THE UNINTENTIONAL TRAP
The mythical abominable snowman or yeti is known as the migoi (strong man) or gredpo in Bhutan. They are believed to live in altitudes between 3,500 to 5,000 metres where the yaks pasture.
Tikchung stood under each pine tree he had selected and studied it. Then he scanned the area around each tree to see how and where they would fall when cut down. He chose three tall trees not too far from each other. With some luck he could easily get about fifteen to twenty planks from each tree. “I got a hundred planks from a single tree,” Ap Dorji, his neighbor had boasted, some days ago. But Tikchung did not need more than forty planks, three trees would be plenty for his kitchen floor.
The rotting floor planks had been the cause of many miseries. His otherwise amiable wife, Pem Choizom, easily worked herself into theatrical outbursts when the subject of the rotting planks was raised and Tikchung had been the victim of many verbal abuses and humiliations. He winced every time a plank creaked for he knew what was coming, “Aren’t you ever going to change these rotten planks?” she would begin.It was of no avail to explain that he could not go for planks at the height of the plowing season. Pem Choizom would deliberately mistake his silence for stubbornness, “You stubborn bull! If you don’t get the new planks we’ll find ourselves in the ground floor with the animals,” she would scream at him.
Of course that would never happen because there was a layer of rammed earth and layers of bamboo over strong beams that were as good as new. If only Pem Choizom had not been so careless with spilling water on the floor while she worked in the kitchen, the planks would have lasted a few years longer. As Tikchung sat in silence, Pem Choizom tossed the last buckwheat pancake she was making at the stove onto the pile in the basket on the floor. In her agitated state, she missed the basket and it fell on the floor, smack on a rotting plank. Another reminder of the “disgraceful floor” as Pem Choizom put it, would hurt their twenty years of marriage. Tikchung made up his mind as he picked up the pancake from the floor and blew the dust off it. “Tomorrow,” he said quietly.”Tomorrow what?” demanded Pem Choizom. She wanted a firmer commitment. “Tomorrow I will go for the planks.” The woman at the stove rolled her eyes although a faint smile of triumph lit up her sooty face.
Next day, Tikchung strapped his axe to his back and tucked his sword into his belt. Pem Choizom handed him a leather pouch filled with buckwheat flour mixed with the fermented grains of wheat and barley from which the alcohol had not been extracted. As he passed the village water sput at the prayer mill he saw that some of the village women had already gathered there to fill their barrels and wash themselves. He could not resist remarking, as he passed the women, “After you are all washed and pretty, the prettiest one may come with me to the forest to help me to get my planks.” There was a chorus of laughter, “Shame on you Tikchung. Look back, Pem Choizom is watching you and anyway a grown man shouldn’t be afraid to go into the forest alone!” teased the women. With a grin, Tikchung headed up the hill towards the forests. After a few hours he reached the thick pine forests where he scanned the trees. Once he selected the trees he cleared away the surrounding bushes to facilitate easy swinging of his axe. The forest rang with the sound of the chopping. The solitary sound gave him a strange hollow feeling and he suddenly felt very alone. He wished he had seriously looked for a companion.
When the tree trunk had almost been cut through he gave it a final push with his entire weight. The tree fell slowly first and then crashed through the bushes and saplings around it, tharow, tharow and a loud crash, a sound that resounded through the forest. The second and third trees were felled in the same way. He looked at the massive trees and he could already imagine the planks and the happy smile on Pem Choizom’s face.
He cut the tree trunks into sections of about three arm spans each, and began the delicate and tedious task of actually splitting the logs into planks. First he drew a line across the centre of the log, halving and then quartering it. Tikchung chopped along the centre line, and then carefully brought his axe down along the marked line with a few easy swings of his razor sharp axe. With each swing the axe would embed itself deep into the soft wood. He could not pull out his axe. He took the wooden pieces made to be used as wedges and hammered them into the logs. With every wedge that was hammered in, the crack in the log would open wider and he could finally pull his axe out. This procedure continued until the plank separated from the log.
Sweating and tired, he decided to break for lunch. He left the wedges in the log, collected his leather pouch and chili paste and went near a stream to eat his lunch. He slowly chewed pieces of the well-kneaded choydam, refreshingly clean-tasting dough that was lightly intoxicating. His arms ached and his back hurt so he decided that a few winks in the sun would revive him for the tough job ahead. He lay on the mossy bank of the stream and fell asleep immediately.
Tikchung woke up, yawned and stretched; he felt much better. He washed his face in the stream and drank deeply of the cool water. The silence in the forest overwhelmed him and he began to whistle as he walked back to his work site. Suddenly he stopped in his tracks and his whistling went off tune. “Ya Lama,” was all he could say, again and again. He blinked and then rubbed his eyes. He was sure that the alcohol in his choydam had been too strong! There it was, an enormous creature standing on its hind legs bent towards the logs he had been working on just before lunch. It had heard him coming and was in a state of panic. But what was it doing with his log? It looked up at him. The creature had the strangest face; a lot like the big monkeys he had seen in Kurtoi (in eastern Bhutan) and yet with such a strong resemblance to the human face.
Tikchung suddenly realized how close he had come to this strange creature and backed a few paces and then, on impulse, he turned and ran. He heard a whistle-like call, turned back and saw the creature moving its gigantic feet, but it was unable to move away from the log. Tikchung stopped and looked more closely. Now he saw what had happened; the creature was trapped. It had put its paws into the crack in the log and pulled out the wooden wedges. The split in the log had snapped back and its hands were trapped. “What is this creature and what should I do?” Tikchung weighed his options carefully. “If I help to release its hands, it may kill me. Perhaps it is best that I leave it like this and go home.”
Tikchung took one more look at the pathetic face looking up to him almost imploringly. He was overcome with pity for the wild creature who had meddled with human work. It would just take a few moments and a few wedges to release the hideous paws and then what? While Tikchung was torn in uncertainty the creature struggled furiously, trying to free its hands. Tikchung was shocked to see the creature lifting the three-meter long; ninety-centimeter diameter wet wood with its enormous strength. Wafts of a most horrible stink filled the air as Tikchung drew closer to the creature. He had decided to release it.
Tikchung approached the creature with great trepidation; his mind was riddled with fresh doubts. “This creature must be a migoi (yeti) and in all my fifty-sixty years I have never heard of anyone being killed by a migoi. People say a lhaende (spirit), perhaps it will disappear just now.”
He approached the creature which tried to move away but could not. It was grunting softly, in a strange way. Tikchung fixed his eyes on the creature and edged closer and closer until he could reach the log. Carefully he took his axe and sunk it into the wood again and again. Each time the axe bit into the wood the creature’s body jolted while its face cringed with shock and fear. Finally the plank fell away from the rest of the log and the creature’s paws (or were they hands?) were freed. It quickly made a few clumsy strides away from Tikchung, stopped, shook its hands as if to restore the circulation and then stood very still looking at him. Tikchung too stood still staring at the creature.
Man and creature stood face to face, immersed in their own thoughts and then their eyes met and locked for one flashing second and their bodies relaxed, they both knew that the other was harmless. the creature suddenly turned and walked away towards the thick of the forests, slowly, without even glancing back once at Tikchung who stayed fixed to the ground, his eyes glued to the creature as it disappeared into the distance. He felt neither fear nor excitement even after such a momentous encounter.
At sun down Tikchung collected his tools and a huge bundle of firewood and headed home. As he passed the village water spout at the prayer mill some of the same women were washing off the day’s mud and grime and filling their water barrels for their evening cooking. They immediately picked on him, “Did you get very lonely and frightened in the forest, all by yourself?”
“Since none of you women agreed to come with me I had to be content with a migoi for a companion,” Tikchung said as he passed the women. He could hear the laughing even as he entered his house at the other end of the village.
By Kunzang Choden, author of Bhutanese Tales of the Yeti