JOURNEY - on Mastering Ukemi (26 page)

“
What do you mean, not good?”

“
There are Chinese, sometimes.”

“
You mean Tibetans, no?”

“
No, Sahib. Chinese.”

“
Do they bother anyone? I mean, we’re Americans.”

He shrugged. I turned to the guys and raised an eyebrow. Chris had seemed happier while drinking and eating, but had that surly look back.

“
I don’t care,” Chris said. “I want to go. I just really don’t want to stay here.”

I turned back to Bim and he nodded his head. “Yes, Sahib.”

***

We headed out the next morning after another long, cold, sleepless night. A warmer wind was blowing softly up the valley and I knew I would be uncomfortable with my heavy down coat so I transferred it to my duffle and got out a sweater and down vest that I could just carry if I got too warm with the climbing. The others saw me and did the same. I hoped the slight change in the weather might signal a change and a clearing and I asked Bim. He looked up at the sky and held still for a minute and said, “Maybe.”

We walked quietly past the lodges and followed the path up the mountain. Most of the trekkers who would be summiting that day were already gone, but there were a few people around who were clearly less than amused by the low-hanging clouds and drizzle. I nodded to one man I vaguely recognized and he looked stonily through me as I passed.

We hiked doggedly for a couple hours and must have been near the summit when we took a branching trail that turned north. Eventually we started back down and after another hour we came to a stone shelter similar to the one we’d spent our last night in. We must have been near 17,000 feet and I was breathing with great difficulty.

Cook was crouching outside the hut and warming what looked like dhal bat. He must have prepared it the night before. That was fine with me. I’d take all the carbs I could get and the lentils and rice would provide some lasting energy. We rested and then ate lunch. We had already traveled farther than I had anticipated. And we had the descent to do this afternoon. After eating I did not feel like waiting, so I told Bim to get us moving and let Cook and his helper catch up. I knew they would pass us on the trail and be there an hour ahead of us anyway.

The trail down was mostly switchbacks. At least it was a good trail, clearly marked and steady. After several hours I heard the sound of water running. Not the big sound of the Dudh Kosi, but more confined, like a mountain stream running over stones. We came around one last switchback and then we were there. A stream that was clearly flowing off the glacier, that was in fact part of the glacier ran next to the trail. Bim led us along the stream for a quarter of a mile and we saw a suspension bridge perhaps twenty feet above the stream. We hiked up the trail and then crossed over the bridge. On the other side we followed the trail a few hundred yards and saw the beginning of a village. We passed the houses and walked into the town square where a flagstone court had been set in front of a large guest lodge. Several more guest lodges were down the trail and it seemed like a very nice village except there was no one there. I looked around for Nawang and did not see him.

Cook and his helper had passed us an hour ago and I figured that Nawang might be getting them settled, but we had never come into a village before without one of our sirdars being there to greet us. I looked at Bim.

He was not happy. He was staring at the lodge in front of us and I looked in that direction in time to see five or six men walk out of the common room door. Further down the road there were more men walking into the courtyard and I turned around and saw several more behind us.

“
Uh oh,” said Curtis.

I looked back at the lodge in time to see four more men step outside. They wore some type of tunic with a red star on the lapel. All the others looked like the silver and jade smugglers from Tibet you see along the trail. They were all wearing yak fur hats and vests. The four in tunics carried machine guns. I looked closer and thought they seemed odd. They clearly weren’t soldiers; the only thing military were the tunics and guns. But they did carry guns and that was bad.

They walked up to us and two moved around behinds us and covered our rear. One, apparently the leader, spoke harshly to Bim in a loud voice, very unlike any Nepali. Bim answered and the man shouted something else at him and Bim cowered. He turned to me. “He says they are revolutionaries. He says they represent the people. They are the new government. He says he is the mayor, by the will of the people and that we must pay a tax to the people.”

The man barked something else at Bim. “He says that he is the representative, the legal representative of the Maoist government and we must pay a tax to him. He says he will give it to the people.”

I looked directly into the thief’s eyes and spoke to Bim. “How much does he want?” I asked.

Bim spoke quietly to the leader and he shouted something back at Bim. I could see Bim working the numbers out in his head. Finally, he said, “10,000 Rupee.”

Damn! I did the math and figured it was about $140-$150. About $35 each. That was not so bad, considering we were being robbed at gunpoint.

“
Ask him if we pay this will we be able to stay and not be bothered again?”

Bim spoke again to the rebel leader and again the man shouted at Bim at length.

“
He says no, we cannot stay. All the town now belongs to the people and for being insolent we must now pay 20,000 rupee.” Bim hung his head at this and I understood everything.

I looked at the rebel leader and all the clouds, the fog, the drizzling rain, the hundred miles of ascents and declines seemed to well up in me and before I could stop myself I told him to go fuck himself.

These were words he understood without a translator. Suddenly all four men were pointing their guns at us and he was screaming at Bim and Bim dropped to his knees and put his hands behind his head.

“
Sahib! Sahib! He say kneel! All kneel and put up hands!” I thought Bim might start to cry from fear. Christian and Curtis dropped to their knees and put their hands behind their heads. Chris took a step forward and looked slowly at me and I glanced down at the flagstones. He grimaced and slowly went down to his knees. I turned and looked at the rebel leader. Everything was suddenly quiet. I could feel the ice-picks that were grinding inside my knee joints and the hunger that never seemed to go away. I could feel the miles and years weighing on me and I knew I’d had a hell of a good life. I also felt an anger building. I tried to clear my mind. I tried to become calm and feel the ki flow, but all I felt was an overwhelming desire to kill these bastards. Some aikido master. Some hotshot 6
^th
dan. I couldn’t even control my own mouth.

“
No.”

I felt something slam hard into my back and stumbled forward. I managed to stay on my feet. The rebel leader was pointing his machine gun at me again and screaming at me and at Bim and Bim was yelling at me…”Sahib, he will shoot you if you do not kneel. Please, Sahib!”

”
No!”

Whoever had hit me before hit me again and this time much harder. My back screamed out and as I turned back the rebel leader hit me in the face with the butt of his machine gun and I went down. I vaguely felt hands on me. There were hands going through my pockets. I was laying on my left arm and tried to get it out from under me but each time I moved someone would strike me and finally everything went gray and then stars exploded everywhere.

I became aware of hands lifting me and then felt myself being dragged. I felt warm bodies on both sides and realized that I was being half dragged and half carried down the trail. Finally I managed to say “Stop, damn it.” They did.

It took a moment to get my eyes open and my head clear enough to shrug away from Chris and Curtis. They had grabbed me and lifted me up when the rebels had told them to leave the village. We were almost to the bridge. “Stop,” I said. “Just stop.” I slumped down on a boulder and took a few deep breaths. That helped to clear my mind. My cheekbone hurt like hell and I knew that it was just the beginning. My right kidney was certainly bruised, but I would not know if it was fractured until I had to urinate. I had experienced both injuries before, several times over my forty year martial art career and they both hurt like hell. Don’t let anyone tell you they don’t. But neither were they fatal. I would live. I just had to suck it up. I can do that.

I sat for a moment and felt a sharp, cold breeze gust down through the river valley. It had a bitter tang to it and felt wonderful. It dried the perspiration on my forehead and cooled me. At the first stirring of the breeze Bim had swung his nose like a weather vane. I enjoyed it for a moment and quietly thrilled at being still alive.

“
Sensei, when you feel better, we need to go. They looked like they wanted to kill us.” Christian sounded very young, I thought.

“
They aren’t going to kill us.”

“
Well you were unconscious and…”

“
They don’t shoot Americans, Christian. The Chinese would be after them with an army if they killed Americans. The Nepali government would send the goddamn Ghurkas after them if they killed Americans. We are their bread and butter. Jesus, China owns half of America’s debt. They won’t allow an international incident. This isn’t the middle east.”

Bim moved close to me and looked up at the mountain trail. “Sahib, the weather change is here.” I turned my own nose into the wind and could smell it myself. I didn’t need to be told. Snow.

“
How much?” I asked him.

“
I think blizzard, Sahib.”

The fog was lifting and swirling away even as we spoke. I could feel it clearly now as the cold blast of air swept through the valley. A big front had arrived and with it wind. I was cold now. The sweat had evaporated and left a sticky clamminess inside my clothing. I knew we needed to get our coats.

“
Where are our porters? Bim? Where is our gear?”

He shook his head and pointed back down the trail. “Maybe with Nawang.”

“
You mean they stole that, as well as all our money? I don’t believe this.”

Christian said, “Sensei! We need to go. You might not think they’ll shoot us, but you might be wrong, you know.”

I looked up the trail and then back at the village. Chris grabbed his arm and turned Christian around on the trail and said, “They won’t have to shoot us. They just need to make us climb up that trail without coats. We won’t get back over that pass in a blizzard without any foul weather gear. They won’t have to do a damn thing else. We won’t make it.” He looked over at me and I could only nod my head at his assessment.

“
What are we going to do?” said Curtis.

I looked back at the village. A quiet cold rage was filling me and I felt very little like an aikido sensei. Without dwelling on it too much, without risking my resolve I said, “I’m going to go get my coat and money back.”

Chapter
16

The Love You Take…

I stood then and went through my pockets. I wore a shirt with many zippered pockets and trail pants with several deep cargo pockets. I had on a money pouch that they had not found inside my trousers next to the skin. Inside that I had several hundred dollars in Rupees, Euros and Dollars. It was still there. My other hidden pouch, really a rabbit patch (one meant to be found) had been found and everything but my passport and visa taken. I felt in the deep cargo pocket on my leg and was thrilled to find my old Leatherman tool still there. “All right!” I said and held it up.

Everyone else looked through their kit to find what had not been stolen. Christian found a tiny key chain flashlight. Chris still had his trusty Swiss Army knife. There were a few other odds and ends but that that was about all.

Bim suddenly stiffened and pointed. “Guard!”

We hustled across the trail and slipped into a stand of bamboo on the opposite side from the stream. The bamboo had been harvested from the inside out – old to new – and left a small chamber inside. The guard took his time ambling past us down to the bridge and when he got there he looked around for a second and then lay the gun down on the boulder where I had recently been sitting. He reached inside his coat and pulled something out. A moment later a match flared and he bent his head against the wind, clearly lighting a cigarette.

I smiled. I looked at Curtis and pointed at him, then the guard. He nodded. He would be the one. I pointed at him once again and then did the two finger point at my own eyes and then again at the guard. Then I pantomimed lighting a cigarette and the flash from lighting the match. He smiled a very hard little smile and nodded. I looked at him and pointed to myself and pantomimed the drawing of a knife and then made a slashing motion. I pointed at the guard once again. He understood. Be careful. The Tibetan smugglers are famous for having their knives at all times and being very good with them. The scars commonly seen on the faces of these travelers attested to their willingness to use them.