Life after Caravan

He was by a high meadow pasture in Jumla. He was there looking after his yaks with his village friends and brothers. A single shepherd looking after forty yaks. Then at the offices of the local World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), a call came for him from his daughter in Kathmandu. She said "Your son is very sick, if you’re truly a father you must come immediately with the money or else don’t".

His 37 year old son was brought to Kathmandu in October for treatment. Initially in upper Dolpa, he was treated in the traditional way. His chest and back had started to hurt. Some healers put a red hot iron rod to different parts of his chest. The scars are still there. He was sent to Kathmandu as his condition worsened.

The news of his son’s failing health made Thinley Lundup Lama anxious. He did not have any money. What could a person who was walking a caravan of yaks ten days away from his village do? In September he had gone to Kyoto, a Tibetan town (three days away by foot from his village, Saldang) with his yaks that carried Tibetan salt all the way to Rimikai, near Jumla, where he had exchanged the salt with some crops, at the rate of two pathi corns for three pathi salt. That was his source of income for the whole family. It was difficult for him to support them, with only buck wheat and potatoes grown in his village.

The aging star of Caravan, nominated for Best Foreign Film at the 1999 Oscars, was distressed when he heard the news. Borrowing money from friends, he walked down for two days to Juphal airport, near the district headquarters at Dunai, and reached the capital via Nepalgunj.

With no money, Thinley couldn’t take his son to the hospital for an X-ray and stool test. After a local daily published his story, hundreds of well- wishers came to his support.

With his son now in a Tibetan hospice, he says, "I have to go back and look after my yaks. I asked my friends to take care of them while I was away." After April, once the snow starts to melt, this father of two sons and two daughters will return to his village.

He’s still grateful to the French cameraman Eric Valli, who he’s known for two decades. "He’s like an uncle and a real friend. When my other son was sick, he brought a helicopter right into the yard of my house in Dolpo and took him to Kathmandu for treatment."

Thinley doesn’t bear any grudges against the movie. Infact he’s proud of it. He’s happy that it’s made this country known to the world. When he hears people say that he was not paid enough for his work, he gets angry. "Yes, I got Rs 300 per day for 10 months", he says. "For my friend who saved my son, who asked me to play a role in the film, I should have done it for free".

He doesn’t remember the date. Eric Valli had come to his shepherd’s hut and at that time of year when his yaks grazed on high meadow pastures in Jumla (10 days away by foot from Saldang in Dolpa). Thinley remembers that Eric’s pants were torn and he had thought Eric to be poor.

Then from the high meadow pastures they walked together following Thinley’s yaks. Thinley exchanged the salt carried on the back of the yaks from Tibet for the local crops. They returned to Dolpo’s Rimikai. Eric came again the following year. And again Eric joined him. The friendship between them was cemented. "After that he came after eight years". Thinley says, "During that time he’d given me a book".

Eric Valli, photographer for the National Geographic, had published a book with pictures capturing, along with Thinley, the images of the caravan trail of yaks and sheep running from Tibet to Dolpa, Jumla, Dailekh.

After sometime Eric said, "I want to make a film based on this book". He had already been decorated by the King for promoting Nepal through his book and for his documentary, The Honey Hunters of Nepal. Thinley was impressed but he could not fathom the importance of the images.

Eric asked Thinley if he wanted to act in the movie. Once he agreed, Eric started looking for other local actors. Since Thinley’s daughter in law had died, the project was delayed looking for a girl for that role in the movie who could speak Tibetan. Eric was forced to turn to Dharamshala, India for someone as well as for the role of Karma. Then they started looking for rented yaks. Finally, fixing the cameras on all four sides of mountain passes, villages, Phoksundo lake, Shey Gumba etc, the film was completed within 10 months.

Before casting, they were brought to the capital and were trained for two months.

When asked whether he had given a good performance, he says shyly "It was alright". Those who know him say that he’s quick tempered. On this he says, "I do get angry at times. I got angry with the fifteen to twenty retakes it took to get the burning of my body scene right in the gumba."

About the time he walked out of the helicopter, he says, "Why wouldn’t I get angry? They asked their people to travel by helicopter but told our people to travel on foot". After the shooting was done at Phoksundo lake, only some privileged people were taken on the helicopter, the rest had to walk through the snowy mountains for three days.

But the scene on a precipitous ledge of a path close above the lake with the yak and the wood falling down and the frightened look on Thinley’s face was brilliant. Thinley agrees that it was the most difficult part to shoot and that it was the best shot in the movie. "In our Karnali zone, there is no word like hero, I just tried my best to act myself in the movie", he says.

"To shoot that scene Eric hired rock climbing Sherpas and with the help of cranes in two, three directions, the cameras were set to move at the same time. And there was a crystal blue lake below into which a dummy yak brought from Paris was dropped", Thinley recollects.

Last year, after watching the movie in a hall, about two to three hundred people came at once and surrounded him, taking his photos. "I was afraid of being trampled on. And I quickly went away in a taxi".

Before he used to take the salt brought from Tibet to Jajarkot’s Chaurjahari. But now the Indian market has taken over. The community forests have also started charging fees for animal grazing. This year he deposited Rs 20 for each yak. On the other side of the Tibetan town, roads have come up and this year he saw around 30 trucks carrying vegetables, flour and rice.

One thing that’s on Thinley’s mind is roads. He stresses that if the government decides to build a road in Dolpa connecting to Tibet, the six VDCs from the upper Dolpa will help with the digging. "We’ve requested the government to build the roads a thousand times but to no avail. Perhaps it should reach an agreement with the Chinese government to help build the roads". After the filming was done, he went to Paris for 5 days. Some people have even talked about him going abroad to earn money. He says, "People shouldn’t talk unnecessarily. Our film would have won but since some people sent messages saying that it was not a Nepali film, it did not receive the award". He adds, "Many foreigners come to Dolpa but Eric was the only person who did what he did".

"After the shooting of Caravan, Eric asked me what he could do to help me. He said he couldn’t build an irrigation canal nor a gumba for it would cost too much. So I asked him to build a school for our children. He gave a lakh for the school."

"The first time I was here (Kathmandu) was 21 years ago," he says. "At the time the King’s coronation was on. He was on a horse. The city was covered in lights".

dedicatedly yours

Sugam Nepal

The days have gone so fast that I am already at the stage of looking back and reevaluating my earnings and savings, my successes and failures. Today, when I look at myself in the mirror, I find small ridges on my face and scattered gray hair seeming as if white rays have spread on a black sheet. I still cherish my childhood and yet remember my adolescence that left a perennial mark on me.

Being nostalgic, from the very beginning, since I was a child I strove for honesty and truthfulness. My wish to vindicate my worth and competence was always there in my mind. This principle of mind always guides me through thick and thin. I don’t say that I had fewer conflicts, less paradoxical relationships, less hard times but it was then, I started to become aware of the differences between the self and others around me. I started to find myself alone in crowds, lonesome in the rabble. Whenever I shared my insight with my friends or peer groups I was the one who was left out among all the others. I would rather articulate it in this way that, I had a different mission and vision in life. From the very beginning my analogies were different, my observations were distinct and thus my pattern of thinking was eccentric.

To emphasise the truth, I never craved for lucrative jobs or a life full of amenities rather I basked myself in glory but never tired in the dream race. I found enormous satisfaction in banishing the blues away and giving guidance to those who had strayed from their path. This intrinsic nature made me think that I had an onus to build the nation in my best possible way. I went through various remorseful situations in my life that started with my studies and ended up with my vocation. At first I underwent plenty of inconsistent thoughts when choosing my course of study and latter it haunted my job. In fact, I could not understand what I expected out of my life. In due course I landed on the field of journalism, which made me walk on sharp stones of disappointment and inconceivable effort. But due to my tolerance, patience, pure dedication and arduous work I pursued the tentative goals and became a role model. The inner need to make use of my knowledge by educating others made me establish various training centres and organizations.

Today when I probe into my past and scrutinize my achievements, I don’t espy the money I earned and I tend to eschew the glamour that was inevitable in my life. Instead what I take into consideration the most is the personal satisfaction I derived when I encouraged the able, acted as a patron to them and helped them to think about the saying, "not to quit certainly for hope".

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