Story by: Utkarsh Sethia
On the night of 15th May 2022, I was searching for “Eay Ma Ho Homestay” in Dhankar village. The village is at an elevation of around 3900 meters in the high-altitude region of Spiti in the Indian Himalayas. The plan was to do remote office work for a week-long time from the village. After around an hour of searching on foot, taking three wrong and two right turns in the darkness, I reached the homestay.
The owner of the homestay, Amma Ji, knew me. She invited me to stay in her homestay when I met her at a momo (a type of steamed filled dumpling with origins from the Himalayan region of Tibet, Bhutan, Nepal, and India) shop before starting a hike for Dhankar Lake – a high altitude lake located around 2 kms from the Dhankar village.
She welcomed me with a wide smile, offered me a glass of warm water, and arranged for me a room that was above the kitchen. The room had a chimney vent passing through it like a pillar.
Amma Ji told me that the room was the warmest one among all the guest rooms and it was especially offered to keep me warm. Perhaps, she observed that the moment I entered the homestay, I was feeling cold. This was a warm gesture that touched my heart.
After some time, Amma Ji invited me inside the kitchen and offered “Tenthuk” which is a common noodle soup in Tibetan cuisine. There, I also met other members of the Choeying family – Amma Ji’s daughter-in-law (Aunty Ji) and her two children – Lama Ji and Dechen. Amma Ji told me that her daughter Sonam will be coming tomorrow to stay with the family.
It was my pleasure to meet all the members of the Choeying family over dinner. The food was delicious, but eating it while talking with the family inside the kitchen made the taste even more delicious.
The family was curious about my journey to their village and were quite amazed to know that I walked from Lallung (a neighboring village located 13 km from Dhankar village) to Dhankar with my bulky backpack and then hiked to Dhankar Lake as well.
I expressed to them my feelings for the Spiti region – peaceful, mesmerising and homely in the company of beautiful mountains and good-hearted people like their family.
The Sunday talks were coming to an end and I told the family about my office work starting from Monday and that I will be needing a table near to an electric socket for doing my office work during the day.
I presumed, based on my experience of working in Kaza (subdivisional headquarters of Spiti Valley) and Lallung village, that there will be electricity most of the time in the electric socket. Little did I know that I would be facing a contrasting reality compared to my expectations from Monday.
I had a good night sleep in the traditional Spitian room. I woke up in the morning and observed that the family was already doing their daily work. Over breakfast, I got to know that the village has a community practice in which there is a rotational responsibility of two houses per day for taking all the cows and donkeys of the village for grazing in the mountains for an entire day.
I went with Amma Ji to drop the homestay cow at a gathering point and observed with my open wide eyes the beautiful sight of hundreds, if not thousands, of cattle being lined up near the gathering point of the village.
This culture of shared responsibility in the Dhankar village is being practiced for centuries and I was lucky to have experienced it in modern times. It is the remoteness of the village that such century-old practices were still being followed.
Amma Ji asked if I was interested in joining the herders for the entire day. This was an irresistible offer for me that I had to turn down for the entire week because of my office work.
It was nine in the morning already and I was preparing to start my office work. Many thanks to Jio (an Indian telecommunications company) that some of the villages in Spiti have been recently covered with a mobile phone as well as an internet network. Dhankar was one of them and was covered in late 2021. I was right on time for choosing to do my office work from the village.
Amma Ji and I together arranged for my workplace. She told me that the electricity supply of the village fluctuates during the day and that there can be electricity outages for hours in the village.
She further added that they have arranged a small-size diesel-operated generator especially for my work needs. I was very much touched by their warm gesture.
Amma Ji taught me how to switch on the generator in their absence and I promised the family of using it in a resourceful and wise manner. With a mix of fluctuating on-grid electricity, my laptop’s battery, and resourceful use of electricity from the generator; I was able to do my office work that day and the rest of the week. I even took an hour-long video call during an electric outage on one of the office days during the week.
If I were to choose a specific time that I enjoyed the most during my stay at Dhankar village then it will be the evenings after my office hours. A couple of times, Lama Ji took me for a village tour where we saw Monasteries, the Tower of Erosions, etc., and enjoyed the sunset together.
Sonam and Dechen became my friends as well and my mother had a video call with Amma Ji on a couple of days while we had dinner together in the kitchen. My mother thanked Amma Ji for hosting me and she in turn invited my mother to visit Dhankar and stay in Eay Ma Ho homestay. The name of the homestay has a religious significance and is derived from a Buddhist mantra of Guru Padmasambhava.
There is a list of perks for doing office work from remote places like Dhankar. I loved absorbing the culture, traditions, practices, and history of the village, tasting local cuisines (Tigmo – a local bread, Shunali – a local sweet, Momos, Tenthuk, etc.) every day, and creating an ever-lasting bond with the Choeying family. Lastly, with peace of mind, I observed an increase in my work efficiency during my remote office work from the village.
I wished from my heart to experience the village culture for some more days and especially join the herders on weekends but I had to make a weekend-long return journey back to my home. I was fortunate to have experienced the village life while at work.
Amma Ji also promised to set up a solar energy-powered electricity backup system for the homestay in the coming years. I thanked the Choeying family for their hospitality and started my return journey with loads of memories in a shared cab arranged by Amma Ji.
Utkarsh is an outdoor enthusiast, sustainability expert, and storyteller from India. He also loves to explore and write about rural India, its culture, traditions, and people. Follow his journey on Instagram or his Personal Blog where he shares his love for the outdoors.
All pictures in this story are owned by Utkarsh, unless stated otherwise.
