Wait, let me backtrack for a minute so this doesn't sound like a scene from a Kusturica movie.
It all started because of Adam. I haven't seen Adam since my pre-army volunteer year, when we were both working for the SPNI. And now, naturally, he's here - in Ladakh. The jagged mountains and inviting natives attract a big crowd of trekkers, and ex-SPNI members are a major target group for that kinda thing. We first meet in The Jewish House, a Chabad-esque organization that operates tourist houses across the globe, though unlike the Chabad House phenomena, the organization isn't affiliated with a specific branch of Judaism, and so the tone is set in each house according to the family operating the place. In Leh's case, we are talking about a bizzaro Kabbalah oriented family on a four month mission from Tzfat. The house provides workshops during weekdays about various religious and spiritual subjects, but I guess the main attraction is Friday night dinner, when a Kiddush is held, and pretty much all of the Israeli crowd in town (which is a hell of allot) comes over to pray, say "Shabbat Shalom" and enjoy a free hot meal along with some light missionary work on the hosting family's part. Adam's been in India for several months now, and was in Nepal before that, and this is his last week here. Although I'm thrilled to see him again, I soon get the same feeling of meeting a work friend, or simply an acquaintance from a very certain point in your life - once you get past the formalities and the joy of reunion, you find you don't really have that much to talk about. But it's still fun to hear about the guys from Adam's group, and where they are today (including the one that found religion, got married and moved to Tzfat meanwhile), and filling him up about what my guys are up to these days.
The next time I see Adam is three days later, just before his departure south towards Delhi, and I can see that his time was well spent, by his burnt skin, stubble and horrible stench. And that's how I hear about Pangong Tso. Although the name sounds familiar from my Lonely Planet guide, you have to be careful about what you pick from that book, since allot of times major disappointments would be highlighted whereas hidden gems would be completely absent from mention. In this case, however it seems that both guide and traveler are in agreement.
Since the lake (Tso means lake here, by the way) is located on the Chinese border - part of it actually lying in China - a special permit is needed in order to allow access to the region. Also, not wanting to hire a private Jeep to get there (for frugal and sentimental reasons both) I decided to look into the local bus scene. Leh being a major hub for tourists and trekkers, virtually every second shop in town is a travel agency, but you still need to choose carefully. The first places I try inform me that: A. There are no local buses going to Pangong, and B. Permits are only issued for groups of two people and more. These two facts naturally lead to the agencies trying to coax me into joining an organized trip that does Pangong and back in one day (which doesn't allow much, since the drive is about seven hours in each direction). It only takes a couple of hours to find the shady agency where the owner promises me he can arrange a permit for individuals, and another stroll down to the bus station to realize that there are indeed local buses going to Pangong.
Saturday morning. 5am. Still dark. I get up and start making my way towards the bus station which is on the other side of town. On the way down I stop and pick up some local bread fresh from the oven, sold at the Muslim side of town from day break. The bread is wrapped in year old newspaper pages, and costs 3Rs. per "pita" (roughly 7 cents). Thank god I checked the schedule in advance and bought a ticket at the same time, since the bus is already full by the time we leave Leh, and in the first half hour of the ride at least twenty more people join us. Although the bus is a local bus, which means that it is the most dilapidated and messy as you can find, the seats are more comfortable than those on the "deulxe tourist buses" I rode before. That doesn't mean, however, that there's too much room for standing, and so, some of the unlucky tourists who joined the ride late choose to climb up on the roof and enjoy the ride from up there (never mind the rain, occasional snow and terrain we face ahead). After the depressing first half hour, where we stop at practically any house on the road to pick up more passengers/luggage, we finally get going and the ride seems to go fairly smooth. Even climbing Chang La, the third highest motorable pass in the world (at 5,289m), only causes the bus to stop twice, during which the errand buy attached shoves melting snow from the roadside down the radiator to try and cool it.
Fixing the radiator at 5,300m
But third time's the charm. Another garbage truck-cum-bus comes along, but this time, there are already passengers in the back. Since by this point there were only six of us who were brave (or desperate) enough to wait for so long, we can all fit in the back, but barely, since there are about 30 more kids sharing the ride with us. Summer vacation having started, all the kids are on their way summer camp somewhere on the lake, and we get to enjoy the camp songs that they seem to know by heart, and we get to experience first hand the fact that many kids suffer from car sickness. It takes about another hour to reach the lake, while the trucks whooshes along at a breakneck speed of 30km/h (and I'm not kidding, that does feel fast by now).
Our cosy ride
When we finally get to Pangong, we are dropped at Spangmik, a "village" consisting of about five houses, all of which double as homestays for tourists in season. During winter (September-May) no one stays in the lake, and the families move to Leh or other, warmer places in the south. We decide to stay at the Parachute Cafe closest to the lake. These cafes are basically tented restaurants, serving a basic meal of rice, Dal (lentil soup) and Sabzi (cooked vegetables), offering a nearby second tent with mattresses and blankets. Ours also serves omlette and Chapati for breakfast - Joy!. Since the seven hour ride eventually took us nearly thirteen, we don't mess around and go to sleep pretty soon after dinner. It's only when I wake up the next day that I can really appreciate where it is that I am. Pangong Tso, spreading some I-don't-know-how-many miles (but allot), is eerily quiet, with clear blue water, surrounded by a desert scenery encircled by snowy peaks that remain snowed all across summer. The road next to the lake is only visited by a solitary Jeep every couple of hours, and apart from that there are absolutely no noises around. There is no source of electricity (not even an unstable one like in Leh) and so most families either make go with no power at all, or keep a tiny solar panel attached to a car battery outside their huts. Except a "hotel" offering concrete rooms, the houses are built using adobe bricks held together with mud, and the fences dividing each family's tiny wheat field are simply made out of stacked stones. The weather changes from chilly during most of the day, because of the clouds and the wind, to brief periods of intense heat when the sun is out. Since we are at around 4,500m, the water remains cold all year long (and freezes over during winter), and I can only force myself into a 5 seconds dunk in the icy water before running out. And that's it. There is nothing else to do in the lake except enjoy the place, and the feeling that you've literally reached the end of the world, and that if you keep going down the road, you'll very soon fall off the face of the earth. Here be dragons, indeed.
The view from Spangmik
Although there is some touristic movement in Pangong, most of which comes by in shared Jeeps and on motorbikes, there are so few people around - locals included - that the lake holds a feeling of a different century. Even though I can't imagine myself living this way for the rest of my life - or even for a few years, at that - the peacefulness and cosy primitiveness of the place hold a unique charm that can't fail but soothe your spirit, even if you got the place after thirteen hours of bumps, hassles and haggling. The owners of each home or cafe survive for five months every year on the very limited diet mentioned above, and with no diversions around, or no life around as some would say. Indeed, coming back to Leh two days later the place seems at least as big as New York, and twice as noisy. The kids and teenagers I ask around in Spangmik tell me that they spend the winter months in Leh. When I ask which place they prefer they instantly reply that the "big city" is the favorite location. But since the kids all stay at home, with no prospect of formal education, it seems positive that they are destined to spend their mature years in exactly the same way their parents spend them now. In a country that is rushing towards westernization and globalization at an alarming (and I believe unsustainable) rate, this bygone haven providing foreigners with an unprecedented feeling of unison with nature and calmness, only acts as a prison barring these children from the world they have grown to admire and aspire to.
In the past two months I believe a great part of me had become disillusioned of the romantic feeling that draws so many people to India, looking for that something ancient and exotic. The same faux-local commodity seems to be offered, as eye candy or for sale in any tourist spot, while getting of the tourist map into the heart of India is virtually impossible, and seems, at least to the outside observer as a very unpleasant and not very interesting place. I'm so happy to have had the chance to take a sharp turn sideways, even if only for a few days, and see something as unique as Pangong Tso.
Greetings from Pangong Tso
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