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In Khumbu
by Robert Branscomb
It took me about two weeks to trek to the last group of stone huts below the base camp of Mt. Everest. In 1979, there were three huts there, at an elevation of about 16,500 feet, graced with the name Lobuche. When I arrived, slowly and with puffing, there was a light snow falling. Perusing the accommodations at the two huts designated for westerners by the signs “Sherpa Hotel” and “Lobuche Rest House”, I found they were full of morose westerners suffering from altitude sickness. Hoping for the best, I proceeded to a dilapidated hut at the end of the village. Inside I discovered all the space I could possibly want, occupied only by an incredibly aged Tibetan woman. She didn’t say a thing when I asked her if I could stay there. She looked at me as if I had lost my way. Since there was no indication that I could not stay there, I went ahead and laid out my sleeping pad and pack on a section of stone bench next to one wall and went outside to survey the scene.
After clambering on the moraines of the Khumbu Glacier, I concluded from my rapidly beating heart that I needed another day acclimatizing at Lobuche before I attempted the walk to base camp. It was getting late when I reentered the hut. The old lady was cooking a pot of rice and vegetables over a juniper fire. I sat down opposite her. We were the only two people in the hut. As my eyes got used to the dim light, I could see that she preferred not moving around. She had all of her cooking things, reading material, knitting supplies, clothes, and blankets within reach of her platform by the fire. It even appeared that she slept there. She filled a couple of bowls with rice and vegetables and handed me one. I was famished, as always, and quickly got to it. As I was stuffing myself, I happened to look over the rim of my bowl. She was staring at me with the uncanniest look, as if she was looking inside me. She looked like the wrathful deity Yamantaka I’d seen earlier in the trek on a tanka at Tubting Choling monastery in Junbesi. I tried to ignore her by ducking back into my bowl. But when I looked back up, there she was, food untouched, staring at me. So I did the natural thing and with a big smile, opened my mouth, which was full of food, and stuck my tongue out. She was so tickled she almost fell off her perch into the fire. She spared me the stare of death for the rest of the evening. Every so often she would look at me and chuckle to herself.
The next morning, she woke me with an assortment of groans and creakings that gave new definition to gout. She had to go out and get water, but was having such a hard time getting up that I picked up the water jug and went out for it myself. Later that day, after my acclimatizing putterings were complete, I returned to the hut to find it full of Sherpa women and men, sitting around her as she regaled them with the story of my previous nights exhibition. They seemed to get a big kick out of it too, probably since a common Tibetan greeting is to stick your tongue out a bit on meeting each other. Mine had been an extravagant greeting. An older Sherpa man came to me and explained that the old lady was very highly respected in the Sherpa community. She had escaped from Tibet during the communist takeover by walking over the mountains into Nepal. He also explained that the hut was mainly for the use of Sherpas carrying loads to base camp, but I was welcome to stay, since I seemed to be a good person. It was never said, but it was implied, that I should be good to her. After the stare she had given me the night before, I figured the old gal could take care of herself just fine. Besides, I wasn’t going to grudge her the pittance charged for food and lodging. I liked the fact that other westerners beat a hasty retreat after peering in the door, apparently believing the hut to be the last abode of smallpox.
I stayed there for two more days, going up to base camp and a hill across from the Everest massif that afforded a fantastic view of the summit. Every morning and evening I fetched the water so she didn’t have to raise her creaky old bones from the fire. We’d sit there every night across from each other, just the two of us, she reading some Tibetan Buddhist text and I James Joyce’s Ulysses by the dim light of the fire. We only communicated by pointing and mime, since neither of us spoke each other’s language. I had the strangest feeling that I had known her long ago, this worn and ancient woman meditating on the words of the Buddha, probably preparing herself for the next life. When I left, we looked at each other for a long time and said nothing. I finally bowed and went out the door. I had a feeling we would meet again, someday, in other guises under different skies.
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