There are those snobs who insist on the distinction between "traveler" and "tourist," and disdain the "tourist."  Then there are those snobs who insist there is no distinction, and disdain the "traveler-snob."  Finally, there are those snobs who agree with the latter set but talk only to locals and barely to other tourists, thereby fixing them, technically, into the first set.

I, being the heartiest of snobs, belong to this last group, of course.  I have no illusions to my status as a tourist, and yet I hate that there are so many other tourists in Ladakh.  I have a very difficult time talking to other foreigners, but have managed, somehow, to befriend families in the villages of Choglamsar, Thiksey, and Sakti, as well as locals and seasonal locals in Leh.  The monks Rigyal and Jigmet approached me one evening last week precisely because of this behavior.  They thought it was hilarious that I could be found on the streets of Leh chatting up Dolma, who sells jewelry and whose parents fled from Tibet, or Riyaz, who is from Srinagar and spends the summer season selling pashmina in Leh and the rest of the year, carpets in Delhi or jewelry in Goa.  The monks had seen me around - hunkered down with my long lens at the festival in Lamayuru, all over Leh.  I ran into them the next day at the festival in Phyang, and they took me to a private viewing room, and then to lunch.  And that is how it happens: serendipity, and I am flying and grinning afterwards.

On the other hand, it's difficult being The Guest in a different culture.  I've been spending time with Gurmit and his family, and doing so has allowed me to experience amazing things that other tourists never get to see.  I (very briefly) helped with the harvest season while in Sakti this week, carrying hay on my back to the roof of Gurmit's aunt's house, where the hay will dry in the sun for the rest of the summer, and feed the cows come winter.  I was abruptly woken up at five thirty in the morning one day because Gurmit's grandmother had to water the field, and we were sleeping on it.  Watering the field involves diverting streams, and soon the place where we'd been laying became a river.  In the next village, at a gonpa that's not in the guidebooks, I saw some of the best frescoes I've seen in all the gonpas I've visited.  However, these were particularly special to me because they include the dancing skeletons of Tibetan Buddhist mythology that I love so much, which I'd been keeping an eye out for, but unable to find anywhere else.

And yet.  Being Jigmet's (Gurmit's mother's) guest has been trying for me.  Yogi and I are told what to do and when to do it, and "no" (even a respectful "man-le") is never an acceptable response.  We are dragged from relative's house to relative's house to be drowned in oceans of milk tea and butter tea, and to sit quietly while the adults are in conversation, in Ladakhi, and the children are playing outside.  We never, ever get to the bus on time, and can never properly plan our dates because the five to six days becomes two days, and the next Thursday becomes next Sunday - thus we spend an extraordinary amount of time waiting, always waiting.  We are not allowed any personal space or free time.  When Yogas and I were on the river banks after a long day of walking in the sun, missing all the buses, and being shepherded from house to house for tea we didn't want and conversation we couldn't participate in - all we wanted was to sit quietly by the river - Jigmet returned intermittently to harass us until we finally gave up and went back to the house.  For tea. 

And all of this is done with love, in our best interests, because we are honored as special guests. 

Of course it sounds culturally insensitive, and completely ungrateful to my good luck, to complain of these things, but three consecutive days without any peace and freedom took me over the edge.  By the morning we left for Leh, I could hardly be civil to Jigmet.  It was at this time that I realized Yogi's superiority to me: he felt exactly as I did, but reacted in a more gracious manner.  I couldn't help it; I'd lost my temper.  This had happened once before, also at Jigmet's house in Choglamsar.  Her niece Tsetan kept berating me to clean my neck because it was so dark compared to my face (I'd been traveling for a month, in the sun and the dust, and there was nothing to do about it) until I had to leave the house because I was so angry I was crying. 

Sometimes this is what it means to be a guest - I am left more or less powerless, and my ideas and needs are incompatible with my hosts'.  To be a snob of the third order takes a lot more forbearance than I first realized.  In fact, it is not ideal to spend all of my time with locals.  Tea parties are eye popping only in moderation, and generosity and hospitality can exhaust my patience.

In the meantime, I am recuperating for a few days - on Sunday, Yogi and I will probably (you never know with this family) be traveling to Nubra Valley with Gurmit and his family.  And I have learned the error of my snobbish ways and now interact more often with other foreigners.  Not at my guesthouse, though.  I've been waitressing and making momos at my favorite Tibetan restaurant in Leh, where the food is good and the owners (locals) spoil me to death.  I interact with plenty of tourists there.