Kawa Karpo, Part I: The Tears of Buddha
Trip Start
Mar 21, 2005
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Trip End
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Yubeng,
China
Friday, June 17, 2005
What disappears but is still there?
What is holy but is made of the earth?
The summer monsoon has reached the Hengduan mountains, a month after leaving the rain behind in Yangshuo, one thousand miles to the east. The night before I packed my backpack full of dried foods--flour, potatoes, peppers, sugar, mangoes, blueberries, eggs, milk, noodles, spices, and hot pot mix--and outdoor gear, including the map of Kawa Karpo, the largest mountain range in Yunnan Province, with 20 peaks over 20,000 feet. I left the hotel early in the morning to catch a taxi to the bus station, streets empty, rain falling, skies dawn grey.
Six hours later, I arrived in Deqin, a large town nestled in a valley on the east side of the Mekong River.
After a taxi ride to the Mekong River valley, I stared 4,000 feet down to the river and across to the town of Xardang on its west bank. Then I stared 12,000 feet up to the top of Meili Xueshan, the highest peak in the Kawa Karpo range. Several seconds later, the summit was enshrouded in the afternoon monsoonal clouds.
The clouds in the Mekong Valley take on a life of their own as they hug the mountains, swirl high into the sky, billow, and dissipate. They decide what you see, like the veil of a belly dancer. They are the gatekeepers to the sun and the glaciers. They bring the rain.
As the Mekong flows south towards Southeast Asia, the monsoonal clouds flow north through the valley.
1 Old Man of the House
When they reach the cold, tall mountains, the rain falls, creating a lush landscape where trees grow up to 14,000 feet and glaciers carve valleys down to 9,000 feet. Seeing trees growing above ice is a peculiar sight caused by the peculiar circumstances of the deep valleys funneling the warm monsoon clouds towards the Kawa Karpo range. Near the river, the rain does not fall--it is desert. In between, are many habitats whose fates are based on the intricate permutations of the rain, the sun, the soils, the slopes, and the ice.I took out my topographic map of the Kawa Karpo range and focused on the village of Xardang below, small houses surrounded by green fields and walnut trees. It was 3 pm. Seeing no trail, I bush-wacked down through steep slopes of oaks and pines, newly-slippery from the first monsoon rains. By the time I reached the river, my legs were tired from carrying eight days of food, fuel, and gear down 4,000 vertical feet, and I was covered in dirt from slipping down the slopes. The land was barren, lizards scurried out of my way, and goats looked up to see who was disturbing their grazing.
The wind howled from the south, causing the wooden suspension bridge to buck up and down as I crossed the Mekong. Hershey and Willy Wonka dream of such rivers: swirling and churning whirlpools and rapids of chocolate milk. Above, the swallows and swifts soared in the air.
Taking a water break on the other side, in Xardang, I sat with some townsfolks and chatted as much as I could in Chinese.
2 The Young Tibetan Boy
A local nun offered me a place to stay in her family's house as some of them were heading the same way the next day. I followed her.Inside the house, I sat around a table with a baby boy, a ten-year old boy, the nun, her parents, her older brother and wife. We drank yak butter tea and ate peanut butter and crackers (mine, not Tibetan!), boiled pig fat, and noodles. After dinner, the boy got a kick out of telling me that if I needed to pee at night, I should pee through the railings onto the animals' floor, the first floor of the house.
Still sore from the descent, I woke up the next morning to some yak butter tea and began the pilgrimage to Yubeng with the whole family: up a steep switch-backing trail to 12,000 foot Nazogla pass and into the lush green Yubeng vale of barley fields, pastures, and forests. My sore legs protested--"them 's big hills!" Eight hours later, we arrived at our home for the night--friends of the family, I guess.
Since my Tibetan know-how consisted of about three phrases, we spoke some Chinese. For the most part, I soaked in the scenery and conversed with eyes, hands, various facial expressions, and more. Talking isn't that needed, sometimes, in life.
In the dark main living room, the walls were plastered, and the ceiling was made of wooden beams covered in a black creosote of sorts. Smoke filled the room from the wood burning fire, which heated dinner and yak butter tea. We began by drinking fermented curdled yak yogurt: not very pleasant going down (maybe the consistency of a cement mixer, if you've ever been duped into drinking one).
3 Mother and Baby Pilgrims
I sat next to the great grandfather by the glowing hearth, who savored the fermented curdled yak yogurt, as he was missing most his teeth and couldn't chew. He sat cross-legged and spun his bronze prayer wheel clockwise in his hand, mumbling prayers. The prayer wheel caught the diffuse evening light of the small east-facing windows, revealing the shining symbols of the Conch Shell, the Endless Knot, the Golden Fish, the Lotus, the Parasol, the Vase, the Victory Banner and the Wheel. These eight auspicious Buddhist symbols spun around each time he prayed, bringing him one step closer to nirvana.
Early the next morning, the family and I headed up a side valley under grey skies. Once in a while, they would cry, foreshadowing what lay ahead. The trail wound upwards under hundreds of prayer flags and immense fir trees, about 150 feet tall and towering within ancient forests of ferns, wildflowers, and mosses.
At noon, we reached the end of the valley, surrounded by cliffs on three sides. Waterfalls spilled from the mountains and glaciers above, the lofty summits veiled in clouds.
Maiocomo, lay to the south, her final resting spot. Once she was a Tibetan princess on the way to meet her suitor; now she is a powerful mountain.
To the north lay the mountain called "Buddha's Hands". From this mountain, a large waterfall spilled to our feet--the Yubeng Shenpu.
The family gathered incense and the father cut a sapling to which he tied a prayer flag. At the base of the waterfall, the father lit the spruce and fir incense and placed the sapling flag pole in the ground. Two monks sat together facing the waterfall praying.
In a small cave overlooking this valley, Guru Padmasambhava meditated as he brought Buddhism to Tibet. He picked an auspicious and beautiful location.
Yubeng Shenpu waterfall represents the compassionate tears of Buddha.
We walked under the tears of Buddha, our sins of a lifetime washed away.
