MOSUO RELIGIOUS FESTIVAL

Immediately at the entrance Buddhist lama's occupy the small house with their ceremonies. Although being a (Goddess) fertility festival, the presence of the monks is felt everywhere

We had intentionally chosen to come at festival time. The Mosuo clearly keep this for themselves, for there were hardly any tourists. That doesn't mean they rejected us. On the contrary openness and friendliness all over the place

People climbing the Holy Mountain on their way to the Fertility Temple

Young girls circling the temple counter-clockwise, throwing corn and rice on the earth, proof of the pre-Buddhist fertility (Bön) origin of their ritual

Elderly Uncle with members of "his" clan

Fire sacrifices are being made

The Sacrificial Fire

The Fire is taking care of by Grandmother's

Down the hill again

Without any hesitation people were willing to be photographed

Lama with girl

Green Man with Wise Women!

Kindness is infectious

One of the many "Elderly Uncles"

A Chinese who lived four years among the Mosuo acknowledges of course the central position of women. However, he said, in practice it very much comes down to a duty-sharing model for women and men

The scene is very colorful. The pilgrimage is a unique event. People from the entire Mosuo territory come to share their common belief. Such a "creative chaos" is very beneficial for body, soul and spirit. Despite physical strain from climbing the slope, we felt uttery refreshed and joyful while leaving

Also at the end of the tour once again the lama "guardians"

On the tent the "breasts symbol"

ON THE ROAD TO THE HOLY GODDESS MOUNTAIN

The view is flabberghasting

He probably also thinks that!

A steep staircase of several hundreds of meters

Close to the rocks the sanctuary. Just a very common small Buddhist temple. I asked the monk (below) where the Goddess was. O, he said, quite a time ago we already have destroyed Her and built our own temple. A first hand proof about the situation. The Buddhists didn't come peacefully to the Mosuo. To the contrary, they submitted the latter by force! Despite that we gave the monk one of our wooden Dutch tulips, "praying for a better karma" for him

What they did (could) not destroy is the Goddess Cave

A pre-Buddhist shrine....

......with sacred stove

On our way back to the "civilized" world the river Jangtze