Yangbajing

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Yangbajing or Yangpachen, is a Tibetan town approximately 87 kilometers (54 miles) north-west of Lhasa, halfway to Damxung in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China. The town lies in an upland lush green valley surrounded by the tents of Nomads with grazing yak and sheep populating the hillside. The place is famous for its hot springs and produces much of the electricity for the capital through thermoelectricity with its power plant, bordering on a flat area of hot springs covering 16 sq/kilometer (6 sq/miles). The Thermoelectric power plant, established in 1976 was the first development of thermal power not only in Tibet but in the whole of China.

There is a remarkable Tibetan myth about Yangpachen. Thousands of years ago, before the sky and the earth was separated, the whole world was in total darkness and people living at the foot of Mount Nyainqentanglha were in despair. However, one morning, a golden phoenix flew to Yangpachen, determined to create brightness by sacrificing itself. It supposedly threw one of its bright eyes into the hands of a fairy which released a blanket of light through a lamp into the air as a blessing to the place. The snow capped peaks of nearby Mt. Nyainqentanglha appeared; meadows that resembled a giant green carpet emerged; and happiness and prosperity came to the Tibetan people. However, a wicked man near Yangpachen coveted the lamp. He was possessed by an evil witch man to sharpen his hatred into an arrow to shoot the lamp. The lamp was broken into many different pieces, and as the pieces of the lamp fell onto the ground, they turned into hot springs and burned the wicked man to death. People believed that the hot springs were the angry tears of the fairy.