Diggar La

Day 3 of the trek, we wake to an unexpected morning frost and water dripping through our tents onto our sleeping bags. The frost is an indication of an oncoming snowstorm and after breakfast in the dining tent - delicious as always and something that will be sorely missed - the leaders, our Himalayan coordinator Namgial, and our guides and pony men meet as the sun rises to discuss whether we should mount the highest ascent of our trek during the snowfall or to delay. After some deliberation we decide to proceed with the climb. Camp is packed up and we begin our ascent of the Diggar La which stands at 17,230 feet. The day started out easy enough but it soon became excruciatingly painful and slow. We ran into a terrible snow storm and high winds the whole way up, and our hands start to lose circulation, so the guides tell us to roll our shoulders and spin our hands to get blood flowing to them. Several students begin to have headaches from the altitude and Kat, one of the girls, falls ill enough that she is placed on a pony and led so that she does not overexert herself. I am fine except for a natural shortness of breath at such a high altitude and I carry the items of several other students who are suffering from the altitude. We climb for what seems like five hours in the snow, finally making it to the top. I scream out "Kiki Soso Largalo," the Ladakhi phrase of accomplishment on ascents which roughly translates cheesily to "The gods have made me victorious." We take pictures at the summit, take a bit of a rest, and enjoy the most incredible view. We reach camp fairly easily on the descent, running down the mountain. Dinner is quick and we all fall asleep easily. The next morning we enjoy a more leisurely walk but on the way hear several rumbles. The sun is out and I ask one of the leaders, Erin, about the sound. She suggests that the snow is melting has started rolling down the mountainside we climbed the day before. An avalanche has perhaps occurred, wrath of the gods, but Diggar La has blessed us with its passage.

Sabu Oracle

Before the trek, we drive through a desert and past dozens of squatters' houses - in Ladakh, a squatter isnt someone who is living in a home that isn't theirs, but a person who builds a part of a house on a piece of land to claim that property on the off chance that development comes to it. The leaders have told us that we are going to visit the Sabu Oracle - essentially a woman who the Buddhists and local villagers believe has the ability to be possessed by spirits and then channel their supernatural powers to give advice to those who seek it.

We walk into a house that we've stopped at, remove our shoes, and enter a room with dozens of pots and pans hanging, mats laid on the floor facing incense burners and cups filled with salt, water, and candles, and a shaft of sunlight dropping through a hole in the ceiling directly onto where I choose to sit. A woman enters the room looking haggard and with her hair wet, and kneels in front of the incense. She lights the incense and starts to chant, and the room fills with the scent of cinnamon. She begins to chant, quietly at first and then building to shrieks interspersed with singing. She throws salt behind her to the left, water behind her to the right. She sways back and forth. The incense seems stronger now, the sunlight more obviously on my face - I'm engaged in the process of her possession. The oracle begins to sweat, her hair even wetter than it was. Suddenly she stops swaying and lets out what seems to me to be one tremendous shriek as she turns toward the group - her eyes seem to roll back into her head. All is quiet, and the incense much less strong than before. Our translator and coordinator Namgial tells us that she is ready for questions.

She gestures to the first of us and they go up - I wait my turn as I hear some people ask intensely personal questions and I wonder what i should be asking - I dont have any deep seeded issues with myself or others and I dont want to ask about the future...I want knowledge about myself. Eventually I just decide to come up with the question when I get there. The oracle gestures to me, and I scoot in front of her, careful not to rudely let the soles of my feet face her.

"What is your question?" asks Namgial.
Then it hits me, something simple but that I've been wondering about myself for a long time.
"I want to know why it was so hard for me to come up with a question for you, Oracle, why I had such difficulty thinking of something that was important for me to have answered or affirmed. how do I come up with the questions I should be asking myself?"

The oracle rocks back and forth, throws some salt behind her shoulder, and slowly speaks in Ladakhi. I listen to the syllables and try to find hidden meaning before Namgial translates. The Oracle and Namgial share a conversation before I hear my answer.
"She says that you have a curious and active mind," Namgial turns to me and says, "but that you have a flickering consciousness. For you to know the questions you must ask, you must be in touch with your inner consciousness before your mind. She says that you must meditate."

I lean back disappointed at my answer. I was expecting something specific, something deeply personal, an insight into myself that I hadn't already been told by another Ladakhi. But meditation is a standard buddhist practice here, and I had heard it. My skepticism in the oracle is confirmed in that moment.

I move into an empty space and allow the next student in after I am gestured away by the oracle, and I sit within my mind for a while. and then I notice that the sunlight from the oracle's ceiling is shining directly on me again, but I'm sitting in a completely different spot and not much time has passed since when I left. I dont know what I feel about spirituality but I did feel power sitting in the shaft of sunlight, the sort of thing I sometimes get when i look at a flower in the wind and my body tingles for no reason. Someone else is crying next to me, and I put my arm around them and pull them into my shoulder. I decide to meditate every day as long as I see fit. Maybe things at the Oracle's arent so bad after all.

Dhomkhar and Leh, Ladakh

This post is pretty much copied and pasted from an email because the internet is especially bad today so excuse me for it not being as put together as usual.

I just got back from a homestay in dhomkar village, which is in ladakh, the himalayan section of india and also the province containing kashmir and jammu, the border of pakistan and a pretty dangerous place. but no worries, i was in the very very friendly part of kashmir, where people don't even notice the conflict between india and pakistan. the only reminders were being woken up by the sound of an Indian Army caravan driving past the house, fifty trucks filled with soldiers standing rigid in military exercise. and then right next to that would be my family and i, milking the cows, harvesting potatoes, cleaning clothes in the stream of glacial meltwater and dancing to the sounds of yaks in the field. i guess it was kind of like the mountain school if you spoke a nonsense language and i could hardly communicate with you, and we were in the himalayas, and the indian army had a base nearby. almost like the mountain school...

that was kind of a spaced out paragraph and i dont really know why because i am having such an amazing time here and couldnt be feeling better. so maybe i'll just write list of all the crazy things that have happened
- i ate spaghetti and yak meatballs at a restaurant
- toilets in ladakh and in india are...well they're matters of patience at best. basically they dig a hole in the ground, a kind of compost toilet, but there's no toilet seat and there's no toilet paper, so you squat and do your business and then the indian method is to use the left hand and a bottle of water to wipe, rinse, repeat. so far i've been able to avoid that thanks to my packing toilet paper in my backpack but indians are understandably disgusted when you touch your face with your left hand or grab food with it.
- i just visited this amazing school called secmol right outside of ladakh's main city, leh. essentially for a long time kids here had to learn everything in urdu, which is used mainly in pakistan and is a kind of really artful written arabic script thats incredibly difficult to learn. and then all of a sudden in 10th grade they would have to learn all their classes in english, without the preparation of english beforehand. the 10th class exams are a huge deal here, kind of like the SATs, and determine whether kids can go on to higher secondary school and then college, and basically everyone failed, but secmol is this alternative school where they take kids who fail the 10th class exam and actually teach them english so that they can retake it. there's a semester program based here called the vermont intercultural semester and there are a bunch of kids tms -aged going to school along with the ladakhi kids. i love how there are so many connections to my life in a foreign country.
- my homestay mom had one tooth.
- ladakhi dance is amazing and you need to learn it.
- the differences between different sections of india are amazing. delhi was so wild, so up in the air all the time and then everything in ladakh is so relaxed. i was never stared at here, or only because in india, everyone makes noise for a white man's business. but the competition for it here is much more subtle, a friendly smile rather than an arm pulling you inside a store.
- schedule wise, im about to go on a 10 day trek through the himalayas. i have my camera ready. please send me emails while i'm gone so i can come back and have something waiting from you.

LOVE LOVE LOVE
zach

First Impressions

Life is good. I’m sitting in a lawn chair right now at the Saumrolee Guest House in Leh, Ladakh, listening to the sound of chanting in the distance, and watching the sunrise lift the nighttime darkness and put me in the gentler shade of the Himalayas. So yeah, I could never write a sentence like that back in New York without it being utter fiction.

That’s the thing that has struck me the most about India – it’s exactly like fiction, like a dream that I would want to tell my friends about because it was just that crazy. Our 14-hour plane trip to Delhi started it off when they served us a dinner of mostly unidentifiable airline food, but included a lovely topping named “lemon pickle.” Natalie, Sean and I were sitting together and while Sean avoided even touching it – an amazing choice in retrospect – Natalie took the plunge and then I followed. It’s a good thing that most Indian food is so delicious because that was the least delicious thing that has ever been in my mouth, and I spent the next 15 minutes trying to wash out the flavor.

We got into the airport and experienced our first real taste of Indian culture – having to push your way wherever you go. The baggage claim was surrounded by a crowd six-deep and we finally maneuvered our way to the front, grabbed our bags, and pushed some more until we were met by the Delhi coordinator, Peter, at the airport, who wrapped us in garlands and scarves as is the tradition. Driving back to the hotel was another introduction to India, which is to say that highway safety is very much up to the driver rather than being a built in part of the infrastructure, and there really weren’t any defined lanes on a lot of streets. Much of what I saw on the first night was overwhelming – trash in the streets, people sleeping on highway medians, the smell of chai – and I went to sleep trying to process everything. Delhi is not New York.

The next two days in Delhi were a lesson in the extremes of living there. The girls had to worry about being modest, covering up enough so that they wouldn’t be constantly heckled; meanwhile, there were women working in the airport that were wearing belly-baring t-shirts. We were told not to look directly at people of the opposite gender, but for most places in Delhi that we stayed at for an extended period of time, crowds of dozens gathered around us and stared, mainly just curious about white people. Feet are considered disgusting and as the most unclean part of the body by most Indians, yet I was always asked to remove my shoes and socks at temples and tread on their holy sites with my bare feet. I saw beggars missing feet, poverty stricken kids with their ribs sticking out, and then I stepped off that street into an Indian clothing store with near-American prices.

A cow just wandered into the garden where I am writing this blog post, and breakfast is on its way. This is my fifth day in India, and yet it feels as if I’ve been here for a month. I’m sitting in the Himalayas, and the experience so far has been as intense as a really crazy dream. And it's one of those dreams I have to tell you about - but this time, it’s no fiction. Life is good.

P.S. I wish I could post photos but the reality of internet in Leh is that it is a no go. As soon as I can find a way, I'll put some up. Check out http://www.flickr.com/photos/79387285@N00/sets/72157602110971522/ for some small versions of a few.

Here It Is

So here it is. I'm at the end of the wait and I couldn't be more thrilled. Tomorrow at 2 PM, I'll be gone until April 10th, 2008 - how ridiculous and amazing. As a girl on my program, Sarah, described it, "I want to be an emotional wreck and have fun doing it. I want to learn about how most of the world live. I'm just looking over the edge and it's so alluring."

I'll talk to you all when I get there.

आ न्यू एअर (A Good Year)

L'shana tova to all you bubbalas. I hope you all are having a good Rosh Hashanah and are happy and healthy! Fittingly, I've spent the last few days enjoying Jewish food before I head off to a land with not so many of them. Bagels, nova, and cream cheese from Zabar's and H&H, latkes from Barney Greengrass, and a pastrami sandwich from Carnegie Deli (oh, how I wished it was from Katz's). I know I'll regret making that list after three months in India and I'm craving Jewish food.

I'm halfway packed and am making the final preparations for the trip. I bought a plane ticket to and from New Zealand so I'm unofficially back on April 10th (I may extend my stay in New Zealand, depending on cost and whether it's amazing or not), and I've been considering what I'll do in India after Global LAB is over. There's a 10-day course in a type of meditation called Vipassana that is offered for free - supported by donations - to all people in India because they view enlightment as a public service and one of the sessions starts pretty conveniently after the program ends, so I may try that. It'd definitely be an experience. I'm also considering touring the south of India because I'll have mainly been in the North up to that point. There are so many options - if you have any suggestions please leave a comment and let me know!

I'm going to get back to packing, but I just thought it was fitting that my trip would fall so close to a holiday which represents a new beginning, and in which people say, "Shana Tova Umetukah," which translates to"A Good and Sweet Year." I have a good feeling about this one.

P.S.: If you were wondering, the script in the title is Hindi. I'll probably be using that a little more often soon!

Finally I'd like to thank all those people who helped make this possible. I am so grateful to you all and I send you my love. Let me know if you want anything at all from India and I will get it to you.

September Days

This blog post is unrelated to the gap year but I feel as if this is as good a place to catalog my thoughts as any. For the last five years I've spent part of September 11th reflecting on my memories of the day, but I've never put them down onto paper. In a weird way, I want to remember what happened, and so I wrote an essay today. If you do choose to read it, please take this in mind: while much of my memory is sad, not all of it is. So please don't be discouraged as you read through.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _

It's the nightttime and yet it is never fully night in the city. The star-pockmarked sky has its dirty, smoky glow and the temperature is at that point where the paint is peeling, dusty window flowers turn the color of pale tea leaves, and the heat would be more becoming to high noon than dusk. Ivy weaves through the red-brick brownstone across the courtyard and even it seems as if it has exerted itself to the limit today, as if it might catch in a breeze and limply slip to the sidewalk. On nights such as this, pitch-black is a vapor, a whisper lost in the breeze.

There was an Indian summer with heat like this six years ago. I woke up covered with a light sheen of sweat to my mother's voice.

"It's 7:00, Zach, time to wake up."

I pretended to be asleep and shut my eyes tightly.

"You don't go to Ethical anymore, Zach. You have to make the bus."

"Mraaaagh," I answered.

My mother frustratedly poked me in the stomach.

"OK, I'm up!" I snapped back at her.

I washed up, dressed, ate breakfast, and went downstairs with Chris to wait for the schoolbus. It was my second day at Fieldston, and I was still uncomfortable going to school with my brother, with seniors three times my size, navigating unfamiliar hallways and new classmates. But I was wide eyed and it was hard to feel badly that day - the trees were green, the flowers blooming, and the wind spoke with the sounds of rustling leaves and trickling water. The world was barefoot and beautiful.

I got on the bus, put on my best fake smile, scanned the seats for my friends, and put my feet forward. If I had timed my footsteps with my heartbeat, I would have been sprinting down the aisle. But I walked past the driver, past the pretty senior girl whose name I'd never learn and whose returned glance I'd always avoid, past Chris and his friends, so comfortable in their routine, and into a seat with my friends Johnny and Max. I sat down surprised that nothing awkward or embarrassing had happened. The bus pulled away and headed towards Riverdale, and I inhaled a lungful of clean river-scented air. Maybe this wouldn't be such a bad day after all.

Arriving at Fieldston, I didn't bother to go to my locker in the middle school corridor. I had all my books in my backpack, and besides, I had already lost and forgotten the combination to my lock. I headed straight to Mr. Rosenholtz' classroom and stood at the windows looking out on the quad. It was a comfortable moment of solitude, an observational solitude that reminded me of my place on campus. I wasn't yet a part of it, but a kid watching and waiting for his chance to run on the senior grass and get chased. Then I'd be part of the group.

The classroom filled and we waited for Mr. Rosenholtz. 8:40 passed and he still wasn't in the room. Unsure of school rules, we didn't dare leave until 9:00, and just before we were about to pick up our backpacks and head out, the door opened and he appeared.

"Have you heard?" he said as he sat down. "Two planes flew into the World Trade Center. One into each tower."

I heard laughter in the room. I've since learned that people often laugh when they are uncomfortable and don't know how to process information that they are given, but I've never been angrier than that moment. I looked around the room searching for the source, my fists clenched, thinking why the fuck are you laughing, don't you know that my dad works there, don't you know that I think he might be dead, don't you realize that the last thing I need to hear is someone laughing at this incredible sadness that's come over me, where all I feel is that tingle before you cry and you can't move any of your muscles, can't even blink your eyelids to let the tears out, so your eyes just well up until the tears fall out onto your shiny new seventh grade English notebook, and yet more than anything I want to beat the shit out of the one of you that laughed to make it go away? I sat still and wept looking at Mr. Rosenholtz, the other kids whispering around me, and he looked back at me, his eyes reciprocating and full of sorrow.

Class ended and word had gotten around. I was one of those kids, and there was no shortage of furtive glances to make it clear that people knew. A special assembly was called and nothing new was said, but I was asked to meet up with my brother and head to the principal's office. Chris found me and I cried into his shoulder.

We walked to Principal Stettler's office and entered into what I can only describe as a makeshift emotional triage. Kids filled with heartache sprawled on the floor and couches listening to a radio broadcast. Chris and I found a spot and cried with the rest of them until our ribs were sore and we were gasping for breath. There were moments when everything in the room was quiet except for the constant of Stettler breathlessly picking up the phone, thank God you are safe...have you heard any news of your husband...Yes, we've been overwhelmed with phone calls, I'm sorry it's taken so long, answering calls from parents and relaying them to kids. And then one kid would start crying, and we were all so emotionally worn down that that's all it would take for the rest of us to start going again. And then the radio reported that the towers fell. I think I must have cried for four hours straight. At some point I went to the bathroom and vomited. School was dismissed and I watched students leave for home as I waited for news. Finally, with half the room empty after hearing the news of their parents' safety, we got the call from my mom. Dad was OK.

One crisis averted, but the tunnels and bridges and subways were closed so I couldn't get home to give my dad a hug. Chris quickly found a friend who offered to put us up for the night, but after such an emotionally exhausting day I needed to fall asleep in my own bed with the knowledge that my dad was asleep in the next room. My friend Alex's dad happened to be at Fieldston with his car, and he loaded me and four of my friends who lived in my neighborhood inside and took off towards Manhattan. We reached a bridge and Dan, Alex's father, took his key out of the ignition, left the car where it was standing, and escorted us into our native borough. We miraculously found a cab so far from everything and drove off, Dan's car still in view across the bridge. I never found out if it was impounded or stolen or if it was just left standing there, abandoned like so many other cars that day. I didn't bother to think about the car for long as we came back to the Upper West Side. Dan paid the 80-something cab fare and I got out.

A group of musicians had assembled on Broadway and a crowd had gathered around them. It was dusk and they started to play Time After Time by Cyndi Lauper. A cheesy choice, but nobody cares at a moment like that as long as the music can serve as the vessel for their emotion. I realized a while ago thinking about that song that I associate music with memory. The guitarist's plucking of the guitar string my heavy breath in, that keyboard solo when a smile crept over my face for the first time in a long time that day and I thought about my dad with so much love in my heart, that wistful bridge representing the strange prettiness in what should have been an empty moment. The song is sad but also makes me feel so right, so comfortable. A perfect kind of melancholy.

I walked home in the dark to say hello to my parents and let the day be over. The star-pockmarked sky had its dirty, smoky glow and the temperature was at that point where the paint is peeling, dusty window flowers turn the color of pale tea leaves, and the heat would be more becoming to high noon than dusk. It was the nighttime, and yet it wasn't fully night in the city. And I love it for that reason.