Crimewatch Tibet / Wet Wet Wet

From Xiahe its back in the car with guide Lilly and driver whose name we've rudely failed to find out, from the city up, up, up into the mountains and grasslands beyond. A half day travel ahead to the little town of Langmusi where we'll spend the next night. On the way, stop by the roadside adjacent to some Nomad tents and disembark to go and make parley with the locals. yes, its one of those tow-curling live-like-the-natives encounters that are embarrassing not only for the sense of intrusion into someone else's private lives but also the utter contrivance of the whole thing. A more pragmatic view says it puts money in people's pockets where its needed, so whatever - we put on our best pleased-to-meet-you faces and trudge up the embankment to meet our new friends.
We are introduced to a young woman in her early twenties with two small children and a coterie of baby yaks to look after. The tent is a kind of temporary home put up by Nomad families whilst tending to their flocks over the summer months. We are ushered inside, given a mug of green tea from the stove heated by yak poop (nowt wasted here) and then offered some food - a local porridge but not exactly that, more like a paste made from oatmeal, yak butter, sugar and sour dried cheese. It tastes as good as it sounds, and after a polite nibble or two we go back to sipping our teas. A while later, making polite conversation as ever, Sian enquires (via Lilly) of the young woman whether her husband owns a motorbike (the de-rigeur transport of the Grassland Nomad, apparently). The question is met by an embarrassed silence on the part of our hostess, explained when it comes clear that the husband in question is currently behind bars at her majesty's pleasure (or whatever) serving a stretch for his part in the recent "Spring Fight". This is an (apparently) annual event - basically a no-holds barred fist and knife fight between neighbouring Nomad families over perceived incursions onto their land by the other families yaks. Once over her embarrassment the young woman seemed pretty chipper about it all, and later we reflected whether just maybe she might be better off without hubby around... This rather lawless tale was still in our minds when, a few miles later, we pass through a small town which Lilly explains was until relatively recently the local epicentre of highway robbery - cars stopped by villagers demanding money or face violence in return. Things apparently came to a head when a Chinese tourist was attacked and raped. Since this tourist also happened to be the sister in law of the provincial governor, the consequences for the village and its inhabitants were both immediate and profound. Since then, trouble has been thin on the ground...
So then to Lagamusi - a town of some 4000 souls straddling a provincial border, Sichuan on one side of the main street, Gansu on the other, monasteries attached to each. We dump at our hotel then set off with Lilly to explore the poorer Sichaun monastery (Kertigompa). This otherwise pleasant excursion was enlivened by the rain which started to fall as we left our hotel and proceeded to hammer down for the entire 90 minutes until we came back. A good opportunity to break out the wet weather wear and see just how bad cheap Chinese rain-ponchos can be. Answer - very, very bad indeed.
Will close with just a quick word about food which we've been a bit remiss in commenting on thus far. Had been warned in certain quarters not to expect it to taste like Chinese at home, and to be prepared for the unexpected - as in, chicken beaks and fish eyes in the soup / stew  /noodles  etc etc.  Well, basically that's all bollocks - or else we've just been amazingly lucky. Almost without exception, the food on our travels to date has been excellent - fresh, tasty, plentiful and almost stupidly cheap. The beer's been OK too, although we did notice last night in Xiahe that the Tsingtao tasted noticeably weaker than we remembered it. Then we started thinking about what Lilly had told us about Tibetan men and propensity for drunken violence, and that got us wondering. Surely, surely, the Han Chinese authorities wouldn't go about watering the beer. Would they???