We sat in the dark gloom of his home, with a bit of lukewarm butter tea roaming around our hands. Another of the remaining legends of the days of trade and odyssey journey-making along the Tea Horse Road, Tseten was slow but steady to warm of the times and tales of his time along the great trade route. One memory spoken would unhinge another, which would lead to more meandering tales.
It was like this with many of these remaining participants of life along the Tea Horse Road. Stories started slowly and triggered a memory strand that in turn would lead to another. Hours and days could pass uncoiling the past. Tseten was ill during a visit near my old home of ‘Gyalthang’ (aka: Shangrila, Zhongdian, Jiantang) in northwestern Yunnan, but it didn’t prevent his old engine of a heart to rise as we sat together.
The great expanses of the Himalayas remained prominent in most of his tales and how they instructed, wreaked havoc, and formed bonds. This route and the conversations around it and the times, almost inevitably sparked something epic in people as though travelling back into a rare time portal. It always had felt that the these participants of the route, had garnered some magic dust upon them that lasted. When asked if he would mind a portrait being taken, he nodded immediately and excused himself. He would come back a few minutes later having fixed himself up. He was ready and he was stunning.
Kham (Eastern Tibet), where so much of the history of the Tea Horse Road passed through…and remains
About JeffFuchs
Bio
Having lived for most of the past decade in Asia, Fuchs’ work has centered on indigenous mountain cultures, oral histories with an obsessive interest in tea. His photos and stories have appeared on three continents in award-winning publications Kyoto Journal, TRVL, and Outpost Magazine, as well as The Spanish Expedition Society, The Earth, Silkroad Foundation, The China Post Newspaper, The Toronto Star, The South China Morning Post and Traveler amongst others. Various pieces of his work are part of private collections in Europe, North America and Asia and he serves as the Asian Editor at Large for Canada’s award-winning Outpost magazine.
Fuchs is the Wild China Explorer of the Year for 2011 for sustainable exploration of the Himalayan Trade Routes. He recently completed a month long expedition a previously undocumented ancient nomadic salt route at 4,000 metres becoming the first westerner to travel the Tsa’lam ‘salt road’ through Qinghai.
Fuchs has written on indigenous perspectives for UNESCO, and has having consulted for National Geographic. Fuchs is a member of the fabled Explorers Club, which supports sustainable exploration and research.
Jeff has worked with schools and universities, giving talks on both the importance of oral traditions, tea and mountain cultures. He has spoken to the prestigious Spanish Geographic Society in Madrid on culture and trade through the Himalayas and his sold out talk at the Museum of Nature in Canada focused on the enduring importance of oral narratives and the Himalayan trade routes.
His recently released book ‘The Ancient Tea Horse Road’ (Penguin-Viking Publishers) details his 8-month groundbreaking journey traveling and chronicling one of the world’s great trade routes, The Tea Horse Road. Fuchs is the first westerner to have completed the entire route stretching almost six thousand kilometers through the Himalayas a dozen cultures.
He makes his home in ‘Shangrila’, northwestern Yunnan upon the eastern extension of the Himalayan range where tea and mountains abound; and where he leads expeditions the award winning ‘Tea Horse Road Journey’ with Wild China along portions of the Ancient Tea Horse Road.
To keep fueled up for life Fuchs co-founded JalamTeas which keeps him deep in the green while high in the hills.
