june 2ol2, Maquen, Qinghai, China

one night stretched to one week…very quick,  as my “Ama” every morning looked out of ONE of  her little guardhouse’s two windows  fenced within the area of local municipality office…2 windows (one covered) had 2 little small rooms and said, “Xue!” which meant “water”, didn’t look like it, but maybe later I thought…for me it meant I no go anywhere that day…she wouldn’t let me and instead fed me with home made bread and salty yak tea…Ah Ama, she knew!…

During the day will be trying to spot together with all of my ninjas if just one yatsa gunbu, I would be very happy yuuu huuuu!…2 days nothing, climbing on the hills, overtaking herds of yaks, up and down those wild grassy giants, mountain goats (one time the MOTORBIKE – look last photo , no.  84   – yeah dude, that’s high up on that ridge, u betch’ya!!!), crawling like a summer worm – true to its name, hm…giving those little visibility shield proof tails are a trip on its own…Just for the record and off statistics…found 2 within half an hour…that’s it, only that half hour I have in  caterpillar fungus hall of fame

There walking  on warm green grassy stretches of freedom, by praying flags multiplied by multiples of multiple multiples, I was given a tibetan name…“Lamu”… sound’s like “L’amour” so I take

there was no shower and toilet 70m away in the corner – one concrete building…simple…very much yes.

experienced beautiful human non-verbal connection,  can’t think of anything but: “xie xie Ama”…her last questions were when am I coming back…soon Ama, I hope soon…

more info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_sinensis, also documentary “Summer Pasture” shows the topic truly well, many people leave their traditional nomadic life and decide to move into towns and cities and to be solely dependent on income from chóng cǎo…this as u can imagine is causing big and vulnerable change in life patterns for future tibetan generations…

again…”xie xie Ama, xie xie…”