The mud-floored lower room, where Leo lives, is designed as a ‘shop’, with a few rough shelves facing that double-door which one bolts when coming in for the night and padlocks when going out for the day – though this latter precaution is ludicrous, as almost every padlock in Pokhara answers to the same key. From the lower room an unpredictable bamboo ladder gives access to my wood-floored bedsitter, through a trap-door without a door. A thin partition separates this room from its twin over my landlord’s shop and there are such wide spaces between the planks of the partition that all my sounds and movements are audible and visible to Thupten Tashi, the young Tibetan teacher who is my neighbour. As I write Thupten is holding a night-class in English grammar for some of the more studious older children and a moment ago they were all solemnly chanting ‘Where did you went? Where did you went? Where did you went?’ But one can’t stand this sort of thing for long so I interrupted with a cry of anguish – ‘Please, Thupten – Where did you go!’ Not that I blame Thupten; the other day I saw a Nepali-English primer full of ‘quotable quotes’ – e.g., ‘He is a girl,’ ‘This is a pictures on the walls.’
My unglazed, wooden-shuttered window is large by local standards – four feet by three – and it looks south across level farmland to a green curve of wooded hills. Two little niches at eye-level in the outer wall (designed for religious emblems) hold my kitchen utensils and toilet articles (i.e. toothbrush and paste), and I’ll sleep in a corner on a bamboo mat; at this season bedding is unnecessary, and before the cool weather comes I hope to have bought a flea-bag from one of the homeward bound mountaineering expeditions. My furniture consists of a new table and stool which were very promptly and quite skilfully made for me by a carpenter in Pokhara. I also have a wooden box as food-cupboard and an empty four-gallon kerosene tin to hold my drinking-water. (These square tins are sold at two shillings apiece in the bazaar, and because they are easily carried on the back they have become the most popular local water-containers.)
Tonight I feel very well-adjusted to the world around me: the camp is almost opposite and I can now hear the Tibetans enlivening their evening with some communal singing, while next door Thupten’s pupils are giggling wildly – obviously they have too much horse-sense to take his English lesson very seriously. It would be hypocritical to pretend that I could live happily ever after in this state of Noble Savagery; yet at the moment I am more than content to have so decisively Got Away From It All.
23 MAY
I find it extremely difficult to keep track of days and dates here – not that they matter very much. Yet for official purposes one does sometimes need to know the date and this aspect of life in Nepal is chronically confused by the fact that the Nepalese month begins in the middle of our month and that both calendars are used indiscriminately by English-speaking Nepalese, who rarely explain which system they happen to be using on any given occasion. This can – and does – lead to unspeakable mix-ups: yet it also provides an excellent excuse when Nepalese officials break their appointments, which they do rather more often than they keep them. Then they can say, with an air of indignant innocence, ‘Oh, but I meant our twenty-third – and that isn’t till next Friday week!’
Recently I have been negotiating for the employment of some of the Tibetans on the Indian Aid Hydro-Electric Project and today, on visiting the work-site, I made a wonderful discovery. This site is about 300 feet below the average level of Pokhara plain, in a very hot gorge through which a small river flows from the lake, and after my discussion with the Indian foreman I went hopefully to investigate the river. What I found far exceeded my hopes – a perfect swimming-pool, about 150 yards long, 10 yards wide and 20 feet deep. The pool is only five minutes’ walk from the work-site, where my duties will often take me during the weeks ahead, yet comparative privacy is ensured by a high, grey cliff on one side and a sheer, forested mountain on the other. The water is a clear green and less warm than the lake; also one can persuade oneself that it is less filthy, because of its movement – and certainly it feels much more refreshing. I spent the lunch-hour swimming happily up and down the length of the pool, since it is now far too hot to eat anything at midday; but unfortunately the very steep climb up from this gorge leaves one again pouring sweat by the time one reaches level ground.
Today, near the river, I saw my first Nepalese snake. Here there is a wide stretch of rock-slabs, glittering with the distinctive local deposit of mica, and while I was walking over this my concentrated thinking on labour-relations was suddenly interrupted by a most curious noise as a snake at least six feet long swished away over the rocks from under my very toes. It travelled fast, its dry scales sounding like a distant swarm of bees, and I just had time to observe that it was olive-green, with brown markings, before it poured itself into a crevice between two boulders. When I came out of the river I looked – cautiously – into the crevice and it was still there, doubtless saying to itself that it didn’t know what the world was coming to, with all these dangerous humans clumping about, disturbing an innocent reptile’s sunbathe.
This afternoon I cycled up to Pokhara Bazaar to attempt to sort out three different accounts at the local bank. The building is guarded by two heavily-armed, sloppily-uniformed and chain-smoking soldiers of the Nepalese Army, and one penetrates to the office by crossing a dim, derelict ground-floor shop premises and climbing a dark, trembling staircase. Some ten individuals staff the low-ceilinged, dingy cavern which one assumes to be the office – but only one of them, so far as I could judge, is literate in any language. If it is accurate to say that banking is in its infancy in Nepal, then this establishment is very decidedly a cradle. Yet as a person inside a glasshouse I shouldn’t throw stones: my own ignorance of the financial world is total, which made the afternoon’s transactions very trying indeed. I had to fill in countless forms to send to Dublin and London, but as they were all printed in Nepali it is difficult to imagine them achieving the desired effect at the other end, and I have a nasty suspicion that since neither I nor the young manager really knew what we were trying to do they were probably the wrong forms to begin with.
This evening Kay lent me her table-thermometer to enable me to see the worst, and now, at 9.30 p.m., my room temperature is eighty-eight degrees Fahrenheit and all the time I am mopping sweat off my face, neck and arms. Yet one shouldn’t complain – this is moderation compared with current temperatures down on the Indian plains.
28 MAY
Like most Asian peoples the Nepalese are very curious about any foreigner’s way of life and their respect for privacy is nil. During this past week they have been coming in droves to inspect my room and their dismay at what they see vaults all language barriers. After one quick look they intimate that it is altogether wrong for me to sleep on the floor, to do my own cooking on a tiny temperamental stove and to wash myself and my clothes in the river. They point out severely that I should have at least one servant and a bigger room with a more tractable stair, a mud floor and a cool grass thatch. So far my Nepali vocabulary consists of one word, meaning ‘good’, and gesturing widely I repeat this adjective – at first cheerfully, then firmly and at last, as their indignation grows, almost aggressively, in self-defence. But my enthusiasm fails to quell their disgust, and when they finally withdraw I can hear their condemnations being repeated to passers-by in the street below.
European adaptability might be expected to promote harmonious race-relations, but I can see that in this country it does nothing of the sort. Instead the Nepalese suspect the integrity – or perhaps the sanity – of a European who fails to maintain European standards, either through preference for the simple life or through lack of cash. They cannot conceive of any European choosing to live on their level – or below it, as all but the very poorest Nepalese families have servants of a sort about the house – and obviously they are embarrassed by a memsahib ‘going native’. So now I am realising sadly that in such a class-conscious and conservative society ‘going native’ is the longest way round to integ
ration.
Our local mail system is thrilling. A Nepalese postal service does exist in theory, but as no one cares to test it in practice the British Embassy very nobly sends a mail bag by plane on Fridays, for the benefit of the missionaries, Kay and myself. Both hospitals are some distance from the airfield, so Kay and I have permission to break the seal when the bag arrives and sort out our own mail before Joseph, the wiry little Magar servant, trots away with the sack over his shoulder. Undoubtedly this ritual is the highlight of our week; it is most exciting to squat on the dusty airfield, beside a large pile of envelopes and packages, and eventually to discover the few familiar and precious envelopes addressed to oneself – a much more gratifying system than the dull process of having letters pushed through one’s letter-box. But naturally there is no certainty about which flight The Bag will come on, and at 10.30 a.m. today, when I saw a speck in the eastern sky, I went hurtling off to the airfield on Leo only to find that The Bag had not been put aboard this plane. Nor did it come on the next flight, which landed at 1.40 – but two hours later we saw with joyous relief our beloved canvas sack being tossed into Joseph’s arms, from the last plane of the day.
For a variety of reasons I find myself having to spend a prodigious number of hours each week simply awaiting the arrival of planes. Luckily one cannot tire of a place where horsemen on richly caparisoned steeds may frequently be seen galloping across the airfield – briefly framed by the wing of a Dakota – with bells ringing a wild harmony and hoofs pounding an exultant reply; or where, under blue skies, a dozen women in swirling crimson skirts gracefully pace the length of the field, half-hidden by their baskets of sweet green grass and their enormous golden wickerwork sunshades.
Another diversion is provided by the Gurkha soldiers. Sometimes one sees scared, barefooted youths from remote hill villages coming to the airfield, carrying battered little tin boxes of meagre possessions, on their way to join those elder brothers, cousins and uncles who are ‘doing well’ with the British Army in Hong Kong, Borneo or Malaya. Then one often sees Gurkhas returning on six months’ leave, after three years’ service, and invariably they look sensationally spruce among their welcoming family. The grimy stay-at-homes wear unwashed, fraying garments, while the well-scrubbed soldiers are attired in starched, neatly-creased khaki shorts, flowered bush-shirts and broad-brimmed straw hats. And instead of the modest little tin box with which they departed from home they now possess at least four huge padlocked trunks. These, of course, are left for their wives, mothers or sisters to carry – one on each bent back, supported by a broad canvas band across the forehead – while the Returned Hero strides importantly ahead, an expensive camera slung over his shoulder and a raucous transistor screaming in his hand as he chats with those male relatives who trot respectfully beside him, carrying light pieces of hand-luggage. Usually at this stage the hero’s pocket is full of newly-acquired rupees, for he will have paused long enough on the airfield to sell a selection of excellent Swiss watches and Japanese pocket-transistors at incredibly low prices.
At first one is appalled by the apparently lethal degree of chaos which prevails on every side at the airfield. The least timid Westerner recoils with incredulous horror from a landing-ground on which, ten minutes before a plane is due, children are flying kites, babies and dogs are romping together, cattle are grazing placidly, mule-trains are plodding stolidly and trans-country porters are carrying loads as big as themselves.
When the plane has landed one frequently sees members of the general public standing in the welcome shade of its wings, nonchalantly smoking. Then, when it eventually taxies away, creating a gale-force wind in which the children dance joyously, no one bothers to move and from the booking-office doorway newcomers are subjected to the harrowing optical illusion that at least twenty people are about to be decapitated by a wing. Incidentally, for the village mongrels this is the climax to their day’s fun. Yelping hysterically they pursue each departing plane with a verve undiminished by the proven futility of the exercise – and just occasionally one of them is rewarded by almost getting his teeth into the rear wheel. Yet appearances are in this case deceptive, and though the situation seems to be so irrevocably out of control none of the accidents which should happen do happen. When a speck appears in the sky at the end of the long valley a man blows a quavering blast on what sounds like a referee’s worn-out whistle and immediately frenzied herdsmen leap onto the field, hurling stones and imprecations at their cattle who, disgruntled but resigned, file off through a gap in the sagging barbed-wire fence. Meanwhile the dogs have also temporarily dispersed, the children have pounced on the babies and removed them, the mule-trains have broken into a canter and the porters into a trot and, as the plane roars low over the camp at the end of the runway, nothing or no-one remains to be killed – which by my reckoning constitutes a daily miracle.
Recently I have been chiefly occupied in supervising the building of bamboo huts, into which we hope to move most of the Tibetans before the monsoon breaks. However, at this season it is not easy to obtain the necessary matting and poles, and today we suffered yet another setback when a local farmer, who had agreed to sell us forty bamboos, announced that his astrologer had advised against the sale as it would be most inauspicious to cut bamboos on his land before the rains came. A practical streak was perceptible in this edict, since May is the least suitable month for felling bamboos; but obviously it simplifies life if one can refuse to honour one’s promise on the advice of an omniscient astrologer. Everybody knows that this sort of argument is incontrovertible in Nepal, where the hour at which King Mahendra begins an air-journey is still determined by astrology as well as meteorology.
It was 5 p.m. when Chimba informed me of this development and at once we set off on our bicycles to hunt for a more amenable farmer, cycling through one of the many beautiful corners of the valley that I haven’t yet had time to explore. By now the level land south of Pardi is grey, arid and harsh to the eyes – but half-a-mile north of the village one is in a new, cool green world where the narrow laneways are shaded by towering, leafy trees and where clumps of powerfully curving bamboos, more than one hundred feet tall, bend their feathered tops over fields of shoulder-high maize. At about 6.30 a strangely muted light began to come from the west and soon this suppressed sunshine, slanting through torn copper clouds, was casting a red-gold glow over the whole landscape until the circular, ochre farmsteads seemed like giant lanterns against their dark green background.
For over an hour we toiled from farm to farm along stony tracks ankle-deep in fawn, powdery dust and often blocked by droves of obtuse buffaloes who panicked at the unfamiliar sight of bicycles. At the first farm we negotiated with a timid boy of eight or nine and his great-grandad – an ancient whose skin was so wrinkled that his legs looked as though he were wearing brown nylon stockings several sizes too large. Not surprisingly these negotiations came to an unsatisfactory conclusion; and at the next two farms the owners, having discovered that we were not going to pay a fancy price, brusquely claimed to need all their bamboo for themselves. I was very aware that these Brahmins were hostile to us non-Hindus – less, I should think, because of our ritual uncleanness than because they see the infiltration of foreign ideas into the valley as a threat to their present profitable influence over the villagers. However, we were eventually promised twenty-two bamboos, of varying sizes and qualities; but tomorrow being Saturday (when it is inauspicious to fell bamboos) we can’t send the Tibetans to collect until Sunday morning – by which time there may have been further astrological intervention.
We cycled home along the lakeside, past the hideous new pseudo-European Royal Palace, and the very sacred Hindu temple that rises out of the water some two hundred yards offshore. When we were out of sight of the Palace I dismounted and asked Chimba to go ahead; then I sat for a little time by the lake. Rarely have I seen anything more lovely than that still, vast expanse of emerald water, beneath a tremendous arch of bronzed cloud, through which a few nearby p
eaks and crags were just discernible.
29 MAY
At five-thirty this morning a jubilant Chimba came scrambling up my ladder (fortunately Tibetans are not at all embarrassed when confronted with semi-nude females) to tell me that the German Annapurna Expedition want forty-two porters for twelve days at Rs. 12/- per day – and are willing to employ our Tibetans. When you remember that Rs. 3/ – is the average daily coolie wage Chimba’s elation is understandable, and together we rushed off to the camp to choose twenty-one men and twenty-one women – a list of whose names and registration numbers would have to be presented to the Anchiladis when we applied to him for permission for the refugees temporarily to leave his district.
By nine o’clock we had made our selection of those most suitable and I had written out the list for Kay to type; but then we received a message that, for a very odd reason, only men would be acceptable. Apparently one of the Hindu hamlets en route to the base camp is fanatically orthodox, and recently the inhabitants have been experiencing great difficulties with their local god because some passing travellers killed a chicken in the village. Therefore it would be extremely dangerous further to provoke this god by admitting into his territory outcaste women who might happen to be menstruating at the time without heeding any of the very strict Hindu taboos that apply to the occasion. As we returned to the camp to revise our list I noticed that even Chimba, who has his full share of Buddhist tolerance, was finding this hitch hard to stomach – perhaps because it had followed so soon on yesterday’s astrological débâcle!
The Waiting Land Page 7