Rising above the holy city of Lhasa, the white walls and golden roofs of the Potala (BudalaGong) seem to grow out of the hill on which it stands. Now a museum, the palace is a labyrinth of rooms, interconnected with countless doors, corridors and stairways, galleries painted or draped with richly coloured silks, and filled with around 200,000 statues. The Potala served both as a monastery and government office. But above all, it was the residence of the Dalai Lamas, the god kings who ruled Tibet for more than 500 years, each one believed to be an incarnation of Avalokiteshwara, the Buddhist embodiment of compassion. The Dalai Lama is the head of the Yellow Hat sect of Tibetan Buddhism. A Mongolian phrase, Dalai Lama means ‘ocean of wisdom’. The 14th Dalai Lama was only 16 when Tibet was occupied by the Chinese in 1951, under whom he ruled in a limited capacity until 1959, after which he fled to India with 80,000 followers. Continue reading →