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The Life of the Changpa Nomads

Connected not to a specific place but to a spiritual ideal, the Changpa Nomads of northern India move across the Roof of the World.

By Pico Iyer

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Rimmed by eternally snowcapped mountains, the low valleys of the Himalayas serve as grazing lands for the Changpas' herd of yaks, goats and sheep.

The community operates like an extended family, with even its youngest members participating in chores and rituals. Here a woman and her daughter tend their herd in the Mangzul Valley.

At dawn, under the cover of darkness and dust, two young shepherds take the community's yaks to pasture. The find good grazing in the summer months, they may have to climb to elevations of 17,000 feet by day, but still they return to camp with the herds every night.

At the Tsopkonaga encampment, in Ladakh: a young boy named Jigmet and his mother. Will his generation choose to inhabit these spectacular lands or to abandon the way of its forefathers for a more modern existence?

PHOTO: Tomas Munita

Rimmed by eternally snowcapped mountains, the low valleys of the Himalayas serve as grazing lands for the Changpas' herd of yaks, goats and sheep.
PHOTO: Tomas Munita

The community operates like an extended family, with even its youngest members participating in chores and rituals. Here a woman and her daughter tend their herd in the Mangzul Valley.
PHOTO: Tomas Munita

At dawn, under the cover of darkness and dust, two young shepherds take the community's yaks to pasture. The find good grazing in the summer months, they may have to climb to elevations of 17,000 feet by day, but still they return to camp with the herds every night.
PHOTO: Tomas Munita

At the Tsopkonaga encampment, in Ladakh: a young boy named Jigmet and his mother. Will his generation choose to inhabit these spectacular lands or to abandon the way of its forefathers for a more modern existence?
PHOTO: Tomas Munita