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Firemen in monasteries guard Tibetan relics

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-02-23 19:52

To believers and visitors, the old scriptures, wooden artifacts, and colorful prayer flags in the Lhasa's Potala Palace, the former winter palace of the Dalai Lamas, are priceless treasures. But to Logsang Nyancha, they are fire risks. 

This June 16, 2007 file photo shows the Potala Palace, the most recognizable landmark and a world cultural heritage site, in southwest China's Tibet autonomous region. [Agencies]

Logsang is deputy head of the palace fire brigade, charged with protecting the cultural relics in Tibet's most recognizable landmark and a world cultural heritage site listed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization in 1994.    

At 3,763 meters above sea level, the Potala Palace is the largest building in Tibet and embodies the finest aspects of construction, painting and religious art in Tibet.    

An ethnic Tibetan, Logsang has worked in the palace since graduating from military school in 2004, but he learned about the fire risks long before. 

A short circuit in electrical wiring started a blaze in one of  the prayer halls late one night in 1984, in the days before the palace had resident fire fighters. The fire brigade arrived as soon as they received the call, but it took three hours and the help of monks and nearby residents to extinguish the fire.    

More than ten Tibetan calligraphists took four years to rewrite some 20,000 pages of the Tengyur, the Tibetan collection of  commentaries to the Buddhist teachings, which was half burned in the fire. It also cost many skillful craftsmen five years to repair the prayer hall.    

The next day, a team of 10 firemen, including Logsang's father, Qiongda, was stationed in the palace.    

"I learned about the fire in my childhood. When I had to choose my college major, I decided on fire fighting without hesitation,"  Logsang says.    

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