Everybody’s Got a Mountain to Climb

Just a day’s journey from Kathmandu, Langtang Valley is a trekker’s paradise. Trails weaving through dense bamboo forests and open yak pastures provide views of snow-capped Tibetan mountains that have led travellers to call Langtang “the valley of glaciers”. Despite its stunning natural beauty and proximity to Kathmandu, Langtang has only become a popular trekking destination in the past 15 years.

Originally an agrarian village, Langtang has been dependent on tourism to generate its livelihood in recent times.

Prior to the earthquake, it is estimated that 90 per cent of the valley’s income came from tourism. “When I was small, I used to work in the fields. I used to think that white people were from another planet, but slowly, my aunts and uncles started making small hotels and restaurants. They realised that tourism was more lucrative than farming,” recalls Bhutti, who works as a receptionist in a hotel in Spain. The village’s reliance on tourism was dealt a blow in April, when each of its 55 hotels and tea houses were buried by landslides after the earthquake.

Langtang’s survivors were evacuated by the Nepali government and housed in a refugee camp in Kathmandu. With the arrival of monsoon immediately after the earthquake, the people were left with little choice but to wait out the rain in the capital. The damaged trails leading to Langtang are yet to be rebuilt and not much restoration has happened in the village since the quake. “The government has made a huge amount of money from Langtang, but we have not got any rehabilitation packages so far,” Bhutti says, referring to the $80 fee that nearly 5,000-6,000 tourists who visit Langtang each year must pay the government prior to entering the valley.

Ganga Sagar Pant, CEO of Trekking Agencies Association of Nepal (TAAN), echoes Bhutti’s frustration at the absence of governmental assistance in rebuilding trekking regions damaged by the earthquake. As an umbrella association of Nepali trekking agencies with the responsibility of advising the government on tourism in trekking districts, the leaders of TAAN are no strangers to the weaknesses of the Nepali government. “Nepal’s government is bound to different formalities, and there are different parallel bodies. The processes are bureaucratic and very slow,” says Pant.

TAAN has sent workers to assist devastated regions like Langtang, but Pant admits there is only so much private organisations can do. “The government has the money we need for the reconstruction of infrastructure but it doesn’t have the initiative. The number one thing we request the government is to lead development and the reconstruction,” he says.

Nepal’s trekking industry is also suffering from the negative media attention it received in the wake of the earthquake. “The media only picked up images of damage and destruction and posted them everywhere, but most of the beautiful mountain destinations are safe. Nothing happened to them,” says Pant. According to a study conducted by the Nepal Tourism Board, only 14 of Nepal’s 75 districts were affected by the earthquake, and of these 14 districts, only two — Langtang and Manaslu — were key trekking districts. Annapurna, one of Nepal’s most popular trekking districts, escaped the earthquake almost completely unscathed. The government of Nepal has also declared the Everest region safe for trekkers.

Oscar Ola, a seasoned American mountaineer was just a three hour’s climb above Langtang Valley at the onset of the earthquake. “When we returned home, we were interviewed by the media. But TV stations tweaked the information to make it more dramatic,” says Ola, who is organising a memorial trek to Langtang for the friends and family of trekkers who died in the quake.

In the aftermath of the disaster, tourism in Nepal has dropped noticeably. Although the trekking season officially starts in October, the country receives a steady stream of tourists from September onwards, after the monsoon season is over. Brazilian Pedro Green, who recently arrived in Delhi after spending three weeks travelling around Nepal, notes how, despite the alluring landscape, there was a noticeable absence of fellow tourists this year. “The guesthouses were empty in the trekking areas. I was the only one paying for the night sometimes,” says Pedro.

Navin Marital, managing director of a Nepali trekking agency called Expedition Himalaya, however, is hopeful. “Business is 50-60 per cent lower than it was at this point last year. We are expecting more business starting in October, so we have not laid off a single employee,” he says.

A report conducted by TAAN states that 40,000 employees engaged in the trekking sector had no work between May and July due to the collapse of tourism caused by the earthquake. TAAN created employment for 30,000 of these unemployed mountain workers through encouraging the United Nations World Food Programme to use guides and porters instead of helicopters to transport food and construction tools to mountain areas. “We are planning on continuing with this programme, which is currently employing up to 500 workers a day, for the next three months,” says Pant. These workers are making three times the amount of money they would be if they were doing similar tasks for the government, as TAAN pays their workers NPR 1,250 per day, while the Nepali government’s daily rate for similar labour is NPR 400.

The trekking industry also needs tourists to continue to help Nepal, especially in the few months after TAAN’s employment programme runs its course. The valley has received support from trekkers familiar with the region. “There are many who love the mountains and who want to help. They are willing to do anything. This is something positive because they can show to the world that it is safe to travel. Langtang is still incredibly beautiful. What the natural disaster has done to Langtang accounts for only one per cent of the valley,” says Bhutti.