Some afternoons we take a walk up the road that runs to Chushot, though we are yet to actually made it to the town.  So far, our end point is the bridge across the Indus from where we can look south to the beautiful Thikse Gompa and enjoy the sound of the wind over the prayer flags.

The bridge and the Indus mark the local divide between Buddhism and Islam.

Over the bridge toward Chushot lives a very old community of Shia Muslims that arrived from Baltistan nearly 400 years ago, and who, along with their religious beliefs, brought polo to Ladakh.  They remain fanatical about polo and have the oldest polo ground in the indo-tibetan range (pics to come).

Every person we meet smiles and calls out Julay! Julay! … hello hello welcome!  Indeed, we feel very welcome, and it makes for a very enjoyable stroll through groves of poplars, past the toiling Nepalese brick makers and through the small herds of cattle and donkeys (Mei’s favourites).  All around are green barley fields irrigated by intricate channels fed by the silty melt water from the Indus before it flows another 1,500 km through Pakistan.