"The sour taste was exactly the sort of thing my taste buds liked..." (Jeff Fuchs)

Shortly after Ma came in and beckoned me to lunch. Yak cheese with dried yogurt and sugar was served with Zhamba. The yak cheese was formed in a triangle and dried in a basket above an ancient wood stove. The sour taste was exactly the sort of thing my taste buds liked, and, of course the ubiquitous tea was served. Dinner was at five and consisted of a thick soup with some sort of root vegetable, tea and a discussion in rapid-fire Tibetan. Meals were experiences that I had to be careful of. Often I would forget that getting up at 5am meant that mealtimes were earlier, lunches were served shortly before 11 am, dinners at 5pm and that was that. I had to keep an eye on people, and when they headed back to their homes I headed home accordingly. One day while the local kids and I were playing ‘run after the pigs’ an ear-piercing yell ripped through the air. The kids were obviously used to it, but for me that omnipotent shout caused me to lurch forward. As my eyes scanned for the source, I finally saw Ma’s bright turban, a dot on the twelve-foot wall, waving those two huge hands signaling an immediate return. Never in an eternity would I ever dare to ignore this woman’s summons. It was time to eat, and I dutifully made my way back for a little feast.

My two ‘keepers’ Ma and Alo, were stunning displays of unpretentiousness and true graciousness. Ma was an immediate personification of strength. A work ethic and straightforwardness bordering on brutal purity made her an automatic target of my affections. Her husband drove supplies from isolated town to isolated town and was away for weeks on end. There was little she couldn’t do, and while she was lean of body, the sinews were born by a lifetime of endurance. Three-foot long braids wound down her back, and I often found myself just staring at this woman of the hills.

Her son was studying at a monastery in India; she was treated with the same deference by all in this little town in between mountains. Alo (Ma’s father-in-law), was a squinty eyed man whose face was pinched by nature’s elements. He carried around Zhamba balls in his deep pockets and used them to coax animals, snack on and throw at inflexible beasts. Rarely was Alo still, and he could generally milk yaks faster than two people.

"Some of Alo’s frustration came out with a wicked old smile of satisfaction afterwards..." (Jeff Fuchs)

One wet evening with a storm promising gray rage, we discovered that a particular yak (a chronic troublemaker) had disappeared. Tibetans referred to yaks as ‘grunting oxen,’ and witnessing the relationship between Alo and these black hairy beasts was part of the great pleasure I looked forward to every day. This grazing land was a two-hour walk into the mountains, and Alo looked to the mass of black forming above. He muttered something and in apparent impatience started chewing on a ball of Zhamba. He deftly threw a ball to me and beckoned me to follow. Rain held but wind slashed at us and seemed content to suck the air from our lungs. Making our way up, we finally sighted the obstinate bull. He seemed to know that he was in for trouble and stared as though awaiting sentence. Alo with his ancient abilities launched a good-sized Zhamba ball 20 feet that nailed our black horned friend in the nose. Some of Alo’s frustration came out with a wicked old smile of satisfaction afterwards. We made it halfway home before the sky let out its torrents. It was a bonding moment between us that needed no defining words.

He had long ago sustained an injury to his hip and needed a walking stick, which he made deadly use of whenever the occasion demanded. I knew that it wasn’t easy for him to accept his lame hip. Indeed, with his powerful wrists he seemed to relish throwing that stick about with reckless abandon. Pigs, dogs, chickens, and yaks alike knew better than to test him. Nothing here was drawn out and life and relations were direct and simple. Long ago I had learned that people living off the lands rarely wasted time.

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