"Magnificent Dzogchen Monastery" By Woeser

High Peaks Pure Earth has translated a blogpost by Woeser written on September 4, 2011 for the Tibetan service of Radio Free Asia and posted on her blog on September 11, 2011.

In a series of posts making up Woeser's summer travels to Lhasa, through Amdo and Kham, the post below is the follow up to "Sershül Monastery In Recent Years". In this post, Woeser touches on environmental destruction in Kham as well as describing all the things that make the restored Dzogchen Monastery "magnificent". The next post in this series will describe Woeser's impressions on arriving in Lhasa.

"Sershül Monastery In Recent Years" By Woeser

High Peaks Pure Earth has translated a blogpost by Woeser written on September 1, 2011 for the Tibetan service of Radio Free Asia and posted on her blog on September 7, 2011.

The blogpost was written once Woeser arrived in Lhasa and is a continuation of Woeser's summer travels to Lhasa, through Amdo and Kham. The post below is the follow up to "Over One Year After the Earthquake, A Rushed Visit to Yushu". At this time, Woeser was also tweeting her impressions from the journey and the tweets contain some important information. Below are translations of three tweets from August 3, 2011.

I’ve been travelling through Eastern Tibet (modern-day Kardze prefecture in Sichuan Province). Where there are mountains, they’re digging mines; where there are rivers, they’re building hydroelectric stations; and where there are mountains and rivers, they’re digging mines and building hydroelectric stations. One of the locals told me that the officials, from high to low, are selling whatever there is in Kardze that can be sold: the development rights for the Zachu River have already been sold to the Huaneng [Power] Company.

2006 Appeal Letter Against Mining in Amdo, Tibet, Resurfaces Online

High Peaks Pure Earth has translated a blogpost and open letter related to mining and environmental destruction in Tibet. The blogpost was posted on a Sina blog on August 28, 2011 but re-posts an open letter from 2006 by villagers in the Gepasumdo (Ch: Tongde) county which is located in Tsolho (Ch: Hainan) in Amdo, part of Qinghai province today. The post also includes 15 photos of the damage in the region.

The blog owner himself admits, "I don’t know how much influence it will have putting this letter and photos on the internet" but it is interesting that these issues of five years ago are re-surfacing online. It would seem that the issues of 2006 need still to be addressed. At the end of July 2011, High Peaks Pure Earth translated an appeal letter by locals affected by serious water contamination in the Kumbum area caused by mining activities.

Mining and subsequent environmental destruction as well as health concerns have also been the focus of blogposts by Woeser, see "Impoverished Matö County", "Please Stop the “Development” of Mount Kailash and Lake Manasarovar for Profit", "Avatar" in Tibet
 and "Songtsen Gampo’s Hometown Is About To Be Completely Excavated".

More Tibetan Students Will Be Educated in China

High Peaks Pure Earth has translated two posts about the recent announcements made in Amdo concerning a new policy on the education of Tibetan students. Amdo's Tsolho (Ch: Hainan) Prefecture is located in the northern part of Qinghai province.

In the early 1980s, the Chinese government introduced a new programme in the Tibet Autonomous Region called the "Inland (neidi) Tibet Schools", a preferential education policy that established schools and classes in cities outside of the TAR in the central and eastern part of China.

A "new and important initiative" was introduced during the "Fifth Tibet Work Forum" held in Beijing on January 18-20, 2010, which according to the summary of the Forum found on the site of Congressional Executive Commission on China is:

"The Fifth Forum introduced a new and important initiative: establishing the coordinated implementation of Party and government policies on Tibetan issues in an area that will include not just the Tibet Autonomous Region, but also Tibetan autonomous prefectures and counties located in Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan, and Yunnan provinces. The expanded area is contiguous and approximately doubles the number of Tibetans who live within the forum policy area."

Having been confined to the TAR, the posts below are an indication that the policy is now being implemented outside the TAR as well. For readers interested in this topic of neidi schooling, the following publication is recommended: "State Schooling and Ethnic Identity: The Politics of a Tibetan Neidi Secondary School in China" by Zhiyong Zhu.

"Tibet is Burning" By Woeser

High Peaks Pure Earth has translated a blogpost by Woeser written on October 18, 2011 for the Tibetan service of Radio Free Asia and posted on her blog on October 26, 2011.

Woeser writes and reflects on the recent series of self-immolations by Tibetans. Since the article was written, there has been one more self-immolation on November 3, 2011 by a Tibetan nun Palden Choetso, 35, of Geden Choeling Nunnery in Kardze, eastern Tibet.


This post is also available in French: http://woeser.wordpress.com/2011/10/31/55/

Poem: "The Truth of Flames on the Thorny Path"

Screenshot of the posting as it appeared on Rdrol.Net

High Peaks Pure Earth has translated a poem written by an anonymous Tibetan blogger that is dedicated to detained Tibetan writer Choepa Lugyal. The poem was posted online on October 25, 2011. Three reactions to the poem have also been translated.

According to the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, Choepa Lugyal was arrested in Lanzhou, capital of Gansu province, on October 19, 2011. Choepa Lugyal's penname is Me Che, which literally means "tongue of flames" but can also mean a small smoldering fire or amber. This poem has since been taken offline, perhaps due to the political sensitivities surrounding not only the detention of the writer but also the reference to fire and flames, evoking the images of the recent self-immolations in Tibet.