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If you are despairing enough, please go to Motuo; if you are brave enough, please go to Motuo.
The first time I knew about Motuo was in Anny Baby’s new novel ‘Lotus’. In the preface, she says, “The way to Motuo is very dangerous. I must remind you- don’t go there!” However, the documentary film on Motuo impressed me enough to be interested in this place.
The documentary shows Motuo as a place separated from the outside world. The only way to go there is to either take the helicopter or to go on foot. A backpacker unconsciously set foot to Motuo. It was a snowy November when the protagonist arrived there. After a few days, the muddy mountain roads were sealed by the storm. During those days, she met a group of bearers. In a simple wooden inn, she accepted a suggestion to hire a bearer to help her out of the mountain. This bearer happened to be her fellow townsman, from Sichuan. That night, she used her video camera to shoot many pictures and images. The image of the bearer flashed past her screen quickly. It was heard that the bearers have strong intentions of protecting themselves because they work in severe and extreme conditions. However the bearer protected her all the way in the heavy storm and finally helped her out of Motuo. Months later, she received a call that said that the man who had saved her had died in the snowy mountains after an unsuccessful attempt by him to save other people. She couldn’t believe what she heard and was very sorrowful. On recovering, she made a decision to find his family. But all she could rely on was his image in her video camera. No one knew any information about him or his family, not even his bearer friends. She spent a year searching around Sichuan and her search continues…
This documentary inspired me to know more about Motuo. A lot of reading helped me understand why Anny Baby names her new book ‘Lotus’. In Tibetan Buddhism, Motuo is a pure land with lotuses. This is the only town that has no roads connecting to the outside world. Every November, there is an onslaught of heavy snowfall and it melts only the next year in June. Being a subtropical zone, this area receives rains all through summer. Along the muddy roads are leeches, visible everywhere. The special geologic environment causes the place to occasionally have landslides and mudflows. Motuo is the most difficult destination to get to, and to most backpackers, going into Motuo is the road to death. This place however continues to be a paradise for backpackers. Every year it welcomes all the pilgrims not only from China but also from all over the world. Just for a day’s stay in Motuo, travelers brave the snow covered mountains and steep cliffs. This isolated place, which is 4,000 meters above sea level, is attracting the brave and offering a challenge to many.
Why do so many people walk into Motuo? It seams all are searching for an indefinable spiritual sustenance. In the novel Lotus, Shan Sheng goes to Motuo in search of his true love. He had to face landslides, mudflows and storms, but he finally arrived at Motuo, the home of his soul. When you are determined to go to a place, a place that brings you so close to death, you must have faith and trust your heart. Motuo is a destination for the despaired and adventurous people to take, because the former fears not Death; while the latter is challenging Death always. The irony is that whoever arrives there, feels a deep respect for life. Motuo rejuvenates the people who go there to find comfort.
English to Chinese: Sands on Sands － Touch of the Sahara
Source text - English Written by: Godwin Tengey Translated by: Li Yanbo
The first thing that comes to mind when the Sahara is mentioned is sand and lots of it even without adding its family name “desert”. For popular imagination, this notion is right. However, the Sahara is more than just sand. In point of fact, only a fourth of the desert is sand- the rest is vast plains covered with all sorts of rock, plateaus from fine and exquisite rocks, and volcanic mountains.
Being the world’s largest desert , this gigantic spectacle of nature can be as gentle as it can be rough. Even though sand accounts for only a quarter of the Sahara, it is the most devastating force of the desert. Advancing gradually each day, the desert is swallowing up most of Northern and Western Africa but ironically that which is eating up mankind is that which makes the desert appealing- the Sand Dunes . Some of these dunes can range over hundreds of kilometres and reach up to 300m (1,000ft) in height. The very large ones are called star dunes.
Hollywood over the years have shown through movies what sand can do but to be realistic no matter the level of technology or visual effects, Hollywood can portray just a little of what actually happens on the Sahara. The wonders of the sand wells – their depths, the speed and efficiency with which they claim their victims is still a mystery to even the desert dwellers. In this abundance of sand it comes as no surprise that desert storms can whip up walls of sand a mile high with tremendous pace and ferocity that it will probably take a “desert F1 race car” to out-pace them. Locals always tell countless tales of large caravans, oases, unfortunate travellers and even entire armies being swallowed and buried by these legendary sand storms. In fact more people get eaten or drown in the desert than they do of thirst and exposure. The desert can go long periods without rain but if it rains, it does so with such devastating ferocity most living creatures in its way are washed away by flash floods .
A saying that is very common among men goes, “a man can’t live with a woman still he can’t live without her”. A woman has the touch of mother nature; it can be extremely devastating or the touch of a lifetime. The Sahara desert is no exception. Of course it is not a domesticated element; it destroys and kills but it is also a spectacle, a wonder and sublime beauty to behold especially at night.
There are no modern skyscrapers or hotels or first level accommodations, only tents but no world-class five star luxury hotel views can compare to the luxurious night view that the Sahara provides and at no cost. The air gets so crisp, the sky so clear, and the canopy of stars so near the world gets smaller all around you and within your grip. The peace, tranquility and silence that sweep across this vast absolutely gorgeous plain is so real you could almost reach out and touch. It is almost always windy but according to desert dwellers when it stops, the silence is so intense you can hear the earth turn.
For an experience of a lifetime and sublime touch from nature visit the Sahara Desert; be it at daytime or night this place will leave a very deep and lasting impression on you. Its one place everyone, if the opportunity knocks, should see and these fine sands on sands will not disappoint you.
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