Today's meat was indeed yesterday's lame yak. Despite our efforts, the beast perished in the hot sun. Tsedup and I had fed it a huge dose of human antibiotics and dribbled milk into its mouth in desperation. The children and I had even held an umbrella over its head to ease the glare of the midday heat, but the yak knew it was dying. It grunted pathetically as the dogs sniffed around it.
When it had died I went out to look at it for the last time. Unlike these people, I was unaccustomed to seeing death. I had only seen my mother's dead bitch. We buried her solemnly beneath a cherry tree in the back garden. The yak was still warm, and as I gently stroked its head I muttered, ' Om mani padme hum.' It is better to die than to suffer, Annay said. As far as she was concerned, its soul was on its way to the next life. She prayed as she skinned it with the other women.
From the day that Tsedup had run away, Annay had stopped eating animals that had been killed, and only ate those that had died naturally. She had prayed that her son would be protected. But even now that he was back, she would not revert to her old ways. Sometimes she had to rely on the generosity of another family in the tribe whose animal had died. But these treats were only occasional, and her diet was poor. Tsedup was always remonstrating with her for not looking after her health. But she was stubborn and not even he could change her mind. Annay was a devout Buddhist. Her virtuous actions were symbolic of her religious devotion and compassion for all sentient beings. She sought empathy with the world and a deeper level of understanding for the life around her. She knew that each of her actions had an outcome. If she showed compassion, the outcome would be positive; if she committed a harmful act, the outcome would be negative. Every day she experienced the world at an emotional level and compassion was her primary motivation. With every good act that she performed, she was increasing her own good karma and achieving merit, sonnam. The ten main meritorious actions of Buddhism are not unlike the Ten Commandments: one should not kill, steal, conduct inappropriate sexual activity, lie, gossip, swear, sow discord or be covetous, malicious or opinionated. Annay was in line for a glorious rebirth.
That evening, we made mincemeat of the poor yak. Amnye, Tsedo and I fashioned momos, the tiny steamed flour parcels, which were the nomads' delicacy. They laughed at my squashed efforts as they placed their own creations, like perfect poppy buds, on the floured board. Later, I tried not to think of the ethical implications as I munched gratefully, delicious hot juice dribbling down my chin. Now and then each person breathed their prayer through greasy lips, as in the corner of the tent the black hide hung limply over the basket of meat.
As we talked in the firelight, Shermo Donker made butter. Tomorrow the tribe would be honoured by the visit of a lama. The butter was to be our family's offering to the monastery. She kneaded it in a bowl, squeezing out the excess liquid; it squelched and oozed lusciously in her fingers. Then she slapped and patted it into cylindrical shapes; perfectly smooth. She continued until long after the children had fallen asleep, the fire had died, the dogs had ceased their howling.
Despite the imminent arrival of the lama, Tsedup had resolved to go to town. The next morning, he sped off with his brother, Tsedo, on the motorbike, scattering sheep, his mother shouting after him, 'Come back tonight! Namma needs you!' Tsedup waved and disappeared in a dustcloud on the far track. I had discovered his fondness for town life, which was strange since I had always thought he would be a true nomad. But I hadn't known how much young nomads loved the town. These days, it was the place to be. And it was normal for nomad husbands to leave their wives sometimes, in favour of carousing with friends and a hotel bed. I missed him when he didn't come home at night and Annay knew it. Yet I tried to suppress my possessive urges. He had been away for nine years and I wanted him to feel alive again. I was just going to have to bite my tongue. One thing was for sure: through sheer necessity, my Tibetan language was improving and I was becoming a more competent namma.
Soon a figure appeared in the shimmering heat. Tsedup's grandmother was ambling over from Rhanjer's tent with her stick. She had walked six miles from the town to stay with his family, as she often did in the summer months. Tsedup's oldest brother had been raised by Ama-lo-lun and Azjung. They had never been able to have a child of their own – Amnye was the product of her previous marriage – and as a boy Rhanjer had been so idolised by them that his grandmother had gradually prised him away from his parents. Subtly he had become a permanent fixture in their tent. It wasn't that Tsedup's mother and father had not wanted him; this practice is quite common in nomad families and usually there are so many children that they are willingly shared between grandparents and parents.
Ama-lo-lun had come to help with preparations for the lama's visit and soon settled into deep-frying twists of golden bread in a wok, heavy with oil. She recited her prayers rhythmically as she turned the bread in the oil with a stick. Tibetans did not pray in the way I understood. Ama-lo-lun was not asking for anything, or thanking her god. She was probably just using the prayer for dedication of merit, part of every devout Buddhist's practice. 'May any merit attained through this practice be dedicated to the enlightenment of all sentient beings.'
As she repeated her refrain, she strained the doughnut morsels and placed them on an upturned metal lid. The fire was bright, the tent dark and clouded with dung smoke. Above her hypnotic chants and the bubbling oil, the milk-churn whirred, as Sirmo turned the handle. Meanwhile, Annay rolled out dough on a wooden board and cut it into small rectangles, slitting each piece in the middle and weaving it into shapes, ready for frying. We were silent, listening to the prayer, which seemed infinite.
Suddenly, through the drone of incantation we heard a jeep engine. Shermo Donker came running into the tent, a flustered look on her sun-blistered face. The lama was here. 'Hurry! Hurry!' she barked at the children. She pulled me outside, and I caught a brief glimpse of the holy man's vehicle as it pulled up next door before she spun me inside our white tent. I felt as if I was being hidden from him. Were they ashamed of me? I would surely be a most bizarre spectacle for the lama. For a moment I felt disappointed. But Shermo Donker soon began rummaging through an old rice sack and produced a fistful of kadaks, the white silken prayer scarves.
'Your tsarer needs retying.' She smiled and I realised that she was about to help me smarten up. She was the expert and I had to look my best. She handed me the prayer scarves and fussed around with my costume, until I was bound tight enough for her satisfaction. In a gentle, motherly gesture, she licked her thumb and smoothed away some mark on my face. 'Yucka!' she said, then tugged at my arm and propelled me towards the main tent. We distributed the prayer scarves and Sirmo and Shermo Donker retied their tsarers, combed their hair and put on their best jewellery. I helped the children into their best clothes. Their tsarers were only marginally less soiled than the clothes they had been wearing, but it was an improvement, and once I had tugged at their hair with a comb, we all set off.
Jerko's tent was on the other side of the stream. It had always been there and it always would be. Each summer when the tribe reassembled in the river valley, all of the tents were always in exactly the same position. Tsedup's father and Jerko seemed to be the luckiest ones. It wasn't a question of status, although they were both prominent figures in the tribe, just the way things were. Being closest to the stream, those families were in the most convenient position for collecting water and washing clothes. Their women were more fortunate than the others, who toiled across the grassland with their water vessels. Our tent was also the closest to the track, so anyone arriving at the tribe would call there first. We were always the first to know who was coming, which was an advantage when the trucks came from town, selling fruit and packet noodles.
Jerko shared the family name, Kambo-Wasser as he was Amnye's illegitimate brother. The two had the same father. Ama-lo-lun knew about it, but it didn't seem to have been a problem for her. That kind of nocturnal liaison was not uncommon in the grassland. The Kambo-Wasser lineage was centuries old and their ancestors had origins in Kham, the province south of Amdo. The people of Kham were notoriously fearsome warriors of gargantuan stature, which explained Jerko's appearance. He was the tallest man in the tribe, with enormous square shoulders and a square jaw. His son, Gabo, was the strongest man, a prize-winning wrestler. The hallmark of a Kambo-Wasser man was his shoulders, which Tsedup had inherited, although Amnye was of a muscular but slighter build, more like Ama-lo-lun's family.
Outside Jerko's home, we joined the rest of the tribe. The lama and his retinue were hidden from our view within the dark confines of the tent, although the front flap had been raised and we could see some magenta-robed monks sipping tea. Jerko's family had laid out low wooden tables, which were overflowing with plates of momos, meat, apples, sweets, soft drinks and Ama-lo-lun's golden bread. The guests sat cross-legged on tufted Tibetan rugs, decorated with elaborate patterns, and I could just make out the golden glow of the butter lamps and the thankas they had hung on the sides of the tent. Outside the tent entrance they had prepared a throne, which was covered in silk cloth, for the old lama to sit on when he gave his blessings. Around me, the crowd mumbled in anticipation. The young girls wore elaborate headdresses that cascaded down their backs in a shower of coral, turquoise and amber. They had donned their best silk shirts with stiff gold brocade designs especially for the occasion and stood in a group, giggling and whispering, shyly nibbling the tips of their fingers. The old women cooed their satisfaction with my traditional costume and took my hand now and again, squeezing it affectionately. 'Amdo Namma,' they said gently, looking up at me with kind eyes.
The sun was growing fierce in the cloudless sky. The prairie lay scorched, the iridescence of the summer flowers lessening now to patches of yellow and lilac here and there. The Machu river shone back at the sky, the same pure blue. A raven looped lethargically above my head and made for the craggy heights of the mountains in the distance. I stayed close to Sirmo and watched for clues about protocol. Most people had begun to prostrate. I watched Shermo Donker push her palms together, then touch her forehead, her throat and her heart. Then she lay prone on the grass, her face buried in the dry stems for a moment before she rose and repeated the action. She was paying homage to the lama by practising the Buddhist form of obeisance. He was the embodiment of Buddha-body, speech and mind; the superior object of prostration. He was a sacred teacher, who had made a vow to serve all sentient beings and through his own actions could demonstrate the Buddha's teaching and give the Buddha's blessing.
Now, even the old men and women of the tribe were stretched out humbly before the empty throne, rising and falling like a Mexican wave. I felt self-conscious. I wasn't a Buddhist, but I had a great respect for their beliefs, and just as Tsedup had never stood up in church when everyone else was kneeling to pray, I wanted to honour this code of conduct. I had never been fit, however, so I was in trouble by the fifth prostration. Flushed of face and panting I was forced to stop, while next to me Tsedup's octogenarian grandmother was still going strong. I had due cause to feel inadequate – but, then, she was driven by a profound sense of devotion. I was not. She awaited the appearance of the sacred old man with all the eagerness of a child.
Except that he was a child. When he finally emerged from the tent, I was shocked to discover that the venerable lama was no more than five years old. He was dwarfed by his entourage of monks, who ushered him to his throne, lowering their heads in respect. His head was freshly shaved, his body draped in layers of miniature yellow and magenta robes, and when he climbed up on to his throne, his tiny Tibetan boots dangled over the edge of his seat. He gazed impassively at the throng before him and squinted in the midday glare. As the monks began chanting their prayer, we were all made to form an orderly line to receive the lama's blessing. One by one, the tribe approached him, bowing in supplication, holding the kadaks in their outstretched arms. He touched each of their heads and placed the scarf around their necks. I had been shocked when I met the thirteen-year-old lama Jarsung in Labrang, but nothing had prepared me for this extraordinary event. I was just as perplexed to see him as he would be to see me.
As I approached him I wondered what on earth he would think of me. Five-year-old children here usually stared and pointed when they first saw me but, of course, that would be an inappropriately extravagant display for such a sacred being, even if he had wanted to show his surprise. As I got nearer, it was impossible to keep my head lower than his as he was so small. I knew it was forbidden, but I was curious to look into his eyes, to see what lay within that face. As his tiny hand touched my head in blessing, I chanced a glimpse. He sat inert, staring with the intelligence of a scientist at my yellow hair. Like Jarsung, he had a seriousness about him that betrayed his inner self. His child's body was just a shell. I felt unnerved, as if he had the power to look into my soul.
He placed my kadak delicately around my neck, and in that moment I experienced an almost tangible sense of the magic and mystery of this place that I had come to love. I felt distanced, unable to understand it, as if the country itself defied being fully understood. It was a place of the unknown, of the fantastic, the impossible; a strange sanctum, whose very landscape was riddled with symbolism and whose holy men possessed superhuman powers. I looked away and moved on obediently, collecting my knotted protection cord, shugndot, from the monk at his side, as the lama bestowed the next Buddha blessing. Free of their religious obligations, the small children were now frolicking and rucking in the grass, splashing in the stream, falling in dung, shouting and laughing, hitting and pinching. Sirmo and I chided them as we walked back to the tent, but as I took one last look at the holy child climbing into his jeep, which was full of butter, I was happy at their wild freedom.
There was a feeling of elation in the tribe after the blessing, like the post-Communion camaraderie of a Christian congregation. There had been a washing of the soul by a 'wave of grace'; for that is what the word blessing, or shinlab, means in Tibetan. I watched the nomads return to their tents and the lunch-time milking.
That day I had witnessed their devotion to Buddhism, not in a monastery but at home. It was remarkable to have been outside, under the blistering sun and the dome of the sky and to have been part of their worship. I had seen evidence of their shamanic practices before, but this had been different. For me, that day revealed the nomads' piety, humility and their veneration of the lama, the symbol of Buddha.
In Amdo, the Buddhist deity predominantly worshipped is Lhamo. She is depicted with a fierce blue face and riding a mule. Amnye had explained that one could pray to her in a manner different from the practice of 'calling upon' the spirit powers of the earth and sky. In the mind of the nomad, Lhamo may be helpful after death, which none of the shamanic gods are. Equally, Chenrezik, the bodhisattva of compassion, may assist after death: his role is to delay his own entrance into nirvana – the ultimate Buddha state, which precludes all possibilities of reincarnation – until every sentient being has been released from the wheel of rebirth to accompany him. I had heard his mantra ' Om mani padme hum' muttered everywhere, as a means of supplication for his blessing. Indeed, the Dalai Lama is his incarnation: 'He who gazes upon the suffering of the world with tears in his eyes.'
The preoccupation with death and rebirth appeared to form the crux of the Buddhist mindset. It seemed to me that the nomads took refuge in Buddhism as a means of understanding and conquering death. I had realised the clarity with which they accepted the impermanence of life. I had seen the strings of white prayer flags fluttering on the opposite bank of the Machu river and knew that it was a water-burial site. I had heard the terrible tales of the tribeswomen performing sky burial for their dead men on the mountain.
But the process of dying I had heard about seemed as mystical as the shamanic rituals. Certain mystic initiates are capable of maintaining a lucid mind during the dissolving of their personalities. They can even pass into the next life fully conscious. An ordinary man, however, is guided down the path of death by a lama. He explains to the dying man the nature of the journey on which he is about to embark and reassures him. Then the lama's task is to command the spirit out of the top of the man's head with a cry of 'Hik!' followed by 'Phat!' The disembodied entity may then begin its journey through a series of visions, guided by his character and past actions. This is the intermediate state, Bardo. After three days, when the lama has induced the spirit to leave the corpse and abandon its attachment to the world, the body is tied up and carried to the sky burial site. It is dismembered, the organs removed, the limbs cut off, the bones pounded to powder with rock. The dead man's body is a last generous offering to the other sentient beings of the earth: the vultures, wolves and birds. Or the fish who consume a waterborne corpse.
After death a person embraces a new life. If they have accumulated enough merit they will be a good person. If not, they may come back as an ant, or worse. Annay was always careful where she trod. Whatever their state of rebirth, the dead person's name is not spoken in the same way again. I had referred to a late relative of Annay's by his name and had been corrected. I had also seen photographs with faces scratched out. Although the younger generation, more familiar with new technology, accepted pictures of the dead, it seemed that older nomads were unsettled by them and preferred, as they always had, the vividness of a mental picture. I wondered what Amnye and Annay had thought of the pictures I had shown them of my grandmother.
I realised that the intricacies of the Buddhist doctrines were not the main preoccupation of devout people like Annay and Ama-lo-lun. It appeared, as with most nomad women, that their main preoccupation was with living a compassionate existence, reciting the mantra, visiting the monastery. They saw the lama as being like a god, representing the Buddha, and I recognised the importance they attached to the offerings they made to him. Buddhism had brought the nomads morality and spiritual liberation and they worshipped the Buddhist deities, but I knew that the tribesmen's hearts were more closely bound to the mountain gods. Annay was always scolding Amnye for not going to the monastery often enough, but a nomad man needs to feel invincible: he calls upon the mountain warrior for his own protection, in battle against his enemies or the elements. The younger men, like Tsedup's brother Gondo, were especially reliant on the protection of the mountain gods. Gondo would climb Archa and scream to the wind over his fire-offerings for success in gambling. There was no place for a lama in these matters. If Gondo sought refuge in the holy man he would be entering a moral debate and would probably be encouraged to cease his negative actions. The mountain gods were not morally judgemental.
I had been privileged to listen to both the soft murmur of a mantra and to the war-cries of wild men on a mountain peak. If the nomads could live with this rich contradiction, so could I.