ཇ་ཨེ་འཐུང་། ཟ་མ་ཨེ་ཟོས།

This photo was taken my friend's sister took on her trip through Lhasa. It's of a tea house by the name of Toilet Tea House. It's real. Supposedly there used to be a public toilet (like there are throughout Tibet) where the tea house now stands and hence it was aptly named. Perhaps it's important to note that the Chinese is a transliteration and NOT a translation! Can I invite you for a cup of ... tea?

My friend's comment on his sisters photo was "Did you drink any tea? Did you eat anything?" (Tibetan in the title to this post). It's interesting to note that there are two ways to conjugate the verb za, to eat.

1.)   མ་འོངས་པ། བཟའ། ད་ལྟ་བ། ཟ། འདས་པ། བཟས། སྐུལ་ཚིག ཟོ།

or

2.)  མ་འོངས་པ། བཟའ། ད་ལྟ་བ། ཟ། འདས་པ། ཟོས། སྐུལ་ཚིག ཟོ།

Basically the difference is with the past tense form, not with the meaning. It seems that the first is more prevalent in Central Tibet and the second in Eastern Tibet. Also on that note, in Central Tibet they prefer to use the word gsang spyod for toilet which is also understood in Eastern Tibet although they more often use spyod khang. At any rate, please enjoy yourself a nice tea today!