Life in Ladakh

Life is still going well in Ladakh, so here are a few snippets of the things I have been doing recently -

After years of not calling myself an engineer at work, (in case someone asked me a technical question) I am happy to be considered an engineer in Ladakh - partly because it is too complicated to explain what a project manager is, but also because I realised that I do have quite a lot of practical engineering knowledge, so could possibly be of help to them.
On the back of this ‘expertise’, I was invited on a trip to the Nubra valley courtesy of Shesyon Solar Earthworks, which is an offshoot company set up by SECMOL who build solar buildings. They have been given the job of building a private school in Diskit as a solar building. Our task was to survey the site and to convert the original architect’s drawings into a ‘solar’ design - i.e. one that uses the sun’s energy to heat the buildings. The site is in a wide flat valley, near to the river, with the water table only 18” below ground level, so the main consideration was how to built adequate foundations using local materials as far as possible. It was very interesting being involved in the discussions, and although I put in my two-penny’s worth, I expect that I learnt more from them than they gained from me.
The 5 hour journey there involved going over the Khandar La pass, which the Ladakhis say is the highest motorable pass in the world at 18,830ft - not sure what the Tibetians would have to say about that, as I went over a pass in Tibet which they said was the highest… It was snowing as we went over the pass (in both directions), so again I didn’t get to see any views - I reckon the weather has something against me! While we were there we got a chance to run around on the sand-dunes between Diskit and Hundar - silver-grey sand in the wide valley with mountains either side, very picturesque. It was an enjoyable trip as the Ladakhis we went with were a friendly lot and spoke good English, so we all got on well. Rigzen, the manager, has a great sense of humour and likes singing - he sang traditional Ladakhi songs for most of the way home, very tunefully (luckily not accompanied by any instruments!)

It seems many Ladakhis like singing - I heard them singing while they are working in the fields doing the harvest, when I was visiting the nearby village of Phey. Emma (an American volunteer) and I went for a walk one evening last week to Phey village and came across three locals sifting grain in a field, surrounded by sheaves of barley. In true Ladakhi style they were very friendly and I tried out a few of my Ladakhi phrases on them, with a certain degree of success. The very wrinkled old lady, Spalzom, was happy to have her photo taken and kept grinning at us with her virtually toothless smile. There was also a man called Lopsang and another lady called Ishay. We sat and ‘talked’ to them for a while and they managed to convey to us that they were going to be using the donkey the next morning at 10am - they spoke about as much English as I speak Ladakhi!
So the next morning we went back to watch the threshing. There was a post in the middle of the field and they were spreading the cut barley around it when we arrived. They then tied up a combination of 13 cows and donkeys to the post, side-by-side - this was quite a task as the animals kept running away (they obviously knew what was about to happen). Once they were all tied up Ishay walked behind them, encouraging them to keep moving with an occasional tap on their backsides with a stick (although they seemed to know the routine), singing as she went. The inside cow had an easy time of it as she could just amble around the post munching at the barley, while the outside donkey had to move at a fair pace to keep up! I took several photos and promised them we’d be back the next day with copies. We managed to print off some black and white photos that evening, so returned the next afternoon with these, hoping to see them doing the winnowing. As soon as we arrived however, Spalzom down-tooled and grabbed our hands to drag us off to her house for a drink - thankfully it was not traditional Ladakhi tea, which is made using butter instead of milk and salt, which I find revolting! (I won’t be serving it at home, you’ll be pleased to know). With a combination of my phrasebook and some sentences Norgay had told me, we managed to ask Spalzom about her family - the problem was that she’d reply to our question in great detail and of course we understood virtually none of it, so we just sat there nodding and smiling while she happily jabbered on! After the refreshments we did see them do a bit of winnowing before we had to get back for our conversation sessions.

Two students had approached me and asked if I would help them with their English, so we had an informal chat for ½ hour one evening. I mentioned this in passing to Becky who jumped on the idea and has now set up a timetable for students to have 15 minute informal chats with the volunteers (there are 4 of us at present) at tea breaks, etc. Although it is a good idea and generally I enjoy the sessions, it is a bit tying as almost every bit of free time has now been taken up, although we do have time while they are at some lessons. It makes it difficult to do something that takes a few hours though, like visiting Phey.

In terms of lessons, Norboo had resumed doing the Juniors’ maths class while I was away, so when I got back he asked if I’d mind helping the seniors who are doing Economics, as they have maths as part of that. At first I was happy to go through Matricies with them (even though I have no idea why them might need them for Economics), but when I had to try to explain determinants, co-factors, and adjunts (which I can’t remember myself), I asked to swap and teach the Juniors’ class again - more my level!

On the pump front things have been moving at ‘Standard Indian Time’ - i.e. very slowly! There have been numerous other more pressing things for Norgay to sort out than my proposed improvements.
Firstly the spare part for the dc pump arrived (the mechanical seal), so I went down to the pump house with Norgay to watch him replace it. On inspection, we discovered that the shaft of the motor wobbled an alarming amount, so we decided to take it apart to have a look, and what a task that was. It took the two of us tugging at both ends to get the rotor out, then we realised why - the ‘sealed’ bearing was no longer - it had split open and there was one whole ball bearing left, the other 12 or so had been ground to pieces! We both got our hands absolutely covered in oil, but luckily the soap they use for washing clothes removed it a treat. They had another old dc pump that had burnt out the year before, so Norgay suggested we took this apart to see if the bearing in it was any good. Its bearing did turn, just, but very stiffly and with lots of crackling noise, so being a wasteful Westerner, I immediately wrote it off as needing replacing! To my absolute amazement, later Norgay proudly told me that he had managed to get it working again by flushing it with oil, and that the pump was now running. The next day I went to have a look at it and was rather concerned about the loud noise the pump was making, although the boys told me that was usual. However, two days later it literally ground to a halt, as the bearing seized up on them, so in the end Norgay had to go and buy a new one.
I did get one improvement added to the system though - a holey barrel on the input end. I spent one day burning holes in a plastic barrel using a soldering iron (with a few in me too), to create a greater surface area at the input end in order to slow the water down so it will not carry in as many stones. It flows in at quite a rate (approx 2.5l/s) and while we had the pump apart I’d removed a cm-sized stone from the impeller of the pump.
As for the more sophisticated barrel / sump in the middle of the pipe, (as per the design suggested by Chris from Clogwyn - thanks Chris) well, it’s all drawn up but I am waiting to go with Norgay to a sheet-metal manufacturer to get a price. He has been reluctant to take me along, as apparently if he turns up with a foreigner they immediately think we’re working for an NGO and so charge us more. However, Becky’s brother-in-law owns a manufacturing business, so she is going to ring him and we should be given a fair price. It’s a shame that I won’t get to see the finished item, so maybe I’ll just have to come back another year…
One thing that I did get finished was the reprogramming of their phone system. They’d had to disconnect it to get a fault mended and no one knew how to reprogramme it - and the manual was completely unintelligible! Written in English, I guess by a non-English-speaking person, it kept using abbreviations for things without any explanation of what they were, so it took me three days of reading it before I could fathom out how the system worked (or at least how I think it does!). Eventually I got it all working again, much to everyone’s relief, so I’ve documented what I did so that next time they can avoid the three day lead-time! The internet is still just as slow though (28kb/s) and just as temperamental.

On 19th Sept it was Emma’s 19th birthday, so as it was her first birthday away from home I wanted to make it memorable for her. The Ladakhis do not celebrate their birthdays, often because they do not know when they are! Many of them have their ‘birthdays’ around the same time - when their parents needed to register them for school they made the dates to fit! I therefore had trouble getting a birthday card in Leh, so I resorted to a wide postcard and secretly got everyone to sign it. I also arranged for Norgay to purchase the ingredients for a chocolate cake while in Leh and for the Ishay, the new cook, to bake it. He used to be the cook for a trekking company so he knew how to do this - he did it very slowly in a big pan on a gas stove and every now and then he lit a small fire on the lid to brown the top! He even managed to decorate it using whipped up egg whites as a covering then jam to write ‘Happy Birthday’. Everyone sang Happy Birthday to Emma (a bit slowly, more like a funeral march), when Ishay appeared with the cake - amazingly it took Emma completely by surprise. We lit some thick candles which she had difficulty blowing out!

Believe it or not, I got up at 5:30am one morning to help them collect the berries from the Seabuckthorn plants - as the name suggests these are very thorny plants and the orange berries are gathered by putting a bucket or a cloth underneath the plant then whacking the branches with a stick. I gained a lot of scratches in the process, but the juice from the berries is very nice (a bit tart, but very rich in vitamin C) which made it all worth it.

Anyway, better sign off now as my time is clocking up.

Any news from the UK is gratefully received...

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