Synopses & Reviews
This is a riveting firsthand account by Blake Kerr, an American doctor who inadvertently walked into one of the grimmest scenes of political oppression in the world. Kerr was visiting Tibet with his old college friend John Ackerly. They were enjoying the sights and sounds of Lhasa, the capital of Tibet, and hitchhiking to Everest, where they "humped loads" for an American expedition assaulting the mountain. Upon returning to Lhasa, Kerr and Ackerly witnessed a series of demonstrations by Tibetan monks greater than anything witnessed by foreigners since China entered Tibet in 1949.
Synopsis
While traveling through Tibet in 1987 on his way to Everest, an American physician and his old college friend inadvertently walked into one of the grimmest scenes of political oppression in the world. Though they knew that Tibet had long been subject to Chinese military rule, their outrage grew as a series of demonstrations by Tibetan monks were swiftly and brutally quashed by Chinese forces. Arrested and briefly imprisoned for attempting to aid the rebels, they managed to alert the international media to their plight. Originally published in cloth by Noble Press (1993), this is the only personal account of the recent rebellions by a Westerner traveling in Tibet.
"The best account to date of the 1987 Tibetan uprising against Chinese police control in Lhasa and the subsequent crackdown on dissent. Blake Kerr captures the beauty, terror, and tragedy of Tibet". -- Washington Post