Drinking a few cups of warm, milky chayng, the local millet brew, at a table filled with red cheeked, robe-clad young Mustangi monks, who have just piled out of a tractor outside the ramshackle old building and join me for their evening meal of Dhal Bhat (rice and lentils). They are returning from the winter spent in Kathmandu, away from the bone-searing artic winds that blast the Mustang region all winter and drive most of its hardy inhabitants to warmer climes. I wonder if I have passed some of these young monks before, walking the cobbled alleyways of my adopted home of Boudha, Kathmandu. The local men, huddled around the old wood fed iron stove, seeking warmth from the high-altitude cold, smile as the strange foreigner walks in, surveys the ancient room, old hand-beaten pots and pans lined up on the soot-covered walls, a low ceiling causing me to crouch and deliver my "namaste" greetings. Its just a simple day in March, the 11th, to be precise. I sit at the table, the monks simple english exhausted as they dig into their meals, and wonder, how many of these experiences, these unique, memory-piercing moments, have been crossed in my years...I ponder the moments of this life, a strange path indeed, a wonderful series of moments, stacked into the deck of life; how many are still yet to be uncovered, I ask. The wonderful mystery brings a grin to my windblown face.
It has been a wonderful 10 days back in the Himalaya, a short trip, but with enduring images; the harsh landscapes masking the cradle of such intricate culture; the ochres and reds superimposed against the barren high altitude desert peaks; the howling winds, the dusty trails, the brilliant blue skies carved against pillow white peaks, truly the abode of the snows. Without the distraction of the world, the mind is free to open, plans unfold out of the crisp mountain air, propelling my onwards. Six months in this strange land; a warm comfort in my soul.
