Shoton means yogurt banquet. The festival has its roots in the tradition of lay people offering yogurt to monks emerging from a period of summer retreat, and it grew into the most important public festival of the Lhasa year. It falls in the sixth or seventh Tibetan month, which usually places it in August in the Western calendar.
The thangka unfurling
The festival opens before dawn at Drepung Monastery, west of Lhasa, where an enormous appliqued thangka of the Buddha is carried up the hillside and unrolled down a sloping platform. Pilgrims and visitors come long before sunrise to see the unveiling and to receive blessings. The crowd is very large and the walk up from the parking area takes time.
Tibetan opera
For the days that follow, Tibetan opera troupes perform in Norbulingka, the former summer palace and park. Ache Lhamo, as it is known in Tibetan, is a masked opera tradition with roots in the fourteenth century, combining singing, dance, elaborate costumes and long narrative stories taken from Buddhist literature. Performances run all day and the audience comes and goes, eating and drinking in the park as they watch.
The food
Yogurt is the festival dish, and stalls selling it thick and tart in large bowls spring up across the city. Families also picnic in the parks on sweet tea, momos, dried meat and fruit. If you are in Lhasa during Shoton, expect hotels to be full and roads around Drepung to be closed to private cars.
Practical notes
Dates move with the Tibetan lunar calendar, so confirm the exact days locally before planning. Arrange the Drepung visit through your guide, arrive very early, and dress in layers; the pre-dawn wait is cold even in August. The Norbulingka opera performances are easier to attend casually and are a good introduction.
