"What looks like the Mustang? To the south Moroccan? Monument Valley? And who runs the Mustang? Shepherds leading sheep and goats. Women's groups. Men on horseback. " Questo ho scritto sul mio notes. Poca cosa per descrivere la giornata di marcia da Kagbeni a Chele.
Eppure mi ricordo.
Il passaggio della frontiera, per prima cosa. Il Mustang è stato aperto agli occidentali nel 1991. Resta un’area ad accesso limitato, nel senso che ogni anno il governo nepalese rilascia agli stranieri al massimo mille permessi di passaggio. Numerose le limitazioni poste a chi vuole inerpicarsi in queste zone. Che ci vengono enumerate e comunicate dal funzionario di frontiera, un uomo sorridente e inequivocabilmente dotato di potere.
Vietato raccogliere legna e usarla per cucinare o per riscaldarsi.
Obbligatorio registrare tutto As transporting the shipment to verify that the bottles or cans are all reported back. Leaving the waste in glass and plastic will be weighed and will be compatible with what is stated at the entrance.
not distribute money or other items to the local population.
Prohibited away alone, leaving behind the Sirdar.
permitted to travel in groups of fewer than two people.
not permitted to sleep in the house of local people.
Prohibited reach the border with China just twenty miles north of Lo Manthang.
forbidden to perform any act that could offend the religious, and local culture.
The border post is situated at one end of the long hands of prayer through the village, at the northern end of Kagbeni. On the roof, two soldiers in camouflage fatigues with a machine gun over the shoulder we smile and greet us warmly. Listen pricked the rules that apply in Mustang and signed several documents. In theory we should be accompanied by a liaison officer, an officer who will ensure that the passengers do not contravene the rules listed above. But come to Kathmandu, Navio We had information that was increasingly difficult to find officials willing to adapt to the rhythms of grueling travel, the altitude, the infinite salite e discese di questa terra. Che alla frontiera lo sapevano e avrebbero chiuso un occhio. Al liaison officer, infatti, non accenna nessuno.
Su un muro dell’ufficio un pannello riporta il numero di occidentali che ogni anno hanno percorso il paese. 978 nel 2000; poi, via via, un calo: 765 nel 2005 e appena 581 nel 2006. Le statistiche del 2007 non erano ancora state elaborate. Il librone che ci fanno firmare indica che al momento in giro per il Mustang ci sono circa una decina di occidentali.
Usciti da Kagbeni ci inerpichiamo lungo un sentiero che taglia in diagonale un ripido pendio proprio sopra il Kali Gandaki. Più che un sentiero è una Track unstable freshly dug clay. Do not look down, flowing with roaring water of the river, but I focus on where the foot. Carriers continue agile and fast and soon disappear from our view.
advances toward us from a distance a flock of goats. There are hundreds. Follow a pastor who continues to launch of whistling to induce the animals most unruly or inattentive to advance. The goats go up and down wildly down the slope and in doing so stirs up the earth. Sometimes they roll on the path hail of rocks and stones. I look forward to the shelter of a rock the flock away.
Tangbe, the first village we meet, is announced three chorten. One black, one white and one red, the colors that are found along the way and featuring all the top Mustang. The village seems uninhabited. I walk strange labyrinths and alleys that wind between whitewashed houses. Not a soul alive. Just a dog barking furiously when he sees us. The residents find them soon after. They are all working in the fields of barley, or in the orchards around the village. Men, women and children.
The rock wall on the other side of the river is interrupted by holes, too regular to be natural caves. But too inaccessible to have been used as dwellings. Nobody can tell me what they are, even Chhuksang, the village where we arrived an hour after the end of the path on the dramatic Kali Gandaki.
Chhuksang A taste for the first time lunch cooked by Dilish. The velocity of the carriers that morning, is easily explained. They run forward with their overloaded panniers to get us to stop before lunch and allow Dilish to install the kitchen. Lunch is served on large trays of bamboo. Dilish examines our faces to see if we are satisfied and one must admit that, if nothing else, the menu is rich. Boiled Potatoes, an omelette with onions, corn, salad and canned fruit.
Chitra is assigned to serve the coffee. Prepares tazze, distribuisce il caffé liofilizzato, versa l’acqua bollente, mette lo zucchero e mescola. Il secondo Ram sparecchia. Kumar lava i piatti e le pentole sul greto del fiume utilizzando la sabbia. Ognuno ha un ruolo. Salvo Goma, il sirdar, e Ram, il suo assitente. Che si riposano bevendo il rakhsi, un alcool locale estratto, credo, dall’orzo.
Pian piano mi risulta sempre più chiara la logistica del gruppo e le relazioni gerarchiche che intercorrono tra i portatori. Goma e Ram, portano solo il loro zaino e arrivati alla tappa, una volta deciso dove dormire e cosa mangiare, si riposano. Dilish, si occupa unicamente della cucina e delle spese. È lui che sa dove trovare le verdure, dove comprare i polli or goats for slaughter and cooking. The boys pitch their tents, and they make stewardship. Kishan is the free electron. It is a pariah, Kishan, and so almost always it is he who is in charge of the most menial. Perhaps for this reason, I always buzzing nearby.
As I write the diary sits by and watches me. With him I feel that my hands know how to do magic.
Chhuksang is a village of few houses. On the entrance doors of the ram's horn which they are linked with the sprigs of colorful threads. All to form a diamond.
The schoolmaster who stops to chat with me at the entrance of the village, I explained that the zor and are used to capture evil spirits before they enter the homes.
Today, the man tells me, is a special day. All the teachers of the schools meet in the Mustang Chhuksang. To discuss programs and students. They arrive on horseback from Lho Manthang and other remote villages. He, in Mustang, living there for twenty years, he says. A hard life. In winter, however, drops to the valley as all the inhabitants of the region. Too cold, too much snow. The wind, he adds, is crushed ice and makes a gesture to mimic the ice needles that penetrate the skin. In October, the inhabitants of these valleys down below a few thousand meters. In the villages is only some old to look after the cows. He is in the winter, he sees his family. And his children. They grow up so fast that
from one year to slow to recognize them.
Chhuksang is located on the banks of Narshing Khola, another tributary of the Kali Gandaki. From here the caravans that traveled the road to reach higher, the great salt mines. It always starts here yet another path to the shrine of Muktinath.
the bed of the river three sadhus, or holy men as they are called in these parts, do the laundry. Lie down on the stones, large sheets colored red, orange and yellow. They talking quietly, half-naked, long hair rolled up into their turbans. Another sadhu, a little more
elderly and with a long white beard, is sitting on the sidelines and laying motionless river water.
Walk on the banks of the river waiting to leave. It is more or less at this height, around 3000 meters, which are the fossil ammonites. A couple of girls there offered a pair at the entrance of the village. Of blacks beautiful stones, round which, when broken, reveal the imprint of a shell in a spiral shape.
Here, in time, there was a sea. A sea-lake, sunken in the mountains.
A girl from the country beckons us to follow. We follow it in four. Claudio, Chitra, I Kishan inevitable. Brisk walk before us and occasionally stops to expect without turning his head but traces of the signs on the ground with his stick. It takes us away from the little houses at the foot of some spectacular rock cones where erosion has given the form of organ pipes. We climb a steep hill and the girl shows us a hole through which they can pull in to one of these cones. we see the interior of the cone, just lit by the dim light of a flashlight, was dug. Three floors which can be accessed by climbing up some rudimentary ladders made of branches and leaning against the rock. Above the first floor, a tiny room.
is so dark inside that despite the flare stack, it takes me a while to realize that the rock walls are painted and the room is nothing but a small gompa with a statue of Buddha in the center. A marvel. Angels and demons battle it out. The Buddha sits in the middle of the tangle of Dante and exhibits the usual calm expression.
We turn three times, from left to right, around the statue of the Buddha. It will bring long life, says the girl. Long life, happiness and health. Kishan makes his three turns, serious and focused.
Un paio d’ore di cammino, un paio di fiumi guadati facilmente, e arriviamo a Chele, il villaggio dove ci fermeremo per pernottare. Subito prima di Chele, un canyon spettacolare.
Alte pareti rosse sulla riva orientale del Kali Gandaki. E anche qui una fila ordinata di caverne. Inaccessibili. È Goma che mi racconta che alcune decine di anni fa era proprio in queste caverne, in passato utilizzate come rifugi o come luoghi di sepoltura, che si nascondevano i guerrieri khampa. Temuti per secoli dai viaggiatori per la loro ferocia e per i loro cani, questi terribili guerrieri tibetani furono i principali attori della resistenza anticinese, in seguito all’occupazione del Tibet. Su ordine del Dalai Lama, all’inizio degli anni ’70, tutti cedettero le armi. In molti si suicidarono.
Chele è un piccolo agglomerato di case in cima ad uno sperone di roccia. I portatori hanno già piantato la nostra tenda nel cortile, sul retro di una casa. È una tenda rossa, piccolina ma all’interno spaziosa.
Ceniamo a casa della gente che ci ha permesso di piantare la tenda nel cortile dove incontriamo Benno e Karine, una coppia di ragazzi svizzeri, di ritorno da Lo Manthang. Sono affascinati dal viaggio che hanno fatto e ci raccontano che cosa ci aspetta da là in poi. Dicono che è faticoso, ma fattibile. Poi, when they learn that we are Italian, to inform us that The Manthang meet three compatriots, three very young boys, who are restoring a monastery. They are doing a terrific job, said Benno. You have to go find them.
The night is punctuated dogs from barking excitedly. They are the dogs of Khampa. The fierce Tibetan mastiffs that people keep a chain in the courtyards of the houses. When I wake up at dawn, all is enveloped in a mist of pink.
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