Where the Indus is Young

by Dervla Murphy

  Around the shoulder of this mountain we were sheltered from the gale and looking up the Khapalu Valley, which is some ten miles long, a mile wide and 8,500 feet above sea-level. At its head stands an overwhelming array of dazzling, sword-sharp peaks and this afternoon the valley floor was a flawless sheet of white, broken only by the several channels into which the Shyok divides during winter. Towards sunset the high cliffs on the far side of the valley were reflected in the Shyok and it became like a roll of shot-silk flung across the snow, its swift rippling surface dark gold with strange glints of carmine.

  By that time we were down to river level, amongst Bara’s poplars, willows and fruit-trees. Most of the houses are high above the track though one large group of dwellings stands beside it; many Balti settlements should really be described as scatterings of hamlets, rather than villages. Only one man was visible, driving two black dzo across the whiteness from the river, and when I called out to ask if there was a ‘chota hotel’ he came hurrying towards us. He was elderly and bare-footed, wearing a tattered shalwar-kameez under a once-fashionable scarlet lady’s coat. His big grin revealed crooked, broken teeth. In response to my question he indicated a small building standing on its own amidst apple-trees and I at first mistook this for a Rest House. Red-coat delightedly appropriated us, leading Hallam into the orchard, tethering him to a tree and helping me to unload. When he pointed to a half-open door I entered the building and recognised an abandoned school, put up before the keen young Pakistani government had learned that school-buildings solve nobody’s educational problems. If the doors and windows were ever glazed all the glass has long since been removed and the roof leaks so badly that one-third of the earth floor is at present under water. The Urdu alphabet is still faintly legible on a wall-blackboard – the only item of furniture.

  ‘I don’t think this is a very suitable floor to sleep on,’ said Rachel, who has never before been known to complain of sleeping accommodation. I could not but agree, so I hinted to Red-coat that a charpoy would be acceptable. He nodded vigorously and hurried off into the dusk, taking Hallam with him to a stable.

  Our arrival had transformed the deserted village into a seething mass of men and boys; it seemed incredible that so many people could erupt from so few houses. As they milled around the little schoolhouse, jockeying for the best vantage points, they created such an excited hubbub that Rachel and I had to converse in shouts. The deep snow on the pass had got into my boots so I quickly unpacked the stove, bared my agonisingly cold feet and sat on the food-sack to thaw my toes and dry my saturated socks. Meanwhile Rachel was crouching in a corner beside a candle as completely absorbed in William the Fourth as though she were sitting by the fire in her own home. The adaptability of the very young never ceases to astonish me. Often these days I have occasion to bless her abnormally small appetite. After riding eighteen rough miles through crisp mountain air most children would not unreasonably demand food, but she looks first for printed matter.

  My toes had just thawed when a hush fell on the mob outside. Then a tall, very thin old man appeared in the doorway, wrapped in a ragged blanket and holding up a lantern which showed him to be toothless, with deep-set, beady, kindly eyes and an unmistakable air of authority. He said that a windowless, leaking schoolroom was no fit place for Bara’s guests to be entertained and directed a bevy of lads to carry our half-unpacked belongings to his home. As we followed him through the orchard the whole juvenile population cheered and sang and wolf-whistled deafeningly. Never anywhere else have I caused such good-humoured turmoil.

  In pitch darkness we stumbled through a labyrinth of narrow passages between dwellings, crossed a short footbridge of unsteady tree-trunks over a frozen nullah, and groped our way through still narrower passages, uneven with humps of old snow and full of the warm smells and sounds of livestock. Then I bent my head to pass through a low doorway into a stable where our unfamiliar scent made invisible dzo snort nervously. A wobbly ladder led to the roof of the stable, off which two doors opened into the kitchen and living-room. We are now installed in the latter apartment, which is about ten feet by twelve and unfurnished except for a high wooden cupboard along one wall. All evening I felt too hot, as the pampered stove was augmented by dozens of men, women and children crowding in to see us. The small unglazed window is sealed with sheets of a Japanese newspaper and one wall is decorated with advertisements from Time and The Observer colour supplement. How cosmopolitan can you get … A few strips of filthy matting on the mud floor add to the warmth and the stone walls are over three feet thick; even now (11.45 p.m.) the air remains warm though the stove has been out for a couple of hours.

  Rachel was soon asleep on the floor, after a supper of two hard-boiled eggs, and an hour later I was given four small chapattis and an enamel soup-plate of very hot curry gravy. Our host, the Headman of Bara, is a charming old gentleman whose thoughtfulness and graciousness could serve as an example to many more fortunate men. This family’s poverty is extreme. A nine-year-old grandson with a hacking cough wears only a frayed blue cotton shirt, of European provenance, which reaches almost to his ankles, and everybody seems in some way diseased.

  Soon after 8.30 our host withdrew, followed by the rest of the family, who first took from the cupboard bedraggled quilts, and bits of goat-skin sewn together, and shreds of blankets. Obviously this room has been sacrificed to us and I only hope the family is warm and comfortable in the kitchen.

  As I write I have a major problem on hand – or rather, in bladder. A natural consequence of having drunk several plastic cupfuls (made in China) of salt tea … The snag is that our host has carefully locked us in, obviously imagining that this would make me feel more happy and secure. (Our door cannot be locked from inside.) So there is nothing for it but to unpack our dechi, making a mental note to sterilise it before cooking the next meal. Although now I come to think of it, we are none the worse for having drunk some urine one dark morning in Skardu (I had thought I was adding water to our tea).

  Khapalu – 10 February

  We were awakened by our Bara host removing a small section of the Tokyo Times from the window, to admit a pale glimmer of dawn greyness and a draught of icy air. His daughter-in-law, with a four-month-old bungo on her back, brought a tin of glowing embers from the kitchen fire and got our stove going after much persistent blowing, which sent clouds of acrid smoke into the eyes of both mother and baby. Once the sun was up a surprising amount of light – reflected off the snowy slope behind the house – came through that little gap in the Tokyo Times. Our bed-tea was sweet and black – none of the family indulged in this luxury – and breakfast was served after a very long interval. It consisted of salt tea, two chapattis and a minute omelette for which our host apologised, explaining sadly that the women could find only one small egg.

  Meanwhile we had been inspected by numerous locals, including a group of twenty-four young women. These came laughing into the room en masse and sat packed on the floor with expectant expressions as though they believed we would at any moment start performing strange rites. One unfortunate girl had a large goitre, a badly pock-marked face and a blind eye – this last a rather dreadful sight, though we should be used to it by now as the loss of one or both eyes is such a common Balti affliction. However, most of our visitors were healthy and happy-looking, with rosy cheeks and handsome features. The quality of their silver, turquoise and coral headdresses indicated that these were the élite of Bara and their faces – though not their clothes or their habits – seemed cleaner than the average Balti’s. So many babies were having breakfast that the background noise reminded me of a litter of suckling piglets and Rachel greatly admired the stoicism of those mothers who were nursing hefty toddlers with mouths full of sharp teeth. After the departure of this contingent several little pools were to be seen on the floor so daughter-in-law scattered a few fistfuls of wood-ash as blotting paper.

  Then Red-coat arrived and settled down in front of the stove to chat to our host. When another man of
fered him a cigarette he casually opened the stove, took out a red-hot ember with his bare fingers, leisurely lit his cigarette and dropped the ember back into the fire. ‘Is he a conjurer?’ asked Rachel breathlessly.

  While we were breakfasting our host called his wife and asked her to find something. She selected a key from a bunch in her pocket, removed a little padlock from one section of the wall-cupboard and after much rummaging handed a wristwatch to her husband. He carefully handed it to me, plainly expecting me to be able to set it going by some Western magic, and the whole family watched tensely while I examined it. As the spring had gone I was unable to help; what baffled the disappointed owner was the fact that the hands could still be made to go round.

  By 10.15 we were on our way, followed by scores of deliriously cheering youngsters. After a very frosty night progress was slow, up and down the icy mountainsides, with Khapalu’s pale brown orchards and white terraced fields gradually coming into view on our right. This oasis is roughly fan-shaped and climbs 1,000 feet from river level to the base of a semicircular wall of glittering snow-mountains. Beyond it the Shyok does another U-turn, having been deflected by a gigantic outcrop of brown rock which rises 2,000 feet above the valley floor. A few miles north-east of this rock one can see the opening of the Hushe Valley, overlooked by a dramatic phalanx of slender, pointed, grey-white peaks. Masherbrum stands at the head of the Hushe Valley and we hope to get as far as Hushe village towards the end of the month, if the track is clear by then.

  Khapalu’s solid, British-built, well-maintained Rest House stands at right angles to the brown outcrop and about two furlongs from it. Through our window we look past the majestic chenar in the garden, across the Shyok – scarcely fifty yards away – and up the widest stretch of the valley to those pointed peaks. Behind are cosy stables, and then orchards and terraces with icy paths leading steeply to the bazaar. These are short cuts; the jeep track finds a more gradual gradient.

  Bazaar prices are lower here than in Skardu, despite additional transport costs; Khapalu’s merchants do not automatically raise their prices when a foreigner appears. This afternoon we got ten fresh eggs for Rs.5 and a seer of onions for one rupee. Moreover, a load of hay costs only Rs.2, and the elderly chowkidar tells me that tomorrow he can provide oats at Rs.1.50 per seer. He is a splendid character, intelligent, discreet and courteous – the first genuine chowkidar-type we have met in Baltistan. Short and sturdy, he has a square nutbrown face with twinkling blue eyes; he and Rachel fell in love at first sight.

  Khapalu is much colder than Skardu and this room has such a high ceiling it is virtually impossible to warm it with one small oilstove. I am now wearing every garment I possess, including a glove on my left hand, and the stove between my feet is turned up full – yet I am shivering.

  9

  The Nurbashi Influence

  Beyond Daho, Khapolor stretches twenty-five miles further down the Shayok, the whole length of the chiefship being sixty-seven miles. As the mean breadth is about thirty miles, the area will be 2,010 square miles. The mean height of the villages is about 9,000 feet. The chiefs of Khapolor have for several generations acknowledged the supremacy of the Gyalpos of Balti but their ancestors most probably had possession of the country for several generations before the rise of the Balti dynasty, whose very title of Makopon or General betrays that they are the descendants of some military chief.

  ALEXANDER CUNNINGHAM (1852)

  The Balti Wazir of Khapalu … was, like all Baltis, a mild and biddable creature and did what he was told. His equipment included an umbrella and a sword, the sword to show his rank, though I am perfectly certain he could never have used it, even in self-defence.

  C. G. BRUCE (1910)

  Khapalu – 11 February

  Roti-making takes far longer on our own tin pan than on Sadiq’s iron griddle. It kept me busy for two hours this morning and I have now perfected a formula – using lots of ghee and some sugar to give us energy – which produces a Balti shortbread.

  Today we followed the jeep-track to 10,500 feet. The sun was warm when we set off and the light had a clarity extraordinary even by local standards. Every colour seemed alive and every breath tasted like sparkling wine as we climbed gradually through scattered hamlets, poplar groves, rich orchards and hundreds of tiny terraced fields. Khapalu’s population (about 9,000) is so spread out that one has no sense of being in even a small town. The atmosphere is completely ‘village’ and the people are much more welcoming than in Skardu.

  From afar one sees a large building near the foot of Khapalu’s semicircular, southern mountain wall, where the jeep track begins to climb steeply. This is much the biggest edifice in Khapalu, and perhaps in all Baltistan – apart from Skardu’s fort. ‘It must be the Raja’s Palace,’ observed Rachel, already wise in the ways of the Karakoram. The eccentric, whitewashed pile of wood and stone and carved balconies has a slightly Tibetan air, though its walls lack the characteristic Tibetan inward slope. It is wildly ramshackle, yet handsome in its simplicity and undeniably imposing as it dominates the valley. Two small circular summer-houses are conspicuous on the enormous expanse of its flat roof, from the edge of which several midget-like figures were studying us with the aid of binoculars. The usually docile Hallam was so determined to leave the jeep track here that I feel sure he once formed part of the Raja’s polo team. When Rachel at last got him past the turn-off we were walking parallel to the polo-ground, distinguishable because of its area – about ten times that of the average field.

  An hour later we were on the rim of an oval plateau some three miles wide and six miles long. Here was mountain beauty in all its perfection: the flat land aglitter with new snow, the light crystal, the blue sky faintly streaked with wispy cloud, the silence profound. But as we walked on Rachel wanted to know what uranium is, how gems are mined, why different races speak different languages, where numbers were invented and when the Himalayas were formed. At times I itch to push her over the nearest cliff.

  On our way home we were at one point overlooking a small hamlet and could see all the life of the community on the rooftops: men, women, children, yak, dzo, sheep, goats and poultry. Many Balti houses are built either around or right beside an ancient apricot, mulberry or chenar tree. On these clothes are hung to dry, having been washed by laughing women in glacial streams with ice a foot thick along the edges. Most of the local women go unveiled – being Nurbashi rather than Shiah – and are remarkably good-looking. To everyone’s amusement Rachel is exactly the same physical type as the majority of the local children; they, too, have round faces, rosy cheeks – now somewhat the worse for windburn – dark brown eyes and straight, light brown hair. This afternoon some of the older boys tried to upset Hallam; obviously they long to see Rachel falling off. Their elders attempted to control them, but without much success. This sort of hooliganism is unexpected here.

  Khapalu – 12 February

  It was a grey morning, with more snow in the air and thick ice on the bucket of water that had been in our room all night. After breakfast we set off on foot to follow an interesting little path around the flank of the nearby outcrop mountain, but it soon proved too interesting to be wholesome. It was about eighteen inches wide, covered with frozen snow and directly overhanging the Shyok. As we turned to retreat we found the way blocked by a dozen goats who showed no inclination to move politely aside; both above and below this apology for a path the cliff face was unattractive, even by goatish standards. However, the drop into the Shyok was scarcely thirty feet, and no rocks were visible, so our chances of survival seemed quite good. Then the goatherd appeared, a cretinous-looking youth with feet bound in leather thongs. He shouted angrily, whether at us or at his animals was not clear to me. But the goats took it personally and came straight towards us. I seized Rachel and forced her into a providential crevice I had just noticed in the rock face. Then I spreadeagled myself against the cliff and hoped for the best. As the goats passed, one young male – probably unnerved by our strange sme
ll – did go over the edge, to the youth’s fury. But having been swept twenty yards downstream he was able to scramble out more easily than we could have done.

  Further wanderings along the base of this mountain brought us to a leafless thicket of some unidentifiable shrub where a flock of exquisite little birds was feeding on I can’t think what. We stopped, enchanted, to listen to their tentative end-of-winter song. It sounded very sweet – and brave – against the enormous snowy silence of the valley. They had white caps, black collars, crimson breasts and black and white barred wings in flight; they were finch-sized but their song was thrush-like. We also saw one large black and white wild duck feeding in the Shyok.

  At noon we came on a hamlet high above river level where everybody gathered along the edges of the roofs to observe our progress and wave and smile and shout greetings. Then a man addressed us in English, asking the standard set of Balti questions – ‘Where is your city? What is your age? How much you pay for horse?’ When we accepted his invitation to drink tea a door was opened in the high stone wall beside the path and we followed a shy girl along a dark, wide passage – evidently a stable – from which led a boulder-stairway of shallow steps, specially constructed for cattle. The roof was divided into two sections and we sat on shaky home-made wooden chairs in the open-air parlour under a chenar, while a yak and three dzo gazed disbelievingly at us through a decrepit wall of woven willow-wands. From a higher roof – that of the kitchen and bedrooms, which led off the ‘parlour’ roof – sundry tiny white and brown sheep, and long-haired grey goats, peered down at us in comical astonishment. A fine cock and his harem flew to and fro – Balti poultry are great fliers – and the fascinated women of the family, themselves looking not unlike roosting hens, squatted in a row on a single tree-trunk ‘bridge’ linking two roofs; had they toppled backwards they would have fallen twenty feet.