Over the course of a decade of repeated visits to a nomadic community and little Dolma’s clan near Litang, I would continuously be in awe of the ’nomadic ways’ of doing simply anything. Moving up to a half dozen times a year, her family of eight would follow their yak herds on their never ending journey to follow the grazing path.
Almost never would I leave the community without at least a few injuries sustained from little Dolma’s ‘play’. Fiercely devoted to her little brother and sister (in a clan of 6 children), she was also a little warrior, able and willing to engage in breathtaking runs over the 4200 metre plains to chase me down and pummel me. Dolma was fully capable of fighting with her hands and teeth…a skill she told me that she learned from the Tibetan Mastiffs which guarded her homestead.
She was one of the ’tea makers’ in-waiting in her home, being taught by her mother the practice of making ‘bo ja’, the churned butter tea of extraordinary pungency. One of the mighty characters I wonder about often. Dolma loved the little flowers that grew in Spring near her encampments, picking them carefully before throwing them high into the winds and letting them settle, before repeating.
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