November 17, 2025 • 24 mins
Let me know if you enjoy my content!
A road where distance is measured in bodies, not miles. That’s where I found myself after a rough fight at home sent me back to my mentor’s monastery on the Sichuan–Tibet border. When a group of villagers arrived in leather aprons and battered knee pads to ask for a blessing, I learned they were headed for Jokhang in Lhasa—the temple that holds a young Buddha statue tied to Princess Wencheng and the moment Buddhism took root on the plateau. I joined them for a week and discovered how devotion looks when it’s repeated thousands of times on stone and dust.
We dig into why Jokhang matters, the legend behind the statue, and how a Tang dynasty princess helped change Tibet’s spiritual course. Then we get practical and visceral: what a full-body prostration actually is, why pilgrims protect their hands and knees, and how each movement honors body, speech, and mind. I walk through the math of progress at altitude, the reality of cold nights and yak-dung fires, and the humble power of tsampa that keeps you moving when everything aches. Along the way, older pilgrims glide past as I lag and learn, and boredom turns into a doorway to flow.
This is a story about faith, grit, and the strange peace that comes from doing one simple thing again and again. If you’ve ever tried to build a practice—training, meditation, writing, or just being a better partner—there’s a lesson here: shrink the step, trust the rule, and keep going. Come for the history of Tibetan Buddhism, the Jokhang temple, and Princess Wencheng; stay for an honest look at what happens when you lay your whole body on the road to move a few feet forward. If the journey resonates, subscribe, share with a friend, and leave a review—what practice are you trying to keep, and what’s your six feet today?
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Yo, what's up everyone?
Welcome back to Asian Uncle, andI'm your host, Uncle Wang.
So I want to close out theseason because it's been quite
long.
I think 13 or 14 episodesalready.
So I want to close out with thisunique experience that I had.
Honestly, I didn't remember thisexperience until just two days
(00:20):
ago.
Perhaps I've seen it so manytimes on my trips there that it
didn't I didn't think it wasanything weird.
But then when I think about it,you know how, for instance,
Americans, Europeans, uh, we goto church every Sunday, and
(00:41):
that's our commitment.
And Tibetans, on the other hand,have a very different
commitment.
Most of them have traveled orplan to travel this route at
least once in their life.
(01:03):
And you'll soon learn that it isthe longest route for anyone to
take, not only Tibetans.
And I was fortunate enough to bea part of this journey for a
week.
And let me tell you, it wasquite the experience.
But before we start, I want totake a little bit of time to
(01:23):
wish you and your family a happyThanksgiving.
I realized this episode launchesa week before.
Enjoy the turkey, enjoy the timeoff.
And so here it goes.
It's kind of weird talking aboutfamily because it's one of the
reasons why I experienced thisjourney in the first place.
It was one summer, I believe,because of stress, uh, I was
(01:45):
constantly drinking out onbusiness ventures that I kind of
neglected the family a bit.
And so I got into an argumentwith my wife.
And the argument was turnedpretty sour.
And so I was pretty depressedand I wanted to leave.
So I went to Tibet.
(02:06):
I went to my mentor's monastery.
I went to LB's monastery, LifeBuddha, remember.
We'll call him by that nicknamebecause I don't want to keep
saying mentor, mentor.
So he'll be LB from now on.
So I went to his monastery and Istayed there for I think two
weeks.
And a buddy of mine saw that Iwas in a bad mood and decided to
tag along.
(02:28):
The monastery just became aplace, like a safe place for me,
kind of a sanctuary where assoon as I enter, I forget all
the troubles that I have in theworld that I'm currently living.
And so, like any other morning,I was having breakfast, just
chilling with LB, listening tothem talk to monks.
(02:52):
Um this group of people came in.
These villagers.
They knocked, and they walked inafter LB signaled them.
They were dressed a little bitdifferently than what I was
normally used to.
And they walked in, they heldtheir hands in prayer with their
heads down, body tucked.
(03:12):
So the first thing I noticed wasthis thick leather plate on
their chest, kind of like anapron that you cook with, except
it was leather.
It was thick.
Looked like you were going to dosome car work or the hands were
filthy.
And they were all wearing thisthick, dirty wrestling knee pad
(03:33):
for some reason.
So before I had the chance toclarify what was going on, they
threw a couple of bucks in frontof LB, like just maybe like
five, ten RB, and just tossedit, crumbled kind of cash,
tossed it in front of him andknelt down.
And then immediately LB took outhis beads, he closed his eyes,
(03:56):
and he shook in his palm, heshook it around in his palm and
swalked back in Tibetan.
And later I asked what was goingon, and he told me that these
are people that are makingpilgrimages.
And whenever they pass by atemple where there's a live
(04:16):
Buddha practicing, they wouldcome in first to ask for
blessing, and then two to ask iftheir trip would you know, would
it be successful?
Would they be okay?
Yeah, it's kind of just comingin and and getting your fortune
told for a brief second whileyou're getting blessing.
(04:38):
And then so I asked, what for?
What kind of pilgrimage?
I will look back and said theirdestination is the Jokhan
temple.
I was like, What?
Because if you recall, theJokhan temples are located in
Lhasa, and that's the capital ofTibet.
And before I go into why I wassurprised, the reason why they
(05:02):
go to this temple specificallyis because there stands a statue
of Buddha when he was 12, ayoung statue that looks like
Buddha when he was twelve, thatwas blessed by the Buddha
himself.
Not only is that significant,but in a historical context,
(05:24):
this is also the first time inancient history that the Chinese
Han people first engaged withTibetans.
So back in ancient China, duringthe Tang dynasty, they were
worried about securing theirborders.
And in ancient Tibet, there wasa Tobo dynasty, or Tubo in
(05:44):
Chinese.
That's the ancient word foractually Tibet.
And they all constantly harassthe borders of the Tang dynasty.
So in order to reach some sortof peace agreement, the emperor
decided to marry their princess.
It's actually his niece, not hisdaughter, marry a princess to
(06:05):
Tubo.
And this princess, very famous,Princess Wen Chen.
It is perhaps the first time theChinese, ancient Chinese and
ancient, first had diplomaticcontact.
(06:28):
And so the Tubo leader asked tomarry their princess.
Legitimate.
But with her, she brought thesestatues of Buddha.
Because back then, Tubo dynastydid not believe in Buddhism yet.
They had their own religion.
(06:49):
It was called the Bin.
It sounds kind of creepy.
That's their old form ofreligion where they worship the
supernatural, some demons, um,different deities, different
gods.
It was kind of like voodoo inTibet.
There was a lot of rituals, alot of evil things you can
(07:10):
actually do too.
I've heard a lot of stories.
I can share with that with you alittle later on.
And so besides the statue beingblessed by Buddha sitting right
in that temple, it also carriesspecial significance where
Tibetans decided to bringBuddhism to Tibet.
(07:33):
And so they've hired theytechnology they really did hire
a spiritual master, believed tobe from Afghanistan or Pakistan,
to Tibet to teach.
And that's where TibetanBuddhism originated from.
And that's where everythingyou've been hearing or seeing,
all that mystic stuff, that'swhere it derived from.
(07:57):
This visit, this temple, thisstatue.
So as a result, they alsoworship the Princess Wen Chang.
I've seen many of her statuesaround Tibet.
And she had to put herselfforward on this great task.
Because if most of you don'tunderstand, life was hard in
(08:18):
ancient Tibet.
Life is hard in Tibet now.
Can you imagine a thousandsomething years ago how life was
there?
And to be a princess in the Tangdynasty at the height of Chinese
rule, to be a princess there andthen to travel 2,000 miles to
the land of the barbarians to bemarried to the leader of what
(08:41):
was seen to the Chinese asbarbarians, nomads, outsiders.
And that's the fate of mostprincesses in China.
They were sacrificed politicallyto keep the border safe.
But she had a very significantimpact on what she did.
(09:03):
Tibet honestly flourishedafterwards.
They invented their own form ofwriting and language, their own
religion, culture, and societyeventually formed around that.
So now I finally know that theseTibetans, because of their
faith, they need to visit theJokan temple once in their life.
(09:27):
But not only do they need tovisit there, they need to walk
there.
And it's not even walking, to behonest, it's doing burpees all
the way to Lhasa, modifiedburpees.
Let me explain to you a littlebit.
So you have a visualization.
The picture you see on thisepisode is this lady on the road
(09:49):
holding her hands up above herhead.
Okay, so that's the first thingyou do.
You hold your hand in prayer,you put it above your head, and
then you place the hand close toyour chin, and then last time,
the third time, to your chest.
This means your body, yourspeech, and your mind.
(10:11):
It's kind of like a uh a ritualwhere you cleanse those aspects.
And then afterwards, you kneeldown and you lie flat on the
ground with your hands pointedstraight forward and your
forehead hitting the ground ifnecessary.
Not hitting it, but placedgently.
So technically, your entire bodyhas to be flat, and you get back
(10:34):
up, you walk to where yourhandprint was, and you do it all
over again.
You get it?
So you start from a startingline, you do one to Ben Burpee,
we're gonna call it that, andthen get back up, walk a couple
of steps to where their handwas, and do that, and that's how
(10:55):
they move forward.
They don't take an extra steppast that.
Their body needs to lie in theentire track that they travel
from their hometown to the Jokantemple in Lhasa, Tibet.
And so this kind of kneelingkowtau method or Tibetan burpee
(11:16):
is has significant impact inyour society.
You will constantly see them doit.
Because, well, I'm not going togo into too much detail of why
they're doing it, because thespiritual master said so, of
course.
But it's part of their faithsystem where everyone, besides
going to Talasa, visiting thistemple once in their lifetime,
(11:36):
everyone of the Tibetan Buddhistfaith should complete a hundred
thousand of these, at least intheir lifetime.
So I've done it.
It took me shit, it took me 12years, on and off, 12 years.
It took both of my kids four.
They woke up every morning, did100 a day.
(11:58):
It would take you roughly threeyears.
So it took them four because youknow obviously we had vacation,
sick days.
That was already the fastest wecan do it.
But we did it at the comfort ofour own house in front of like
our Buddhist statues.
But the Tibetans, they were onthe road, exposed.
(12:23):
Finally, to put into perspectiveof how far this is, okay, Elbe's
Monastery is located in XinglongCounty in Sichuan province.
Okay, if I walk the north path,which is slightly longer, by
maybe a couple miles, I believe,which is the 317.
I think that the south path iscalled the 318, 317 is the north
(12:46):
path.
That route from the monastery inXinglong to Lhasa Tibet is 2,000
kilometers or 1,200 milesroughly.
That's the same distance fromNew York to Florida, or for my
European friends, from Paris toAthens, Greece.
(13:08):
Okay, not to mention the averageelevation across this path is
well over 3,000 meters.
From one point you'll pass apeak, it's called Chirra Sign or
the Trader Mountain in Chinese.
That's over 5,000 meters.
That's almost two-thirds upMount Everest.
(13:29):
I did, I did take a picture of ayak up there once.
He wasn't moving much either.
But back then I was in a car.
I couldn't imagine what it wouldbe like to walk past it.
And my ears wouldn't stopringing when I was driving
across.
I don't want to think what wouldhappen if I really made the trip
(13:52):
entire trip with them.
That's straight up insane.
And it was very intense too toeven think about it.
I don't even like to hike inAmerica.
I don't even like to go onwalks.
I hate camping too.
unknown (14:05):
Right?
SPEAKER_00 (14:06):
Pay to be homeless.
So this was definitely not mything.
So it just.
And while I sat there stillsurprised, you know, LB told me
that his mother had done it nottoo long ago.
(14:27):
He pretty much just mocked me.
Because this lady was like 65 atthe time.
And so what he meant was, Ithink my mom did it too.
Stop being a little bitch.
And so LB suggested right afterthat I should go with them for a
week.
And that he'll come pick me upafter.
(14:50):
So he sent his younger brother,also a monk, called him Little
Bro.
He didn't speak much.
Well, actually, he didn't speakany Chinese.
He only spoke Tibet.
We kind of just did it signlanguage style.
And so I had no idea what I wasgetting myself into.
I knew it was not going to befun.
And I didn't even know where tobegin asking questions.
(15:13):
I didn't have much time tothink.
So little bro tapped me on theshoulder and he gave me a bunch
of equipment.
And for my hands, I had theselike wooden clogs with a strap
nailed inside where I can holdonto it, and that's where my
hands go down.
Other people had on leather,like thick leather gloves, all
(15:34):
sorts of stuff, whatever youcould get your hands on.
And I was just wearing my ownshoes.
They said to tie some cloth onit so it doesn't, you know, it
doesn't uh you don't it doesn'tget wet as easily, I guess, and
put it put a bag over it.
Um it's like okay, and also Ihad the knee pads, I had an
(15:55):
apron, it wasn't as that thick,but it was still a good enough
apron to keep uh the ground offmy clothes, I guess.
And there was nothing for myforehead, and they said just
don't put your forehead on thestreet.
So he told me to pack someclothes, some some things to
clean myself off with if Ineeded to put it in a book bag
(16:18):
or something, the meals or themotorcycles that are following
will carry it.
And for food.
And we'll get to that in a sec.
So having said that I can't passthe length of my hand extension,
I have to walk up rightafterwards.
(16:39):
Given that I did 2,000 the firstday, I did 1500 next, and then a
thousand, and then just around500 the rest of the days.
And you had no idea how muchpain it was after day one.
These burpees are for oldpeople, it looks like it's for
(16:59):
old people, but if you dothousands of them a day, it
hurt.
I was hungry, I felt a littleburnt out, and I felt every
single muscle in my body.
Blisters didn't form until daythree.
I was very lucky.
But I think I should have pacedmyself.
I uh lagged behind everybody byday three.
(17:21):
Actually, I think I laggedbehind everybody on day two.
Yeah, they I think they wentaround 3,000.
Um, they did 3,000 um burpees aday.
Yeah, and I only did 2,000 thefirst day.
I think I probably lost them onthe first day, yeah.
And it was embarrassing becauseI was probably the youngest one.
I was in good shape, or Ithought I was.
(17:43):
I didn't get any altitudesickness either.
So I didn't know.
It was just too mentally it wasmore mentally frustrating than
it was physical.
We slept out in the open atnights, except for one night,
uh, because it was raining.
And it was cold as fuck.
And so Little Bro brought mesomewhere, this this where a
(18:07):
local Tibetan was living, likethis hut.
He spoke to him a bit, and helet us share his fireplace.
Oh, and a little about a bitabout fireplace in Tibet.
To keep that running, they don'tuse only wood.
Like you can't just be choppingwood to keep that fire running,
especially when it's cold.
So what they do is they use uhdried yak shit.
(18:30):
Like they even use that to pastethe house to avoid humidity or
to, I don't know, I guess tostrengthen it.
But there was it didn't smell.
It was just it was really clean,to be honest, and they put that
inside the fire along with thewood and it helped it burn a lot
longer.
So, in terms of food, we hadzamba.
(18:51):
It was like what I describedbefore, it was flour dough, plus
barley, and some other stuff.
It was gross.
It was chewing, it was kind oflike chewing on play-doh with
sesame seeds inside.
That's exactly what it tasteslike.
It didn't taste like anything.
But if you ate enough of it, itdoes fill you up.
It's easy to carry.
You could just mold it and stuffit anywhere.
(19:13):
You could even bring the powderand just mix it yourself while
you're on the road.
So that was our main source offood.
And for some reason, it kept megoing.
I only did when I went to thehut, he also gave me a bowl of
kind of I think it was crushedcauliflower.
I killed it, I destroyed it.
(19:34):
I was so hungry by that day, andI was wet too.
After I dried my clothes, I justpassed out.
Uh next morning, you know, Ijust kept going.
Like that trip really, this justshort voids really humbled me.
I started losing my mind.
I didn't understand theirlanguage.
(19:54):
No, nobody was talking.
Mostly they were just praying tothemselves, mumbling some
things.
And so I started joining them.
I started, you know, doing somechanting, some mumbling.
And when I got bored, it justgot even worse after that.
Extreme boredom, where you justare so in tune to what you're
(20:15):
doing at the moment.
As irrelevant as you may thinkit is, you're so focused at the
moment that you reach a state offlow.
That's all you're thinkingabout.
Your mind, body, soul allfocused on this one burpee that
you're doing.
And I remember vividly at onepoint that the scene from
(20:37):
Forrest Gump when he ran acrossAmerica, when he said he had a
lot of time to think.
You know, no phone, nothing.
Just me, my movement, and thenever-ending role you see ahead.
So, anyways, if I kept my paceon day one, okay, let's just say
(21:00):
I did 1800 burpees a day.
I kept that pace every singleday.
And I'm under six foot with myarms extended, let's just say
six foot with my arms extended.
Okay, that would equal a littlebit over three kilometers or
almost two miles per day.
(21:21):
So if I kept up that pace, Iwould make it to Lhasa in around
two years.
But most people make it in thefastest.
I've heard LP told me from theirmonastery, they made it in nine
months.
And a week passed.
It passed by rather quick.
(21:44):
The first day or two, it was sohard to endure.
But when you reach that flow,you know, you feel like you're
floating.
It didn't feel that horribleanymore.
And so I finally reached mydestination on day seven.
(22:06):
I didn't shower.
Um, I didn't stink either.
Not because I'm Asian or I havedeodorant or not, it was just
maybe something in the air, justlike the cow shit.
If you put that shit down here,it'll probably stink.
But there, for some reason, theair will just circulate so well.
You know, it's hard to reallystink or you smell the stench
unless you're like nose up toit.
(22:28):
And if you had to go, you justshat or pissed in the bushes, or
men and women.
The ladies would go down furtherinto the bushes or have a drape
covering them.
And so I saw LB pull up in hisbroken down car, once again
smiling, mocking.
Okay, because the truth is Ijust made it down the mountain
(22:52):
that the monastery was on.
I was barely 10 kilometers out.
And the hut that I stayed atthat I mentioned before, that
was a relative of Lai Buddha.
I thought the trip was so long,but it was so it was
embarrassing.
I just made it down the mountainbarely.
(23:15):
I spent at least two daysrecovering.
Uh, blisses all over my foot,and I knew they were mocking me
too.
I couldn't understand what theywere saying, but I knew they
were talking about me.
And so that was quite theexperience I wanted to share
with you.
And if you ever get the chanceto travel to Tibet and you see
people like that on the streets,you'll know why.
(23:38):
It was very amazing to see.
And I don't know if I have thatkind of determination to make it
all the way there for themonastery.
Uh that's just too much.
But maybe.
Maybe one day I, if this podcastblows up, I'll podcast my way,
my two years, my two yearjourney to Lhasa.
That'd be pretty cool, right?
But, anyways, this episode'sbeen long enough.
(23:59):
Thank you for uh tuning in.
And again, happy Thanksgiving.
I'll see you on the nextepisode.
Peace.
Yo, what's up everyone?
Welcome back to Asian Uncle, andI'm your host, Uncle Wang.
So I want to close out theseason because it's been quite
long.
I think 13 or 14 episodesalready.
So I want to close out with thisunique experience that I had.
Honestly, I didn't remember thisexperience until just two days
(00:20):
ago.
Perhaps I've seen it so manytimes on my trips there that it
didn't I didn't think it wasanything weird.
But then when I think about it,you know how, for instance,
Americans, Europeans, uh, we goto church every Sunday, and
(00:41):
that's our commitment.
And Tibetans, on the other hand,have a very different
commitment.
Most of them have traveled orplan to travel this route at
least once in their life.
(01:03):
And you'll soon learn that it isthe longest route for anyone to
take, not only Tibetans.
And I was fortunate enough to bea part of this journey for a
week.
And let me tell you, it wasquite the experience.
But before we start, I want totake a little bit of time to
(01:23):
wish you and your family a happyThanksgiving.
I realized this episode launchesa week before.
Enjoy the turkey, enjoy the timeoff.
And so here it goes.
It's kind of weird talking aboutfamily because it's one of the
reasons why I experienced thisjourney in the first place.
It was one summer, I believe,because of stress, uh, I was
(01:45):
constantly drinking out onbusiness ventures that I kind of
neglected the family a bit.
And so I got into an argumentwith my wife.
And the argument was turnedpretty sour.
And so I was pretty depressedand I wanted to leave.
So I went to Tibet.
(02:06):
I went to my mentor's monastery.
I went to LB's monastery, LifeBuddha, remember.
We'll call him by that nicknamebecause I don't want to keep
saying mentor, mentor.
So he'll be LB from now on.
So I went to his monastery and Istayed there for I think two
weeks.
And a buddy of mine saw that Iwas in a bad mood and decided to
tag along.
(02:28):
The monastery just became aplace, like a safe place for me,
kind of a sanctuary where assoon as I enter, I forget all
the troubles that I have in theworld that I'm currently living.
And so, like any other morning,I was having breakfast, just
chilling with LB, listening tothem talk to monks.
(02:52):
Um this group of people came in.
These villagers.
They knocked, and they walked inafter LB signaled them.
They were dressed a little bitdifferently than what I was
normally used to.
And they walked in, they heldtheir hands in prayer with their
heads down, body tucked.
(03:12):
So the first thing I noticed wasthis thick leather plate on
their chest, kind of like anapron that you cook with, except
it was leather.
It was thick.
Looked like you were going to dosome car work or the hands were
filthy.
And they were all wearing thisthick, dirty wrestling knee pad
(03:33):
for some reason.
So before I had the chance toclarify what was going on, they
threw a couple of bucks in frontof LB, like just maybe like
five, ten RB, and just tossedit, crumbled kind of cash,
tossed it in front of him andknelt down.
And then immediately LB took outhis beads, he closed his eyes,
(03:56):
and he shook in his palm, heshook it around in his palm and
swalked back in Tibetan.
And later I asked what was goingon, and he told me that these
are people that are makingpilgrimages.
And whenever they pass by atemple where there's a live
(04:16):
Buddha practicing, they wouldcome in first to ask for
blessing, and then two to ask iftheir trip would you know, would
it be successful?
Would they be okay?
Yeah, it's kind of just comingin and and getting your fortune
told for a brief second whileyou're getting blessing.
(04:38):
And then so I asked, what for?
What kind of pilgrimage?
I will look back and said theirdestination is the Jokhan
temple.
I was like, What?
Because if you recall, theJokhan temples are located in
Lhasa, and that's the capital ofTibet.
And before I go into why I wassurprised, the reason why they
(05:02):
go to this temple specificallyis because there stands a statue
of Buddha when he was 12, ayoung statue that looks like
Buddha when he was twelve, thatwas blessed by the Buddha
himself.
Not only is that significant,but in a historical context,
(05:24):
this is also the first time inancient history that the Chinese
Han people first engaged withTibetans.
So back in ancient China, duringthe Tang dynasty, they were
worried about securing theirborders.
And in ancient Tibet, there wasa Tobo dynasty, or Tubo in
(05:44):
Chinese.
That's the ancient word foractually Tibet.
And they all constantly harassthe borders of the Tang dynasty.
So in order to reach some sortof peace agreement, the emperor
decided to marry their princess.
It's actually his niece, not hisdaughter, marry a princess to
(06:05):
Tubo.
And this princess, very famous,Princess Wen Chen.
It is perhaps the first time theChinese, ancient Chinese and
ancient, first had diplomaticcontact.
(06:28):
And so the Tubo leader asked tomarry their princess.
Legitimate.
But with her, she brought thesestatues of Buddha.
Because back then, Tubo dynastydid not believe in Buddhism yet.
They had their own religion.
(06:49):
It was called the Bin.
It sounds kind of creepy.
That's their old form ofreligion where they worship the
supernatural, some demons, um,different deities, different
gods.
It was kind of like voodoo inTibet.
There was a lot of rituals, alot of evil things you can
(07:10):
actually do too.
I've heard a lot of stories.
I can share with that with you alittle later on.
And so besides the statue beingblessed by Buddha sitting right
in that temple, it also carriesspecial significance where
Tibetans decided to bringBuddhism to Tibet.
(07:33):
And so they've hired theytechnology they really did hire
a spiritual master, believed tobe from Afghanistan or Pakistan,
to Tibet to teach.
And that's where TibetanBuddhism originated from.
And that's where everythingyou've been hearing or seeing,
all that mystic stuff, that'swhere it derived from.
(07:57):
This visit, this temple, thisstatue.
So as a result, they alsoworship the Princess Wen Chang.
I've seen many of her statuesaround Tibet.
And she had to put herselfforward on this great task.
Because if most of you don'tunderstand, life was hard in
(08:18):
ancient Tibet.
Life is hard in Tibet now.
Can you imagine a thousandsomething years ago how life was
there?
And to be a princess in the Tangdynasty at the height of Chinese
rule, to be a princess there andthen to travel 2,000 miles to
the land of the barbarians to bemarried to the leader of what
(08:41):
was seen to the Chinese asbarbarians, nomads, outsiders.
And that's the fate of mostprincesses in China.
They were sacrificed politicallyto keep the border safe.
But she had a very significantimpact on what she did.
(09:03):
Tibet honestly flourishedafterwards.
They invented their own form ofwriting and language, their own
religion, culture, and societyeventually formed around that.
So now I finally know that theseTibetans, because of their
faith, they need to visit theJokan temple once in their life.
(09:27):
But not only do they need tovisit there, they need to walk
there.
And it's not even walking, to behonest, it's doing burpees all
the way to Lhasa, modifiedburpees.
Let me explain to you a littlebit.
So you have a visualization.
The picture you see on thisepisode is this lady on the road
(09:49):
holding her hands up above herhead.
Okay, so that's the first thingyou do.
You hold your hand in prayer,you put it above your head, and
then you place the hand close toyour chin, and then last time,
the third time, to your chest.
This means your body, yourspeech, and your mind.
(10:11):
It's kind of like a uh a ritualwhere you cleanse those aspects.
And then afterwards, you kneeldown and you lie flat on the
ground with your hands pointedstraight forward and your
forehead hitting the ground ifnecessary.
Not hitting it, but placedgently.
So technically, your entire bodyhas to be flat, and you get back
(10:34):
up, you walk to where yourhandprint was, and you do it all
over again.
You get it?
So you start from a startingline, you do one to Ben Burpee,
we're gonna call it that, andthen get back up, walk a couple
of steps to where their handwas, and do that, and that's how
(10:55):
they move forward.
They don't take an extra steppast that.
Their body needs to lie in theentire track that they travel
from their hometown to the Jokantemple in Lhasa, Tibet.
And so this kind of kneelingkowtau method or Tibetan burpee
(11:16):
is has significant impact inyour society.
You will constantly see them doit.
Because, well, I'm not going togo into too much detail of why
they're doing it, because thespiritual master said so, of
course.
But it's part of their faithsystem where everyone, besides
going to Talasa, visiting thistemple once in their lifetime,
(11:36):
everyone of the Tibetan Buddhistfaith should complete a hundred
thousand of these, at least intheir lifetime.
So I've done it.
It took me shit, it took me 12years, on and off, 12 years.
It took both of my kids four.
They woke up every morning, did100 a day.
(11:58):
It would take you roughly threeyears.
So it took them four because youknow obviously we had vacation,
sick days.
That was already the fastest wecan do it.
But we did it at the comfort ofour own house in front of like
our Buddhist statues.
But the Tibetans, they were onthe road, exposed.
(12:23):
Finally, to put into perspectiveof how far this is, okay, Elbe's
Monastery is located in XinglongCounty in Sichuan province.
Okay, if I walk the north path,which is slightly longer, by
maybe a couple miles, I believe,which is the 317.
I think that the south path iscalled the 318, 317 is the north
(12:46):
path.
That route from the monastery inXinglong to Lhasa Tibet is 2,000
kilometers or 1,200 milesroughly.
That's the same distance fromNew York to Florida, or for my
European friends, from Paris toAthens, Greece.
(13:08):
Okay, not to mention the averageelevation across this path is
well over 3,000 meters.
From one point you'll pass apeak, it's called Chirra Sign or
the Trader Mountain in Chinese.
That's over 5,000 meters.
That's almost two-thirds upMount Everest.
(13:29):
I did, I did take a picture of ayak up there once.
He wasn't moving much either.
But back then I was in a car.
I couldn't imagine what it wouldbe like to walk past it.
And my ears wouldn't stopringing when I was driving
across.
I don't want to think what wouldhappen if I really made the trip
(13:52):
entire trip with them.
That's straight up insane.
And it was very intense too toeven think about it.
I don't even like to hike inAmerica.
I don't even like to go onwalks.
I hate camping too.
unknown (14:05):
Right?
SPEAKER_00 (14:06):
Pay to be homeless.
So this was definitely not mything.
So it just.
And while I sat there stillsurprised, you know, LB told me
that his mother had done it nottoo long ago.
(14:27):
He pretty much just mocked me.
Because this lady was like 65 atthe time.
And so what he meant was, Ithink my mom did it too.
Stop being a little bitch.
And so LB suggested right afterthat I should go with them for a
week.
And that he'll come pick me upafter.
(14:50):
So he sent his younger brother,also a monk, called him Little
Bro.
He didn't speak much.
Well, actually, he didn't speakany Chinese.
He only spoke Tibet.
We kind of just did it signlanguage style.
And so I had no idea what I wasgetting myself into.
I knew it was not going to befun.
And I didn't even know where tobegin asking questions.
(15:13):
I didn't have much time tothink.
So little bro tapped me on theshoulder and he gave me a bunch
of equipment.
And for my hands, I had theselike wooden clogs with a strap
nailed inside where I can holdonto it, and that's where my
hands go down.
Other people had on leather,like thick leather gloves, all
(15:34):
sorts of stuff, whatever youcould get your hands on.
And I was just wearing my ownshoes.
They said to tie some cloth onit so it doesn't, you know, it
doesn't uh you don't it doesn'tget wet as easily, I guess, and
put it put a bag over it.
Um it's like okay, and also Ihad the knee pads, I had an
(15:55):
apron, it wasn't as that thick,but it was still a good enough
apron to keep uh the ground offmy clothes, I guess.
And there was nothing for myforehead, and they said just
don't put your forehead on thestreet.
So he told me to pack someclothes, some some things to
clean myself off with if Ineeded to put it in a book bag
(16:18):
or something, the meals or themotorcycles that are following
will carry it.
And for food.
And we'll get to that in a sec.
So having said that I can't passthe length of my hand extension,
I have to walk up rightafterwards.
(16:39):
Given that I did 2,000 the firstday, I did 1500 next, and then a
thousand, and then just around500 the rest of the days.
And you had no idea how muchpain it was after day one.
These burpees are for oldpeople, it looks like it's for
(16:59):
old people, but if you dothousands of them a day, it
hurt.
I was hungry, I felt a littleburnt out, and I felt every
single muscle in my body.
Blisters didn't form until daythree.
I was very lucky.
But I think I should have pacedmyself.
I uh lagged behind everybody byday three.
(17:21):
Actually, I think I laggedbehind everybody on day two.
Yeah, they I think they wentaround 3,000.
Um, they did 3,000 um burpees aday.
Yeah, and I only did 2,000 thefirst day.
I think I probably lost them onthe first day, yeah.
And it was embarrassing becauseI was probably the youngest one.
I was in good shape, or Ithought I was.
(17:43):
I didn't get any altitudesickness either.
So I didn't know.
It was just too mentally it wasmore mentally frustrating than
it was physical.
We slept out in the open atnights, except for one night,
uh, because it was raining.
And it was cold as fuck.
And so Little Bro brought mesomewhere, this this where a
(18:07):
local Tibetan was living, likethis hut.
He spoke to him a bit, and helet us share his fireplace.
Oh, and a little about a bitabout fireplace in Tibet.
To keep that running, they don'tuse only wood.
Like you can't just be choppingwood to keep that fire running,
especially when it's cold.
So what they do is they use uhdried yak shit.
(18:30):
Like they even use that to pastethe house to avoid humidity or
to, I don't know, I guess tostrengthen it.
But there was it didn't smell.
It was just it was really clean,to be honest, and they put that
inside the fire along with thewood and it helped it burn a lot
longer.
So, in terms of food, we hadzamba.
(18:51):
It was like what I describedbefore, it was flour dough, plus
barley, and some other stuff.
It was gross.
It was chewing, it was kind oflike chewing on play-doh with
sesame seeds inside.
That's exactly what it tasteslike.
It didn't taste like anything.
But if you ate enough of it, itdoes fill you up.
It's easy to carry.
You could just mold it and stuffit anywhere.
(19:13):
You could even bring the powderand just mix it yourself while
you're on the road.
So that was our main source offood.
And for some reason, it kept megoing.
I only did when I went to thehut, he also gave me a bowl of
kind of I think it was crushedcauliflower.
I killed it, I destroyed it.
(19:34):
I was so hungry by that day, andI was wet too.
After I dried my clothes, I justpassed out.
Uh next morning, you know, Ijust kept going.
Like that trip really, this justshort voids really humbled me.
I started losing my mind.
I didn't understand theirlanguage.
(19:54):
No, nobody was talking.
Mostly they were just praying tothemselves, mumbling some
things.
And so I started joining them.
I started, you know, doing somechanting, some mumbling.
And when I got bored, it justgot even worse after that.
Extreme boredom, where you justare so in tune to what you're
(20:15):
doing at the moment.
As irrelevant as you may thinkit is, you're so focused at the
moment that you reach a state offlow.
That's all you're thinkingabout.
Your mind, body, soul allfocused on this one burpee that
you're doing.
And I remember vividly at onepoint that the scene from
(20:37):
Forrest Gump when he ran acrossAmerica, when he said he had a
lot of time to think.
You know, no phone, nothing.
Just me, my movement, and thenever-ending role you see ahead.
So, anyways, if I kept my paceon day one, okay, let's just say
(21:00):
I did 1800 burpees a day.
I kept that pace every singleday.
And I'm under six foot with myarms extended, let's just say
six foot with my arms extended.
Okay, that would equal a littlebit over three kilometers or
almost two miles per day.
(21:21):
So if I kept up that pace, Iwould make it to Lhasa in around
two years.
But most people make it in thefastest.
I've heard LP told me from theirmonastery, they made it in nine
months.
And a week passed.
It passed by rather quick.
(21:44):
The first day or two, it was sohard to endure.
But when you reach that flow,you know, you feel like you're
floating.
It didn't feel that horribleanymore.
And so I finally reached mydestination on day seven.
(22:06):
I didn't shower.
Um, I didn't stink either.
Not because I'm Asian or I havedeodorant or not, it was just
maybe something in the air, justlike the cow shit.
If you put that shit down here,it'll probably stink.
But there, for some reason, theair will just circulate so well.
You know, it's hard to reallystink or you smell the stench
unless you're like nose up toit.
(22:28):
And if you had to go, you justshat or pissed in the bushes, or
men and women.
The ladies would go down furtherinto the bushes or have a drape
covering them.
And so I saw LB pull up in hisbroken down car, once again
smiling, mocking.
Okay, because the truth is Ijust made it down the mountain
(22:52):
that the monastery was on.
I was barely 10 kilometers out.
And the hut that I stayed atthat I mentioned before, that
was a relative of Lai Buddha.
I thought the trip was so long,but it was so it was
embarrassing.
I just made it down the mountainbarely.
(23:15):
I spent at least two daysrecovering.
Uh, blisses all over my foot,and I knew they were mocking me
too.
I couldn't understand what theywere saying, but I knew they
were talking about me.
And so that was quite theexperience I wanted to share
with you.
And if you ever get the chanceto travel to Tibet and you see
people like that on the streets,you'll know why.
(23:38):
It was very amazing to see.
And I don't know if I have thatkind of determination to make it
all the way there for themonastery.
Uh that's just too much.
But maybe.
Maybe one day I, if this podcastblows up, I'll podcast my way,
my two years, my two yearjourney to Lhasa.
That'd be pretty cool, right?
But, anyways, this episode'sbeen long enough.
(23:59):
Thank you for uh tuning in.
And again, happy Thanksgiving.
I'll see you on the nextepisode.
Peace.
Popular Podcasts
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.