Musings by Wayne Yoder

My room doesn't seem all too clean, although it is covered in carpets with cushions placed along the edges to sleep. A couple window panes are broken so it might well be quite cool here at night. We're at about 12,000'. There is another room across the hall, which is used as a bedroom, and it has a dirt floor with a mattress lying flat on the floor. That room is quite dirty compared to mine so I suppose it is all relative. There is a lot of dust in the air and I imagine it must be quite difficult to keep things clean. No running water in the house but a pipe outside to wash hands and face. Mountain water from melting snow. I imagine being without a bath for a week! Oh, well, why not?? There is electricity here, which comes on at 7:50 pm, yes 7:50 at night and goes off at 11pm. No switches to turn it on or off, but all are at the mercy of the man with his hand on the big switch at the main station somewhere.

This evening I have a Ladakhi stew for dinner. It is very tasty. I have to get used to eating between 9 and 10 pm and struggle to stay awake as 10 nears! Wongchok, the 55 year old father, doesn't get home from his shop in Temisgam until 7:30 or 8:00pm. It is interesting to watch him because when he gets home he immediately finds his granddaughter and wraps both arms around her, cuddling her, talking to her, as long as he can during the evening. He reluctantly gives her up to 'Abi', grandma, when his food is set before him. Abi, whose name is Laskit and who is 46, pours Wongchok his chang, the local barley beer, and then sits on the floor with the granddaughter, Sonam, making sure she gets her turn to cuddle. Everyone here is a nurturer, including the boys. They equally love to have their turn with Sonam and are very tender and loving with her.

When Wongchok comes home he walks past my room and tells me to come to the dining room so we can sit and 'discuss!"- meaning to talk. So I do. He likes his chang and always has a couple glasses of rum mixed with water, and tells me he would like to have four or five but I think Laskit keeps an eye on his consumption. He keeps pushing me to have some chang but not caring for alcohol I decline after a small glass. It has the taste of a dry white wine. Each evening Wongchok and I go through the same ritual of his wanting me to drink with him and my declining. It is the custom here not to accept an offer of drink or food a couple of times before actually accepting. It is considered impolite. So that adds to the persistence. They think I am just being polite when I really do not want chang. When the chang doesn't work, then Wongchok tries the rum, but after several days he begins to understand. He loves his chang and rum but by the end of my time there he is apologetic about the amount he drinks.

This morning I sat outside the front door of this two-story house. Laskit has a rather nice flower and veggie garden for a front yard/garden. It is pleasant sitting there in the morning sunshine watching the butterflies move from flower to flower as well as the bees. Off to my right are the mountains and the green terraces of wheat and barley fields. A peaceful and meditative setting. A little later I go for a short walk through the fields and along the streams. I wonder who built all these stone walls which are everywhere to keep the terraces in place, and who built over what period of time all the irrigation canals which seem to be everywhere. The water comes out of the mountains and is primarily from melting snow. One can see canals snaking high up along the mountain sides being carried to fields farther away while other canals make their way down to the lower fields. It is learned over a long period of history, but the men and women know when it is their turn for the water to enter their fields. I often just watch the women, who seem to be the primary ones to handle the irrigation, out in the fields with a small shovel moving a clod of dirt here or there which changes the direction of the water flow. It is not hard work but requires a knowledge of which canal goes where to make sure all the fields get their turn at being irrigated. It is quite an intricate and ingenious system. Looking up along the mountain sides you can always tell where the canals flow because of the greenery. No water, no greenery.

This afternoon I walked on up the valley following the strong and full stream flowing down between the mountains. I followed it to a point where there was no more human habitation and basically no greenery, bushes, trees, just huge boulders and mountains of scree which is a mixture of dirt, sand, very fine stones and some a little larger. It is interesting to see how far up the valley the Ladakhis cultivate the land. As long as there is a flat space, or one that can be made flat, and water, there is cultivation. Then I walked down the other direction to lower Ang and came upon 5 women who were cracking and cleaning apricot nuts. They invite me to come and sit with them and we have our 'conversation' - given that we had no common language. There is a cute little boy there about 2 years old. He is all smiles, friendly and he lets me hold him for a little while. This is the beginning of apricot season. There are lots of apricot trees as well as apple trees.

I also find some wild mint tea growing so I pick some and take it back to the house. Since I don't generally drink black tea, I ask Laskit if she knows what this is. Neither she nor Dolkar, the daughter-in-law, seem to know what it is so I explain it to them and they are happy to make that my tea of choice. I do like the butter and salt tea which is the common tea here but my body says no so I listen or pay a price.

The food and crops here are grown organically. The fertilizer comes primarily from the dung of the animals as well as the composting toilet. In the houses there is no running water and no standard western toilets. There is a room about 10'x10' which is the toilet room and the floor is covered with dirt as much as a foot or two deep. In the middle of the room is a hole in the floor, which is where you do your toilet. Beneath this room is where the toilet is collected and may be about 8' or 10' below. When you've finished doing your business, you throw a shove of dirt down the hole. Eventually this is mixed together with ash and dirt and then taken to the garden and fields. Nothing is wasted; everything is used. And that goes for just about everything else as well. For drinking water here, Laskit or Dolkar will boil water for me and let it cool and then for precaution I have a few drops of liquid which I add which are supposed to kill anything that is still moving!! I've had no problems. By this time I can probably drink the water from the stream but I choose not too. Folks do their laundry in some of the canals as well as bathe. However, in most villages everyone knows in which streams and canals you wash your clothes, which ones you bathe in and which ones are for drinking. The villages are mostly self-sustaining but Western modernization is encroaching slowly and making its nasty mark. The West is not needed here for the most part but modernization will likely come nevertheless. That seems to be the way of the world, but I am impressed with attempts by the local people to put some limits and curbs on what, how and when this happens.

Thu, 17 Aug 2006 Ladakh, India

— to be continued ---

Final Working Copies:
28 May 2007 - "Hemis Monastery"

3 June 2007 - "Ladakh, India: Ang to Lamayuru"

7 July 2007 - "Kashmir to Ladakha"