We met this boy between Dege and Manigango. He had left home a month ago with his aunt and uncle, nun and monk, and their journey to Lhasa and back would take another eleven. He would walk every step of the way, and every step of the way he would prostrate himself as devout pilgrims do.
Amazingly, his uncle said, this pilgrimage was completely his own initiative.
He looked perfectly happy, creating his own slow motion road-movie.
We met briefly, twenty minutes. Then we moved on at our pace, he moved on at his.
‘No school?’, I had asked. But his uncle taught him every afternoon. I was left wondering many more things. Did he miss his family, did they carry a mobile, did they keep in touch at all? Did they ever worry they may not get enough support of local people – no lodging, no food, no alms? How about the winter cold?
Questions that only a non-pilgrim can ask, I suppose.