Experiencing Himalayan Life

So I am back from my week long grade 9 activity week. Have you ever wondered what it is like to spend an entire week camping with 12, 14 year old high school freshman in a freshly harvested corn field in a small Himalayan village? Well if you have read on.

Our adventure began with a 12 km road hike (uphill most of the way) to the wonderful little village of Takarna. Takarna is situated on the flanks of a small valley created by a spring fed creek that is a tributary of the Aglar River 500 meters below. The hillsides surrounding Takarna are surrounded by terraced farm fields that give the landscape an interestingly textured look. It reminds me of a topographic map,the kind with the lines that tell elevation. Upon arriving in Takarna we are given our choice of any freshly harvested and plowed terrace in the center of the village. Makes for a bit of a dusty and dirty week but a very nice little camping spot. The majority of these students have very limited if any camping experience and it was interesting to see them go throughout the struggles every novice camper experiences, overall they did extremely well.

For me some of the highlights of the week were the time we spend in the village interacting with the villagers, and helping them out with their daily chores. I think I could become a Himalayan farmer. It intrigues and impresses me to no end how these people can squeeze a living out of this relatively small chunk of land on the side of a mountain in the Himalaya. They do most everything for themselves. They grow almost all of their own food, corn, beans, dal, some fruit, peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes, you name it. They have cows and buffalo for milk. Their own mills to grind grain into flour.

We milked water buffalo, plowed the fields the old fashioned way with 2 cows and a homemade plow, beat dal pods with a big stick to release the bean; I was a Himalayan farmer!!!! I have always loved working with the earth, sun and elements to create and harvest amazing bounties of vegetables, fruit, and other edible goodies. I aspire to someday grow or raise the majority of the food me and my family consume. People have been doing it since the beginning of the human race, and I think there is not many things more fulfilling than eating fresh food you have grown yourself. This was the part of the weekend that I enjoyed the most.

Some of my students and I riding on top of a jeep back to camp along one of those crazy Indian roads. What you can't see is the thousand foot drop off to our left. Only in India!!!!

Evening campfire pow-wow