Impact of modernization

Like most other Chinese cities, Lhasa is prosperous with designer outlets, billboards and an ever expanding fleet of private cars. Official figures said that of the 300,000 permanent Lhasa residents, every fourth person owns a private car.

The economic boom, however, goes in tandem with a series of developmental problems.

With the growing number of autos, most Lhasa citizens are beginning to feel the pinch of congestion, drivers also complain it is increasingly difficult to find a parking lot, and the problem has deteriorated the plateau's environment, which was already troublesome due to climate change and retreating glaciers.

Across the plateau region, prostrating pilgrims, prayer flags, prayer wheels, suffocating incense and other icons of traditional Tibetan life are seen side by side with Coca Cola and Budweiser billboards, designer clothing outlets and pop music starring Chinese and international stars.

As a result, clashes are becoming more frequent between the call for modernization and an economic boom and an urge to maintain the Tibetans' own icons - its unique language, religion, art and virtually every aspect of its cultural and social life.

For nearly half a century, Tashi Tsering, 82, has been raising funds to build schools in Tibet's villages which emphasize the Tibetan language and culture.

"Schools in Tibet should teach all subjects, including modern science and technology in Tibetan, so as to preserve our traditional language," he said in a letter to Tibet's regional People's Congress.

Tashi Tsering is one of the most enthusiastic advocates of preserving traditional Tibetan culture.

A former member of the Dalai Lama's personal dance troupe, Tashi Tsering disliked old Tibet's theocratic ruling elite. He studied in the United States and returned to Tibet in 1964, hoping to contribute to his home region's development.

He spent six years in jail during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), and became a professor of English at Tibet University in Lhasa after he was officially exonerated in 1978.

Tashi Tsering's cause to revive traditional culture, however, faces difficulties under the impact of modernization and the influx of new products and ideas from other parts of China and abroad.

The Tibetans, for example, have joined the global craze for Apple Inc.'s iPhone. Many people, from office workers and young business executives to monks at Lhasa's major monasteries, bought the latest model, the iPhone 4, shortly after it was launched.

Yet the iPhone does not have a name in the Tibetan language, or even in Mandarin Chinese. "We just borrow its English name and call it iPhone," said Pempa Tsering, a white-collar worker in Lhasa.

Pempa Tsering and his Tibetan colleagues love the iPhone because it supports a Tibetan typing software and a Tibetan-Chinese dictionary. "I always remind myself not to forget my mother tongue," he said.

Also, amid the economic boom and its threat on Tibet's identity, the central and local governments have spent heavily to preserve its culture, religion, arts and other Tibetan icons.

Starting in the 1980s, the central government spent at least 1.3 billion yuan reinforcing major religious sites, including the Potala, the Jokhang Temple and Lhasa's three major monasteries, Drepung, Ganden and Sera.

Poverty, however, remains a critical issue in Tibet.

At the end of last year, Tibet still had half a million people living in poverty, earning less than 1,700 yuan a year, the local poverty relief office said in a press release earlier this year.

This was, however, only about half the 2005 figure, thanks to a number of poverty-relief projects carried out in the past five years, it noted.

It said the central and local governments were determined to lift more people out of poverty in the coming decade by providing vocational training for farmers and herders, upgrading infrastructure, fostering Tibetan-specific industries, such as traditional arts and crafts, tourism, food and herb processing, and eradicating endemic conditions that prevented people from earning a living.

Meanwhile, the central government has pledged "leapfrog development" and "lasting stability" in Tibet in the coming decade.

By 2020, the per capita net income of farmers and herders in Tibet should be close to the national level, according to the plan announced last year.

Tibet's economy has steered into one of the fastest growing periods in history, with hefty investment in infrastructure construction projects, including airports, highways and railways.

Among the most important projects were an extension of the Qinghai-Tibet railway from Lhasa to Xigaze, Gunsa Airport in the northern Ngari Prefecture, Bangda Airport of Qamdo, and a 100,000-kilowatt photovoltaic plant in Ngari.

Tibet will start building another extension of the plateau railway, from Lhasa to Nyingchi, in the coming five years, according to the region's plan for economic and social development in the 2011-2015 period.

"The clashes between traditional culture and social and economic exist in every culture," said Lhasa-based Tibetologist Drongbu Tsering Dorje. "But preservation of traditions must not become barriers to hinder the overall progress of our society."

As he sees it, economic development is crucial for the prosperity of the snowland.

When he was giving a presentation at a French university, Drongbu Tsering Dorje said a student openly accused the Chinese government of the extinction of traditional Tibetan culture.

"Is it fair for you guys to enjoy every comfort of a modern world, watching with curiosity how the Tibetans still suffer in a Medieval society?" he asked.

The entire audience was hushed.