2 tourists died a couple days ago—coming over the pass—all I could understand from the ani-haru was something about a photo and then “avalanche.” I ask some of the English-speaking gompa visitors if they know anything about it, but nobody does, or else they have completely different versions of the story—not 2 tourists but one guide, or it wasn’t an avalanche but something else...

A bizarrely inefficient kitchen cleaning yesterday. We take everything out of the kitchen, and carry to Hira’s room. Hira paints the kitchen walls, splattering everywhere. She hands me a filthy rag and tells me to wipe down the grungy shelves, which have dirt and paint all over them. Then she painted the shelf edges and bottoms of the walls red, and the floor black. Then we carry everything back into the kitchen.

I spend a lot of time these days babysitting the gompa. Amusing to listen to the guides make up stories when they don’t know the answers to the tourists’ questions. I don’t know much either, and the ani-haru don’t always agree on things like the age of the gompa or the meaning of the different items. Drew a diagram of the statues and asked Chenzom to write down their names. “Pahila pahila,” she tells me—“at first”—there were 3 fires, burning on earth, water and stone. The three Buddha statues are each linked with a different fire, and painted green, white and red to symbolize their elements. Two of the original fires went out—now only the one burning on water is left, and one more has appeared, also in water. As usual, I don’t know how accurate any of this information is.