I got back from Tibet on Sunday the 26th. As I got off the express train that runs from Domodedovo Airport to Paveletskaya Metro on the circle line, I had a bizarre and entirely unexpected feeling of coming home. I told Aubergine about it, and he said I'm sucked in now, Moscow's got me, I'm one of "us" now, there's no escape. Shudder.

Tibet was...I can't think of an adjective. What a bizarre interaction between my group and the place. Cast of characters:

Tyler, my friend from the geology summer thesis program. He's getting his masters in geology (salt tectonics) and planning on working in the oil industry for a while (I love the new breed of environmentally-minded but steelily ('steely' should have an adverb) pragmatic recent college grads). He spent all summer in the field with...

Thomas. Enormous gravitational pull in a group. Entertaining, considerate, smart, decisive, stunning green eyes. There was a certain chemistry between us from the get-go (funny how quickly "I'll never be happy with someone who's not with me intellectually every step of the way" turns into "I'm a thinker and he's a doer and that's perfect"...) but nothing came of it. It might have made for weirdness in the group, and it would have felt like a betrayal of Tyler, perhaps for no reason in particular. (Pineapple: "Did you pull?" Me: *pause* *long-winded explanation about the complexity of the situation...* Pineapple: "Right, whatever you want to tell yourself to feel better.")

Ward is Thomas's childhood friend. He's working in Beijing for a company that sets up hotels or something. As far as I can tell his job consists of listening to conference calls. He lives in an Ikea-perfect apartment in some sort of "international" building, well-insulated from actual Chinese people. For the last part of the trip he complained nonstop about the food, the weather, the people, you name it. He was always really kind to me, and it was great of him to put us up in Beijing, but I have no burning desire to keep in touch. (Damn, now that Americans are entering the picture I have to be vigilant about partitioning the blog-readers and the blogged-about).

Nelson is Thomas's college friend. He spent a couple years working for the Chicago stock exchange as one of those guys down on the floor who waves tickets around. That, combined with his carving out his own personal plush expansive territory in our tiny train-cabin, raised my hackles a bit, but he grew on me a lot as the trip went on. He's got this great, super-competent outdoorsy streak that he doesn't rub in your face, and he's 100% who he is and will accept you as the same.

Traveling with a group and traveling alone are like night and day. Half the time I felt almost like I was back in America hanging out with these guys and watching Tibet on TV. So much of my mental space was occupied by group stuff that the place itself almost seemed like an afterthought. It's impossible not to be struck by the contrasts in Lhasa between old Tibetan life and the new influx of Chinese, or by the tiny yak-herding towns with mud buildings draped in prayer flags, or by the opulence of the monasteries (is there any religion immune to gold and war?), or by, um, the Himalayas, but I felt much more removed from it all than ever before.

Granted, I've never been to a place where the lifestyle is so different from my own, and I'm sure that had a lot to do with my feeling of distance as well. It affirmed my choice of Russia as a place to live--I don't think I'd get as much out of a place where I felt like a complete outsider.