Silk Road

Silk Road

                              By Nick Middleton

Analysis :

The chapter ‘Silk Road’ written by Nick Middleton is part of author's travel along the ancient trade route, Silk Road.

It is a beautiful and detailed description of the route, Silk Road as it is an account of the narrator’s holy journey to Kailash, Kora through the famous Silk Road which is known for trade between the Romans and Asians in ancient time. 

The story narrates small incidents of road blockages, describes the land features and accounts the health issues, other challenges and difficulties the narrator went through.

It is an insight into the people who are ready to go through any amount of pain and face all the difficulties to complete their Kora, pilgrimage.

The chapter deals with the historical importance of the Silk Route as well as its significance in present day. 

Summary

The narrator was heading towards Mount Kailash to complete his kora, his pilgrimage. He said goodbye to Lhamo while leaving Ravu where he had stayed for few days. Lhamo gave him a long-sleeved sheepskin coat as a farewell present. He continued his journey with Daniel, an interpreter who helped him with the local language and Tsetan, a guide who drove him. 

They took a short cut to get off the Changtang, through a route that took directly towards Mount Kailash crossing several high mountain passes but there was no problem if there is no snow. They crossed the gently rolling hills of Ravu, open plains, few gazelles nibbling the arid pastures. Further, the plains became more stony than grassy and a great herd of wild ass also passed. Then, there appeared ‘Kyang’, a pall of dust and the herd galloping in tight formation as if practising manouveres. 

As hills appeared, in the rocky wilderness drokbas were tending their flocks. People would pause, stare at their car and wave as they passed. The sheep would take evasive action. Nomads’ dark tents were pitched in splendid isolation, usually with a huge black dog, a Tibetan mastiff, standing guard. They would cock their heads, stare, chase their car speedily and barked furiously with massive jaws for a hundred metres that’s why these ferocious Tibetan mastiffs became popular in China’s imperial courts as hunting dogs and were brought along the Silk Road in ancient times as tribute from Tibet. They saw snow-capped mountains and entered a valley where the river was wide and mostly clogged with ice and the trail was twisting with the meanders. The turns became sharper and the ride bumpier. Further, the track had steeper slopes with big rocks with patches of bright orange lichen. Beneath the rocks, he felt the pressure building up in his ears, he snorted and cleared nostrils. At another tight bend Tsetan stopped as there was snow. Tsetan and Daniel came out of the vehicle. A swathe of the white stuff lay across the track. The bank was too steep for vehicle to scale. The narrator also came out. His wristwatch showed them at 5,210 metres above sea level. Daniel said that its icy top layer was a danger not its depth. They grabbed handfuls of dirt and flung them across the frozen surface. Daniel and narrator stayed out of the vehicle to lighten Tsetan’s load. He drove towards the dirty snow. Ten minutes later, at another blockage he decided to drive round the snow. Tsetan negotiated with one obstacle after the other. 

At 5,400 metres above sea level his head began to throb horribly and he drank water. They finally reached the top of the pass at 5,515 metres. There was a large cairn of rocks festooned with white silk scarves and prayer flags. They took a turn round the cairn, in clockwise direction as per the tradition. Tsetan checked the tyres and stopped for petrol. His headache cleared as they careered down the other side of the pass. At two o’clock they ate hot noodles inside a long canvas tent, beside a dry salt lake. On the plateau there were salt flats and brackish lakes, vestiges of the Tethys Ocean which bordered Tibet before the great continental collision that lifted it. It was a hive of activity, men worked with shovels along white lake laden with piles of salt. By late afternoon they had reached the small town of Hor, back on the main east-west highway that followed the old trade route from Lhasa to Kashmir. Daniel found a ride in a truck to Lhasa. They stopped outside a tyre-repair shop to fix the punctures.

Hor was a grim, miserable place as there was no vegetation, just dust and rocks. The town sat on the shore of Lake Manasarovar, Tibet’s most venerated stretch of water. Ancient Hindu and Buddhist cosmology pinpoints Manasarovar as the source of four great Indian rivers: the Indus, the Ganges, the Sutlej and the Brahmaputra. Actually only the Sutlej flows from the lake, but the headwaters of the other rivers rise nearby on the flanks of Mount Kailash. They were near the great mountain but they stopped to drink some tea in Hor’s only cafe badly painted and having broken windows. Good view of the lake compensated for bad look of buildings there. A Chinese youth in military uniform cleaned his table with a filthy rag and brought a glass and a thermos of tea. Then, they drove past more rocks and rubbish westwards out of town towards Mount Kailash. His experience in Hor was a stark contrast to the accounts of earlier travellers’ encounters with Lake Manasarovar. Ekai Kawaguchi, a Japanese monk was moved by the sanctity of the lake in 1900 and burst into tears. Few years later, Sven Hedin, a Swede also had the similar experience. They stopped at a guest house in Darchen. 

The rubbish dump in the open air of Hor had worsened his cold blocking one of his nostrils again and herbal tea wasn’t good enough. They were at 4,760 metres not much higher than Ravu. At night he had been gasping for oxygen several times, which scared him. He tried breathing through mouth, then switched to single nostril power and was taking sufficient oxygen. But when he was dozing off, he woke up abruptly. He wasn’t able to sleep. His chest felt strangely heavy and sat up, and that cleared his nasal passages almost instantly.  He felt, it must have been his regular emergency electrical impulses again, but this time, he wasn’t gasping for breath, he was simply not allowed to sleep. Sitting up once more immediately made him feel better. Propping himself upright against the wall helped him relax.

Tsetan took him to the Darchen medical college which looked like a monastery. In the consulting room he met a Tibetan doctor who wore none of the paraphernalia - white coat, stethoscope, etc. He gave a brown envelope containing fifteen screws of paper, it was a five-day course of medicine. After breakfast package contained a brown powder that tasted like cinnamon. The lunchtime and bedtime packages contained small, spherical brown pellets and looked like sheep dung. After first full day’s course, he slept soundly. Seeing this, Tsetan left him, to return to Lhasa. As a Buddhist, it didn’t really matter if narrator passed away, but he thought, it would be bad for his business. Darchen had heaps of rubble and refuse, but the sun shining brilliantly in a clear blue sky across the plain to the south gave him a vision of the Himalayas and a huge, snow-capped mountain, Gurla Mandhata. The town had rudimentary general stores, men playing a game of pool and women washing their long hair in the icy water of a narrow brook past his guest house. Darchen felt relaxed and unhurried but, there were no pilgrims. The town was bustling with visitors and many brought their own accommodation, their own tents. His arrival at Darchen was too early. He was still struggling with self help programme on positive thinking and without assistance of Daniel he could only wait. The parts of the route were liable to blockage by snow as the chunks of dirty ice still clung to the banks of Darchen’s brook. Since Tsetan and Daniel had left, he couldn’t answer even most basic question.

One afternoon at Darchen’s only café he met Norbu. The cafe was small, dark and cavernous, with walls and ceiling wreathed in sheets of multi-coloured plastic that is used to make voluminous shopping bags sold all over China, Asia and Europe. Plastic must rate as one of China’s most successful exports along the Silk Road today. The cafe had a single window beside which he could see the pages of his notebook and novel. Norbu who was also staying in the same guest house, saw his book and asked, “You English?”. He was wearing a windcheater and metal-rimmed spectacles of Western style. He was Tibetan but worked in Beijing at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, in the Institute of Ethnic Literature. He had also come to do the kora as he had been writing academic papers about the Kailash kora and its importance in various works of Buddhist literature. He said in happiness, “We could be a team,” He felt, his positive-thinking strategy was working. They both were ill-equipped. Norbu kept reminding him that it’s very high, he is very fat and it’s tiresome to walk. But he had enthusiasm and he was Tibetan. Narrator decided that perhaps Norbu would be the ideal companion. Norbu suggested to hire some yaks for luggage, and he had no intention of prostrating himself all round the mountain as his tummy was too big.

Difficult Terms

Kora - pilgrimage, holy journey in Tibetan language

Drokba - nomad, shepherd

Gazelles - small antelopes

Kyang - wild ass

Mastiff - big strong breed of dog

Meander - bend or curve in river

Cosmology - ancient history

Yak - Tibetan ox

Important Question Answers

I. Give reasons for the following statements.

1. Tibetan mastiffs were popular in China’s imperial courts.

Ans. Tibetan mastiff, a huge black dog was perfect as standing guard. These ferrocious beasts were popular in China’s imperial courts as hunting dogs and were brought along the Silk Road in ancient times as tribute from Tibet.

These big beasts would cock their great big heads when they saw any stranger, they would explode into action in great speed like a bullet. These shaggy monsters, blacker than the darkest night, usually wore bright red collars and barked furiously with massive jaws. They were completely fearless and would  chase a vehicle for a hundred metres or so before easing off.

2. The author’s experience at Hor was in stark contrast to earlier accounts of the place.

Ans. The narrator’s experience in Hor came as a stark contrast to accounts he had read of earlier travellers’ first encounters with Lake Manasarovar. Ekai Kawaguchi, a Japanese monk who had arrived there in 1900, was so moved by the sanctity of the lake that he burst into tears. A couple of years later, the hallowed waters had a similar effect on Sven Hedin, a Swede though he wasn’t habitual of such sentimental outbursts.

However, Hor came to be a disappointing experience to the narrator. It was then, a grim and miserable place. There was no vegetation, just dust and rocks, liberally scattered with years of accumulated refuse, which was unfortunate for the town that sat on the shore of Lake Manasarovar, Tibet’s most venerated stretch of water.

3. The author was disappointed with Darchen.

Ans. First of all high altitude at Darchen posed him health issues and he wasn’t able to sleep. He was left alone as he arrived quite early and many pilgrims weren’t there. Darchen was dusty, partially derelict and punctuated by heaps of rubble and refuse. The buildings were badly painted and made a grim and dismal scene. He was ill equipped and he had to wait for a companion until he met Norbu.

4. The author thought that his positive thinking strategy worked well after all.

Ans. When the narrator met Norbu and he said that he had come to do the kora, his heart jumped. Norbu had been writing academic papers about the Kailash kora but he had never actually done it himself. When Norbu told that he came to Darchen on his holy journey to mount Kailash, his eyes lit up and told him, “We could be a team.” Norbu also told excitedly. “Two academics who have escaped from the library.” He started feeling that his positive thinking strategy worked well after all. He was waiting for a companion positively and he finally met Norbu and that was the power of his positive thinking. Healthwise also he was getting well and positive.

5. The article has been titled ‘Silk Road.’ (Note on Silk Road)

Ans. The chapter is aptly titled as ‘Silk Road’ as it revolves around and describes the Silk Road which the narrator follows to complete his Kora to Mount Kailash. Silk Road refers to a network of the land routes linking Europe and Asia. The Silk Road was a network of Asian trade routes active from the second century BCE until the mid-15th century. Spanning over 6,400 km, it played a central role in facilitating economic, cultural, political, and religious interactions between the Eastern and the Western worlds. The Silk Road derives its name from the highly lucrative trade of silk textiles that were produced primarily in China to the Romans who had a passion for silk and exotic flora and fauna of the East. The author, Nick Middleton, in his travelogue, detailed the route with all the beautiful landscapes, geographical features and animals and people’s life, work and culture.