Moon

September 17, 2010

When we arrived in Rambok, there were women washing their hair in the stream. Up above the houses, men were gathering hay and lashing bundles to donkeys. The mud-brick homes were simple, but the windows - with beautiful, carved wooden casings - elevated them from the mundane to the exotic and lovely.

One of the women in the river came over to us as she was brushing her hair and said, "home stay?" We nodded our heads wearily and followed her to one of the homes. Inside the entry, the floors and walls were made of mud. The woman led us to a curtained doorway and pointed inside. Taking off our shoes, we entered a lovely painted and carpeted room with many windows. Like the room in Lakrook, a small, built-in shelving unit displays photos, cut-outs from newspapers and other lovely, brightly colored baubles. It looks like a mini Buddhist altar (which it may very well be... I have no idea.).

Two pallets lie along the windows, and once he had dropped his pack, Joshua made a bee-line for one of them. Still on my feet, I drew back the simple white curtains to look out at the village and the valley. Just beyond the dusty, dunn mountains lie snow-capped, jagged mountains. In the East, the moon was rising over the mountains, and down below, donkeys were braying. Horses with bells munched on grass and their swaying movements made the most lovely sound. A woman was milking a yak. Men were herding goats with long curved horns (ibex?).

After a few minutes, the woman came back in bearing cups of tea and sweet, nutty cookies. We polished the whole tray off quickly, and when we were done, I left Joshua tucked under his blankets to go for a little walk with the camera.

Cameras simply cannot capture landscapes like this. I know I've mentioned this before, but it's true: the thing that makes these places so otherworldly, extraordinary is their scale, the way they sweep out before you, the way they make you feel so absolutely small and big at the same time. In the photos, the treeless mountains looks dry and barren, and the farmland looks just as meager. But up close, this place is surreal. It looks like photos taken of the moon. The people who live here farm and care for their animals, and clearly, it is not so meager that they haven't been able to live here since before the 10th century.

I walked a ways past the village. A couple of donkeys let me come close enough to run my hand down their noses, and then they trotted past me. Over a small stream and up a scree slope, I paused to sit and watch the moon rise. The sky is so blue here. It's uninterrupted, intense, and bluer than any other sky I've ever seen. Overused words like 'electric' come to mind.

The sun began to dip below the mountains, and the long shadows made me cold. Turning back, I walked quickly to avoid a chill. At the home-stay, Joshua was bundled in his long-sleeve, flannel, fleece hat, socks, and two blankets. His face was red and his eyes were bloodshot. Although I had been chilled in a t-shirt, it was pretty clear that the layers of fabric were warding off more than just long shadows.

I fussed over Joshua for a bit, but when he fell asleep, I sat reading the India LP guide and a little Ladakhi phrase book that I had found in the room. 'Joo-lay' I know. It's the best sing-song greeting I've ever heard, and it's compulsory: if you see someone as you're walking by (or vice versa), you acknowledge them. 'Kamcheng?' means 'how are you doing?' 'Kamcheng' means 'I am doing well.' See? Ladakhi is already easier than Turkish :)

The Ladakhi phrasebook also had some helpful tips: 1) never EVER put your used silverware back in the serving dish. If you do, you've made it unclean. 2) never EVER point the bottoms of your feet at ANYONE. Feet are considered unclean, and even if you step over an object, you've tainted it. If you step over food or items used to prepare or served food, no one will use it. 3) The Ladakhi practice 'dzangs,' or insincere refusals. When a Ladakhi offers someone something to eat, drink, etc., it's customary for that person to refuse two to three times before they accept.

All of a sudden, I was panicked that I had pointed my feet at someone, stepped over something, and accepted offers too quickly. I'm a walking cultural-faux-pas. Oh well. The phrasebook says the Ladakhi are known for their forgiving nature.

Isn't that weird? It's strange to read cultural analysis of people who are right in front of you. Apparently, the Ladakhi people who live in the Hemis National Park (where we are right now) are semi-nomadic. In the summer, they live in tents and move their herds all over the park. In the winter, they go back to their villages. Some people remain to grow crops, and this combination is called agro-nomadic. As one of the most isolated Himalayan cultures, the Hemis Ladakhi are one of the last remaining tantric Buddhists. While their Buddhist roots are influenced by Tibetan leadership and inter-marriage, it's possible that this area has been Buddhist for much longer - some anthropologists hypothesize that Buddhism came to this area by way of India in the 10th century.

I don't know what to think about all that. On one hand, I feel privileged and honored to be able to observe and engage with people that I've only ever read about hypothetically: one of my favorite scholarly books is 'The Other Side of Eden,' and in it, the author talks about nomadism. Now I'm staying in a home with people who spend part of their year living as nomads. But, until I read this, I had no idea. I didn't realize that the modern neon-colored tents we had passed earlier in the day were nomadic tent villages. For them, this is not some political statement, but rather a way of life. I know this should be obvious, but I think I'm guilty of seeing the idea rather than the people. Does that make sense? I thought nomadism was cool as an idea, but even though the author of 'The Other Side of Eden' give anecdotal evidence, I've never really considered that nomads look (and probably think and talk) like anybody else.

When I was writing about Turkey, I think I did the same thing: I was so in awe of Islam and all its trappings - veils, the Call to Prayer, minarets, etc. - that I may have overlooked our similarities. This probably sounds very confused and discombobulated, but I'm thinking about inadvertent racism, or 'nice racism.' I'm obviously not the kind of person that thinks that people of different colors, religions, lifestyles, etc. are bad or somehow inferior (although my story of the walnuts in Zumi Valley might prove otherwise). I believe in treating others the way you wish to be treated. But here's the thing: sometimes being too nice (trying to compensate for all the ignorant nut-fucks who do and say bad things about any kind of humanity that dares to be different) is its own kind of racism.

When I was receiving training to become a teacher in a diverse (or in my case, completely segregated and not diverse at all) setting, one of the main things they talked about was holding students of different classes, races, religions, etc. to the same standards. The absolute worst - and most racist - thing you could do would be to excuse behavior or poor academic performance because of a student's difference. This was something I had never considered before, and if no one had warned me about it, I'm sure I would have made a lot of mistakes (I probably did anyway).

Blurgh. I read the last three paragraphs, and I'm still no closer to a nice and tidy summation/conclusion. I wish to be kind and loving, but I'm sure I make mistakes all the time.

***

This morning, the alarm went off at 8 AM, and shortly thereafter, our guesthouse-keeper knocked on our door to tell us that our taxi had arrived. Panicked, we double-checked our ticket to confirm that we had arranged for the taxi to arrive at 9. We had, and we tried as best as we could to explain this to the flustered taxi driver.

Packing quickly, we cleared out of room within 30 minutes. Joshua still wasn't feeling well, but we hoped that a couple of millet crackers and an apple might settle his stomach. Once we had paid the guesthouse-keeper, we loaded our packs into the jeep taxi and got in. I sat in the front, trying to stave off some of the inevitable motion-sickness.

The drive from Leh to Zancheng takes about an hour and a half. While the first few miles are on paved road, the last 15 are all on deeply rutted, boulder-strewn dirt roads. As we drove through the outskirts of Leh, we saw a lot of construction going on. There were quite a few houses that looked badly damaged, and I asked our driver if the damage was from the floods that had happened earlier in August. He nodded, and warming to me, he explained that although there had been a warming, nearly 150 people had died in the mud-flows.

Beyond the airport, our taxi driver pointed out the military bases and the Spittuk monastery. Although Leh is very safe, Jammu-Kashmir is sandwiched between Pakistan and China, and India has a strong military presence here because of the disputed borders. (Parents: don't worry; there are big-ass mountains between us and all disputed borders :)

Past Spittuk, we drove through a small village and across the Indus River. On the other side, we drove for a few miles on a flat, rocky plain. Every once in a while, our taxi driver would stop to ask vehicles coming in the other direction about the state of the roads. There are lots of the landslides here, and after the mud-flows, the road conditions can vary from day to day.

After a while, we exchanged names, and our taxi driver explained that his name, Douwah, means 'Moon.' He asked us what our names meant, and we told him that Ellie means 'light' and Joshua basically means 'Jesus.' After that, Douwah took out his cellphone and started playing Avril Lavigne. He asked us if we were married, and when I said yes, he seemed very pleased. He nodded his head, smiling with all of his teeth. Next, he asked us how old we were and then told us to guess how old he is. I had absolutely no idea. Like most Ladakhi, Douwah's face is sunburned and weathered around the eyes; even so, his teeth are white and straight, and he has an enormous smile. When I refused to guess, he told us he was 29.

Past the plain, we began to follow a harrowing, narrow road above the Indus river. We climbed up and up, and looking at the wilderness around us, I thought, 'what the hell have we gotten ourselves into? Is there anyone out here?'

Finally, we began to descend, and when we reached a fork in the road, we saw four hikers coming in our direction. Douwah stopped to arrange a return ride for all of them, and then he dropped us off at the start of our path. When he left, he waved goodbye over and over again.

The trail from Zancheng to Rambok isn't very long; in all, it's probably about 6 to 8 kilometers. That said, the terrain is very rocky, and we had to ford the river a number of times, soaking our feet and our pants up to our knees. The scenery was beautiful, and on either side of the river valley, steep red cliffs rose up to the vibrant blue sky. On our way up, we encountered a couple of other hiking groups that had hired guides. The first was an unfriendly German couple, but their guide, Douwah (yup, same name... Are you beginning to notice this post's theme?), was very friendly, and he walked with us for a little bit, asking us where we had come from, where we were going, if we like Ladakh (a resounding yes), and if we planned on coming back again. He seemed a little concerned about the size of our packs, and after confirming that we were heading to Rambok too, he seemed to adopt us, pointing out directions and suggesting that we all take the same taxi back to Leh from Stok. He also asked us if we were married, and like the other Douwah, he was very pleased when we said yes. Although I don't think many Ladakhi ever communicate their discomfort with many non-married traveling couples, they were all too happy to express their approval over our matrimony :)

Although our elevation had increased with our taxi ride and the climb to Rambok, I was feeling fine. I was a bit short of breath, but otherwise, the headache and nausea were gone. Joshua, on the other hand, was not feeling very well at all. For him, the hike from Zancheng to Rambok turned into a bit of a death-march. He was grim faced and silent for most of the time, and when I wasn't gasping at the scenery, I was asking him how he was feeling around every turn (which I'm sure didn't make matters better).

Finally, we reached a parachute cafe and a little sign that pointed to nearby Rambok. Although we were about to pass the cafe by, Douwah ran out and stopped us, encouraging us to come in and have some tea. Looking like he was about to drop, Joshua agreed, and we sat inside the white parachute tent with the mean German couple and another unfriendly hiker couple of unknown origins (would it kill people to make small talk? I know they all knew English.).

Once we had finished our tea, we walked the last kilometer into Rambok.

***

At about 6, I took a break from my Ladakhi studies to use the Ladakhi toilet (I may agree with the idea of no-waste, spartan toilets, but they are no fun to use). On my way out, the same woman who had served us tea in the parachute cafe ducked her head out from another room and invited me inside. The room was lovely; in the corner, a beautifully decorated wood-burning stove had our rice and bhaat dhal simmering. Above, open cupboards held delicate pottery, plates, tea cups, and copper cooking pots. On the floor, woven mats brightened the room, and in the corner opposite the stove, pillows and low-lying tables provided a seating area beneath the large, lovely windows. Like our room, the ceiling was comprised of thin sticks that had been bundled together and laid over beams supported by elegantly carved posts.

While Tseching cooked, we had a stilted conversation in English. She is 26; I'm 24. I'm married but don't have children; she's unmarried and doesn't have children either. I have one sister and two brothers; she has three sisters, and like me, she's the oldest. After a while, she came over and pointed at all my jewelry, wanting to know the stories about each piece. I told her that the thin gold chain around my wrist was my sister's, and then seeing how much she liked it, I asked her if she would like it. She nodded her head, and I clasped it around her wrist (Hannah: I thought you would approve.).

When the food was done, Joshua came into the room too, and we all ate the rice, lentils, and greens. The food was delicious, and when we had finished, we watched Tsering try and offer her cousin more (she refused twice, and then finally agreed). We drank yak-butter tea while Tsering washed the dishes, and when we had all finished, we went back into our rooms. Tsering and her cousin knocked on our door to see if we needed anything, and when they saw that we had a bag of dried apricots, they looked envious. Inviting them in, we shared our pistachios (from Turkey) and our dried apricots. Tsering looked at my brand-new running shoes and was in awe. She picked up Joshua's camping pillow and was amazed at how it stuffed into a tiny sack. She tried on Joshua's gloves.

After a bit, we said goodnight. After a meal and a little nap, Joshua was feeling much better, so before we go to sleep, Joshua and I are reading and writing. We don't want a repeat of last night!

September 16, 2010

We just barely roused ourselves out of bed by 11 AM. Although we had set the alarm for 9, it just wasn't going to happen. We slept like the dead for almost 14 hours. When we finally managed to get up, we dressed and put on our hiking boots to explore Leh.

The night before, our guesthouse-keeper had told us that there was a short-cut foot-path to Leh, and wary of the fast and furious drivers, we wandered around, trying to find it. Not too far down the road, we spied a number of people opening a gate and heading downhill. We decided to follow them.

It pays off to imitate locals, and past the gate, we found a foot-path that wound around gompas, lovely prayer-wheels, and statues of Buddhas. Next to us, an irrigation ditch fed gardens and burbled pleasantly, and before us, the Himalayas reached up to the sky. Although we're skeptical that this foot-path is a short-cut, we'd walk a mile further just to enjoy it :)

Back in Leh, we stopped at the bakery below the mosque for some freshly baked bread, and then at Dzomsa, we returned our glass jar and loaded up on water and millet crackers. I love that everything is re-used here: the cheery woman at Dzomsa even wanted our apricot pits (she grinds them down into a powder to cook with). Through with breakfast, we checked out the bus offices, and finding them closed, we decided to go with one of the smaller tourist agencies that offer mini-bus and jeep taxi rides to Manali. At Glacier Adventures, a nice man named Juma gave us our options, and when I explained that I get really motion sick, he made the decision for us: mini-bus, seat 3 (best seat on the bus). We leave for Manali at 2 AM on the 20th, and we'll arrive between 7 and 9 PM on the same day. (LP describes the journey as 'bone-jarring.') Although the bus cost a bit more than we had wanted (a little less than 40 dollars per person), we weren't fussy; it's one of the only ways we can get to Manali, and everything else is so cheap. Once we had our bus ride to Manali sorted out, we arranged for a taxi to Zancheng. Juma gave us his business card, and told us the taxi would pick us up from our guesthouse at 9 AM.

Feeling much better with all our transportation worries taken care of, we decided to hike up to Leh Palace, an enormous mud-brick complex that sits high above the heart of the city. Although there weren't signs delineating the way, we wandered through the higgeldy-piggeldy neighborhoods winding vaguely up. Eventually, we found a road that seemed to lead to the palace, and just before we got to the gate, we stopped to admire a couple lovely gompas below.

Inside the palace, the walls and floors are made of dirt. The ceilings have long beams, and above them, branches lie in thick clusters. The rooms and halls are earthen and dark, but as we climbed higher in the building, more and more windows allowed light inside. In the center of the palace, a prayer room is fully decorated, and its beautiful carpets, painted walls, statues of Buddha, and altars give you some idea of how the whole place would have looked hundreds of years ago. We took off our shoes to go into the prayer room, and once we were there, we sat and stared at the beautiful candle-lit altar.

At the top of the palace, we climbed a couple sets of ladders to reach the roof. Looking out over the city, we had our best views yet. This high up, the sun bleaches out everything except for the sky.

Making our way out of the palace, we headed for the switchbacks that led us to the fortress and gompa above. Draped in thousands of prayer flags, the place flutters in white, yellow, red, and green. I've never liked the sad, single strand you see so often on porches in the states, but here, threadbare and in the thousands, flapping in front of gompas and Himalaya, they are fantastically beautiful. We took the most unbelievable photos (see Joshua'a photo site http://andertfamilyfun.shutterfly.com).

Back at the palace, we stopped for a little water break and ran into Derrick and Aubrey again. We talked for a little while, asking them how they had thought of their epic journey and what they had done to prepare for it. After graduating in '07, they had taken a two month trip to Indonesia, and inspired by the travelers they had met who were traveling for years at a time, they spent the next three years saving up.

Once we had parted ways, Joshua and I agreed that although their trip sounded incredible, a year and a half would be too long for us. While we're envious of all the places they will visit and get to know, six months is long enough. We'd miss our family, friends, and pets too much to be gone any longer (that, and my bed. I miss my bed.).

Back down the hill, we went in search of Amdo, a Tibetan restaurant that Derrick and Aubrey had recommended. On the second floor overlooking the busy main street, we found a table and immediately ordered the hot lemon-honey-ginger concoction that had made us feel so much better the day before. Although I was starting to feel much better from the altitude, Joshua was not. His head hurt, and he had felt nauseous all day. We hoped a little ginger and food would help.

To eat, we wolfed down a spicy mushroom and vegetable soup with fried vegetable momos (stuffed dumplings). It was all delicious, and still hungry, we ordered another plate of momos.

By the time we had finished eating, it was already 6. Trying to beat the sunset, we picked up more water and snacks from Dzomsa and head up our new foot-path to the guesthouse. After nearly four days without showering, we decided to brave the the outdoor solar-shower, even though it was getting cold and dark. Joshua went first, and when he came back, he told me that the water was so hot, it almost burned him. He wasn't lying. I had to flood the shower head with cold water and then add just a little bit of the hot. I guess it shouldn't surprise us; the sun is so strong, it's no wonder that it can cook the water close to boiling point.

Clean and warm, we burrowed into our sleeping bags and read for a little bit. Around 9, we turned off the lights to go to sleep, but then the oddest thing happened: we couldn't fall asleep. We laid awake for hours fretting about falling asleep and wondering if it had to do with altitude sickness or not (it is one of the symptoms LP lists). Finally, we convinced ourselves that we weren't dying from acute altitude sickness, and instead, we were just jet-lagged. We fell asleep.