Entering the Langza village what followed that is not just about seeking a comfortable village home stay, but lot more about the experience of facing a different life and living traditions. After reaching Kaza this is the first time that we are having a view and experience of a Spitian village with its square white colored houses, organic Spitian farming, religious tradition and above all the simplicity and plentitude in their domestic life. In a way in our summer trekking in the Spiti valley Langza had been our gateway to the life and nature of picturesque high altitude villages of Spiti.
Spitian houses are built by stone and mud and shaped like boxes with bold features, like bold outlines below the roof and surrounding the broad windows with dark color and all the houses baring a few exceptions in this whole route are white colored. The lush green valley around Langza is full of patches of farmland where the most common vegetable that is cultivated this time of the year is pea and Spitian pea as we have been informed several occasions are the most demandable and fetches good price in the market. The scarcity of the water is a constant problem in Spiti and many villages in this region depend on channelizing the glacier born water through the village sewage system for farming and in the daytime in the summer the whole family remains busy in the farmland barring the children. It took close to six hours of steep trekking to reach Langza and when we reached in the fading sun of the late afternoon it took us sometime to find someone in the alleys of the village to ask regarding the home stay accommodations in Langza village provided by some villagers under the ecotourism project.
After fixing our accommodation, we roamed around the village a little. Sonam, a flamboyant boy at his teen took us to the valley in lower part of Langza. On the way the golden sun over the lush green and wide open valley made as dumbstruck with its fresh, virgin beauty and as we walked on we passed a farmland where for the first time we saw a family tilting the land with yaks. Temperature was coming down steadily as the sun was fading in the west and chilling wind continued to blow. We took refuge in the neatly furnished broad dining cum kitchen room of Sonam's house. Spitian kitchen rooms are placed in the center of all the activities in the family and house. With chimney cum fireplace cum oven in the middle of the room people sit around in thick cushions and carpets and there they eat, gossip, take tea and watch television. The bright faces of Sonam and other children accompanied the warmth of the fire in hospitality and made lasting impression deep in our memory lane.
Our experience of the summer trekking in the Spiti valley faced many jewels on the road and the Buddha statue in Langza is one of the most striking among them. In the early morning we set for the statue of Buddha up above the village and the only primary school in the village just beside it. The towering sitting Buddha in Langza is probably one of the rare open air statues of Buddha in the entire Himalaya and we were just spellbound facing it in the glaringly fresh morning sun. This huge orange colored Buddha is a visual marvel with green backdrop on one side and snow covered peak on the other side. We photographed the children of the village assembled in the little courtyard of their school, we distributed candy among them and their rough faces continued to stare at the lenses with remoteness and wonder. Yesterday we decided to take Sonam along with us up to our next destination in Komic and as he came with a small backpack and that same refreshing smile, we set out for our journey.
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