The weather is really taking its toll here. Wednesday was the third day running that the two roads into Spiti (one at either end of the valley) were blocked by landslides. The road crews are amazingly efficient at getting to the landsides quickly with bulldozers, which simply shovel the debris over the edge of the road to tumble down into the river below. But these last few days of rain has meant that the landslides just keep coming. The electricity has been mostly out for about 24 hours now – rain has probably got into the hydroelectric plant which powers most of Spiti, and the back-up power cable from the neighbouring valley must be damaged by all the landslides. And no electricity means that the internet, tenuous at the best of times, is totally dead. It’s a good reminder that Spiti’s links with the outside world are fragile and unreliable.
It was a relief to wake up to sunshine this morning.
We drove up to Ki Old Age Home in the morning to drop off our props and costumes (and share an obligatory cuppa!), before continuing up to Ki Monastery. There are about 25 people in the Old Age Home, most of whom are former nuns.
Ki Monastery is a beautifully unique building, perched on a cone-shaped rocky outcrop with a commanding view of the whole valley. Steep steps wind in and around the buildings, a jumble of white-washed clay which has been built, repaired and added to over the 1000 years of the monastery’s chequered history.
At the monastery, Kaku introduced us to his grandfather, an elderly monk sitting outside in the sunny courtyard. He had come to live at Ki Monastery at the age of 7 or 8, and now 80 years later was one of the oldest monks there. He was deaf and partly blind now, and the younger monks cared for him. (Thinking about it, he must have been a great uncle - monastic life doesn't lead to grandchildren!)
There are around 300 monks living at Ki Monastery, of whom 125 are student monks ranging in age from 4 to 18.
We went down a steep flight of steps to meet the principal of the Monk School, only to discover that it was actually the assistants office at the bottom of the steps. We had to meet him first, collect another assistant, then go all the way back up again. Lungs heaving, we dutifully followed the assistant almost to back where we started, when he veered off along a narrow ledge with a sharp drop on one side. Petes vertigo got the better of him at this point, so Ben, Kaku and I carried on along the ledge and down another huge flight of stone steps to the principals office.
With Kakus help as translator, we invited some of the younger student monks to join us at Ki Old Age Home for the performance. He happily accepted. All good….except the climb back up again!
We walked back down to Ki village and the Old Age Home. Fields tended by Ki villagers supply both monastery and village with food, and spread in a long green band out from the cluster of traditional houses. Kaku had gone ahead of us to help the Home prepare lunch, and when we arrived we sat down to a simple meal of rice and peas, served from a huge blackened pressure cooker. The altitude means that everything cooks much more slowly – pressure cookers are a mainstay of every kitchen.
We finished eating and set up our stage at one end of the big lounge. The elderly nuns sat on cushions arranged against the walls. The young monks arrived and sat on the floor at one end, to the welcoming smiles of the nuns. They lit up in the company of the children, and were clearly loving all the hustle and bustle around them.
Our audience was simply beautiful today. Old wrinkled faces with kind eyes and toothy smiles, lovely ladies with a playful sense of humour. A heap of little boys with shy faces at first, slowly becoming confident and enjoying the show. We truly loved being in their company.
After the show, everyone had tea together. The young monks made short work of a huge plateful of biscuits – small boys are the same all over the world.
Pete interviewed some of the nuns. What did they think of the show? One of the ladies replied animatedly in Spitian, with a grin on her face. Kaku translated “They didn’t understand anything but they thought it was great”. Gales of laughter all round.
