“Wow!” I replied. “That’s awesome. I don’t think I have any friends that go so far back into my childhood.”
“Oh, we didn’t say we were friends . . . ” Allison began.
“You only asked how long we knew each other,” Charlie finished.
Though they’re close friends, they’re quite different. Where Allison tends to playfulness, Charlie tends to a take-no-crap attitude. As Charlie herself puts it, she’s “very German.” While the rest of us wait patiently for our meals—recognizing we’re in the mountains of a third world country where things happen slowly—Charlie demands to know where her pizza is. Then again, like Lucy, she’ll fiercely defend anyone in our group from even the most minor threat or injury.
I’m learning to appreciate her intellect and wit, although at first . . . she scared the hell out of me.
Charlie is the assertive one.
Allison: (Charlie calls her Allie.) Mid-twenties. Allison giggles more than she talks, and when she talks it’s usually about something that leads to giggles. Her laughter is mischievous and infectious. One morning, Lucy blew her nose, I blew mine, and Allison blew hers, one after another, until we sounded like an orchestra of kazoos. Allison started giggling, and soon the three of us were leaning on each other, laughing helplessly. This is not unusual around Allison.
Allison is the laughing one.
Cara: At thirty-five, I’m the oldest. But who am I in this group? Do any of us ever see ourselves clearly? I can’t even see my physical self: I left my mirror behind, and there are few of them in the teahouses along the way. This hike will take me about 250 kilometers (150 miles) in distance and up to 5,416 meters (17,769 feet) in altitude, the farthest and highest I’ve ever hiked in my life. But this is also spiritual terrain, where I find my soul reflected in the giant Himalayas and the diminutive Nepali people. A spiritual journey: unless we close our hearts and minds, is there any other kind?
Cara is the contemplative one. Also the chatterbox. A one-woman mismatched pair.
***
Just as we were all getting ready for bed tonight, terrified screams in the room next to mine sent the lodge into mayhem. Several of us ran to the source, where we found Charlie and Allison gripping each other and babbling as they backed away from the wall. Resting on the wall above their beds, apparently unperturbed by the commotion, was the largest spider I’ve ever seen. Including leg span, it was as big as my entire open hand, its body almost the size of a golf ball.
One by one, everybody came in to look, as fellow lodgers spread the word that it was, indeed, the biggest spider they’d ever seen. A few people started to look for something to trap the enormous creature without having to touch it. Melanie ran for her camera. When she returned, I said, “Wait! You’ll never be able to tell how big it is. Here . . . ” I stepped up to the wall and, to give her photo a size reference, splayed my hand out next to the spider. Okay, maybe I was showing off.
One of the Nepali lodge employees assured us this type of spider wasn’t dangerous, and a few trekkers suggested it probably wouldn’t bother anyone if left alone. This suggestion sent Charlie into a panic: “No! I am really afraid. I can’t possibly sleep if that spider is in here. Someone must kill it.”
The employee grinned and said, “I am brave. I will get the spider.”
“Don’t kill it,” I said. “Just put it outside.”
“No!” Charlie insisted. “You must kill it! I will not be satisfied until I see his dead body.”
The young man only succeeded in chasing the spider through a crack in the wall, into my room next door, and back again. Then it disappeared completely. It took several of us to convince the arachnophobic Charlie that the creature was probably too terrified to come back out. The show over, we all retreated to our rooms.
Late last night, as the lodge drifted into a silence broken only by occasional snores, I was lying awake gazing into space, when I glanced up at the red night-light above my bed and saw the spider lurking there. I soon saw his purpose: a large moth fluttered around the glowing red bulb and was instantly devoured by the speedy predator. It was revolting to watch. Not wanting to turn the lodge into bedlam again, I said nothing. I simply pulled out my camera, snapped a photo, and tried to go to sleep.
Several times during the night I felt a tickling sensation and leapt out of bed in horror, certain the spider had jumped on me. But the tickling only came from the wings and legs of tiny insects and, once or twice, my imagination. When my eyes flew open for the hundredth time or so, I was dismayed to find that my eight-legged roommate had abandoned his post near the night-light. Where the hell did he go?! I barely slept the rest of the night.
I promised myself never to tell Charlie and Allison about the return of the gargantuan spider, or they might be afraid to ever again fall asleep on this trek.
Spiders don’t frighten me as much as the thing I’m running around the world to escape: the slow death of my youth. I’ve come on this trek to drink the last few drops of that vanishing volition. From here, I can see the moment when wisdom will replace action, when acceptance will replace desperation. A college student who skips a semester and puts on a backpack is a traveler, a twenty-five-year-old who quits her job to put on the same backpack is an adventurer, at thirty-five she’s a bohemian, at forty-five a drifter, at fifty-five a loser, at sixty-five a bum. However, those lines become blurry under the intoxicating influence of self-discovery or meaningful purpose.
Sometimes the lines blur enough to allow us to share each other’s paths for a time: students hanging out with bohemians, drifters sightseeing with bums. For this trek, it’s bohemian meets adventurers. The question is: will this bohemian be able to keep up? Especially after a sleepless night on spider watch.
chamje, annapurna circuit, nepal
This morning, Nat and Zack led the charge up the mountain with the energy and competitiveness of teenage boys. Ron started the day in step with them, his long legs bringing to mind the deceptively lazy-looking gait of a camel. Shortly behind that trio, Charlie, Allison, and Gunther gamely kept up a steady clip. Melanie, Lucy, and I brought up the rear, and the gap soon widened until we lost sight of the rest of the group.
Mel and Lucy again questioned why the guys in front were rushing. I wondered, too, but the question didn’t perturb me. By rejecting a fast pace, these young women were reaffirming the values that brought them here in the first place. But the guys in front might have been moving at a pace that felt equally relaxed to them. Even if they were pushing it, the choice was theirs. We’re all independent trekkers, and although we appear to be on the same path, we’re not.
The trail seesawed steeply: up . . . and down . . . up . . . and down. As I tried to ignore the pain in my calves and the twenty pounds on my back, I felt humbled by the sight of local men and women carrying astonishing loads up the mountain on their backs, the weight supported with the help of a strap across the forehead. Some carried entire wooden beds or sets of tables and chairs.
We were captivated by the giggling children who waved and called out, “Namaste!” and “Hello!” but we were disappointed when many followed their friendly greetings with unrelenting demands for candy and pens. Often they followed us for some way: “Hello-sweet! Hello-schoolpen! Hello-sweet! Hello-schoolpen!” Their persistence was so maddening we cursed the generous trekkers before us who’d given away those items. And where was the dentist to fill the resulting cavities? And who could carry enough pens in a backpack to stem this flood of harassment?
When we passed mule trains—bells jingling, plumes rising from harnesses, tassels swaying from colorful headdresses—I passed on the side of the trail nearest the mountain. On one narrow path, as I pressed myself against the hillside, an animal with a heavy load ground me into the rocks. I must admit, if I hadn’t heeded Mel’s advice that mule might have bumped me off the cliff.
I soon lost sight not only of the group ahe
ad, but also of Mel and Lucy behind. Yet I didn’t feel lonely. Instead, I treasured my private view of the world . . . like a secret. A wet, flowing, living secret.
Where there’s life, there’s water. Without it, there would be no Annapurna Circuit, no farms, no villages, no 250 kilometers of paths to link them all. Like most of the world’s worthy hikes, this one embraces many waters and signs of water: contented streams gurgling in newborn wonder, garrulous waterfalls gushing headlong toward their destiny with gravity, vertiginous bridges swaying over adrenalizing contemplations of mortality, satiated crop-terraces surfing irrigated mountainsides, and, on this side of the pass, the constant company of the Marsyangdi River. The river is not a silent companion, but it is perhaps best appreciated in silence.
At lunchtime, I caught up with the main group in Jagat. Several people had decided to try their first daal bhat. Hoping that not all daal bhat is created equal, I ignored my post-traumatic taste disorder and ordered a plate. It was much better than the scary stuff I’d eaten at Shyama’s place. As Nat put it, “I wouldn’t serve it at a dinner party or anything, but it’s not bad. One bowl of this and you could hike all day.”
On the subject of hiking all day, I found myself defending my slow pace, although I don’t recall anyone accusing me of anything. “I know I’m slower than all of you, but then my legs are shorter than everyone else’s. I’m only five-two, the shortest one of you is about five-seven, and Nat and Ron are more than six feet tall. So, in actuality, I have to walk a lot farther than anyone else, relative to my size.” Titters rose around the table.
Nat started to say, “Yeah, but taller people have more weight to carry—”
“Fuck that!” I interrupted, to an appreciative roar of laughter.
“Well, that ended that argument, didn’t it?” Nat said. “There’s nothing you can say to argue with ‘Fuck that!’ now is there?”
I left before everyone else did, hoping to get a head start. But the group quickly caught and passed me. Instead of speeding up to catch them, I slowed down. When I came to a waterfall overhung with leafy trees, I sat next to its small wooden bridge and played my recorder for a bit before moving on. When clouds began to gather and the afternoon sky grew prematurely dark, I picked up the pace and caught up with the main group at a lodge in Chamje. Within moments of my arrival, it began to rain.
As gathering trekkers wove the dining room into a noisy web of voices and laughter, several in our group voiced concerns about Mel and Lucy, who hadn’t yet arrived. They showed up, weary and soaked, just as the wet gray sky became a black shout of water.
“The past two days have already been so much more strenuous than I expected,” Mel said, with a look so downcast her face looked partially erased. “I just don’t know how I’m going to get through three weeks of this.”
“I’m just putting one foot in front of the other,” I said.
“That’s the only way to do it,” Zack said, making me self-conscious about how banal I must have sounded. Yet the trite is often true: in any daunting undertaking, the only way I can cope is by focusing on the few steps directly ahead.
However, I share Mel’s exhaustion. I can’t keep my eyes open. It isn’t yet nine, and I’ve already retreated to my room in the third floor loft. The voices murmuring below are rocking me to sleep, like a remembered sound from the happy moments of my childhood: grownups talking in the next room, a sound that tells me I’m safe and all’s right with the world . . .
chame, annapurna circuit, nepal
Was it only four days ago that I told myself all I had to do was get up each day and start walking? Beware the simple idea. Today’s leg was a long and difficult haul, and the realization that it’s only going to get harder the higher I go is like that recurring nightmare: the one where I find myself at school taking an exam for which I’ve never studied. Dharapani sits at about 1890 meters, Chame at about 2680. That’s an elevation gain of 800 meters (2600 feet) in five hours of walking. But it is, still, a simple idea: just . . . keep . . . walking.
We each fell into our own rhythm, and once again I found myself walking alone for most of the day. With no one else to distract me, each moment stood out in relief, the way I’ve heard moments do when you’re on acid—or about to die.
Alone. If you say a word often enough it empties and expands, empties and expands with meaning until it is no longer one thing, but all things. Alone no longer means joy or pain, love or loss, good or bad. It is only the journey I walk through. Alone is inevitable, and if there were ever a place for inevitability it would be the Himalayas. These mountains know what it is to be beyond loneliness, to simply sift the sun and snow for evidence of time and signs of life.
In Bagarchhap, I bought a small loaf of bread from a tiny bakery. A handful of children began following me, their eyes keeping time with the hard, dark little loaf swinging from my hand. I gave them each a piece, and their grins made the remaining heel of bread more enjoyable, although no less tough and chewy.
As I pushed on to Danaque, I heard bells jingling and was flabbergasted to see two men on horseback appear out of nowhere, bearing down on me at a gallop. I’ve become used to goats, cows, and pack animals, but this was new. It was the first sign that I was truly moving high up into the Himalayas and the villages of Nepal’s ethnic Tibetans.
In Danaque, I passed a whitewashed stone Mani Wall in the middle of the path, lined with a row of metal prayer wheels on either side. In a Mani Wall, each cylindrical wheel is inscribed with the Tibetan Buddhist mantra, “Om Mani Padme Hum,” and each wheel is stuffed with paper scrolls inscribed with the same mantra. An old woman was circling the wall counterclockwise, spinning the wheels—passing her hand along them the way a child might pass her hand along a chain link fence to set the metal vibrating—sending hundreds of mantras spinning to the heavens. I had the strange impression she had been walking around that wall, spinning those wheels, since the beginning of time, and would still be circling there at the end, when the universe stops circling and collapses inward on itself.
Leaving the old devotee to her loop, I continued moving forward to Chame, to meet the moment I’ve been waiting for: my first glimpse of Annapurna II, a true behemoth of the Annapurna Range. How do you describe the way your heart feels when you first fall in love? The way your body feels when you have your first orgasm? The way your mind feels when it first understands that everyone and everything will die, and in the next moment grasps the pure dumb miraculous luck of being alive? It is no wonder that great masters have wandered into the mountains and found enlightenment. Here enlightenment is not only something within, it is something external—so for even the most foolish among us there must be hope to find it.
As evening came, I spotted fresh snow falling on the distant peak of Annapurna II (8000 meters, or 26,000 feet) and the closer Lamjung Himal (6900 meters, or 22,700 feet). With the first sight of snow, came the first night of bone-aching cold.
Before dinner, I showered under a slender strand of lukewarm water so spare it only warmed one body part at a time, leaving the rest of my body a map of gooseflesh in the rapidly cooling high-altitude air. I made the mistake of washing my hair. It refused to dry and I shivered through dinner, even though I wrapped in several layers of clothing and pulled a wool cap over my wet head. Every few minutes, I left the dining area to stand by the kitchen woodstove with my cap off, trying in vain to dry my hair and warm up.
Several porters sat around the stove and we swapped pleasantries. Alan, a dark, compact porter with a wide, white grin, taught me several Nepali phrases, including the common greeting, “Kosta cha?” (How’s it going?), and the standard reply, “Ramro cha!” (It’s going great!).
After dinner, Nat philosophized about the spirituality and simplicity of Nepal’s mountain cultures. “The people who live in these mountains don’t stress over all the crap that drives the rest of us mad: getting ahead, buying a better house or car, working
more to get more. They don’t concern themselves about acquiring things or attaining wealth the way Westerners do. As long as they have enough food to eat and a home to sleep in, they’re happy.”
Zack’s response was, “Yeah? Well if they’re so satisfied with what they have, why do their kids keep asking for my fucking pens?”
Seems to me we’re climbing to a place where both happiness and madness are beside the point.
pisang, annapurna circuit, nepal
This morning I set out early and on my own, beholden only to my path. Beyond the brilliant white, muscular peaks of Annapurna II and Lamjung, the immense shoulders of Annapurna IV slowly revealed themselves. The mountains continued to astonish me, although to look at the pine forest around me I might easily have been in the high country of California or Colorado.
I was resting on the sundeck of a lodge in Barathang, turning my grateful face up to the fleeting heat of the intense mountain sun, when up walked the rest of the nine. We all ordered daal bhat. An hour later my friends were grumbling about the long wait for our meal. I dryly observed, “I never thought I’d be waiting so impatiently for daal bhat.”
Mel looked unhappier than the mere wait for food could explain. I asked her if she was all right. “No,” she said. “I have a terrible headache and I felt nauseous all last night. I’m afraid it’s altitude sickness. A couple of the others said it’s too early, that it’s just my imagination. But Chame’s above ten thousand feet, and people get symptoms at even lower altitudes. Do you think I’m overreacting?”
Since I’d met her, Mel had been talking about, worrying about, and planning for altitude sickness, a.k.a. Acute Mountain Sickness, caused by lower oxygen levels at high altitude. I half-suspected her symptoms were psychosomatic. On the other hand, she was right: people do get AMS at altitudes even lower than 10,000 feet. So I said, “You could be overreacting, or you really could be sick. No one knows how you feel except you, so only you can decide.”
They Only Eat Their Husbands Page 23