“I want to show you something,” said Andy, my Chinese friend. I met him and his girlfriend a couple of days before in Drango, a small Tibetan town in Western part of Chinese province of Sichuan. They were coming from Shanghai, both young and educated. She was a web designer and he a team-building advisor, traveling overland to Lhasa to escape for a while from the hectic life of a ultra developed mega city, to enjoy freedom, fresh air and learn Buddhism from Tibetan monks.

From Drango we traveled together to the biggest Buddhist institution in the world - Larung Gar Buddhist University, a metropolis of thousands of wooden huts and temples, hidden away in desolated reaches of Kham. For a while it was the place for aspiring Chinese to study Tibetan Buddhism. In the year 2000 ten thousand of them stayed there after renouncing the comfortable life of endless material development. Yet, the wilderness could not protect them. The government in Beijing was acutely aware of the dangerous trend, their fears fueled by recent negative experiences with Falun Gong. Half of the Larung Gar city was razed to the ground and almost all Chinese students expelled. Recently I shared a two-day train ride with a man from South China. He knew about the destruction of Larung Gar: “My friend was there at the time; she told me about it. The government was afraid that Tibetan monks will teach wrong things to the Chinese, that they will infect them with support for the Dalai Lama.”

Four years later, the police was still guarding Larung Gar University. Foreigners are not welcome and Chinese visitor are strictly controlled. But in China, there is always another way: “When the road is closed, you go around through the mountains.” And this I did, along with many others who have returned to continue their studies and retreats.

After the forbidden adventures in Larung Gar I decided to join Andy on his way to Ashuk - the birthplace of Tibetan warrior king Gesar. Not so long ago, Tibetans were thrown into jails for possessing an image of King Gesar. Nowadays he has become an all-Chinese hero, actively promoted throughout China by the government, as a historic leader with the vision of social justice and equality. As result, his home village has become a popular destination for many pilgrims from all parts of China.

So there we were, the three of us, stuck in the late spring snow, shivering in cold in a simple cement room. We passed around a Pepsi bottle of Tibetan sour beer - chang - and sang to keep us warm. Andy and the girl had inexhaustible repertoire of popular Chinese songs. Songs about the mysterious land of unearthly beauty and immaculate nature, about the land of flowers, blue skies, clear rivers and people with pure hearts - they were songs about Tibet.

This was something new to me, a stark contrast to my belief that Chinese look down on Tibetans, that they despise their backward culture and beliefs. During my stay in China I was again and again proven wrong on this point. When I visited a nearby monastery hundreds of Buddhists from all parts of China were there, attending the opening ceremonies of the new temple they helped to build. This was the eight new temple in that monastery, all of them build in the same way, with the money and support of Chinese who are increasingly turning towards Tibetan Buddhism for spiritual guidance. The growing public interest in the wisdom of Tibetan lamas in China could be compared with the similar thing happening in the West. Yet it is not the same, as Buddhism has been a part of Chinese culture and life since the 4th century, even before Buddhism was embraced by Tibetans. Throughout centuries Tibetans, Hans and other nationalities living in that inter-connected part of the world had relations of trade, culture and religion. Buddhism - and for that matter, closeness with Tibetan Buddhism - has become engraved deeply into the subconscious culture of Chinese people. A few decades of repression and cultural destruction were not enough to erase it.

Yet, most Chinese are unaware of the suffering that was imposed on Tibet by Mao’s actions half a century ago. How could they know? A unrealistically bright version of history is though in schools and shown in TV every day. Even Tiannanmen Square massacre is internal secret many Chinese know nothing of. But some people know. Andy knew: “Monks told me about what has happened to Tibet.” Young generation is less burdened with the myth of painless birth of a modern Chinese state, more open to admitting and discussing own shortcomings, more open to listen to others points of view. Even the central government exhibits some of this openness: leaders talk not only about miraculous economic growth, but more and more about the negative effects and dangers it has created - abuse of natural resources, ecology, social inequality and poverty and lack of opportunities in the western parts of the country, including Tibet.

I went to Tibet not to look for bad things, but to search for good ones, to find that which gives hope for the future, that what needs our support in order to prevail. We, Tibet supporters, are perhaps sometimes puzzled as to why His Holiness the Dalai Lama is so forgiving and approaching to the Chinese, as to why he gave up the sacred dream of independence. “Independence is old fashioned concept,” he says, “It is not relevant in this increasingly inter-connected world.” Perhaps he can see that Chinese - as human beings and as a society - have amazing potential for good; same potential that all of us have. Recognizing this basic goodness and encouraging it in one another, is perhaps the true essence and strength of the Tibetan movement.

“I want to show you something,” Andy said that evening, as we were freezing in our small cement room on the roof of the world, “I got it from one monk…” He reached deep inside the bowels of his backpack and pulled out a postcard size photo of a smiling monk, “…His Holiness the Dalai Lama… I always have it with me.”