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difficulty at Tobu with coolies until a pig shot; to Chingmei; error in mapping |
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14th. - Tobu appeared this morning in its true colours. Would they give us coolies ? Of course, only too delighted, three to a load to help us along the quicker, but by 8-30 not a coolie had arrived and I took a party up to the village. Here there was a continual chorus of " lolabu," " lolabu," - " will come " " will come," but not a man started. It was the custom they said to sit in the morung in the mornings till they felt moved to eat rice and then after that they would carry our loads. Threats and imprecations had not the least effect at first though after a time they gradually produced about one quarter of the number wanted, otherwise all the reply was "lolabu" and no one came. The village meant to go - some time, and each man hoped his neighbour would go first and he would escape having to carry himself. The "chiefs" have absolutely no authority and their orders had no effect at all, and when I threatened to burn the house of the biggest he laughed and obviously did not take it seriously. |
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Eventually we shot a big pig and went away. This produced a rush of coolies, but still not enough. Then I started to go back to the village ; this was a mistake as it frightened them, and the women and children, till then present in crowds, all bolted and most of the men so I turned back but the remaining coolies were quietly produced and we got away at 9-30. |
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It was a long march steeply up hill most of the way, and the Tobu coolies, who had eaten no breakfast were many of them physically unable to carry. Most of the dobashis and gaonburas with us had to carry a load for part of the way, but in the end we got to Chingmei about 5-0 p.m. very tired, I reckoned the distance at 16 miles, but it was a very tiring 16 miles for everyone. On the way we passed the deserted site of the village of Ungpang which split up generations ago into two parts, one going to form the Hawang clan of the Changs, the other the Konyak village of Angfang. We crossed the tila at Waoshu, which must be 8,000 ft. up, or very near it indeed, a rather dismal looking village of scattered houses with the dejected look that always seems to go with villages at a great height. The inhabitants are mixed Chang and Konyak. |
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I was very much disappointed with the view from Chingmei. By the map we should have been across the main range between Assam and Burma, but the mapping is wrong and this side of the range does not drain into the Namzalein as indicated, but into the Zungki and so to the Ti-ho. Between us and the Namzalein there seemed to be two more ranges, the furthest of which seemed to be joined on to the Saramati range and to form the Namzalein-Ti-Ho watershed, though I fancy it is not actually as high as the range we had already crossed. |
