A life lesson in Pasor

As promised my guide (Purdil) and the driver (Mir) arrived early in the morning at Khijiz and soon we were on our way deeper into the Bartang valley. The road was in similar condition to the one from Darvaz to Rushan but got progressively more isolated since we must have passed only a handful of vehicles that day.

The valley views were like the previous day with rocky mountains rising right from the edge of the road expect that the scenery was more dramatic and wild. The word Bartang in Pamiri means narrow (Bar) passage (tang) and is a reference to the narrowness of the valley which distinguishes it from some of the other valleys of the Pamirs.

The road although coarse was passable in a good 4X4. During the winter-spring period these roads are often cut-off due to snowfall and rockslides; not surprising looking at the geology of the mountains. Purdil mentioned that the government has permanently stationed a road grader at set intervals to make sure the roads are cleared periodically.

Bartang Valley

Although very remote, today this road is motorable. It does not take much imagination though to see how difficult it would have been for the people to travel in and out of the valley just a century ago. The only options were along the river, which has serious rapids and that too only during autumn when the water levels are low or, pack animals along the ridge of the mountains and its high altitude passes to cut into an adjacent valley. It could have taken days, possibly weeks for people to get in and out.

Perhaps that explains why each valley in the Pamirs is reputed to have its own dialect and culture. The dialect of the people from the Bartang valley unsurprisingly is called Bartangi. Its fascinating to imagine that with so much isolation, just going to a neighboring valley would have been akin to going into foreign lands before the roads constructed during the Soviet times finally connected these people.

Over four hours later we reached closer to the head of the Bartang river and the valley opened to a 180-degree panoramic view. We stopped at the village of Nisor and were welcomed into a family home who offered us food and tea along with bread.

There is a dry river bed beside this village from where it’s a day’s trek to the Sarez lake. There is a chilling reason for the dry river bed - Sarez lake was formed when an earthquake hit this region in 1911 and resulted in a landslide that completely buried a village and created a natural dam. Since then the water level has been steadily rising and the lake now is about 75 km long, 2.5-3 km wide and 0.5 km deep…basically a lot of water.

Purdil called this lake “the sleeping dragon of Tajikistan”. This is not just because its outline resembles a dragon from space but crucially it is a natural disaster of epic proportions just waiting to happen. The dam at a high elevation is reputed to be unstable and the day it breaks, the immense volume of water will sweep always almost all the villages of the Bartang valley and similarly many more downstream valleys. The effects will be so devastating that an estimated 5 million people will be affected across Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Afghanistan. I had to stop and think to really comprehend the immenseness if it could affect people hundreds of miles away.

Nisor

Near Nisor, the Murghab and the Gudara rivers join forming the Bartang and for the next few hours we took the dusty road along the Gudara river to eventually reach the hamlet of Pasor.

I would have liked to have reached earlier so we could commence our trek the same day but it wasn’t to be, so I decided to make use of the few hours of daylight by wandering among the hills around Pasor. I was a bit of a novelty to the children and the women as they went about herding their cattle into the covered sheds. In this far-flung mountainous region, as the night descends, the threat of wolves and snow leopards preying on their cattle is very real.

Savnob; the provincial administrative center

Soon one kid came running behind me calling “friend!…friend!” until he caught up to me. Now…perhaps I have stayed in Africa for too long or traveled to too many countries for my own good but immediately a red flag went up in my mind. My subconscious felt the drain of another kid who calls you a friend to hang with you for a while and then it eventually ends with them asking for something.

An apple tree in Nisor that fruits twice a year

No doubt I’ve become desensitized and I don’t say it with pride but authenticity. I get the concept of “the haves vs. the have nots” but there comes a point when the heart gets overridden by the mind that recalls the many not so pleasant memories.

Joma tagged along for a while as we chatted and took pictures. As dusk settled we walked back down only to realize that he had misplaced his spanner and his fear of the wolves prevented him from going back and fetching it.

I told him not to worry and we went together back up the hill to find it. Closer to the village, he showed me the place of the sleeping ancestors (graveyard), the volleyball trophy he helped win through the school window and then finally his very modest house. He lived with his parents who were much older; I initially mistook them for his grandparents. They asked me to have tea with them but I politely declined with my conscious now weighing heavy on me.

Mir & Purdil

Yak meat

Hamlet of Pasor in the background

Here was a kid, all of probably twelve who just wanted to hang with me and took me in without any preconceived beliefs and not only did I judge him but judged him horrendously wrong.

As I left him that evening, with him speeding on his bicycle with a flat tire I noticed he had not once asked me for anything. I felt absolutely gutted looking at him smile and wave at me as he sped away.

Overlooking Pasor and the Gudara river

Through it all I had contemplated giving him some of my snack bars or sending a good tire and an air pump from Dushanbe but wouldn’t that pre-condition him to look at any future traveler a different way?

Joma!

Somebody else in my shoes would have taken a more active stance and done something about it…I choose the passive option and did nothing except leave the innocence of the moment be!

If Joma remembers me and our interactions, great!...if he does not then that’s ok as well. We are not meant to leave a mark always.

As for me, I hope that Joma’s hauntingly windswept, sunburnt face will remind me not to be too quick to judge others and that sometimes its ok to let the heart overpower the mind.