Week 8: Nubra Valley

28/06/09

This week has definitely been a highlight of our time in Ladakh so far. As Tom mentioned last week, Jason booked us a jeep for 3 days and 2 nights in the Nubra Valley – and it was amazing.

On Friday morning, after an obligatory cup of tea at Yung Chen’s house, the five of us – Tom, Yung Chen, Yang Dul (Yung Chen’s daughter), Jason and I – began the 6 hour drive up and over the Ladakh Range, along the highest motorable road in the world, into Nubra. It took us two hours to traverse a hair-raising 40km ascent to the top of the Khardung La (18,380 ft). As we got near the top the road surface quickly deteriorated due to rivers of melted snow flowing down them. We bounced through potholes and over stones excavated by the running water with nothing but thin air between the edge of the road and 100-metre drop below. We round a blind hair-pin bend in the road and are unexpectedly confronted by an oncoming truck. Our backs are gently thrown from our seats as the driver hits the brakes, knees clench, hearts stop and then we fall back into our seats again, relieved to still be on the road and not to be at the bottom of the mountain mangled in the carcass of the car – the ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ of future tourists. Slowly, the two vehicles inch past each other and we’re off again. Fortunately there is a fantastic view over Leh and the surrounding mountains to distract us and soon enough we’re joking about again.

The reason for going to the Nubra Valley is not necessarily to visit some certain attraction but just to experience it. No matter how many photos we took, we couldn’t take one that really showed how spectacular the land forms were and the sheer scale of everything. Nubra is hemmed in by the Karakoram Mountains to the north and the Ladakh Range to the south. The Shyok River runs parallel to the Ladakh Range and the Nubra River flows into it from north to south. Along both of these valley floors, at the bottom of the huge, steep-sided reddish-brown mountains, are scattered a number of very fertile villages. On our second night we stayed in Panamik, a village as far north as a visitor can go, which was built on an alluvial fan which had fallen from the mountains behind it into the valley below in which the huge blue Nubra RiverGrand Canyon. A terrace was suddenly swallowed up, rivers had carved enormous gullies and crevasses in the rock until all that was left was like a bar code. Except for the villages, everything was barren. The only things that would grow were tough shrubs and the only animals that seemed to be able to live there were camels, donkeys and lizards. We flew along the mountainsides and occasionally across the valleys filled with white rounded rocks and pebbles brought down by the rivers. We kept wishing we had a geologist with us to tell us about all the rock types and landforms. braided over a width of perhaps 500m. There were hundreds of these alluvial fans, like the tail-ends of huge sandy wedding dresses flowing down from the mountains. Other parts of Nubra were like the

Our first stop in Nubra was Deskit where there is a small Lamdon school with a hostel. We had a tasty lunch of momos and noodles and then, glad for a chance to stretch our legs, went for a short walk to see the school. We met some of the staff who we bumped into the next day when we went for a 30-minute camel ride in some sand dunes (!). The school was having their summer picnic and so they invited us for butter tea after our undulating ride. The camels were two-humped Bactrian camels which are descendants of the camels who used to travel along the main trade routes through Central Asia and into Leh. They weren’t the most comfortable animals to ride on but we all enjoyed the strange experience.

After seeing Deskit we continued west along the Shyok River for another 7km to Hundar where we found a nice guesthouse and went for a walk along one of the river’s tributaries. We found an old mill and walked upstream through the trees and chortens up to a bridge which is another dead-end for tourists (very clearly stated by a number of armed military men on the other side).

On the second day we misguidedly had it in mind to go to see the Siachen glacier. However, we hadn’t yet realized that it was outside the permitted tourist area and is still the scene of military occupation as part of it is in an area which is disputed between Pakistan and India. So we gave that a miss and did the camel ride followed by a visit to Deskit gonpa on our way back and up to the Nubra River. Deskit gonpa is about 700 years old and sits majestically above the town on a big crag. Like the other gonpas we’ve visited so far, there were the usual heavily decorated prayer rooms and statues and rooms with prayer books in them. What was interesting about this gonpa was how they get their water. It was great having Yung Chen with us because of course she speaks Ladakhi and everybody likes her so whenever we went to visit places we got special treatment and found out more about where we were. In this case, we got shown around the gonpa by a monk who also took us round the back and further up the long crag to show us the deep gorge and how the monks used to climb down the almost vertical 100m rock face to collect buckets of water. Now they have a long water supplying pipe which goes far back up into the gorge to a point where the river is above the gonpa. However, sometimes the pipe needs repairing for which a rope is attached to a big rock at the top for the monks to abseil down and along the cliff face on. Om mani padme hum.

In the afternoon we drove north along the Nubra River through the village of Sumur on to Panamik. After finding a nice family-run guesthouse there and eating more momos we drove 4km upriver to cross the bridge and then 4km back downriver to the bottom of the path which led up to Ensa gonpa – a tiny, 800 or 900 year old gonpa looked after by one monk half way up a large rocky hill. The path wasn’t very obvious but it was a great climb. First we scrambled up a small steep slope of loose slate and then found a slightly more obvious path which zigzagged up the hillside, marked here and there by small piles of rocks. After about half an hour of working our way up the slippery sandy path we got to the top. Thanks to Yung Chen we got a tour around the place and got invited to have tea with the monk. We sat in a room which overlooked the valley. It was coming towards the end of the day and the sun was falling on Panamik with its tall green poplar trees and lush green barley, sometimes interrupted by a haze of purple heather and splashes of yellow mustard fields.

We all slept very well that night but woke up early the next morning to go down the road to the hot springs before breakfast. The actual spring was further up the hill but the water had been channeled down the hill to a small building of two rooms where it came out of a pipe. Although the water cools as it comes down the hill it’s still quite hot when it comes into the building. So we had nice warm showers, followed by chapattis before setting off on our way back to Leh. On the way we stopped once along the Nubra River where there was a short walk to a nice lake. It was a baking hot day and, although there was some greenery and wildlife around the lake, once you got beyond the low hills surrounding it, it was like stepping into a desert. The car in the distance was wobbly with heat haze and we were glad for the breeze coming through the window when we set off again.

Out last stop before leaving Nubra was the Samstanling gonpa near Sumur. Recently, the head lama of the prominent Spituk monastery died. His reincarnation was found in Nubra and currently lives in the Samstanling gonpa and so of course with our travel guru, Yung Chen, we got the chance to visit him. When we first arrived he was playing with his train set but when he saw us he waved his hand to tell us to come in and his minder took him through to the room next door so he could give us his blessings. We each gave him a white silk scarf and he gave us an orange string. Being only 3 years old, he was a little impatient and went to attempt to climb up a wall hanging when he was done but despite that, he seemed to be very understanding of his role.

By the time we all arrived back in Leh we were pretty exhausted but we all thought Nubra was absolutely incredible and were glad to have been.

As for the rest of the week at school, the hostel students made up some short plays again – this time about friendship/family. They all did pretty well which we were pleased with because most of the stronger students weren’t there because they’re still busy studying for their exams. This was quite good for the less confident students as they had to take more initiative. In fact on Wednesday almost all of the students at the girls hostel session were no older than 12. We were planning to do a debate but I figured we wouldn’t get very far with that so instead we played games like Pictionary which they really enjoyed.

On Thursday the huge group of 63 UWCSEA students visited Lamdon. Like the Tanglin group, they brought lots of donations of school equipment. However, this time we got something too – Tom was walking around with a big smile on his face for the rest of the day because the group brought out his nice leather basketball. I’m guessing he’ll be making the most of it next week!

Week 7 – Plans and the Orange Army (not the Dutch)

IT’S HOT!! Summer has undoubtedly arrived in Leh in force! I didn’t think it would get much hotter but we have not seen a cloud all week! In the middle of the day the sun can be maddeningly bright. Thankfully we both have good dark glasses and plenty of sun cream! The heat is certainly tamer than in Cambodia or Singapore since there is virtually no water in the air. All you have to do is step into the shade and the temperature drops a few degrees. This makes the heat really pleasant instead of being a nuisance.

A group of Tanglin Trust students arrived on Thursday this week so Joss and I decided to attend the special assembly that was being held to welcome them. The assembly turned out to be a marathon one and a half hours and we were both very glad we had on plenty of sunscreen as the sun was really beating down. We felt a little sorry for the Tanglin students who had only arrived the day before and looked a little shell-shocked. At least someone had warned them beforehand and they all wore good wide-brimmed hats or sunglasses like Joss and I. The sunglasses we wore turned out to be useful for blocking out the sun and the glare of the Tanglin students’ t-shirts! The group had special Ladakh 2009 shirts made for the trip and opted for a flamboyant and slightly frightening shade of fluorescent orange! As Joss pointed out, the teachers probably chose the color to aid them in locating the students throughout the trip. The assembly was fun though, with an enjoyable drama on keeping Ladakh clean and a song to that affect by one of our boy hostel students, Tundup. We had a chance to catch up with Nirku, a long time guide on the school trek, for lunch while the Tanglin group was eating and he told us all about some education projects he is trying to set up in the very remote region of Eastern Nepal where he is from. Joss and I both thought that might be an idea for the summer holidays!

We finally caught up with Bill Kite, who has been out of Ladakh literally since our second day, to discuss possibilities for trekking. Our primary reason for wanting to chat with him was to find out how much we really need to pay to go on a trek since all the trekking agencies we have talked to so far have given us fairly ridiculous quotes. We were hoping that Bill could help us find a better deal as the prices we had seen so far would really limit what we could do financially. Thankfully Bill told us that most of the trekking agencies in Leh charge about twice what it should really cost to run a trek per day for two reasons. Firstly, they only have business in the summer months (June, July and August) so they need to make enough money in that time to live on for a year. Secondly, most agencies are so small that they don’t own all their equipment so they have to factor in renting it out from other people. Also, most people come to Ladakh for a once in a life time experience and don’t mind shelling out extra money so the trekking agencies get away with charging a lot. Factoring all these things in we still wouldn’t be able to afford much so Bill kindly told us that if we wait until early July when Tanglin, UWC and his dental group have all been and gone he will have all his equipment sitting around doing nothing plus a bunch of really nice guides (most of which were on the trek when I came a few years ago and apparently still remember me) who don’t want to go back to Nepal just yet since it is still monsoon season there. Bill Kite also owns all his equipment and has other work he is happy to lend us the equipment and charge us quite a bit less. Joss and I were both really relieved because although this means we will have to wait about a month to do any trekking it means we can do a lot more with our money and won’t be limited to just one trip.

This week Jason, the dentist, told us that he and his protégé Yueng Chen are going over to Nubra next weekend in a jeep owned by one of Yueng Chen’s cousins (therefore the price will be more reasonable) and we are welcome to join them. We were both really excited about this since we have been dying to visit Nubra and needed people to go with. Conveniently, the jeep will leave early Friday morning which means we will be able to welcome the UWC group when they arrive at school on Thursday. Just incase anybody missed it in our previous blogs, the road to Nubra is allegedly the highest motor road in the world (actually second to a road in Bolivia by about 100ft according to our guide book) and is supposed to be a rather amazing/hair-raising drive. Not to mention that Nubra apparently has bountiful natural beauty of many varieties. Foremost among our reasons for going to Nubra are opportunities to cross short portions of desert on camelback (which Joss is particularly excited about) and at least one stunning glacier (which I am particularly excited about!)

Teaching this week was also really good! As Joss mentioned last week the girls have really stepped it up since we talked to them about their level of engagement. The boys have also maintained a good standard although we have lost a few students to extra exam preparation tuition since there are exams in a few weeks. The girls really got involved with a lot of discussions this week and we were so pleased with them that we allowed them to choose a fun topic for Friday’s session. They decided upon: Girls VS Boys. Surprisingly, most of the students seemed to want to argue on behalf of the boys! Very strange! We all had a lot of fun with this debate and thankfully there was no winner!

That’s it for this week!

Week 6: Out and about

14/06/09

As Tom mentioned in last week’s blog, we’d been having some problems with getting the girls to come on time (or to come at all). However, after talking to them it has been going much better. This week we tried again to get them to do a drama – this time about a Ladakhi story – which they did really well. We only got one day, Tuesday, with the boys at their hostel because, due to the next day being a holiday, all the hostel students had gone to town on Thursday afternoon. On Friday, Mr. Tundup had organized a huge picnic for all the older students – at least 700 of them! – in a nearby town called Shey, a bit further south from Choglamsar where we had the other picnic. Tom and I were also invited but decided to first go with Jason and Yung Chen to visit Spituk gonpa. The gonpa, like most others, sits high up on a hill overlooking Spituk with the glacial blue Indus River running through it. Built in the 15^th century and founded by King Graspabumlde, it was the first ‘Yellow Hat’ (a Buddhist sect) monastery in Ladakh. We walked up and down steps winding between the sturdy white-washed mud-and-stone monasteries and temples and past walls and roofs covered with colourful prayer flags. We went inside one small red-painted building where there was a tiny dark room in which the walls were lined with terrible wooden masks and in which stood a number of large stone statues of the gods, their faces covered with decorated cloths out of respect. We also went inside the main temple where a number of elderly monks where sitting and eating lunch and reciting hymns. The room, smelling of butter tea, barley bread and burning candles was elaborately decorated – every wall was covered with paintings of the protector deities and from every column hung colourful hangings. At the back of the large room were photos of H.H. the Dalai Lama and other important lamas as well as statues of gods – all shrouded with white scarves. There was also a table of offerings including silver bowls of coloured water and flour and butter made into shapes. When we went outside again we were shortly followed by the monks who offered us butter tea and bread. We walked through to a courtyard after this and looked inside another similar temple which held the Kangyur and Tangyur (The Discourses and Commentaries) in wooden shelves along one wall. Up above the temple we took in the view of the Indus valley for a while before heading to the picnic site.

To get to the picnic we headed for Shey where we turned into a road on the right at a fish farm. Beyond the farm was a beautiful long Teletubbyland-like narrow pasture with a gurgling stream running through it. We soon found everyone – little clusters of makeshift tents and speakers around which groups of students where enjoying themselves in the sun and dancing together. Tight-walking over the stream on a few wooden poles we found ourselves sitting in the teachers’ spot with some of the teachers we’d become friends with at the last picnic. It was another sunny day and we spent most of our time playing cards until it was time for a most delicious lunch of rice, lentils, potatoes, stewed vegetables and whatnot followed by yoghurt and fruit. Tom and I have decided to give up on trying to eat meat here – the vegetarian food is so much better.

Later in the afternoon Jason and the two of us decided to drive down the road to the next town, Thikse, where there is another gonpa. This is a very well-known gonpa and there are postcards and posters of it all over the place in Leh. This is not surprising because it’s really spectacular. Thikse used to be a very small village, almost all of which clung to the side of a steep hill on top of which is the gonpa. However, in the last 10 to 15 years it has grown incredibly fast – it now stretches far into the distance along the valley floor. I reckon it must be at least three or four times the size. The most famous thing about Thikse gonpa is that it houses the largest Buddha statue in Ladakh – and it is enormous – literally 2 storeys high. We climbed up a large staircase to get to the second floor of the building and were greeted by a humongous golden Buddha head. You could look down to the bottom floor to see the bottom half of the Buddha, His two massive golden feet pointing up at you as he sits in the lotus pose. His smooth, serene face is framed by a huge intricately decorated headdress. The whole of the temple was surrounded by a continuous line of golden prayer wheels on which the mantra om mani padme hum is written. Climbing up higher we went inside another temple much like the ones we had been in at Spituk but this time empty of monks. Up another couple of flights of steps we got to the rooftop on which there was a library. Something I really like about these buildings is their windows which are usually very tiny and have a thick black border around them. Sometimes their wooden shutters and frames are painted with little patterns which have mostly been worn away over time which gives them a beautifully rustic look.

From the top of the gonpa we had another sweeping view of the valley in which Thikse lay – at this point Tom realized that that was where he did a home-stay when he came to Ladakh on the school trip a few years ago. At the bottom of the gonpa hill is a large barren plot of land in the middle of which is a tiny L-shaped building which is one of Lamdon’s satellite schools which we visited on Wednesday with Mr. Tundup. The 75 students – from Kindergarten to grade 8 - are taught in the 10 classrooms. We met the principal and a volunteer teacher from England who told us a bit about the school and we had a look in the classrooms where classes of up to 11 students (usually only 4 or 5) where taking classes. It must be fantastic having such a teacher to student ratio and we really hope that we can spend a few weeks helping out at this school although we’re not sure yet where we would be most helpful. We also visited the Lamdon school 3km down the road in Shey which was slightly larger (about 180 students) and had a hostel where the majority of the students stayed. We’ll probably do some treks first before visiting one of these schools for a few weeks but we’re looking forward to it already as it will be quite different from being in Leh.

We headed back to the picnic, narrowly missing a small canyon in the middle of one of the small back-roads, where more cards were dealt. Someone thought it would be fun to go for a walk through the pasture along the stream where we entertained ourselves with poo-sticks and jumping from bank to bank. However, I ended up being exploited for being the guinea pig to cross a boggy patch and returned to the picnic site later with bog-coloured trousers.

The rest of the weekend hasn’t been very eventful because Leh is on tax-strike and everywhere – literally everywhere – has been closed since Friday morning. Apparently there used to be no taxation in Leh but now the government wants to add it. Word is that no one is opening up again until their demands are met – a good time to go walkabouts?

Week 5: The view from the top

07/06/09

Another week in Ladakh! This week teaching went really well with the boys! Thats the good news, unfortunately we had a few problem with the girls hostel students. We also FINALLY made it up to the victory tower that affords a great view over all of Leh and we are still planning for our trips out of Leh in the coming months.

Its strange that things have been going so well with the boys and that things have been a bit harder with the girls. Partly because the boys are a little younger and partly because everybody (Mr. Tundup and ourselves included) assumes it will be easier teaching girls. That is not the case in Ladakh. The boys show up bang on time for every session we have had so far and are extremely enthusiastic about any task we set for them. Unfortunately the girls frequently keep us waiting for as much as half and hour and are less than enthusiastic about certain tasks we ask them to perform. For example, although the boys really enjoy the informal debates we have been having they had no problem when we asked them to prepare and perform a story about Ladakh in English. In fact they got extremely involved and produced some really great short dramas. When we tried to have the girls do the same thing half of them complained that they would rather have a debate. We think this is because in a debate often, despite our efforts, the confident students get to talk a lot while the shy students get to hide behind them. In a drama this isn't possible as the groups are small and we stipulated that everybody must speak. So far our sessions with the girls hostel students just have not been as satisfactory compared with the boys. This week we got a bit fed up when the kept us waiting for almost 45 minutes and then told us they needed to get washing done, (this also happens with the boys, but they give us some notice) after this we had a rather frank conversation with the girls trying to make it clear that if they wanted us to work with them they needed to be entirely in or out rather than showing up occasionally and not involving themselves much. To be fair, the girls seemed to take this onboard much more readily than when we tried to subtly hint at it and there has already been a marked improvement.

We also finally climbed up to the victory tower that over looks Leh this week, and we were not dissapointed by the view! This victory tower is situated a couple of hundred feet above the royal palace of Leh. This royal palace was deserted when Kashmir invaded and the royal family moved to a palace in nearby Stok where they still reside. The victory tower was built when the Ladakhis kicked the army of Kashmir out. The view is great as one side looks down right over the school and the other looks over the old and new towns of Leh. The short walk up is a little steep but it is well worth it!

On Sunday we also went up the 560ish steps to Shanti Stupa to watch a large ceremony to celebrate something to do with the birth of Buddha. It was a little unclear if it was his birthday or not. It seemed like all of Chang spa was making its way up to the top, many carrying short and wide wooden tables (which coupled with the steep steps is quite impressive). When we got to a good vantage point to watch the proceedings we saw a banner welcoming visitors from Singapore. We found this a little confusing until one of the leaders of the ceremony lapsed into English to welcome some Buddhists from a temple in Singapore who had come to celebrate here. We watched the ceremony for some time but since we had no translator and all the reading was in Bodhik we headed back down for lunch after a few hours.

Not much else happend this week other than a little informal basketball coaching and continued planning for trips in the future. We are going to go with Mr. Tundup next week to visit some of the Lamdon satelite branches where we might spend a few weeks teaching soon.

Lots going on next week so hopefully the blog with have a bit more substance!

Tom Kemeny