回不去的西藏，走向消亡的游牧生活

For hundreds of years, nomadic Dokpa yak herders moved between the high-altitude Tibetan Plateau and the Himalayan valleys of Sikkim, following migration patterns that were crucial to their culture and their livestock. Yaks had the opportunity to breed beyond their own gene pool; young people could meet potential spouses from a wide variety of families; Dokpas ran lucrative cross-border trade operations and visited sacred places where they performed important Buddhist rituals. With the outbreak of hostilities between India and China in 1962, however, the frontier between India and Tibet was sealed. Dokpa migration routes were severed and families were trapped on whichever side of the border they happened to be on when it was closed.

数百年来，放牧牦牛的牧民在高海拔的青藏高原和锡金喜马拉雅山谷之间迁徙，遵循着对其文化和牲畜都至关重要的迁徙模式。牦牛不仅有机会超越自己的基因库进行繁殖，也让年轻人可以从大量不同的家族那里遇到未来配偶。牧民们开展着利润丰厚的跨境贸易业务，前往举行重要佛事的圣地。然而，随着印度与中国在1962年爆发敌对行动，印度和西藏之间的边界被封锁了。牧民的迁徙路线被切断，游牧家族被困在了他们当时恰好所在的一侧。

Life for the nomads became increasingly difficult as they struggled to adapt their age-old survival strategies to their newly restricted territory. For those stuck on the Sikkim side, many challenges — including land mines that blew up their yaks and economic oppression by local, non-nomadic Lachenpa people — arose and persist to this day.

面对新近受到的领土限制，这些游牧民族努力调整旧式的生存策略，他们的生活变得越发艰难。那些被困在锡金一边的人遇到了很多挑战，并且持续到今天，包括牦牛踩到地雷被炸死，以及当地非游牧民族拉钦巴人(Lachenpa)对他们的经济压迫。

With their herds suffering and their future bleak, Dokpas began abandoning the mountains a few decades ago. Today, virtually every family sends their children to boarding schools run by the Tibetan government, in Indian cities as far away as Varanasi and Bangalore – and most parents know that their children will never return to the incredibly harsh life of herding yaks between 14,000 and 18,000 feet above sea level. These photos are part of a project that I’ve been working on to document Dokpa life in north Sikkim, before it disappears forever.

随着牦牛群受困，他们的未来变得黯淡，牧民们几十年前开始离开山脉。今天，几乎每个家庭都将孩子送到瓦拉纳西和班加罗尔那些遥远的印度城市，送到西藏政府管理的寄宿学校上学，绝大多数父母都知道，孩子永远不会再回到在海拔1.4万英尺(约4300米)到1.8万英尺(约5500米)的地方放牧牦牛的那种艰苦生活中去了。在锡金北部牧民的生活永远消失之前，我一直在努力记录它，这些照片就是该项目的一部分。

Gelik left his life as a high-altitude yak herder about 20 years ago to move to the Tibetan settlement of Ravangla. He explained that when the border between India and Tibet was sealed, all Dokpas thought it was a temporary response, and that after some time they’d be allowed to migrate again. But they weren’t, and as a result, the yak-herding life became too difficult. He wants to go back to Tibet once before he dies.

大约20年前，格里克(Gelik)放弃高海拔牦牛牧民的生活，搬到了拉旺格拉(Ravangla)的藏人定居点。他说，当初印度和西藏之间的边界被封锁时，所有牧民都以为这只是暂时的，只要过一段时间，他们就能恢复迁移。但并没有，放牧牦牛的生活变得太过艰难。他想在死之前回一趟西藏。

Samten Doma milks a yak in the mountains of north Sikkim. She spends winters in the Tibetan settlement at Ravanlga, in Sikkim, and goes to the mountains to help her husband — who lives with the yaks year-round — in summer.

桑登多玛(Samten Doma)在北锡金山上挤牦牛奶。她在锡金的拉旺格拉藏人定居点过冬，夏天则去山上帮丈夫的忙——丈夫全年都跟牦牛住在一起。

Every morning, many Dokpas — who are Buddhist — pray and make offerings of fire and flour.

每天早上，很多牧民——他们是佛教徒——祈祷，用香火和面粉敬神。

Some of the last remaining Tibetan sheep in all of India belong to a Dokpa herder named Sing-ge, who during the summer stays at Phalung — at roughly 15,500 feet above sea level. Dokpas used to keep many sheep, but the regional governing council, called a “dzumsa,” which is led by the majority population in the area — the Lachenpas — set rules around the sale and slaughter of sheep, including fixing prices so low, it was no longer worth it for Dokpas to keep them. All except for one family sold theirs off.

全印度最后的藏绵羊，其中一些属于名叫辛格(Sing-ge)的牧民，夏天他住在海拔大约1.55万英尺(约合4724米)的帕龙(Phalung)。牧民们曾经畜养过很多羊只，但是该区域治理委员会“dzumsa”——由该地区的人口占多数的拉钦巴人领导——制定了销售和屠宰羊只的规则，包括把价格限定在很低的水平上，所以牧民们再养羊就不划算了。除了一个家族之外，其他人都把羊卖掉了。

A Dokpa who now lives in Thangu, a village in north Sikkim that has a large number of of Indian Army bases. It feels far away from the mountain.

一个牧民现在居住在锡金北部的村庄丹古(Thangu)，那里驻扎着大量的印度陆军。那里感觉远离高山。