Why a Booktrail?
Destination: Tibet Departure Time: Various
Two stories about Tibet and the man the author meets on the Friendship highway
The Friendship Highway
What you need to know before your trail
Charlie Carroll tells the story of two journeys and of two Tibets. The first is his own journey and experience of the country. For this is the country he has always wanted to visit and has only now had the chance and determination to do so. The second is a very different story from the viewpoint of an Tibetan exile , Lobsang, who has always wished to return home to the country of his birth. But Tibet is the forbidden country and a return is almost impossible.
The two young men meet on the road known as The Friendship Highway. The two men talk and exchange stories and both are woven together to give a unique insight into a country and a people undiscovered by most of the rest of the world.
Travel Guide
The Friendship highway
The Friendship highway is 440 miles long and stretches between Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, and Zhangmu, the border town just across the river from Nepal. This is the story of the history of Tibet, its annexation from China in 1950 and how all of them has impacted on the county and the people today.
The stories which come from this meeting of two very different men are strikingly different – Charlie is after all a Westerner and Lobsang has been ostracized by his native country.
Chinese-controlled Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) in 1989
Lobsang’s escape from his own country – for that is what is was, an escape are evoked through a child’s eyes making it all the more poignant. A child cannot begin to understand why his family suffer so much and why some have to leave.
Following his journey into Kathmandu where he lives as a refugee,he then studies in Delhi, his strength and perseverance despite his hard start in life, a shining example of what a person can achieve in the bleaksest of circumstances.
Tibet
The longing for one’s homeland becomes so strong , especially when a fellow student and one he is in love with, returns too. Lobsang howver must return via the rocky mountain passes.
As the two men journey together in every sense of the word, a picture of Tibet emerges, one dark in some areas and lighter in the other but the overall image can only be seen when you close the cover and stand back to admire it – the beauty of its landscape, the hope of its people and the significance of its local customs.
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