Ladakh: The Guesthouse at Leh
A compassionate grandmonther who spoke to us caringly and made us feel at home, an old man who alway s wore goncha – the traditionally Ladakhi wear, a young man who was always available for help and a cute little girl who melted our hearts with her broken-tooth smile. Together, they formed the family that hosted us in Leh. We randomly picked our accommodation in the town, and ended up lucky to stumble upon this friendly bunch who ran a guesthouse.
The guesthouse at Leh
It was a simple place managed by a young man named Wangyal, a small guesthouse with a bunch of rooms built next to their residence. The one-acre enclosure had a few apple trees and a vegetable garden where they grew at least a dozen things. We had arrived there in darkness and had immediately crashed for the night after the long journey from Keylong. Waking up late next morning, I peered through the window and saw Namgyal Tsemo Gompa through a small gap between apple trees. Some branches of an apple tree brushed into the wall near the window. The tree was full with fruits, but unfortunately unripe.
The guesthouse was in a quiet place far from the market, in Sankar Village. No vehicles, no noise of any sort and no commercial activity whatsoever near by. The hours of the day spent in the guesthouse would go quiety, reading a book, having breakfast under the apple trees or over a social dinner at the beautifully decorated dining hall.
The dining room
Wangyal appeared stern when he spoke, but was a friendly and helpful man. On the first morning when we needed to find our way to the market, he accompanied us half the way and showed us the route through a maze of narrow passages. When we checked out after 10-days without paying him because we were in a hurry and could not find him on time, he was not upset about it. Of course, we cleared our dues a week later after returning to Leh.
The little kid was someone whom I looked forward to see all the time. She always had an easygoing, charming smile on her face. She would come play with us ,and say a few things slowly in her broken tongue. And the grandmother was always there, sitting and watching from her chair and pretending anger when the kid was naughty.
Sometimes the grandmother and kid would spend hours together working in the garden. So many veggies and flowers grew in the garden that I never managed to count them all. There were cauliflowers, onions, sweet peas, some edible leaves, at least another half-a-dozen vegetables and an uncountable variety of flowers. I wanted to spend an hour or two checking them all out, but it never happened.
The guesthouse was a great place to stay, but there was a small problem to take care of. I had to go to the main market for everything – to see places in the town, to have lunch, to talk to travel agents and for any other transactions. The market was a little far, and walking back and forth was a pain. The bus-stop was even farther, and meant long walks through the town when I did short day-trips out of Leh. In the later days when I stayed in Leh on transit, I ended up staying at another guesthouse closer to the town. But the old place always remained the favourite.