View finder: 40 years of seeing
A photographer-writer duo chronicles the scenery and evolving lifestyles of the country's Himalayan terrain. An extract
The silver thread of the sacred Kali Gandaki river winds beneath me, and the unimaginably high snow and rock buttresses of the Nepal Himalaya soar towards the Tibet border to meet the pure cobalt dome of the spring sky. Above me lammergeiers wheel through the thermals and the crows circle and scream, that evocative signature call of the Nepal mountains. Pale wild roses with yellow stamens bloom beneath the multi-coloured prayer flags, fluttering their pleas to the gods.
It is 1974 and the trail from Pokhara to Jomsom has just reopened for trekkers. I have arrived in Nepal wide-eyed and entranced, 23 years old, one of 90,000 tourists this year eager to embrace the adventures offered by a still-fledgling Nepal tourism industry.
My feet ache with blisters, formed before a kindly ex-Gurkha teashop owner forced some good woollen socks on me, and I have a large bruise on my thigh from a water buffalo at Ghorepani who did not appreciate my friendly pat. But nothing diminishes the intensity of this moment. I cannot believe my good fortune to be here in this remote and extraordinarily beautiful wild country.
And so it is that, although I never meant to stay, I am still here. Trekking in the mountains and then hanging out in Kathmandu on a tight budget—although I never was a very successful hippie—was my first experience of Nepal in 1974. I avidly explored the Kathmandu Valley’s temples, palaces and medieval bazaars, frequented the Om Restaurant run by the brothers of my future Tibetan husband, and cycled through the terraced paddy fields to discover outlying corners and remote shrines.
Now, over 40 years later, I write sitting in the garden of the yellow Nepali-style house with traditional terracotta roof tiles that my husband Tenzin and I built, overlooking Kathmandu Valley. The afternoon light filters through the trees and bamboo, insects are busy amidst the flowers, doves call from among the rocks, and the stream that becomes the Vishnumati River gurgles through the adjacent wood. Over my personal journey through time much in Nepal has changed, but that strong sense of privilege and connection that overcame me in 1974 still remains. In the course of my work in tourism, conservation and development, I have seen this same bond resonate with many visitors, inspired not only by the spectacular scenery but more often by the people of Nepal, bringing them back again and again.
LisaChoegyal is a Nepal-based conservationist and author. Excerpted, with permission, from Nepal Himalaya: A Journey Through Time.
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