The Mystery of the Kailash Trail - Chapter 4 - Part 3

Chapter 4: Part 3: Are the large wild yaks ranging near Kang Renpoche? 

Sangye asked for Yeshe’s father to get some fresh soup and noodles cooked for the group and also to get buckets of hot water for them to wash up. Brother Tameng patted old man Dawa in his appreciation of Sangye’s thoughtfulness. He said, “Old man Dawa, we are either stinking and very smelly, or your friend Sangye is indeed very thoughtful and considerate. Let us get cleaned up and refreshed with food, my friend. Who knows what this day is going to lead us into?”

Dawa smiled and nodded. He knew Sangye and could guess where this would lead towards during the coming hours. The old Qinhai horseman was a pure out and out trailsman. This sort of a mystery was the challenge of his lifetime for him. Dawa felt the same challenge that was inviting him to sink in. Here they were, in the most mysterious place on Earth, and they had thought that they had heard about all the mysteries that were to be known.

Yeshe’s mother felt blessed to be serving to the two monks from the monasteries in the valley. They were actually here, in her eatery, sitting down to partake in what she was cooking. This was a story that she would take back with her to Qinhai and she knew that all the women-helpers would take back to Darchen. There would be gossip and stories and rumours that would be woven inside one another, and the final story would not be anything about the real reason that this strangely mixed up group would have for getting together.

She felt that she knew and understood the old man Sangye, better than her own husband did. Yeshe was also similarly attracted to his grandfather, she knew. Her son would never manage an eatery. He was trapped with them, here, having to take care of the animals and help in the eatery. She saw the tourists, pilgrims and visitors to the valley, those who came in from so many different places, nations and locations, of very different religions and rich and poor and those who had left everything behind them. She knew that her son was better than many among those who visited, even if they were rich and had better equipment.

Sangye was talking to the old man Dawa, while the two monks were washing up in the secluded area of their cave behind the eatery. Two boys and Yeshe were waiting near them to help and provide more buckets of hot water. Old man Dawa was speaking, “Wild yaks are common in the plains and hills away from this region. I have seen herds of more than two hundred wild yaks in one grassy plain. I have hunted them and have skinned some myself. We are familiar with domestic yaks and we live with them all our lives. I know what I saw at night. These were wild yaks that we have never seen.”

The monks came into the eatery, cleaned up and looking eager to join in the discussion. Yeshe’s mother would not allow Sangye and Dawa to sit with the monks until they had gone and cleaned up. She chased them out of the tent. Brother Tameng smiled at the two old men pretending to be frightened of Yeshe’s mother. He bowed in prayer, along with the monk from Dirapuk, before beginning to eat. Yeshe came to them and sat nearby on a small stool, waiting to get them more noodles and soup. His mother came back with tetrapacks of orange juice, “especially smuggled in from Ladakh,” she said, in a whisper.

It was not much of a luxury, but it was certainly a thoughtful gesture on her part. The orange juice and other juice packs, tetrapacks and cans, came in through Ladakh, smuggled in by Changpa nomads, in huge quantities. There were other smuggler gangs along the border with Nepal and the tourist and spiritual circuit certainly welcomed these supplies. Whenever raided or caught, the eatery owners would explain them away as supplies purchased from tour groups.

Norbu entered the eatery with his pilgrim tour owner and came to sit near the two monks. The pilgrim guide, Bipinbhai Shah, was a regular tour operator, who would stay in the valley for more than six months, and had come to the kora for the past ten years. He knew his place in an open location, in front of the two monks from the local monastery. Their word was law to the local peoples, and if he refused them, he would not be able to operate in the region. Norbu had not told him much, and he did not know the details or reasons why the boy would not accompany him.

Bipinbhai Shah did not bother too much about the reasons. After all, he was not married to the yak-boy, he thought. He needed two yaks to carry the baggage, and he did not mind it if different yaks took on the burden. But, he was curious. A little bit. Something strange must have happened for the monk from Choku and the monk from Dirapuk to sit in this miserable eatery outside the regular camping areas. He did not even allow his pilgrim group to eat in these tented eateries. His group usually set up their tented places, inside a compound, and cooked their own food. It was safer and cleaner for the tourists and pilgrims.

He sat reverentially on a stool at some distance from the monks. The old pilgrim guide from Choku came up to Bipinbhai and asked for him to allow Norbu to stay back. He told him, “Bhai, I know you from earlier. You are a good and fair man. We need your help. I know Norbu, as I know his family at Shiquanhe. The two monks have decided to travel to some remote areas, and we need Norbu’s help and his two yaks. This is all sudden, and we have no time to go to Darchen and get new help teams. Can you manage without him?”

Bipinbhai nodded in agreement. His mind was thinking fast. This was really weird. This old man was definitely lying. There were many pilgrim guides in the Dirapuk area without any work. Holy men do not just go out wandering in these hills. But, he could not disagree. He was given a bowl of soup. He knew it would be made of vegetable stew, since the two monks were also drinking from similar bowls. He sipped at his bowl politely, knowing that it would be a sacrilege to refuse, and later, bowed and stood up and left the eatery.

Norbu walked out with Bipinbhai and bade farewell. The pilgrim guide was fond of Norbu, since he had accompanied the group on several kora. He paid him his entire fees, and added some money in a liberal measure, to retain goodwill. Bipinbhai knew his economics in this region. The added ‘tip’ that he paid to Norbu, he knew, would bind the boy to his pilgrim group as an unpaid obligation. The boy would be back with his yaks and with his pilgrim group for the next year, and he would be more than enthusiastic, thought Bipinbhai, and waved at him, as he went back.

The two yaks and his mastiff, his tents and other baggage, had been brought up to the eatery and had been kept in the custody of two helper-boys from Darchen. The boys knew Norbu, and were excited at these sudden happenings. Something strange must have happened, they gossiped. Norbu returned to the tented eatery and went to sit with Yeshe. The old man Dawa patted him in affection, and said, “Welcome, boy, get some hot soup and noodles inside you. Yeshe’s father will get some Darchen boys to feed your yaks and your mastiff.”

Brother Tameng and the old horseman, Sangye, had been in discussion with each other. It was the monk from Choku monastery, Brother Tameng, who spoke, as though he had come to a decision after seeking advice from Sangye. He said, “Brothers, we do not know what is to happen in our lives now. The circles of our lives bring us all together, and our circles have met each other. This valley is the most mysterious place on this world. This valley is also the most sacred place on this world. We are fortunate that we are here, and we saw or experienced what we did yesterday.”

“We do not know where the herd of large wild yaks went. We do not know what happened to the twelve pilgrims who sat out there in the circle of stones below Choku. Why did the pilgrims sit out in the open in the rainstorm? Why did the wild yaks not frighten them? Why did the wild yaks come to the circle of stones? Why did the wolves wait at a distance? Was there any connection? We may never know anything about all these events.”

He continued, “What we do now know, because of old man Sangye and young Yeshe here, is that the herd of wild yaks came down the slope behind this ridge. They seem to have come down the long slope behind Dirapuk. This is certain knowledge. We can try to find answers to these questions. Let us plan and let us go inside the valley and try to explore this region and see if there are any wild yaks, if they are very large, and if there are more of them. If we saw only male wild yaks at night, there must be others. There must be female wild yaks, and there must be young ones, and there must be herds inside these valleys. Let some of us go into the valley.”