday dinner. There are numerous western hippies in town so I'm sure we'll have company. In fact, I just left Lori in a cafe with 3 of them and they were last seen playing cards.
We plan to resume stalking the Dalai Lama tomorrow morning so wish us luck!
