Mount Everest, the Reconnaissance, 1921Howard-Bury, Charles
History
Mount Everest, the Reconnaissance, 1921
Howard-Bury, Charles
Everest, Mount (China and Nepal); Mount Everest Expedition (1921)
Wild game is plentiful in the Upper Bhong Valley. I shot numerous hares,
some ramchakor and a bar-headed goose during the trip; while Gujjar
Singh caught a young, week-old burhel lamb on the summit of the Lungchen
Pass, which, however, died after three weeks in captivity. Gazelle are
common on the Sutso Plain.
By the end of June, Lalbir Singh had finished the inking of his previous
surveys, and was ready for fresh work. Accordingly, after spending a
couple of days in examining his board, and checking the spelling of his
village names with the aid of the local Tibetan officials, I despatched
him on a lengthy programme of work in Pharuk and Kharta. It was three
months before I saw him again.
About this time a messenger arrived from the Dzongpen of Nyenyam,
inviting us to visit his district, which lay four marches to the
Southwest, in the valley of the Po Chu or Bhotia Kosi R. Although
Nyenyam was not one of the districts specifically mentioned in our
passport, Wollaston and I decided, with the concurrence of Colonel Bury,
to avail ourselves of the opportunity of visiting this little-known
area.
Leaving Tingri on July 13, with the interpreter Gyalzen Kazi and
Surveyor Gujjar Singh, who had now returned after completing his work on
the Lungchen Pass, we camped that evening at Langkor, a small village at
the Western edge of the Tingri Plain. A cantilever bridge which spans
the Gya Chu opposite the village had been carried away by floods shortly
before our arrival, and the whole population of the hamlet, male and
female, were busily engaged in its reconstruction, working in relays to
the accompaniment of prolonged and vigorous blasts on a "conch" which a
monk was diligently blowing in order--as it was explained to us--to
avert further rainfall until the bridge should be completed. His efforts
were rewarded with tolerable success, as the rain held off all day in
spite of the threatening storm-clouds which loomed up from the
South-west.
The most interesting feature of Langkor is an ancient temple, an
appanage of the great Drophung monastery of Lhasa. This building, which
is said to be over 1,000 years old, contains a sacred stone alleged to
have been hurled across the Himalayan Range from India, and to have
pitched in the Tingri Plains. The name Tingri is said to be derived from
the noise ("ting") made by the falling stone. The stone is carefully
preserved inside a wooden box, which is opened with much ceremony on the
first day of the Tibetan new year. The temple, which is managed by a
committee of fifteen civilian monks (nyakchang), also contains a library
of 4,400 books, and an image of the Indian saint Tamba Sanye which is
popularly believed to have grown by itself from the ground _in situ_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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