House of Snow

by Sir Ranulph Fiennes Ed Douglas

  It was just time to light the lamps in the village houses. The cowherds were busy laying out feed and spreading litter for their livestock. Over by the stream the crickets made the air resound with the music of their ensemble, as if some musicians from the city were playing their tanpuras. Down below, Telu Magar’s dog barked monotonously. Dhané was standing beside the calf, his eyes brimming with tears. The calf turned its eyes toward him and gave a cry of utter misery, as if it wanted to tell him in its mute infant’s language that this was the last hour of its life. Dhané wiped his tear-filled eyes with the hem of his shirt and sat down beside the calf. “Go now, mother, go happily. May your soul find joy in the other place.” The calf gave one strong kick and then gave up its breath, as if it were obeying his command. At milking time, the buffalo kicked out, brandished its horns, and jumped around, and Dhané was unable to touch it.

  It was Phagun, and the fields were empty and bare. Several farmers had just begun their plowing. Dhané had let his buffalo out onto his dry field, and at midday he lay sunning himself on some straw on the open roof of his lean-to. Just then, Leuté Damai arrived in a foul temper.11 Leuté was very wealthy. He reaped a profit from sewing for the whole village, and he also had plenty of fields of his own, so he did not need to defer to anyone. Dhané climbed down from the roof, and Leuté saluted him, lifting one hand to his brow: “Jadau, Saheb,” he said12 “Have you let your buffalo loose? It’s been through my field, and it hasn’t left a single stem of my buckwheat standing. If my patrons let their stock wander out like this as if they were bulls,13 what will be left of me? Come with me and see the damage your buffalo has done!”

  “It can’t have been in there for long; it was in my own field just now!” said Dhané.

  “I don’t know anything more about it, but I’m going to get the mukhiya to fine you for this. You’ll have to pay whatever he decides.”

  “All right, all right, there’s no need to get so excited, Damai! If it’s destroyed your crop I’ll repay you!”

  “Do you think you can still talk down to me like that when your buffalo has ruined me? I’m going to the mukhiya right now!” Leuté strode off. Very soon he returned with the mukhiya and several other men, and they went over to Leuté’s buckwheat field, taking Dhané with them.

  There was a ravine between Dhané’s and Leuté’s fields. The far wall of the ravine, on Leuté’s side, was very high, and cattle and buffaloes were unable to climb into Leuté’s field. But Dhané’s buffalo had followed the ravine right down to the main path and had then gone around to get into Leuté’s large terraced field, where it had destroyed roughly half the buckwheat. It was resolved that Dhané should pay a fine of three mohars.14 He was made to promise to pay within ten days, and a written record was made of this. When they had secured Dhané’s mark on the paper, the mukhiya and the other men returned to their homes.

  Haay, the ways of fate are strange! One afternoon in the burning sun of Chait15 the buffalo came staggering into the cowshed. Dhané came down from the yard and was about to pat it when he noticed that it bore some bruises, which he guessed had been caused by some blows from a stick. He was speechless. But what could a poor man like Dhané do? Slowly he muttered, “Who hit you like this? You must have got into someone’s crops. That’s just how it is.” The buffalo’s womb had been injured, and four days later its calf was stillborn.

  1 Phagun: mid-February to mid-March.

  2 Baidar is probably a corruption of the word bahidar and is defined by Turner as “clerk, writer” (1930:459). The baidars fulfilled an important role in village communities in eastern Nepal, acting as advisers to village headmen on legal issues and drafting documents for them.

  3 A proverb meaning that livestock can never be a sound or permanent investment because of its vulnerability to disease, old age, natural calamities, and so on.

  4 In the old currency system, an anna was one-sixteenth of a rupee.

  5 Dhané is the diminutive form of Dhan Bahadur’s name, and the name is chosen ironically: dhan means “wealth” and dhané means “wealthy one”.

  6 Cowrie shells were a common form of currency in rural areas of Nepal before the economy became centralized and monetized.

  7 Nepali prose narratives such as this switch between present and past tenses more frequently than an English translation can reflect. The present tense is often used to depict physical settings or to analyze psychologial or emotional conditions, producing a period of reflective stillness in the text, while the events of the story are usually recounted in the past tense. In this text, the present tense is also sometimes used to recount the unfolding of events, and this is reflected in the translation as far as possible. There are a few instances, however, where a paragraph begins to describe events in one tense and then switches to another for no apparent reason: the translation departs from the original in such instances so that this switching between tenses (which can be confusing in English prose) does not occur within the body of a single paragraph.

  8 The baskets (doko) are carried on the back and shoulders and secured by a strap (namlo) around the forehead. The ghum is a boat-shaped covering made of interlaced bamboo strips that protect its carrier from the rain.

  9 Kahila means “Fourth Eldest Son.” Very few characters in this novel are addressed by their given names, and this reflects colloquial speech, in which kinship terms and birth-order names are used much more commonly. The birth-order names that occur in this novel are Kancha (m), Kanchi (f): “Youngest”; Kahila (m): “Fourth Eldest”; Sahinla (m): “Third Eldest”; and Jetha (m), Jethi (f): “Eldest.” A dhami is a shaman or diviner.

  10 Bankalé: a malevolent forest spirit.

  11 The Damai are an artisanal case who traditionally work as tailors. They occupy a low position in the caste hierarchy.

  12 “Jadau” is a deferential greeting used by lower castes when addressing a member of a higher caste (Turner 1930:207). Leute’s use of this form of greeting would appear to contradict the author’s claim that he “did not need to defer to anyone”: the inference is perhaps that the status acquired by birth remains a more powerful factor than any status acquired through wealth. Alternatively, in view of the ensuing tirade, it could also be construed as sarcasm.

  13 Bulls are not generally confined but permitted to wander at will and are often held up as symbols of lustfulness and irresponsibility.

  14 A mohar is half of one rupee.

  15 Chait: mid-March to mid-April.

  SCHOOLHOUSE IN THE CLOUDS

  Sir Edmund Hillary

  Sir Edmund Percival Hillary (1919–2008) was a mountaineer, explorer and philanthropist from New Zealand. On 29 May 1953, Hillary and Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers to reach the summit of Mount Everest. They were part of the ninth British expedition to Everest, led by John Hunt. Hillary was named by Time as one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.

  PANGBOCHE-SCHOOLHOUSE IN THE CLOUDS

  Pangboche was one of the first villages to petition me for a school. It is the closest village to Everest and sprawls over a scanty terrace high above the Imja River. The people are mostly poorer than in the neighboring villages, and they have locally the reputation of being unreliable and dishonest. But on several expeditions I have known a number of the better Pangboche Sherpas, and they have proved just as hardy and loyal as the rest of them. Life in Pangboche is even more rigorous than in the ordinary Sherpa village, and perhaps this has made the people more suspicious and less demonstrative. No words of praise have been written by expeditions about Pangboche – only complaints about the pilfering, and hard words about the local insistence on being paid for everything and paid in more than full. This seemed a place that badly needed a school.

  On April 1 Desmond Doig, Murray Ellis and I left Khumjung, bound for Pangboche. In heavily falling snow we strolled along the spectacular rocky path above the Dudh Kosi River and then plunged down the abrupt two thousand feet to the river itself. Above us the long
, rising track clung to the side of the steep spur leading to the Monastery of Thyangboche; we puffed our way up this slope, which never seems to get any shorter or any easier. We reached the crest in fast fading light. Through the whirling snow we could see tall, distinguished figures waiting for us at the ornately decorated entrance arch of the monastery grounds. It was the head lama himself, some of his senior lamas, and old friend Dawa Tenzing, veteran of a score of tough expeditions.

  Doing us much honor, the head lama led us across the grassy crest of the spur to the new monastery rest house. Largely donated to the monastery by Dawa Tenzing, this rest house filled an urgent need in supplying accommodation for distinguished visitors – religious dignitaries, village headmen and expedition members. Much of the timber had been salvaged from the “Green Hut” my expedition had built at 17,000 feet in the Mingbo Valley some two and a half years before, and it was satisfying to see it being put to such good use. The head lama showed us around with great pride and then beckoned us over to a table spread with food. We sat down in jovial mood and had placed before us delicate china cups resting on exquisitely carved silver-and-gold stands. After drinking ceremonial tea, the head lama gave a few formal words of welcome and then departed, having invited us to dinner on the following day.

  We awoke to a brilliant morning. The monastery, the trees, the peaks around, were all dressed in a layer of new snow, sparkling and gleaming in the early sun. At the head of the valley, only ten miles away, the summit of Everest, crowned with a long plume of wind-blown snow, thrust up into the blue Tibetan sky. Our walk up the valley to Pangboche was a delight. The landscape was incredibly beautiful under its new snow and reinforced my belief that this is surely one of the loveliest places on the surface of the earth. Even Pangboche itself looked clean and peaceful.

  Our first visit was to the gompa, where we paid our respects to the lamas and laid an offering of Rs 100 ($13) on the altar. Slowly the village elders gathered while I waited with an outward show of patience I certainly didn’t feel. When a quorum was present we moved off leisurely up rapidly drying paths to the ridge above the village. Here on a piece of communal land the village had chosen the site for the school, and nearby was a huge pile of rocks gathered for the school building.

  In Pangboche flat land is at a premium and I had no desire to use the best arable land, which is urgently needed for food. But this site had many limitations. A building could be constructed on it but there was no room for a playground, and my eyes kept straying to the dry wash funneling down from the slopes above. I strolled over to a group of rocks piled in the form of an open fireplace and noticed ashes and half-burned remnants of many fires.

  “What is this fireplace doing out here?” I queried.

  “It is the burning ghat for cremating the dead,” was the reply, “and it will be necessary for the lamas to have many prayers and ceremonies before it can be moved elsewhere.” The thought of the delays and expense of such a proceeding was rather daunting, and we all sat around in the sun in a glum silence.

  Finally someone made a suggestion. Farther up the ridge was an old house for sale – the house wasn’t very good and the land was very poor so the total price was only Rs 6oo ($8o). Were we interested? We were. Anything was better than the religious problem of moving a burning ghat. En masse we drifted up the hill, surmounted a little crest and then came suddenly on an old rock house surrounded by two small potato fields enclosed in dry-rock walls. We stopped, enchanted. It was the most glorious position. A hundred feet below us the gompa and houses of Pangboche lay spread-eagled in the warm sun. On every side were tremendous mountain vistas – Everest to the north Ama Dablam and Kangtega to the east, Numbur to the south and Taweche directly above to the west.

  Protected by a rock wall from the sharp wind, we sat in the sun and discussed the matter. After careful deliberation the headman agreed that the village would try to raise the money for the land by levying a charge on each house – “but we must have time, sahib.” This was a worthy suggestion but time was now more important to us than money. Desmond, Murray and I had our own little conference. Murray felt we should start clearing operations on the site immediately, and Desmond and I agreed. I put to the village another proposition. I would purchase the land and donate it to the village for the school. The village in return must reaffirm its intention of giving free labor for the clearing of the land, the assembling of rocks, and the carrying of timber from the forest. The foresters, carpenters and stonemasons would be employed by us. The elders accepted this offer with enthusiasm and assured us that villagers would start demolition work on the site next day. We agreed that the necessary documents would be drawn up and brought to Thyangboche in the morning for signing in the presence of the head lama. Everything had gone amazingly well and we were in high spirits as we strode back down the valley to Thyangboche.

  “TEA”

  At 5 P.M. we went to the monastery to have tea with the head lama. First we made our bows in the great temple and I placed an offering on the altar. Then we were conducted by a young lama along a narrow alley and through a heavy door into a paved courtyard. Here we were greeted by a ferocious Tibetan mastiff, who threw himself against his chain in frantic efforts to get at us. The young lama took hold of the brute’s collar and pulled him back out of the way, but we were glad to slip past the snapping jaws onto dark, winding stairs and up into the head lama’s private room. This was small but beautifully decorated, and the window framed the most stupendous view of Kangtega. Sitting cross-legged on a carpeted bench in the window alcove was the head lama, dressed in gorgeous brocades. We each in turn presented him with scarves and presents and received his blessing. For the next hour we sipped Tibetan tea – a horrifying mixture of black tea, salt and rancid yak butter. The head lama was in fine form and most vivacious. He and Desmond and I were old friends, so formalities went by the board. The Nepali interchange of gossip became too quick for me to hope to follow.

  Finally food appeared. First a greasy soup made from venerable yak – and with the full flavor that only year-old meat can give. Despite my long experience of this dish I had difficulty in getting it down, but my discomfort was relieved a little by observing the suffering of Murray Ellis, a conservative New Zealand eater, tackling his first traditional Tibetan meal. Next course was rice, fried yak, fried potato chips and a thicker soup from the same old yak. We all managed to do better with this. Dessert was a large bowl of dahi (curds) with sugar added and we devoured this with enthusiasm. Yak dahi is excellent food, and with the addition of sugar and tsampa (cooked ground barley) is popular with all expeditions.

  The head lama’s room had no heating, and a vigorous breeze came through the partly open window. Outside I could see Kangtega outlined against the cold night sky; there were signs of a hard frost. Sitting on a cushion in the unaccustomed cross-legged position, I was rapidly becoming stiff with cold despite my down jacket. But the lightly clad lama seemed unaffected by the temperature and chatted gaily on. At 7:30 P.M. I’d had all I could stand and politely suggested that we had taken too much of the lama’s time and must now leave him in peace. But no he said, we must have our final ceremonial cup of tea. Fortunately someone took pity on us and the tea was hot and sweetened, the milk fresh. We left the head lama with mutual expressions of affection and esteem and scurried across the frosty sward to our warm sleeping bags in the rest house.

  It was with reluctance that we crawled out of bed next morning, for it was cold although the sun was shining on the peaks above. We were immediately advised that we had been commanded to breakfast with the abbot of Thyangboche – the second in seniority in the monastery. A combined groan went up from the three of us. Dried, matured yak is hard enough to take in the evening – but for breakfast? No, we couldn’t do it! Despite our obvious distress Sirdar Mingmatsering was adamant – go we must or insult our hosts. We staggered outside and watched clouds writhing around the summit of Everest. Then we marched off to the execution. The abbot is a wonderfully genial
old man whom I remembered from as far back as 1951. He welcomed us with glasses of raw rakshi. Then breakfast was placed before us. It was as bad as we had feared – Tibetan tea with rice and yak stew. The day was saved by the final dish – hot fresh yak’s milk with tsampa and sugar – and this helped quiet our queasy stomachs.

  At the appointed time we gathered at the rest house for the meeting with the Pangboche villagers and the signing of documents, and were there joined by the head lama attended by two of his junior lamas. After an hour’s delay the only people who had turned up from Pangboche were the old mother of the owner (who himself lived in Katmandu) and the man who was acting as agent for the land – no headman, no elders, no Pangboche lamas. It was becoming clear that things had gone far too easily the previous day – the village had taken it all as a game not to be played too seriously.

  “How is work going on the school site?”

  “No one turned up.”

  ‘Where is everyone?”

  “Digging their potato fields and upvalley, grazing their yaks.”

  The head lama advised us not to complete the deal for the land. It was agreed that Dawa Tenzing and the head lama’s secretary would go to Pangboche the next day and find out definitely whether a school was wanted or not. A diary entry illustrates my feelings at the time. “Pangboche is so backward in every way that it badly needs a school. But there seems some doubt in our Sherpas’ minds whether the parents will take their children away from work and send them to school. In general the village is terribly poor and the inhabitants notoriously moronic. Would it be better to transfer the school to the smaller village of Phorche, where the people are a more cheerful and robust type?”