Leh -> Karu – Multiplex, Crematorium and Salad
17. June 2026
I’ve known Tsering Dolma for quite a while now, and a bit closer since 2017—which is when she came to visit me in Ruhpolding. She used to work for another travel agency, ran a fashion boutique, and then settled down in Karu with her second husband. Here, they built a small house with two rooms for homestay guests. That isn’t exactly easy, though, because—what travelers actually end up winding their way out there? With my winter group, I then arranged for us to have lunch at her place on the day we visited the monasteries in Sakti and Chemre. It was a complete success; she is a fantastic cook, and her daughter absolutely charmed the group.
The daughter goes to school elsewhere and only comes home on weekends, the husband is a taxi driver and hardly ever home during the season, the oldest son is studying far away anyway, and so she is mostly alone with her elderly father-in-law. So, wouldn’t a visit from me be nice? My thoughts exactly! The father-in-law had also gone away for a few days, so we had the house all to ourselves.
Conveniently, Tsering Dolma has a car and offered to pick me up. That was great, of course. And she was totally open to us making a few more discoveries along the way. That was also great. But first, I showed her something she didn’t know yet: the restaurant where I had gone to eat with Rigzen. It really is nice there, the food is delicious, and the coffee is an absolute joy.
We took a different route through Sabu instead of the highway via Choglamsar—and boy, was I amazed. How everything had changed here! Houses, roads, people, and shops everywhere. A huge inhabited area that used to be completely empty. And then we also passed the new multiplex cinema. Back in the winter, the people who opened it had stayed at our hotel and even invited us, but we couldn’t (and didn’t want to) go. The place had been a real talking point among the locals. The building belongs to a Ladakhi, but it is run by India’s largest cinema operator. Is that a good thing? In any case, I just had to see it with my own eyes now. Standing right in front of it, you really no longer feel like you’re in Ladakh.
It was early afternoon and therefore neither cinema- nor dinner-time, but there was still a good mix of local and Indian visitors hanging around in the eateries. Many younger people seem to view the new addition as a great enrichment, while the older generation isn’t quite as enthusiastic. Should I watch a movie here sometime? There are three screening rooms, and one of them apparently mostly shows English-language films.
We drove on and arrived at a place that couldn’t be more contrasting, and which was also new to me: a crematorium. Tsering Dolma had never been here before either. There are three public cremation sites, and you can do whatever you like with the ashes afterward. Indians are cremated here too—just like a few days ago when three of them lost their lives in a traffic accident. There is a hall where Buddhist ceremonies can be held, and a monk looks after the whole place. It is currently being expanded. There is also an underground room designed like a mandala, which is only opened once a year. It doesn’t even have a door; instead, it is bricked up again and again.
Then we went to get some food. Tsering Dolma has a huge extended family. Some of them live right around the corner and grow a special kind of lettuce that is very delicious. My own attempts to grow it have been unsuccessful so far, but that simply cannot be! So, we didn’t just pick some for dinner, but also took a few small plants with us.
Then we were back on the highway. A few vegetable vendors had set up shop here, where the village folks who had been to town liked to stock up on their way home. The selection was great, and so were the people running the stalls.
Speaking of food—a great deal of it is delivered from the outside. But in a supermarket in Leh, I noticed the many different yogurts, which come from various local producers.
Onpo is one of the oldest producers and has its production facility in Thiksey. I wondered if I might be able to go and take a look? Tsering Dolma was skeptical—she thought they might be afraid we were there to inspect their hygienic conditions. But you have to try! There was even a sign on the main road, and the location was marked on Google too. But a tour wasn’t possible after all. There were several workers from Nepal hanging around who refused to grant us entry. And the owner was nowhere to be found. But it was interesting nonetheless. For one thing, we drove through an area where neither of us had ever been before—another kind of new development zone, but with many larger local homesteads. And, as it turned out, at least one production facility. We also wondered why they didn’t even have a sort of farm shop—especially since there was that nice signpost out on the road. Well, I’m not giving up on it completely just yet. To be honest, I’m less interested in the hygiene and more in how the whole thing embeds itself into Ladakh.
Then we arrived in Karu and made ourselves comfortable. It was raining.
When it let up a bit, I went back outside for a short walk. While I was out, I snapped a photo of the stone factory on the opposite side of the valley.
It is really interesting how Ladakh is transforming from a purely self-sufficient agricultural and livestock economy into many other sectors. And also, just how many migrant workers there are here. They have been around ever since I started visiting Ladakh, but this time I suppose I’m paying a bit closer attention.
The local diet is also changing more and more with products from the outside and new types of vegetables. And so Tsering Dolma made a salad with a delicious lemon, apple cider vinegar, and olive oil vinaigrette and crushed almonds, which was very tasty. As I wrote above: she is a fantastic cook and open to outside influences.
And so, despite my back handicap, I once again saw and learned so much more than I could have imagined when I got up this morning. And that is exactly how I love it: checking things out with curious spontaneity, seeing what there is to see, and just letting myself drift through the day with plenty of time. How lovely!