I've been wanting to get into the mountainous areas of Nepal to document the "janjatees" or mountain people. People have lived there for hundreds of years but for whatever reason (climate change possibly) they're becoming more and more prone to drought. The UN then helps some of these unreachable places get water or distributes food. My friend Nabraj was actually born in these mountains as his family is Tamang - a caste and ethnicity that's lived in the steep slopes for centuries.
At around 10:00am we started our motorcycle journey to the river where we left our bike (this was only the beginning). After getting to the river we have to hike. We met up with some tamang relatives of Nabraj and started our journey. The women we were with make this journey about once a month to get clothes and various other items that they can't produce themselves such as salt. After crossing the river by wading through it.
It was about a 4 or 5 hour hike to the house in which we were staying: up rocky paths, winding across the slopes, over ridges... it was pretty insane. I didn't know that we would be embarking on such a hike so of course I had a bunch of useless crap: my laptop, all my camera equipment, toiletries, etc...
It was pitch dark by the time we got there and shortly after we ate a meal and went to sleep. The next day we visited everybody else. Nabraj's family seems to own the entire two faces of a mountain... and we walked ALL of it. I'll post more about the trip tommorrow.
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