Leh – I am getting worked up and winding back down
31. May – 06. June 2026
I arrived in Leh, where I would be spending a lot of time working, sorting myself out, letting things sink in, living daily life, and so on. Tundup had kindly invited me to stay in his office. Or rather, what do I mean by office—years ago, he built a three-story building in the lower part of Skara, near the airport. It used to house the office and storage space, and the top floor even had three rooms. This has now been converted: in the basement, there is a small supermarket to supply local people (which started during COVID); on the ground floor, a kitchen, a cozy dining room, and reception; on the first floor, office workstations (the staff had downsized, not because of less work, but due to more efficient structures); and the second and third floors contain rooms. I’m allowed to stay in one of them. There is even a kitchen right next door.
But as has often happened to me lately: certain expectations were not met…. I wasn’t expected with open arms, as Tundup hadn’t given them a heads-up; they demanded my passport instead of showing hospitality—and then the room hadn’t been prepared “perfectly” either. It was lacking a bit of that “loving touch” I so often imagine. And it hadn’t been cleaned thoroughly enough for my liking. Tundup later told me that I apply my German standards too often. It was Sunday and I was still without a SIM card. Last time I was in Ladakh, the Airtel shop was open on Sundays, so I headed over there. It’s a long walk uphill, but it was good to stretch my legs. And I was able to take my dirty laundry with me right away.
What wasn’t good was that I encountered dogs along the way. One of them felt the need to bark at me and bite into my laundry bag, and in a flash, another 4-5 barking dogs packed together and surrounded me. My heart dropped into my boots and my body froze with fear. Memories of my dog attack in Georgia 3 years ago came flooding back. But I was lucky—right behind me was the entrance to a guesthouse, and I ducked inside. The dogs didn’t follow. I practically fell into the arms of a young man and sobbed, cried, and wailed, and could hardly stop. The guy was a sort of “Tibet freak” with wild hair, tattoos, piercings—and an open fly. Stupidly, my eyes kept darting back to that. He was totally sweet, though, and tried to calm me down, while also making it clear to me that it was perfectly okay to react so strongly. And after all, “God” had ensured that nothing serious happened to me. Aside from God, I was just so incredibly grateful! I calmed down a little. Did I want him to escort me? For a little bit? We stepped to the entrance. Just then, 4-5 Indian tourists came walking by—and I simply joined them. Dogs are much less likely to attack a group of people. I left them at a laundromat, and from that point on, there were plenty of other people around anyway.
This time, the Airtel shop actually was closed on Sundays. A small shop next door was advertising SIM cards, so I went in to ask. Without even looking up from his phone, he grumpily informed me that this didn’t apply to foreigners. He wasn’t friendly at all. And so I ended up grumbling to myself on top of it. I took a different route back down—without any negative dog encounters—grabbed the mop bucket, and took out some frustration cleaning. “Great start”….
By the next day, I had pulled myself together again. My room has a comfortable bed and a view. The plot of land next door is empty and serves as a temporary home for dogs. They are highly active and very barky at night. The plot beyond that is a parking lot for large buses. From there, I can sometimes watch meals being prepared and eaten. And I get to have my breakfast on a lovely balcony.
As always, Tundup is terribly busy. He shifted his focus to Indian travelers early on, and it’s doing wonders for his business. They have an absolute mountain of work in the office until mid-June. They even handle group sizes of up to 60 people.
I went back up to the city center to pick up my laundry and get the SIM card—both successful. And even better: as I was walking along the road, a motorcyclist pulled up next to me and asked if I wanted a lift. Just like that. How nice!
I already knew that a lot of construction had been going on in Leh. But this time, it was even more sobering—even more hotels had been built, with even more under construction, and on top of that, all these buildings were packed with people. What used to be fields back in the 1990s has been reduced to just 5 to 10%. Instead, it’s just houses or building plots. And masses of Indian tourists! Very few Western faces. The Indian tourists absolutely love roaring through Ladakh on motorcycles. Sometimes even in enormously large groups. I met a Ladakhi acquaintance who specialized in motorcycle tours, and he was completely groaning about it. There aren’t enough motorcycles here! You have to borrow them from some shady characters, and they charge a fortune. But he has no choice. I’m really curious to see if things change a bit in July/August. And what it actually looks like in the villages.
I spent a lot of time in my temporary home, but I also met up with people. I absolutely had to visit Nawang and his Kashmiri wool shawl shop. Sooo many beautiful pieces! And such a lovely guy!
I also went out for a meal with Rigzen. She and I had co-led the Losar group together. She took me to a place nearby, and I was quite amazed. Very modern, large, a garden with a trampoline, and a live stage. And pretty much no tourists. It’s near the army base—they and their families love going there. We ate pizza. And I finally got to have a mango lassi. Plus, we shared totally funny and dramatic travel stories with each other.
Then I also met up with Aniek, whom I’ve known for many years but hadn’t seen in ages. She is from Holland and supports the nuns in Nyerma with their guesthouse and so on. Later on, I’ll be spending two nights there as well. Reminiscing about old times, we went to a garden restaurant that used to be called “Penguin.” Now it’s called “Lamayuru”; it still has good food and nice people, but it honestly could have been made to look a bit prettier.
For some reason, my oxygen levels don’t want to go any higher (low 90s isn’t worrying at all, but I had expected it to increase more after all this time) and I find myself a bit too short of breath as well. On top of that, I had a bit of constipation. So, I went to see the Tibetan Amchi and was given some little herbal pills.
One morning, I had some more interesting weather outside my window, and then a double rainbow even appeared!
My neighborhood is lacking certain shopping options, so to stretch my legs as well, I often walked up to the pedestrian zone. There, I ran into many Ladakhi women, for example, who hugged me warmly and wanted to take pictures with me. They belonged to the women’s wing of the Ladakh Buddhist Association and were on a crusade against alcohol. Ladakh is suffering more and more from drug addiction and alcoholism—this is currently one of the big talking points in society. Ban alcohol and become a dry state like Gujarat? Where there is no alcohol, no one can get addicted? However, the home-brewed barley beer, Chang, has been a part of their society for ages.
And so the days drifted by a little. But on the 7th, everything changed. And you can read all about that in the next blog post.