A Himalayan
high: Tibetan Buddhism is alive and well in Ladakh, and it's
easier than ever to try a spiritual pilgrimage
Jeremy Clarke For Daily
Mail 19 December 2016
Bring on the Buddhist
monks, nuns, lamas, prophets and oracles, I thought (spiritually)
on my way to Ladakh.
But arriving at Leh,
capital of the Himalayan desert kingdom, after a helter-skelter
approach and violent landing, and looking around at the surreal
grandeur of the mountains, I was appalled.
Never before had I seen
such an arid and inhospitable landscape. With the thin air at 3,200
metres, walking from the plane to the bus rendered me puffed out. I
also felt slightly, though pleasantly, lightheaded.
Situated at the politically
sensitive apex of India between Pakistan, communist Chinese-run
Tibet, and Kashmir, Ladakh is a country of lavender and
rose-pink-hued mountains; and, when one comes across them,
surprisingly verdant oases along the rivers, foremost of which is
the mighty Indus.
Since China put the
colonial half-nelson on Tibet, Ladakh is the last stronghold of
Tibetan Buddhism.
Racially and culturally
Tibetan, it is a country of Mongolian faces; bleached and tattered
prayer flags; long, low mani walls to keep the evil spirits away;
thousands of white-washed reliquary tombs; oracles, healers and
astrologers; colossal monasteries perched high up on the mountain
crags; yaks and marigolds; and scarlet and orange-robed monks
calling the shots over a peasantry of startling innocence. And all
of that under the bluest of blue skies.
Ladakh was closed to the
outside world between 1948 and 1974. For the next 40 years the
trickle of foreigners was largely confined to hippies,
anthropologists, Himalayan trekkers and pilgrims.
The slow pace of change has
been accelerated by the 2009 Bollywood smash-hit The Three Idiots,
filmed in Ladakh, and which signalled an influx of curious tourists
from the Indian sub-continent.
More recently, mobile
phones and satellite TV have broadened the horizons of the Ladakhi
youth, who are beginning to look to the outside world for education
and employment.
The only road into the
kingdom has also been improved, though it is still impassable
between November and May, when the inhabitants gather around their
dung-fuelled household fires to weave yak hair woollies and sing
songs.
In winter, it is said, a
person sitting outside with his face in the sun and his feet in
shadow will suffer heatstroke and frostbite
simultaneously.
My week’s stay was divided
between three of Shakti’s village homes. The company rents the
upper stories of these houses from Ladakhis and has furnished them
to a high standard. I would describe the accommodation as Ladakhi
peasant vernacular with chrome mixer taps. At each house, I had my
own chef and waiter-cum-servant.
The three houses I stayed
in belonged respectively to a healer with a hard stare; a carpenter
with a shrill, thousand-year-old mother; and an antediluvian
farming couple with a fairy-tale beautiful daughter.
The first, called the
Medicine House, was spectacularly placed beside the confluence of
the Zanskar and Indus rivers. Here, I acclimatised for a day. I
needed it. Even cleaning my teeth made me gasp for air. At night,
the candle flames were attenuated in the thin air.
On the second day, feeling
more aspirated, I began to get out more with the help of the
excellent local guide and a driver. I’d wanted to see monks, and
monks was what I got.
I seemed to spend all day,
every day, at monasteries, taking my shoes off and on, panting and
mingling with monks: monks with Ronnie Kray spectacles and hearing
aids; monks wearing Crocs; barefoot monks; tiny tot monks; matinee
idol monks; irreverent monks; melancholy monks.
I talked to monks who were
more worldly and well-travelled than I will ever be. I sat
cross-legged for hours among chanting monks and in a hypnotised
state slurped rancid butter tea by way of a break. I dreamed of
monks at night.
I went to an old monk
doctor about my stiff neck. He took my pulse then spooned some
dried herb balls from a sweet jar into a little paper sack. Take
three twice a day with warm water, he said. My neck was better
after two doses.
The next day I visited an
oracle at her home. It was arranged that she would go into a trance
for me and take questions about the future. She ran outside and
stuck her head in a pail of water and returned possessed by a
turbulent demon.
It made her shriek, gave
her hiccups followed by a sneezing fit and then threw her to the
ground. The demon was called Nyntangla, said the interpreter. Did I
want to ask Nyntangla a question? No thanks. Afterwards, when
Nyntangla had vacated possession, the oracle was serene, back in
her right mind but tired.
Ladakh. Amazing place. Back
home, I feel like the oracle woman post-spirit possession: returned
to my right mind, serene, tired; with the incense-fragranced
memories of extraordinary things seen and done in that high thin
air.