Shiva's Lakes

I am sitting on a window ledge with the lakes behind me and the sun slowly rising behind the mountains. Listening to really badly recorded Tibetan (or maybe Tamang) music which intermediately has cows mooing and roosters crowing and it is impossible to tell which is real until I remember that there are no cows or roosters at 4380 meters. Stamping comes from the kitchen: A young guy cooking the mornings daal bhat in the kitchen. Yesterday he was singing along to 'I'm too sexy for this shirt' whereas today he seems happy with the moos and crows accompanying this popular home recording. The lake is still dark and covered in a skin of ice, although the sun is spreading a white golden path across it. I had followed its marker rocks yesterday – tracing the footsteps of the pilgrims who believe that the lakes were created by their vagabond Lord, Shiva.

The pilgrims visit the lake to change their scared strings. This means that the rough slated path which circumnavigates the water is covered with discarded holy thread. I walked around thinking of all the thousands of people who had walked so far for their beliefs. Walking with no 'special' equipment and sleeping in roofless barns. I thought about the woman with frozen feet, wooden feet, who was hobbling and hiding her way around Sing Gompa. I thought about how the pilgrimage had killed her and how she had ended up left, abandoned, dying, in a cold desolate lonely place. I thought about the person she must have been and the person she is now – clearly crazy and only sort of alive. I felt privileged to be walking a path which people will sacrifice everything for, while I was 'just' enjoying nature. As soon as the sun peaked down behind the highest peaks, the air around the lake seemed to freeze.

I walked fast through the shadows picking out the most stable slabs and passing mini piles of stone statues which frame the lake, almost as if they were 'natural' creations rather than the man and woman made constructs of the years of pilgrims.

The next day we crossed the pass. I hung a small string of prater flays in the middle of a mountain of flags and thought about the dead, the dying and the living: I though of a woman who I never really knew, but who had recently died, the mother of a dear friend. I thought of how she must feel to be free above the mountains, drifting in the winds. I thought about the woman who is dying from crossing this pass as she sits and waits for her frozen body to consume her, a painful and fateful pilgrimage. I thought of little Gita, who will never see the enormity of the power of nature, but only feel it from the confines of the walls of an institution which saved her. Three parallel realities.

Trekking in the Sky

An incredible twelve days. A bumpy bus ride to Syrunbensi, with the roof so full that the window next to my inside seat cracked and fell away, discarded and without surprise. Arriving in the dark, as electricity shortages continue to rival the hours with power. A cheap room of 50 rupees, and the only night where an accommodation charge was paid, with other nights being satisfied with a promise to eat freshly home cooked daal bhat and Tibetan breads.

The first days walk began with an interaction with a jolly Tibetan monk who was teaching at the local school and treating us like long lost friends after learning about my time in Dharamasala. Bouncing over one of many suspension bridges to turn around and see a maroon robe flying down the road as a kamikaze buffalo enjoyed the chase.

The days trek led searching feet through bamboo forests and across streams a million times over. The night was spent huddled around an iron stove, the centre piece of all of these small little tea houses, and a small fortune of warmth carried upon backs up vertical paths from the capital many hours drive away and even more days walk. Fires fuelled with wood, leaving a taste of timber in the evenings tato pani, while higher up yak shit provided a more ecological fuel.

Rimche and then Chamje: Small Tamang villages, established upon subsistence farming and surviving on a so far erratic and seasonal tourism. Sherpa women with their Tibetan striped aprons worn the 'wrong' way around as they camouflage their behinds with bright multi colours, in contrast to the women of Tibet who wear their aprons tied around their laps. Grubby tiny toddlers are strapped to working backs with old pieces of cloth; their young faces are filthy and already scared red from the wind, sun and below freezing temperatures.

Living becomes harder as more distance is put between the roads and the dwellings, while every few hundred meters climbs brings harsher nights and thinner airs. Young mothers deal with their herd of children while following the bells of their dzo cow-yak cross breads. They walk hours away from their village to collect yak shit, which they pile into a bamboo basket and hang around their foreheads. They walk hours back to their mud stove, where they then cook the crops which they have managed to harvest in arid soil. Working in groups of friends, never alone, and always with a witty remark to try and persuade the few passing trekkers to spend a night under their two roomed 'Hotel'. Friends are made through jokes and the limited vocabulary of smiles and touches, but money keeps intervening. We shy away from the groups of catered tourists with their too many porters carrying their imported food and guides from far away.

A community project in the town of Langtang: A yak cheese factory. The factory is hydro powered and shares its electricity with Langtang each night. Its profits are invested in a local project after a community meeting. And who taught them to make their tasty hard cheese and delicious 'Italian' bread. "Japanese volunteers" comes the proud reply.

Ancient rows of mani stones lead the way through open hills and towards full bred hairy grazing yaks. Newly constructed prayer wheels revolve in the middle of streams - blessing the water and sending their whispers down to lower elevations. Their singing and squeaking following our wet footsteps, and leaving me wondering who still builds these ancient forms of hydro power?

The Japanese connection becomes more apparent as entire fields are filled with Japanese trekkers, trekking each with two cameras, tripods and even at 4000 meters, protective face masks.

Silence and stillness greats my resting ears at the top of Kyanjin Ri - a 4773 meter peak, which is dwarfed by the 7000 plus meters of the Langtang range, calling our eyes towards the skies. I leave my kata - from Dharamasala to the Himalayas pointing home towards Tibet. I say a Thank you to Tashi and a Thank you for the cycle of Nature.

A long way down, passing ice cold water and rolling rocks, trekking down in blissful happiness as the sun falls behind the soaring peaks just after noon, leaving us walking narrow paths in a never ending dusk. Washing in basins of tepid water and sleeping too deeply under piles of well worn clothes and heavy dusty precious blankets.

The porters keep coming: A never ending stream of supplies for villages too remote to be naturally self sufficient, and for 'trekkers' paying dollars for bottles of beer and packaged chocolates. I observe my leather gortex boots as they carry me through mud and keep my ankles straight across piles of scree. I watch the flip flops of the porters, carrying 50 kg each for 600 rupees a day; sweat pouring from their foreheads as they smile a 'namaste'. I feel the lightness of my own backpack, and wonder why I need so many 'things' for the rest of my every days?

More night time arrivals, and discussions of Tourism. Contradictions of looking for wilderness and finding 'development'. Fears of neo colonialism verses naive dreams of a lost Shangri-la.

The indulgence of a solar powered hot shower, the surprise puja for Buddha's conceptions as people of all ages, sexes, nationalities and beliefs hold candles of light towards their own ignorance in the musty warmth of Thulo Syafru's Tibetan Nepali Tamang Sherpa Gompa. Five local families working together to feed their neighbours and us 'strangers'; an annual privilege we are told.

Walking past wild monkeys and wild marijuana plants. A strange night in Sing Gompa where I fight with a Nepali tourist about an Indian pilgrim with frozen feet. She could be me. Now she is no one. Soon she will 'have been'.

Up to Gosaikunda - Shiva's Lakes. Frozen stillness, echoes of Hindu pilgrims as scared strings lay discarded on black stone cold rocks. High in the Sky lay pockets of transparent glacier water, worshipped through lines of piled rocks and invisible footsteps of bare frozen feet. An outsider, I take a photograph, I read a description, I wonder and then I walk. Up and over Lauribena Pass (4610 meters) and then a very very long way down. A roller coaster walk, testing stamina and yet basking in novelty.

Fresh mountain air, a tired body, aching knee, contentment and extended time. Twelve days feeling like an Eternity - wishing that this could be an eternity as the mountains remind us of our human impermanence and inevitable insignificance despite our desire to conquer and to control. Happiness seems to come from the air, from the routine instinct of walking in the natural nature.

Following a trail leading back down into a 'civilisation' whose disregard for the wild leaves me feeling a revolution towards. Passing working farms, littered villages and packs of other tourists until my feet take me to a bus whose rusty wheels leave me in the middle of Kathmandu...