The Secret of Shambhala: In Search of the Eleventh Insight by James Redfield

Instead I grabbed the canteen
     and a sack of food, ran behind the farthest mound, and hid in a place where I was out of sight but could still see what was
     happening.
    The vehicle slowed down. As it pulled up even with me, I realized it was the van we had seen earlier at the roadblock. The
     driver was the blond man whom the Chinese soldiers had been interrogating, and in the passenger seat was a woman.
    As I watched, they slowed the van to a complete stop and began to talk. I thought about going out and talking to them but
     immediately felt a flash of fear. What if the soldiers had alerted them about us, insisting that they be notified if we were
     seen? Would they turn me in?
    The woman opened her door slightly as though to get out, still talking with the man. Had they spotted the Jeep? My mind was
     running wild. I decided that if she got out and came over, I would just start running. That way, they would only get the Jeep,
     and I could put some distance between myself and this place before the officials came.
    With that thought in mind, I looked back at the van. The two were gazing toward the mounds, an expression of concern on their
     faces. They looked at each other one more time before the woman slammed her door shut, and they sped away toward the west.
     I watched the van crest the small hill to my left and disappear.
    Somewhere inside me I felt disappointed. Maybe they could have helped me, I thought. I considered running to the Jeep and
     overtaking them, but I dismissed the idea. Better not to tempt fate, I concluded. It was more prudent to go back to my original
     plan and attempt to find my way back to Lhasa and home.
    After about a half hour I returned to the Jeep and started the engine. The crow to my left squawked and flew down the road
     in the direction the Dutch van had gone. I turned the other way and headed back toward Zhongba, taking a series of small roadways,
     hoping to bypass the main streets and the restaurant. I made it several more miles before I reached the top of a hill. I slowed
     the Jeep as I crested the peak so that I could survey the long expanse of highway in the distance.
    When I got into a position to see, I was shocked. Not only was there a new roadblock set up half a mile down the mountain
     with dozens of soldiers, but I could count four big trucks and two Jeeps filled with troops heading my way, closing fast.
    I quickly turned the Jeep around and raced back in the direction I’d come, hoping they wouldn’t see me. I knew I would be
     lucky to outpace them. I reasoned that I should travel farther west as fast as I could, then bear south and east. Perhaps
     there were enough small roads that I could get back to Lhasa that way.
    I darted across the main street and into a series of side roads, again heading south. I turned a curve and realized I was
     going the wrong way. I had inadvertently returned to the main road again. Before I could stop, I was less than one hundred
     feet from another Chinese checkpoint. There were soldiers everywhere. I pulled over to the side of the road and put on the
     brake, then slid way down in the seat.
    Now what? I thought. Prison? What would they do to me? Would they think me a spy?
    After a few moments I noticed that the Chinese seemed oblivious to my presence, even though I was parked in plain sight. Old
     cars and carts and even pedestrians on bikes kept passing me, and the soldiers would stop them all and ask for identification,
     checking their papers and sometimes searching them. Yet they paid me no attention at all.
    I glanced to the right and realized that I was parked just short of a driveway that led up to a small, stone house, several
     hundred feet away. To the left of the house was a small lawn of uncut grass, and beyond the grass, I could see another street.
    Just at that moment a large truck drove past and stopped right in front of me, blocking my view of the checkpoint. Moments
     later a blue Toyota Land Cruiser driven by another