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LIMPING TO THE CENTRE OF THE WORLD

A journey to Mount Kailash.

Dolma La

I wake to a lucky day, cold but clear. The snow flurries have stopped and Kailas is etched against an achingly blue sky. It has a magnetic effect. I can’t take my eyes off it for too long, swivelling around to make sure it’s still there, that I’m not hallucinating, that I am here. It looks serene and magical and inspires many prayers from me reminding the mountain why I am here and asking for these wishes to be granted. I wait for my Thirulls. Thirull II calmly collects my backpack, slings it onto the saddle of his pony and abandons me to my fate. But I not alone in this; apart from lucky Prasad and his loyal woman porter, the other porters have no intention of holding our hands up and down Dolma La.

      Thirull ambles up with my pony. I intend to ride as much of the way as I can to save my knees for the final assault. But Thirull has me trek a kilometre to a narrow bridge and then balance my way on loosely placed logs over the stream. The yaks and ponies walk down to the stream bed and up the other side effortlessly. Thirull’s dogs still prowl along with us and I hope he fed them the night before, they look gaunt and hungry. Even as the floor of the valley gradually rises towards Dolma La, the hills become mountains—blackish—grey, savage, rocky flanks and peaks dusted with snow. There is the feeling that even as we approach nature in this harsh wilderness, we’re diminished while it expands to tower over us with its natural power. From a great distance we may believe that we are equal to these mountains, hut that belief lasts only until we reach their foothills and are reduced to ants.

      We halt at the foot of Dolma La for collective deep breaths. Dolma La rises more steeply than the Lipu Lekh, and as far as I can see, it is paved with boulders and rocks. The pass is seven or eight kilometres up and the slope is a steep seventy degrees. It’s not going to be hard; it’s going to be brutal work. A thousand upon thousand pilgrims may have passed this way but they’ve left little trace of their footprints and we have to pick our through the hazards of the boulders as best we can. We move in slower and slower motion and the ponies start to falter, straining to keep their footing on the icy patches between the rocks. About halfway up, Thirull calls it quits for his pony. It is panting like an exhausted dog, its tongue hanging out, heaving for air. From here on it’s four steps and a five—minute halt to get the thin air into my lungs. Even Lamba doesn’t have the breath to spare for a ‘comfortable’ as he walks beside me. The air is blasting cold, whipping down the mountains, lacerating my cheeks. I’ve forgotten Kailash, Shiva, prayers, spiritual feelings; it’s just a matter of placing one foot carefully in front the other. Far ahead and above me is a huge patch of ice and snow clinging to the side of a mountain, near its peak, and I try to keep my focus on it. Surely, the top of the pass must be getting nearer. Cluttering the rocks at Shivasthal are hundreds of flap and pieces of clothing left by pilgrims past. Pradeep has vowed to leave his wife’s jewellery here when he passes. I too should leave something here but I don’t have any spare clothes for Yama, the god of death to judge me by as I pass. They makes me think of my friend Radha, who wears a ‘Free Tibet’ badge pinned above her heart and goes on an annual retreat to Dharamsala. Naturally, she’s follower of the Dalai Lama. She was supposed to give me a flag to plant somewhere among these rocks in her name but I never got it before I left.

      The ritual remains unchanged—four steps, suck hungrily on the air for a little oxygen, and four more steps. An hour later, I’m parallel with the ice—and—snow patch, but there’s no sign of the pass: I keep climbing and when I look back the patch is now below me. Another hour or more of climbing and the ground finally levels out.

      Like the Lipu Lekh, the Dolma La is a narrow gap between the mountains on either side. The eye of another needle at 5550 metres! I can’t see Kailas at all—hidden by the surrounding peaks—as I collapse hoping I don’t have to get up again. Sharma and Das are crouched nearby, arranging sticks in a square of blackened stones that looks well used by other pilgrims. The wind blows out their matches and I’m called in to provide additional shelter for them. The sticks finally catch fire and give off a flickering candle of warmth and light. Sharma sprinkles rice, ghee and camphor on the fire as they chant ‘Om Namah Shivaya’. We all repeat their prayers and, after a half hour’s rest, pick ourselves up to descend the pass. The little flat shelf drops steeply away to another unending cascade of boulders and rocks. I can’t even see where this torrent of stone ends. Das tells me it’s eight kilometres to the bottom. Ahead, as always, are Pandey, Dhanu, Dhansekaran, Prasad, the Sharmas and Lamba, moving so enviably easily, threading their way through the little gaps between the rocks. Behind me are the others, Dolma and her assistant helping Mrs Bali and Lakshmi, Sharma, Das and Jamsaheb. I start down the seventy—degree slope cautiously, trying to keep everyone in sight. Every five steps I take a five— minute rest. The incline skirts a deep drop down to the round, faded-sapphire Lake of Gouri Kund. Parvati bathed in this lake and its water is sacred. In the brochure, they advise you to send a porter down to collect the water as it’s a dangerous descent. Without a porter to obey my command, I’ve no intention of making this detour. But way below I can see a determined figure threading its way down to the lake with a can. It looks like Pandey, another virtuous man. I keep him in sight as I, too, inch down. The gaps between the rocks are icy here, and, elsewhere, streams rush through on their way down. Every step has to be watched. I’m trying to keep a straight path down but it’s finding my way through a maze of gaps, some just a foot width that forces me to zigzag. I step on the face of a rock; it’s icy, my foot slips and I jam down heavily on my other leg to stop falling over. My knee almost cracks from the jolt, the other knee buckles as I try to keep my balance. ‘Shit’ is my mildest expletive. I sit heavily on a rock, the pain is excruciating and I hold my breath until it subsides. I carefully flex the bad knee, it’s still attached, and still moves. I’m wishing I’d taken more painkillers although they wouldn’t have strengthened my knees. I must not panic. There’s no snow only a slight sleet. I stand cautiously, the knees just holding my weight, and start down again.

      Ahead is a large ice patch and I can either skirt it-—a detour of at least thirty metres—or cross it. I don’t have the energy to make this bypass. The wind has buffed the ice smooth as a skating rink. I take baby steps across, propped up by my cane, and when I reach firm earth on the other side, I feel like I’ve managed to cross the Styx and survived. I look for Dhanu, Pandey; there’s no one in sight ahead. I look back at the heaving boulders, but there’s no one in sight there. I seem to have lost the trail and start to really worry that if I should fall and knock myself out, I’ll fall between the rocks and never be found. I’ll only be discovered missing when Lamba blows his whistle and performs his counting ritual. Come to think of it, he hadn’t done it this morning, so I won’t be missed until Darchen! I could do with a helicopter at this moment to airlift me down, though I’m not having a heart attack or frothing blood. The death zone on Mount Everest starts at 25,000 feet, and 202 men, experienced mountaineers, young, strong men, and also not climbing alone, still lie buried in the snow. My death zone could be this point on Dolma La. Like those two men on the Lipu Lekh Pass—a piece of cake compared to this one – I’ll be discovered huddled in a foetal position, a frozen corpse. Only the mountain knows how many pilgrims, over the millennia, have died here.

Sanctuary

I have no other wish for Kailas and Shiva to grant that to get me down in one piece. I say it out aloud for him to hear ‘Kailas, you called me here, so now please get me down safely.’ And I keep repeating this as I literally inch down the mountainside. Keep praying, I tell myself and watch where you place your feet. I look up during a rest. A slice of Kailas looms parallel to me, almost at eye level, and I pray it is watching and guiding my painful progress down through these rocks. The air’s so fine that I have to suck it in five times before I get a hit of oxygen and I’ve also run out of water. I’ve asked Kailas for a change of luck—for the better, of course—and sitting here I believe it’s been granted. I can feel it coursing through my blood. My luck is in, luck has brought me to this point, and luck will be my handmaiden until the end of my days. Luck will get me out of this mess safely. But luck depends on being patient, waiting for an opportunity, on not being impetuous. I’m not going to push it by racing down this cataract of rocks. I start down again, feeling stronger, tapping away with my cane, finding crevices for my feet. An hour later, in the far distance below I can see something, a tantalizing white dot. I could be hallucinating. Like a ship-wrecked sailor searching the empty seas, I use the camera’s zoom as my telescope. The white dot becomes a slightly larger white dot. I point up the pass—no one in sight—then scan the landscape on all sides. There is not living being anywhere, just rocks, rocks and more rocks. I shift direction and aim as straight .is possible for the dot, a beacon of hope and sanctuary. A half hour later, to my surprise, when I round a couple of large boulders, I see Mrs Bali, Lakshmi, and Dolma and her assistant ahead of me. I must have made a really big sidetrack for them to have overtaken me but they are moving faster than I am. Dolma and the girl, sure-footed as goats —holding the women’s hands— are picking their down a more distinct path zigzagging down between the rocks. In another hour, the dot becomes a tent gradually growing larger and more welcoming. The ground flattens out but is still strewn with boulders. When I look back, I can’t see the peak or the pass. I can’t see Kailas either but I do send a prayer of thanks to Kailas. I was meant to survive and reach the Lham Chhu valley.

      I stagger the last few steps and duck into the tent. It’s soothingly warm and I collapse beside Lakshmi on the soft cushions scattered around the floor. All I want to do now is curl up and fall asleep forever. As I start to doze off in this womb, my only thought is, I have prevailed.