We were feeling the altitude. Breathlessness, headache, and general malaise were reported in varying degree by members of the party. Under such circumstances the attraction of sight-seeing detours is at it’s lowest, and though the Gayumchhona lake was but a few miles out of our way, not all of our number cared to go; they set out with the porters direct for the next camp, and only Harold and I, with Angtsering as guide, went along to pay our respects.
We were on the road to Kampa Dzong, A stage of eighteen miles would have brought us there before nightfall. But beyond the Kowa La all is forbidden land; to cross that simple pass without the prior permission of the Indian and Tibetan governments would be, in a double sense, to put ourselves “beyond the pale”; international incidents have been precipitated on less provocation than this. Even amid the freedom of the hills man finds himself still in chains; chains not of destiny, but of the stupidity of human forging. Even while lip-service is paid to the cause of peace, men are divided, and kept in ignorance of each other by the policies of governments. Mutual suspicion, and a chronic pessimism regarding both individual and collective human motives, seem ever to be the characteristic attitudes of all who come to rule, no matter what ideological tide has swept them to their pinnacle. Great may be their responsibility weighty their decisions, but there is a depressing uniformity in the stuffy untrustingness of their ways. Would not the rulers of the world be better for a breath of sane fresh air? Let them open their doors each to the other, and allow the wind of freedom to play, not in the wordy fantasy of mere political speeches, but in the reality of free men moving freely about the world. Not in the Babel-like hysteria of the broadcast word (as we know to our sorrow) shall nation speak peace unto nation: it is in the unpremeditated meeting, face to face in the natural way, that understanding comes. The traveller of goodwill is his country’s best ambassador.
No, we could not visit Kampa Dzong in the world’s present adolescent state of official provincialism – the mentality that shelters behind high walls, bedded with broken glass. But we wanted to see Chomiomo from the north and to visit a lake that is rarely seen. Most of the time we trudged in snow, but the ground was almost level, and a wind from the south pushed us along. Angtsering told us of his wretched experience with the German expedition on Kangchenjunga and the lack of organisation in the matter of food supplies. Though these men do not easily complain, it is natural that a major breakdown in supply should remain a vivid memory when the smoothness and success of other expeditions is almost forgotten.
The day was gloriously clear. In the crisp moisture-less air even the horizon sky was a deep undiluted blue, darkening further towards the zenith. Before us as we trudged were dun-coloured, rounded hills, but every backward glance was into a dazzling enchanted land of surging snow crests, upthrust from the flat white world over which our tracks made blue-tinted pools of shade against the light. The nearer giants seemed to uphold the sky, flanking the scene with majestic strength. in the background, under the snowy rim of the plain, was the dark gulf in which lay Thangu. But our eyes leapt far beyond; the world of valleys, of rhododendrons and juniper, of forest sloes and swirling streams, was lost in the folds of the crinkled earth; we looked from the nearer snows straight to the jagged lines of peaks far south. With the joy of recognition we looked on Lama Anden, at whose feet we had crawled as less than ants; still it appeared bold and beautiful, but no longer overpoweringly dominant, and we saw for the first time it’s just proportions in the Himalayan scene.
Gyumchhona lies in a hollow among the rounded hills within two miles of the Kengra La. We saw the grassy saddle of the pass, approached by a gentle incline in an open, snow-free valley; but the bowl containing the lake was almost entirely lined with snow. It was a grey-blue sheet of water, coated with ice for some distance from the shore; a lonely lovely place, not, however quite deserted, for a herd of yaks was grazing on a constricted patch of ground along the eastern shore. At sight of us the two little boys attending them came charging across the snow, far callers must be rare in this part of the world, and we were obviously a pleasant diversion.
I went alone to the northeast edge of the lake, past the browsing yaks and the creaking ice of the shore. I noticed a peculiar intermittent hiss probably caused by the escape of air trapped between water and ice, and now released by the mid-morning thaw. The detour was well worthwhile. From this new viewpoint the lake had an aspect altogether grand; it now appeared backed by 6000ft of ice-cliff and glacier culminating in the summit snows of Chomiomo. A cruel gleaming whiteness predominated. Black dots of yaks beside the lake; and black ridges bolstering like flying buttresses the final arête of the peak: these were the only non-reflecting points in a landscape that was both mirror and burning glass, played on by an extravagance of light.
It was a tiring plod up soft snow to rejoin the others. We lunched at a rocky patch off cheese and scones, and Lachen apples. The glare was extremely troublesome, and combined with the altitude of 16,000ft it give us both a wretched nagging headache. Seemingly we were well protected, but even the shade of sun-glasses and the broad brim of a bush hat pulled well down were not adequate to deal with this fierce actinic bombardment. Forced to half-close my eyes and gaze through the lashes on a narrowed world, I longed for a patch of grass to give relief.
Crossing a shoulder, we moved down scree to the Yumchho plain. Angtsering suggested yak-milk, and when we agreed, paused for a moment to get his bearings, then led us in and around hummocky country till we same to a herdsman’s tent. This was the place called Ochha, a mere camping ground occasionally occupied by those nomadic folk who are the only users of the plain. The tent lay snug and low, the ground inside having been excavated to a depth of quite two feet. There was plenty of room around the fire, but because of the smoke we preferred to remain outside. Three women were the only inhabitants; they swapped animated gossip with Angtsering, and seemed pleased to receive their visitors. The eldest woman was the mother or grandmother — we couldn’t discover which) of one of the Lachen pipans. This, however, was not allowed to stand is the way of friendship; Harold proffered cigarettes, which were accepted in the graceful Tibetan manner by the cupping of outstretched hands. These people had summered above Thangu in the pastures of Jha Chu; they were now en route to Tibet in their leisurely nomadic way. The young woman who now produced a large pan of milk had a comely face, wind-whipped to a healthy pink, and her black hair was trained in an elaborate coiffure. It was evident that even here, in such inhospitable surroundings, it was possible to live well, and have leisure for some of the refinements of life. We drank the thick, warm liquid from our thermos tops, which were refilled and filled again; but Angtsering drank his from a delicate china tea-bowl – an incongruously attractive piece to be produced from the depths of a black and greasy yak-hair tent. We said goodbye to these lonely, hospitable folk, and faced again the wind and the glare. We did not knew it at the time, but it was to be six days before we should see again any of our fellow beings. We followed a stream, running sluggish and almost silent along its boulder bed. It seemed-hardly possible, yet was nothing less than the truth, that this was the Teesta in it’s infant course. These grey waters, meandering weakly on the silent plain and gripped in ice where the current lagged, were as strong, as the upthrust rocks of Kangchenjau. Time was their ally; they had carved a gorge through the great range; and, in a crescendo of gathering strength, would bring the ice of their glacier birth down to the Bengal plain and a tropic sea. Only in the vaguest way could the dwellers in the tent know this. Yet it may well be that their conception of the sea is a truer evaluation than our own facile acceptance of its wonder. Always the waters fall, and always they are received; somewhere immensely distant, immensely far below; always unseen, forever a mystery.
Ours was now a dull plod along, the slightly tilted plain. It was hardly a climb, but we made slow and heavy going. Breathlessness was a symptom deceptively easy to dispel; we had only to rest for a minute, and our lungs would be at ease; we would feel fit, if not for a sprint, at least for a test of stamina. It was self-deception. To resume the march was to know weariness, at every step. Our halts became unprofitably frequent; we did not even pretend to admire the view, though the north face of Kangchenjhau was superbly displayed close on our right flank; physical necessity. rather than aesthetics, ruled our lack of pace, and we were good specimens of the non-acclimatised state. Harold confided in the sirdar the woeful tale of his head, and of his anxiety to reach camp and the aspirin bottle. Whereupon Angtsering produced from his pocket a packet of “Aspro”, and we stared in wonder as if he were a Maskelyne.
It was good for morale. Again we took interest in the map, and in our line of route. The long low hill on our left, we discovered, bore the name of Changri, which Harold metamorphosed into “Shangri”, and announced that the little col, just west of the highest point, was therefore “Shangri La”. He suggested taking a picture, but I felt suddenly for the romantic readers of fiction, deep in their armchairs, and for that other great public in the plush seats of cinemas, for whom the gates of paradise are only suitably revealed by the rose-tinted lenses of Hollywood. I looked at the drab little, snowless pass, and the picture remained untaken.
A Short Walk in Northern Sikkim 1946 