LHASA, March 28 (Xinhua) -- Palha Manor in Gyangze County under Xigaze in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region is the only remaining aristocratic manor of the 12 such manors in old Tibet.
It is kept in its original shape as a museum, where one can see the luxurious lifestyle of the masters and the tragic fates of the serfs in the past.
Palha Manor is a three-story building with 57 rooms and a combined floor space of over 5,000 square meters.
The treasure house is full of fur clothes, fine china bowls, and expensive ornaments made of turquoise, agate, and other precious stones.
Louis Vuitton handbag, Omega watch, Montblanc pen, Scotch whisky, those on display were daily items for the Palha family in the 1950s.
The family had 37 manors, over 1,000 hectares of land, 12 farms, more than 14,000 livestock and 3,000 serfs in their heyday, according to people familiar with the manor's history.
However, the serfs lived a miserable life with no land but only endless labor.
When they finally got some rest, 60 serfs had to cram into a low and damp yard of 150 square meters, with each living with an average of 2.5 square meters.
In 1959, people in Tibet launched a democratic reform that ended the region's feudal serfdom and freed a million serfs, or more than 90 percent of its population at the time.
The Palha family fled overseas, deserting the manor, which later became a protected site.
Over the past 64 years, Tibet has progressed from darkness to light, from poverty to prosperity, and from autocracy to democracy.
In 2022, Tibet's regional GDP reached 213.3 billion yuan (about 31.1 billion U.S. dollars), representing a giant leap from the 1959 figure of a mere 174 million yuan.
The average life expectancy in Tibet soared from about 35 years before 1959 to over 72 years in 2021.
Produced by Xinhua Global Service
