The Snow leopard

by Peter Matthiessen

  I sit here as peaceful as a Buddha, and from across the fire, Tukten smiles as if I had held up the lotus. The dancing is over, and now this humble tulku of Kasapa is seated thigh to thigh with the bright-eyed ancient, delighting her with Tukten jokes while soothing the sleepy infant girl, who has crawled into his lap. There are no boundaries to this man, he loves us all.

  NOVEMBER 19

  I wake in happiness before first light, and do morning chanting in Chirjing's chapel until the sun softens the sky behind the mountains, and Tukten, unasked, brings me tea. Afterward, Jang-bu in his finger rings and Gyaltsen in his schoolboy knickers come to say goodbye. I thank Jang-bu especially for his good grace in asking so many stupid questions on my behalf and tease Gyaltsen one last time about my boots. Then I take leave of Chirjing and her mother, saying how honored I have been to sleep in a temple of the Buddha. Tears in her eyes, the old lady takes my hand and bangs her head against my chest in blessing, saying something like, "Tuchi churochi" which seems to mean, "Thank you very much," or perhaps it is "Tashi shok!"—"May these blessings prevail!"—or even (I hope not) "Tanga cheke" a small coin. Then I set out to explore Saldang.

  Though the village lies at about the same altitude as Ring-mo, perhaps 12,000 feet, it is utterly different in aspect. Ring-mo is a Himalayan village below tree line, while Saldang belongs to the treeless deserts of the Tibetan Plateau. The village is scattered on an open slope that descends the sides of the Nam-Khong Valley to the river, and its houses are the desert gray-brown of this land, from which they crop up like eruptions. Drought and erosion have left a soil of hard-caked dust, yet the slopes have been terraced for marginal planting, made possible by snowmelt of spring and summer; the melt also supports small clumps of birch and willow planted near the houses and protected from famished livestock by stone walls. The branches are cropped for fodder, it is said, but this use must be very linited; one feels that the trees were brought here to relieve the extreme severity of the landscape. In late November, the starkness of Saldang is pointed up by the scarcity of its inhabitants; at least one member of every family, usually more, has gone off to the south or east, in search of work, and the beasts are gone, too, for want of grass or fodder. (In former times, the herds would have wintered on Tibetan plains, but now they must be taken south across the mountains.) In such barrenness, the neat aspect of houses, walls, and fields speaks for the strong spirit of these villagers, who constructed spears to drive off bandits, and can dance so merrily when their food is almost gone; the religious fervor here is represented by the many walls of heavy prayer stones, the stupas that rise like turrets on each barren knoll, and the strange rows of upright slabs, like gravestones, known as obo, which are characteristic of northern Tibet and Mongolia.

  The landscape is mysterious, all contrast: in the clear, hard light, the shadow of a motionless horse has the force of omen. One day human beings will despair of grinding out subsistence on high cold plateaus, and the last of an old Tibetan culture will blow away among the stones and ruins.

  I wander down the hill to Saldang Gompa. The temple is locked, since its lama is away in another village, but in a yellow building that abuts it are suspended two enormous cylindrical prayer wheels, perhaps four feet in diameter and ten feet high, bristly painted with such symbols as Asoka's wheel, the ceremonial conch, the orb of compassion, serpents, flowers, barley offerings, OM MANI PADME HUM. Saldang is a Sakya-pa gompa, and the Bodhisattvas Manjusri and Chen-resigs are celebrated here, together with the historical Buddha, Sakyamuni, and Maitreya, the Buddha to come. In the brilliant frescoes on the walls, the ubiquitous Padma Sambhava holds a danyen very like the one that was played last night by the dashing lutist of Saldang; the Lorus-Born is celebrating some celestial event with a blue Lord of Death, who one day will hold up a bright mirror from which we cannot hide, and weigh the white pebbles and the black in final balance.

  Tukten has been acquiring a few supplies, and at midmoming he and Dawa meet me at the gompa. With them is the handsome lutist, off to Kathmandu to seek his fortune: he will accompany us as a porter-guide as far as Murwa. Karma, as he is called, seems less spontaneous than he did last evening, over chang and firelight; he tends to accost one with his charm. Happily this charm is leavened by the unsophisticated smiles of his young Tibetan wife, she who danced so joyfully the night before, and of the infant Chiring Lamo, who sits atop her load like a smiling Buddha— what good luck to have this Chiring Lamo in the party! Besides the baby, the girl carries the family belongings, while Karma will lighten the loads of the two sherpas, Dawa especially: although more cheerful now that he is on his way home, Dawa seems listless, and is giving muted hints of obscure illness.

  The trail ascends the river bank to a string of hamlets known collectively as Namdo. In this region, temples and villages alike have entrance stupas with bright well-made frescoes and mandalas, all of them in excellent repair. There are also imposing prayer walls with inscribed scriptures and the wheel mantras that Tukten calls ling-po. Beyond Namdo, on an isolated tower of rock over the river, is a Nyingma temple called Sal Gompa with a wonderful meditation chamber, surrounded by a covered gallery but itself wide open to the skies. Sal Gompa is very well maintained by a tall woman of great presence who feels no need to call herself a "lama"; a couch is ready for the Lama of Saldang when he comes to stay. The statues at this Old Sect temple are unexceptional, but the bright thankas there are delicately done, perhaps the best that we have seen, and we congratulate the caretaker on the care taken with Sal Gompa, so markedly in contrast to Namgung.

  The path continues up the western bank of the Nam-Khong, passing two more gompas, one of which, on the far side of the river, appears to be abandoned. The prayer walls on the river path are much visited by wolves, but there is no sign of blue sheep or of leopard. At one of the prayer walls, the girl sits down in the sun and offers her breast to Chiring Lamo, serenaded the while by a crowd of chukar partridge that had fluttered off the holy stones into the gullies. The girl is wearing a helmet of red wool, and suddenly I recognize that these red cheeks and pretty smile belong to Tende Samnug, who wore this red helmet on the day at Shey that she gave me four potatoes. Karma, of course, is Karma Dorje, son of Ongdi the Trader; what I have taken for false charm was only his eager overtures of recognition. That day at Shey, they had no baby with them, and were all bundled up against the cold, but all the same, I much regret that I did not recognize them until Tende put on her red winter hat, or respond more warmly to their claim of friendship at last night's fire. Soon this merry Tende rises in a tinkle of small bells that dance from her sash and from the gay striped apron worn by married women of Tibet; and Karma, stepping jauntily along with his beautiful swan's-head lute strapped to his pack, seems ready to smile at anything at all. Like many Bhotes from Dolpo and Mustang, he calls himself a "Gurung"—"Karma Dorje, Gurung" he insists. Being thought of as inferior by the Hindu tribes that rule Nepal, some younger Bhotes seek in this way to raise their status, but there is no real link between these people and the Gurung, whose villages we passed in late September, along the southern slopes of Annapurna.

  At the small hamlet known as Tcha, we finish the day's journey. I protest at first: there is plenty of time to get to Haka, the last settlement before the first of two high passes between here and Murwa. But Karma says that the people of Raka are hostile Kami people, and when Tukten supports him, I give in; I remember too well the Kamis on the trek between Dhorpatan and Yamarkhar, not to speak of the Kami people of Rohagaon.

  In its narrow canyon, already in shadow, Tcha is a gloomy place, and its people hide from us. It lies at the mouth of a tributary ravine, and up the hill across the river is Hrap Gompa, now abandoned. In caravan come seventy yaks that are turned loose to graze around Hrap Gompa; the herders are from Nyisal, bound southward for Rohagaon to find grazing. Now heavy clouds appear over the canyon walls, shrouding the mountains and bringing misgivings about GS, who will stay at Shey into early December and may see the onset of real wi
nter weather.

  NOVEMBER 20

  A night wind in the Nam-Khong Canyon rattled my thin tent like a dry walnut leaf, but this morning the wind is moderate, and stars fill the wedge of blue-black sky that is visible above the enclosing walls: I set out before daybreak, to get warm. The canyon is bitter, bitter cold, as if winter were locked all the year in this dungeon of black stones and ice closed by sheer walls. It seems much colder than the coldest dawn at Shey, it is well below freezing, and there is no hope of sun before midmorning. At a turn in the canyon above Tcha are the heavy square tents of the nomads from the north; since I have no stick, and cannot find one in this treeless land, I am glad that my footsteps on the frozen sand are inaudible over the torrent, for there is no place to hide here from their dogs.

  On a gravel bar is a gaunt cairn to the water demons, klu, who can be vengeful if neglected, Tukten says. Among the rocks move shadows, trollish shapes— a little old woman, much too old to be the mother of the two bundled children who are with her. In this wintry place, in the gray light, the little band has strayed from some Gothic tale. The shivering boy, not more than ten, carries a load that looks heavier than my own; the little woolen girl, still toddling, must be lifted across the frozen brooks that protrude like ice tongues from ravines in the east wall. The old woman is bent beneath a load of sheepskins; what she will get for them farther south can scarcely repay such a hard journey. She lifts gnarled fingers to her mouth, but I have no food: I make sign that she should ask food of the sherpas when they come. They smile at me as best they can. Perhaps these cheerful children are brave orphans, perhaps they are abroad so early to avoid freezing to death for want of fuel I go on to Raka, walking as hard as possible just to keep warm.

  A yak herd goaded by wild boys descends the mountain to the huts at Raka. In a stone corral are more than one hundred yaks, which will carry these stacked bales of wool and salt into the south; the bales are guarded by big-headed mastiffs that lie quiet, dog eyes fixed upon the nearest dog. Long-haired men wearing short swords, striped cloaks, sashed short tunics, and wool boots lashed tight under the knee sit smoking by their fires. These men of the north are bold and colorful, but the denizens of Raka are brigands, "bad men," Karma Dorje says, who live all year in this dark canyon, as if hiding from the light. Pinch-faced as prisoners, they watch us pass.

  Above Raka, the canyon narrows to a gorge, and the torrent veers from one wall to the other. Neither the Raka dwellers nor the nomads have bothered to make bridges, but in this season, after a long month without rain, the river is low. To cross and recross it dry-shod, we try to make steps by heaving heavy stones into the shallows, but the big stones are frozen hard into the gravel bars, and the small ones that are freed, when piled up high enough to protrude out of the torrent, are soon slicked over by a gloss of ice. We throw sand on the stones and extend hands and leap. But after three precarious crossings, the tactic is given up; it is tiring, and requires too much time. Instead we take off boots and socks, roll up our clothes as high as possible, and wade out barefoot, breaking through the skim of ice on both sides of the stream. The repeated crossings turn my feet to stone, and I curse Karma: how much simplier it would have been to pass Raka yesterday afternoon, make these crossings in the warmth of day, and camp beyond, where the gorge opens out into the valley. As it is, the three hours of good light wasted yesterday at Tcha have condemned us to a long hard day with a high pass at the end of it. But throughout, Tende laughs and chatters, and her gay spirit eases my annoyance with her husband, whose manner is just as light, though not so fetching. He leads in the bridge-building and testing, and when inevitably he slips, and soaks his clothes, he laughs, a gallant minstrel after all. Tukten is also cheerful and resourceful, but Dawa stands there oxlike, and I must call out to him time and again to come and help us. Seemingly, he is not present, he is stumbling and apathetic. At one point, sliding his load across wet ice, he places its cover uppermost, thereby soaking my exposed sleeping bag below. Of late, this instinct for the inept move has been unerring, and no amount of remonstrance does any good.

  On the far side of the Raka gorge, cold sun shafts burst from easterly ravines: one ravine, so Tukten says, leads down to Tarap. The northern slopes are green with thorny growth, but there are no cliffs here, and no sign of blue sheep. The river must dance with fine white-water torrents in the spring, for the canyon ascends steeply to an open valley, where a broad black gravel bed, windswept, without life, comes down out of the snows. Here we turn south, toward the Himalaya.

  In this stretch, the going is easy, and Tende, taking Karma's load, removes her boots and goes on barefoot, leaving Chiring Lamo to her husband. Where the river turns, Karma stops to build a fire. Having no faith in his assertion that this Namdo Pass, though "very steep," is only an hour's climb above the riverbed, I take off my boots and wade a tributary stream and keep on going, hoping that my stem example will hurry this laggard in his midday meal.

  Across the stream is a large stupa, and near the stupa is a cairn of ragged prayer flags and crude mani stones. Mixed with the stones in a jumbled heap are huge-horned skulls of the argali, one of which looks relatively fresh. The argali, long-legged and swift, does not depend on nearby cliff ledges for safety, and for the rest of the day I scan the thorny mountainsides for Ovis ammon.

  Ahead, two herders turn twelve yaks loose among the thorns. They will not try the pass today, for one is collecting brush for firewood while the other guards his bales beside a cave. Not far beyond, the yak route turns off from the riverbed, starting a steep ascent into the snows. Already it is afternoon, and I have been walking steadily for seven hours, and it feels too late in a long day to start a hard climb to the Raka Pass. On the other hand, if we make camp this early every day, it will take us five days instead of three to get to Murwa. I keep on going in the hope that Tukten will make the others follow.

  Whoever opened up this track after the October blizzards wanted badly to go south, for to judge from the signs, his hapless animals broke through the crust repeatedly into deep snow, and made aimless furrows where they struck off on their own before floundering back to join the others. Since then, however, a number of caravans have crossed the pass. The broad yellow-pocked track is strewn with dung, and the frozen dung offers footholds on the ice. Excepting a vole avenue that leads from one rock outcrop to another, there are no wild tracks to be seen; the only life is a high flock of pale finches, crossing the frozen sky toward the south.

  The track mounts toward triangular snow peaks, the sun falls. I climb hard to keep up with the light as it withdraws in its great silence up the mountain; thus, I manage to stay warm right to the summit, where the sun sinks into the crescent between peaks. Wind has blown some snow from the steep faces, and black wing shapes of exposed rock fly on the whiteness. The sky gleams, and the rigid peaks resound. The beauty of the Namdo Pass opens the mind, for it is a true portal of the Himalaya, where the traveler passes from one world to another. I have no idea of its name, but this one suits it: Nam-do means "sky-Stone."

  I turn at the cairn to stare behind me. All around the northern hemisphere lies the brown waste of the Tibetan Plateau, without a single sign, not one, of the human life in the shadows of its canyons. (Here at the summit cairn, in the first week of December, GS was overtaken by a snowstorm; he later described how a yakherder in his rough skins, in swirling snow, planted a prayer flag on this cairn, where GS's altimeter read 17,500 feet)

  The sun is gone. From far below rises the cry of Chiring Lamo, her infant voice the only life in the white waste. Considering the clouds of yesterday and last night's wind, we are damned lucky that this fair weather has held. When Dawa's head appears at last, I wave to him, then cross the saddle quickly to the farther side, for it is dusk. Below is a great bowl of snow, a mile or more in width, and beyond the snow bowl the head of the valley that descends to open mountainside where we might camp.

  I hurry through cold shades, under the mountains. Strangely, the track emerges into s
un, for this long valley, descending westward, opens out again upon the sky where the sun, setting, bathes the mountainsides in holy light.

  Then Dawa comes, and we make camp on a tundra ridge. Tende comes next, haggard but smiling: she moves about in the cold dusk, crooning to Chiring Lamo, gathering up dry yak chips for a fire.

  NOVEMBER 21

  The camp is less than a thousand feet below the Namdo Pass, and so this morning there is biting cold, with no warmth in the frozen sun when it appears over the eastern rim. This canyon plunges eventually into a maelstrom of narrow, dark ravines that must emerge into that eastern arm of Phoksumdo that we saw on October 25, for there is the aura of a void between one spine of summits and the next where the turquoise lake of the great demoness lies hidden.

  Despite the cold, Tende and Chiring Lamo sit near naked on a sheepskin by their daybreak fire, the child's head laid amongst the beads and amulets and cold silver on Tende's round brown breasts. But Dawa is sick this morning; through Tukten, he tells me that even before leaving Shey, he suffered from dysentery and internal bleeding. That last is worrisome; it might well lead to worse. Perhaps he should rest, but we cannot stay in this wild place between high passes. And of course it is only luck that he came out with us; had it not been for Gyaltsen's fear of Tukten, Dawa might have remained behind and died there, without ever speaking up, less out of fortitude than in that peasant apathy and fatalism that is so often taken for stupidity.

  I give him something for his dysentery; it may kill him. In his weakened state, Dawa longs to be taken care of; it pleases him to be reminded that he must wear a snow mask, so as not to complicate his sickness with snow blindness. He stands before me in knee britches, big head hanging, like a huge disobedient child.

  The yak route descends into night shadows, crossing the ice rivers of this canyon and emerging again on sunny mountainside. Here where sun and shadow meet, a flock of Himalayan snow cock sails away down the steep mountain. To the north and west, across the canyons, the thorn-scrub slopes are cut by cliffs, and soon blue sheep come into view, two far pale bands, one of nine, and the other of twenty-six. I search in vain for sign of the snow leopard.