Nepal-Tibet Floods and Kailash Pilgrimage: A Himalayan Tragedy and the Question of Fate

Sixteen years ago, almost to the day, I travelled the same Himalayan road that hundreds of Kailash-Mansarovar pilgrims travelled this week. I crossed the Friendship Bridge that no longer exists. Today the Bhote Koshi river has reclaimed it—and hundreds of lives besides.Before sunrise, amid a rousing chorus of “Har Har Mahadev!” (Victory to the Supreme Lord Shiva), our tarnished bus chugged out of a Kathmandu hotel, belching diesel fumes into the drizzle. It carried far more than 16 pilgrims. Stuffed inside and lashed precariously onto the roof were two weeks' rations, gas cylinders, sleeping bags, duffel bags, a cook, three Sherpas, a Sherpa sardar, and the collective faith of people who believed they were travelling to the holiest mountain on earth. It was mid-September—and the monsoon had overstayed its welcome. For two anxious weeks I had watched satellite images of Nepal and southern Tibet, hoping for a break in the weather. The cloud cover refused to lift.Only if we could cross the high Lalung La Pass into the rain shadow of the Trans-Himalaya would we finally escape the tyranny of the monsoon. Nepal’s Flash Floods Show the Devastating Power of ‘Cascading Hazards’The night before departure, Kathmandu had drowned beneath sheets of rain. By dawn, however, fierce winds were tearing the clouds apart. The Rain Gods have always treated me kindly—but they offered no such assurances about the road. The road through the valley of the Bhote River had been given a sound hammering by the seasonal rains and was in a dreadful condition. Massive landslides and huge boulders had hurtled down the mountainsides and blocked our path. Whenever a slushy landslide had to be crossed, I jumped off the bus on the pretext of taking a picture and walked across it, having more faith in my trembling legs than the balding tyres of the bus that rocked, groaned, skid, and slid across the mire. At one bend the outer edge of the dirt track had been washed away completely. On my side of the bus the valley disappeared vertically into the roaring river thousands of feet below.As we lurched forward, one of the rear tyres hung briefly in empty space. Before I could say my last prayer, we were on safe ground. I never fail to admire the courage of the fate-tempting, foolhardy bus and truck drivers of the Himalaya. The Bhote Koshi accompanied us all day. It was not a river in the comforting sense of the word. It did not meander or sparkle. It exploded.Fed by glaciers and monsoon rains, it hurled itself through the gorge with a violence that made conversation inside the bus impossible. Sometimes it vanished beneath cliffs, only for its thunder to rise through the valley like artillery. At other times it appeared beside us, white with rage, smashing itself against black boulders. By late afternoon we reached Kodari.17 Dead in Nepal-Tibet Border Flash Flood, Villages Washed AwayThe border town was unrecognisable. Years earlier, in 1994, while returning from the Central Asia Expedition, I had crossed into Nepal through what had then been little more than a sleepy frontier post with a handful of houses. Growing trade with China had transformed Kodari into a bustling, chaotic settlement where endless lines of trucks clogged the narrow streets and warehouses competed with shabby hotels for every available inch of land. While we exchanged Indian rupees for Chinese yuan over lunch, frail women porters—wrinkled beyond their years—unloaded our baggage from the bus. Bent almost double beneath impossible loads, they carried our worldly possessions towards the bridge while we followed with cameras around our necks and pilgrimage on our lips. Then we walked across the Friendship Bridge. Halfway across, a young, sullen Chinese soldier, motionless as a statue, stood at attention, gun in hand. I felt like tickling him, but his bayonet was too sharp. Outside the immigration hall we were joined by a Kailash-Mansarovar pilgrimage group from Chidambaram in Tamil Nadu. Around us swarmed Tibetan porters carrying enormous sacks from which protruded sheep's hooves. Mash, a Texas-educated, notoriously worldly Sindhi spinster in her mid-30s, working as a psychological counsellor, a clairvoyant, a regression analyst and a spiritual tour leader, affected by the swarming legions of poor, scrawny porters in patched shoes and tattered rags, asked me what I thought of “all this poverty”. “Fate,” I replied. She looked at me sharply. “What do you mean?” I told her an old conversation between Shiva and Parvati. One day, Parvati looked upon the world and challenged Shiva. “How can you call yourself the Supreme Lord,” she asked, “when there is so much hunger, disease, and misery?” “They are fated to suffer,” Shiva replied. “Hogwash,” said Parvati. Shiva smiled. A beggar was walking along a forest path. Shiva sliced open a watermelon, filled it with gold coins, sealed it perfectly and placed it in the beggar's way. The beggar picked up the watermelon, took it to a grocer and exchanged it for 14 pieces of bread. “You see?” Shiva said. “Had he cut the fruit, he would have discovered the treasure. But it was not his fate.” “Rubbish,” Parvati protested. “How was he to know? Bread is more precious to a hungry man than fruit.” “Then watch again,” Shiva replied. This time he split a melon in half, stuffed it with gold coins and left it open on the path, the treasure glistening in plain sight. As the beggar approached, an odd curiosity struck him. “I wonder,” he thought, “what it feels like to be blind.” He closed his eyes—and walked straight past the fortune that could have transformed his life. “Now do you believe me?” Shiva asked. Before Mash could demolish my philosophy, the Tibetan guide shepherded us into the immigration hall, where surprisingly cheerful young Chinese officials stamped our passports and welcomed us into Tibet. Beyond the border, five Toyota Land Cruisers carried us towards Nyalam through the gorge of the Matsang Tsangpo, as Bhote Koshi is known in Tibet. The rain returned with astonishing ferocity. Waterfalls poured from every mountain. The river disappeared beneath clouds but never ceased roaring.Nepalese traders had long called Nyalam the ‘Gate to Hell’, for the old dirt track climbing from the border had been one of the most terrifying roads in the Himalaya. I had driven it once before on a thunderous night. Rain had poured down in amazing volumes. Ear-splitting lightning crackled as diligently as the deafening thunder. Loose rocks, pushed by the furious winds, assaulted the vehicle’s roof and bonnet. I had reached the relative safety of Zhangmu with shivering bones—but delighted at having come out of the storm in one piece. The Chinese later replaced that perilous dirt track with an immaculate highway, reinforced with tunnels, retaining walls and engineering that bordered on the miraculous. Sitting comfortably inside our vehicles, we admired waterfalls drifting sideways in the wind and forests dissolving into mist.Explained: Why Western Nepal Is More Prone to Earthquakes It was tempting to believe that human ingenuity had finally conquered the mountains. But the Himalaya have a cruel habit of correcting such arrogance. This week the Bhote Koshi reminded us who truly owns the valley. The Friendship Bridge has vanished. Kodari village and roads have been torn apart. Hundreds of pilgrims who set out chanting “Har Har Mahadev” have simply disappeared into the river's fury. And ever since I heard the news, I have found myself returning to that conversation between Shiva and Parvati. Were those pilgrims destined to die? If destiny had written their names beside that river long before they boarded their buses, what are we to make of the families who persuaded them to go? Of the drivers who chose to leave an hour earlier or later? Of the traveller who stopped to buy tea and therefore missed the flood by five minutes? And if their deaths were not fated, how do we explain the terrifying lottery by which one pilgrim survives while another, walking a few steps ahead, is swept away forever? Faith offers one vocabulary. Science offers another. The mountains remain indifferent to both. Perhaps Parvati was right all along. Perhaps the beggar did not miss the gold because destiny condemned him to poverty. Perhaps he missed it because human lives are woven from countless ordinary choices, coincidences and moments that only acquire meaning after tragedy. Or perhaps Shiva was right—that there exists a design too vast for our frightened minds to comprehend. I do not know. What I do know is this. Sixteen years ago, almost to the day, I crossed that bridge with laughter in my heart, irreverent jokes on my lips, and the excitement of approaching Kailash. I remember the old women carrying our luggage, the impassive soldier, the thunder of the Bhote Koshi beneath my feet, and a philosophical argument about fate that seemed little more than an entertaining diversion while waiting for immigration clearance. Today the bridge, immigration hall and parts of Kodari exist only in memory. The river still roars through the gorge, as eternal as the Himalaya themselves. The pilgrims who travelled that road were seeking Shiva on Mount Kailash. Whether they found their destiny, their God, or merely the terrible unpredictability of nature is a question that neither philosophy nor pilgrimage can answer. Perhaps only the mountains and tectonic plates know. (Akhil Bakshi is the author of Stairway to Heaven: Circumambulation of Mt. Kailash in Tibet.)

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Nepal-Tibet Flash Floods, Kailash Pilgrimage, and the Question of Fate

This week, the Bhote Koshi river reminded us who truly owns the valley, writes Akhil Bakshi.

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