From Vanishing Pine Nuts to

Expanding Apple Trees: A Story of

Changing Tribal Culture in the Himalaya

Aghaghia Rahimzadeh

 

From Kalpa, I walked along the sinuous, three-mile Hindustan-Tibet road toward the last village, Roghi. This section between the two hamlets is well-known for its magnificent views of the Indian Himalaya. On one side, native wind-swept forests of chilgoza pines and deodar cedars—devadāru in Sanskrit, translating to “wood of the Gods”—stretched between massive vertical cliffs, some of which hung directly over the road. Wild waterfalls pierced through canyons continuing the long drop to where the Sutlej River, some two thousand precipitous feet below me, snaked across the valley floor. High altitude pasturelands lay in the upper reaches where shepherds still graze their flocks of sheep and goats. On the other side was the vast Kinnaur Valley in this remote region of Western Himalaya. Fold upon fold of mountains in the mighty Kinner Kailash Range, sacred to both Buddhist and Hindus, dominated the landscape. Jorkanden, at 21,237 feet, the tallest of Kinner Kailash’s peaks, rose into the deep blue sky, while villages and apple orchards scattered across the terrain making their way up to the snowline.
 
 

 
Last year, I was continuing my research in the Kinnaur District in the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. I had been visiting this region for a decade collecting data for my dissertation research, studying Kinnaur’s booming apple economy and its consequences on the Kinnauri society and environment in a relatively short period. Since receiving my doctorate in Environmental Science, Policy, and Management three years ago, I have continued my research in Kinnaur and deepened my friendships with the Kinnauri Tribal Peoples. I am charmed by this faraway Himalayan outpost, its tribal traditions, and the rapid pace of change it faces. In the course of the last decade, I’ve witnessed the apple economy become more precarious with each passing season as warming temperatures, decreasing snowfall, and periodic landslides have threatened the changing abundant harvest. On this trip, I wanted to learn more about the chilgoza pine nuts and their socio-ecological and economic role in the region. I was curious to learn why this once-significant wild crop was declining in production, and whether preserving the chilgoza might mitigate any adverse effects climate change could have on the local apple economy.

The glaciers on the surrounding mountains have shrunk in size as winters become shorter and milder. The rain shadowed region has historically received little rain and heavy snow, but today the opposite is happening and thus disrupting the water supplies. Glaciers and snowmelt provide the only source of water for irrigation. Like an indicator species, the Himalayan highlands are an indicator place, and among one of the first to feel the impact of climate change. My friends in some villages have already faced water shortages and have had to truck water from the river thousands of feet below to irrigate their orchards high up on the mountain. Other friends have lost their homes and orchards from major landslides caused by heavy rains in an area already susceptible to erosion. These warmer winters no longer kill off pests and diseases so I have noticed the Kinnauris spraying their orchards with chemicals more frequently. With each indiscriminate spray, beneficial pollinators are killed off, and because of the chemicals, the orchards require more water.

As I walked on this dilapidated road, I paid close attention to my surrounding, taking in every peak soaring to the heavens, every tree busy with native chirping birds, and the Himalayan Eagle circling the sky above, all the while remaining attentive to avoid rocks that periodically tumbled down the cliff shattering on the road.

Constructed in the 1850s on an antiquated and important trade route in the region that was locally known as the Wool Road, the Hindustan-Tibet Road served as one of the arteries of the ancient Silk Road that connected Tibet to the Indian Plains. Now, as modernization sweeps through Kinnaur, this road is continually under construction from the increasing rock and landslides.

In the past, instead of using currency, the Kinnauri Tribal Peoples depended on pastoralism, such as grazing sheep and goat whose wool is woven into colorful textiles. They also bartered and engaged in subsistence farming for their survival, which provided a safety net in this harsh region. They ventured on trade migrations with their animal herds to their neighboring region of Tibet and back toward the Indian Plains. Vital to the local and regional barter economy, the Kinnauris brought wool, cumin, medicinal herbs, salt, goats, and sheep in exchange for essential goods such as grains, sugar, and cotton clothing. One of the main commodities with which the Kinnauris traded for these goods was the chilgoza pine nut, produced by a wild forested pine tree native to small pockets in Western Himalaya. The chilgoza pine is a robust tree that can endure harsh growing conditions, surviving in little soil and extreme cold and drought at high altitudes, but may not be able to survive modernization and climate change.
 
 

 
The trees can live to be 150 to 200 years old and require about 30 years of maturity before they begin to produce cones and seeds. Yet pine nuts, which are a valued culinary ingredient throughout Asia, the Middle East, Europe, and more recently, North America, are costly—due in large part to the difficulty in extracting the small seeds from the pine cones. Chilgoza provided the only means of monetary revenue prior to the emergence of the market economy of the 1950s that introduced apples as a cash crop for export. With the success of apple production, however, the Kinnauris are no longer dependent on the wild crop and now the indigenous knowledge that formerly enabled the trees to thrive is rapidly being lost thus, replacing the chilgoza as one of the sources of Kinnaur’s local economy.

As I neared the village of Roghi, I cut to the left through apple orchards, taking a small path down into the valley. The narrow trail ran parallel to the irrigation stream that was flowing with water from far away mountaintops. Himalayan Silver Mint lined the irrigation channel, its cool and pungent scent filling the air. The warm October afternoon was gradually changing to autumn. October is a busy month, not only because it is apple harvest season, but also it is the start of wedding season, in conjunction with the Bengali tourist month where people from the far away state of West Bengal travel to the region to enjoy the cool and fresh mountain air.

Down the path, two- to three-year-old apple saplings had been planted in a tiny parcel of land on the edge of a house. These days, people plant apple trees on any accessible bare land. In the distance, laborers were shouting and laughing as they harvested apples from the nearby orchards.

I reached the village proper and walked through the newly restored Roghi Temple with its stone slabbed roof and woodwork carved with motifs of flowers and birds that embody the landscape, as well as lizards or tigers or other symbolic animals that are believed to ward off evil spirits.
 
 

 
Further down, the sound of chatter alerted me to a group of two men and eight women sitting in a circle in a courtyard, surrounded by huge piles of chilgoza pinecones, tossing empty shells onto the mounds. I realized they were extracting the pine nuts from the cones. I recognized Mr. Dev Raj and his daughter-in-law, Sujata, two people I had met on one of my previous visits to Roghi Village. Surprised to see a foreigner in the heart of the village, we exchanged greetings and after joining them in their circle, they offered me tea and a plate of fresh buttery and rich chilgoza pine nuts. Despite being small, the seeds are packed with oil and once toasted, their nutty flavor and crunch make them nearly addictive.

“How was the chilgoza harvest this year?” I asked.

“We only harvested about 300 to 400 kilos,” one woman said as she wiped her hands with a rag.

“Last year we harvested even less than what we collected this year because we had even less snow then.”

“When there is little snow, the ground is dry, so the tree dries up and doesn’t produce many cones,” Mr. Dev Raj explained.

I had been hearing similar sentiments from people all over Kinnaur. Chilgoza pine trees have adapted to a specific climactic condition requiring heavy winter snow. The warm winters have been affecting the health of the chilgoza trees and reducing seed production, while the drier seasons disrupt regeneration of the chilgoza seeds. According to international climate studies, the average temperature rate at which the Western Himalaya is warming is significantly higher than the rise in overall global temperatures, and this disparity is projected to continue.

Near the mounds of cones, bulky burlap sacks of recently-harvested, large, and heavy pinecones were scattered around the courtyard. Mr. Dev Raj and the other man broke open each of the chilgoza pinecones with a small tool, slicing the cones into four parts and tossing them in the middle of the circle. The women then took the sliced cones, tore them open, and used their fingers to pull each of the seeds out from under the scale.

“Can I help?” I asked.

They all burst into laughter. One elder woman more vocal than the others roared, “You probably can’t do this. You have delicate hands and soft skin.” Erupting into another round of laughter, they shifted and tossed me a sack to sit on and join them in the circle.

I took quick glances at the others in the group. The women swiftly deseeded the cones with their thick callused hands, hands which held the stories of decades of hard work at this severe high mountain region. For ages, Kinnauris have been participating in this kind of collective work, although the practice is rapidly being forgotten by new generations already reliant on the apple economy, which is now threatened by climate change as the orchards become too hot and dry to sustain the export crop. Unfortunately, cooperative labor practices, such as this group processing chilgoza, are becoming rare as people rely on migrant laborers to conduct much of their work.

Prior to the cash economy, Kinnauris helped each other prepare functions, harvest traditional crops, and construct homes, grain storage, or water mills. They rejoiced and celebrated when their projects were completed while the hosts provided local musicians for dancing, food such as chilta made from the traditional crops such as buckwheat, and homemade alcohol brewed from apricots and grapes. These networks of cooperative labor ease the strenuous activities and make their effort more efficient. By working together, villagers bond and become dedicated to one another, knowing that they can count on each other whenever in need.

With the newfound prosperity from the apple economy, Kinnauris are now able to hire outside seasonal laborers to conduct much of their work in the fields and orchards. In the village, a few activities still remain where households must contribute their collective labor, including building and maintaining the many irrigation channels and village foot paths, but even these communal activities are waning. What once would have been a cooperative labor arrangement where people worked together and received a share of the chilgoza at the end of harvest, is now an opportunity for wages. These women I was sitting with were relatives and kin of the male contractor who had hired them. They received between 3,500 to 5,000 Rupees ($50-70 USD) for about fifteen days of work.

Sensing all eyes on me, I nervously picked up a sliced cone and began extracting the seeds. I pulled the seeds out from under the scales of the cones and felt the sap sticking to my hands. The woman next to me pushed one of the small bowls filled with cooking oil toward me. They frequently submerged their hands in oil to prevent the thick sap from sticking to their fingers. I emulated them, wiping any residual sap from my oily hands with a cloth, and continued with ease.
 
 

 
“Why is chilgoza important to you?” I asked the group.

“Chilgoza is good for our health, it gives our bodies fat and protein, especially during the snow season,” one of the women offered as she tossed an emptied pinecone onto the mound behind her.

Her comment was perceptive, as pine nuts provide a considerable source of fat, carbohydrates, proteins, and dietary fibers, especially during long winter months when access to nutritious food was once difficult for people living at such high altitudes.

“Do you use any other part of the tree?” I asked as I dipped my fingers into the oil, wiping the sap off.

“The tree keeps giving. We use the needles as mulch to keep moisture in the soil. They also act as a natural fertilizer and improve soil fertility,” one of the men explained as he banged his hand tool on a pine cone slicing it in quarters.

I nodded, impressed with their scientific knowledge. Having depended on subsistence agro-pastoralism for generations, they are intimately aware of agricultural and environmental science more than many Westerners appreciate. As we worked, he continued. “Chilgoza trees are important to us because they grow on shallow and rocky soil and hold the slope together.” Because large-scale erosion is common to these areas, tree roots play an important role in preventing erosion.

“Chilgoza is God’s gift to Kinnaur,” an elder woman announced. “The trees don’t need any water or fertilizer, and they grow wild. They keep giving to us in different ways.” Her comment was met with a round of agreement, and I gained deeper awareness for the cultural importance of these simple, but valuable, pinecones.

After extracting the seeds, we tossed the emptied cones onto a large pile behind us. Later, they would be used as fuel in the traditional woodstoves found in every Kinnauri kitchen. Although removing the seeds was difficult, my small hands managed, and the group, especially the vocal elder woman, offered an approving smile. Finding pinesap on my clothes, hair, phone, and camera, and my wrists tingling with the pain of repetitive motion, I was impressed with the ease with which these women spent two weeks, eight to nine hours daily, engaged in the tedious work. I now had a deeper appreciation for every pine nut I enjoyed eating and every chilgoza garland I saw.

The sun was setting indicating it was time for me to return to Kalpa. After I left the group, I walked to the bus stand through the old part of Roghi with ancient buildings constructed from wood, a stark contrast to the enormous new cement buildings sprouting in Kinnaur’s villages.

The sounds of unplanned development ricocheted across the valley, as hammers banged, machines roared, and boards sawed, demonstrating the growth and wealth that the apple economy has brought to Kinnaur so far. Although I marveled at the progress, I wondered how sustainable all this affluence and growth were, considering the looming changes in the climate and water problems ahead.

The bus leaving Roghi was late, so I hitched a ride back to Kalpa from Mr. B.S. Negi, who turned out to be an apple and chilgoza contractor from the village of Pangi, a few kilometers in the opposite direction on the Hindustan-Tibet Road. He was in his fifties, a jovial and kind looking man who contracted the harvests of chilgoza all over Kinnaur. That fall, he was selling a box of 25-28 kilos of apples for 2,000 Rupees (about $28). Comparably, just one kilo of chilgoza pine nuts was sold between 1,500- 2,000 Rupees ($21-28). This is a considerable price difference locally, but makes sense because one kilo of pine nuts is much more difficult to harvest and extract than a kilo of apples.

After we picked up another hitchhiker, a young woman who was going to pick up her daughter from school, I asked Mr. Negi, “Why chilgoza was declining in Kinnaur?”
“Chilgoza is decreasing because of the apple trees,” he explained, driving along the road that curved around a precipitous cliff some two thousand feet below us. “To maintain chilgoza is easy. But these days people like working with apple trees, which is neat and clean. Apple trees give us more money than chilgoza so people are cutting their chilgoza trees and replacing them with apples.”

The hitchhiker in the back agreed. “One good apple tree can fill ten boxes, which comes to about 10,000 Rupees ($140) minimum. But these days the chilgoza may only give us 2,000 to 3,000 Rupees ($28-42).”

Although chilgoza offers a supplementary source of income and a kilo of pine nuts fetches more than a kilo of apples, there is a bigger market for apples. The total returns from the latter is much higher. Also, an apple tree produces much more than a chilgoza tree. But if the apple trees don’t produce, selling chilgoza may mean the difference between hunger and subsistence.

Related to the market is the changing harvesting practices of chilgoza. Each village has rights to its common chilgoza forests. Traditionally, every autumn, villagers collectively harvested the pinecones from their village forests. Men climbed the trees and plucked the ripe pinecones with a sickle, while the women collected the fallen cones. Villagers generally only harvested the ripe cones and left the smaller, younger cones for the following year’s harvest. The mature cones that were difficult to reach were left on the branch, which opened and released their seeds and potentially regenerated into new chilgoza trees. The cones were then deseeded and the pine nuts were equally distributed among all the village households.

In the last several decades, unsustainable commercial harvesting methods have replaced traditional harvesting that had enabled the abundant production of pinecones. Because the apple harvest happens simultaneously with the chilgoza harvest, Kinnauris place most of their attention on the apples while they hire migrant laborers from Nepal to harvest both crops. Laboring has taken on a social stigma in which fewer Kinnauris participate. One consequence of this shift is that younger generations may be freed form labor, but they are now more dependent on earning cash to pay the laborers.

The shift to hired labor has also come at a great cost to the environment. Unlike the traditional harvesting methods, where only the ripest cones were harvested, the hired laborers collect every cone on the branch regardless of its maturity. To collect a fully-grown cone suspended at the end of a branch, they chop the entire branch, which also takes out unripe cones that would potentially drop their seeds for regeneration of the tree or would have matured for the following year’s harvest. Because of these modern-day commercial practices, there is little likelihood that the tree can reproduce naturally and hence, the once extent chilgoza forests are facing a decline.

As the chilgoza vanish, it is not only the economic safety net the cones provide that will affect the Kinnauris. Chilgoza also plays an important role in the local culture and is deeply tied to Kinnauri tribal identity with its use during weddings, religious ceremonies, and funerals. I learned this when my host, Prema Ji, with whose family I was staying in the village of Kalpa, invited me to attend our neighbor, Yog Raj’s, wedding. I was acquainted with Yog Raj’s father, Mr. Suraj Lala, who owned the beautiful apple orchard across from my room. The multiple-day wedding promised to be an outstanding event.

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Prema Ji was dressed in her finest outfit with her long, thick braid cascading from her traditional green Kinnauri hat. I was touched to see her wearing the purple Kashmiri shawl I had gifted her the previous year. Draped over her forearm were strands of malas, beaded garlands, that she had been making for several weeks. As part of a Kinnauri tradition, chilgoza pine nuts, native wild apricot kernels, and local walnuts are expertly strung into these beautiful garlands and offered as gifts during important festivities and religious ceremonies. Prema Ji had sat outside in the sun for several hours every day one-by-one breaking open the shells with a stone. She then threaded needle to bead each into strands of long garlands. It was a tedious process, yet an important one in Kinnaur. The garlands Prema Ji had been so carefully preparing would be offered to Mr. Suraj Lal’s family during a ritual at the wedding.

While Prema Ji was in her finest festive outfit, I was dressed in my typical casual travel clothes, wool shirt, sturdy hiking pants, scarf, and a down jacket, that provided comfort and warmth at this high elevation region. With a camera over my shoulder, and heavy strands of chilgoza garlands around Prema Ji’s forearm, we left the compound at around noon and headed to the wedding festivities at Mr. Suraj Lal’s large pink house that was a short distance away on the hill above Prema Ji’s property.
 
 

 
Other people from the wedding were coming and going, some in a hurry, others leisurely acknowledging each other as they passed. As we made our way up the steep path, we were greeted by people in their finest celebratory outfits. Men and women were both wearing their traditional green Kinnauri woolen hats locally known as tephang. During festivities and important functions, tephangs are adorned with dried seedpods, some of which are dyed in green, pink, blue, and purple colors, and offered as gifts during different celebratory occasions. Men in their woolen suits and jeans walked in groups, their shoulders draped in traditional hand-loomed woolen stoles with a white background and intricate colorful Kinnauri motifs. Women holding strands of chilgoza garlands were wearing their traditional green velvet jackets or woolen vests and woolen shawls, their long black braids draping over their backs from under their Kinnauri hats. People saluted each other on the path. Many had just completed their apple harvest and were now able to take a break from orchard work.

A group of men rested against the short stone wall of an enclosed apple orchard, catching their breath from the steep climb and the thin air at this high-altitude region. We passed an area on the path with few stones, some small branches and a handful of grains of rice indicating where a prayer offering had been made to ward off evil spirits from the wedding celebration.

As Prema Ji and I reached the house, I was stunned to see a scrolling electronic message board above the doorway. The message, in English, was advertising a luxury tent that I assumed had been rented for the wedding. The advance technology of the sign seemed particularly out of place in such a remote village.
 
 

 
“Greetings, welcome, please come in,” Yog Raj beckoned us inside. He was sitting in a chair near the doorway taking a break from the many jovial rituals involved in a Kinnauri wedding.
We walked in, passed the cowshed and entered a packed courtyard of Kinnauri women. My cheeks warmed as an outsider with improper attire, but the women’s smiles and warm greetings welcomed me and made me feel at home. Children ran around playing in the courtyard. People sitting on carpets on the second and the third-floor balconies were sipping tea. Besides the groom’s relatives, I could only see a few men among all the women.

The large, three-storied house along with the courtyard were extravagantly embellished with colorful party decorations. The lavish setting was no real surprise since the prosperity of the apple economy has brought displays of conspicuous consumption to Kinnaur. During wedding celebrations such as this, outdoing each other with food, gifts, alcohol, and increasingly elaborate functions has become in vogue. Large, lavish houses with 20 to 30 rooms, most of which stay empty throughout the year, are replacing beautiful traditional homes of more modest size. Similar patterns are visible as people order the latest products on Amazon or buy new and costly cars and trucks. After every apple harvest in the fall, the number of vehicles increases. Villages are experiencing an unprecedented conundrum as insufficient parking areas compete for scarce land because these old villages were never developed with vehicles in mind. Many of the homes like Mr. Suraj Lal’s are only accessible by walking on small village paths. People must park their cars at the entrance of the villages, which cannot accommodate the increasing number of vehicles.

Most Kinnauris, such as Mr. Suraj Lal, are deservedly enjoying a comfortable lifestyle. How sustainable such a way of life will prove to be, as the climate continues to warm and affect the health of the orchards, remains unknown. Apples require a certain number of chilling hours in the winter season depending on the elevation at which they are grown. Insufficient chilling, an increase in both minimum and maximum temperatures, and erratic precipitation, affects apple production and the quality of fruit. How long can this economic boom, based on a single cash crop, continue? For the moment, the wealth the apples have brought was on full display at the wedding party.

About fifty or so women of all ages sat on plastic chairs in the courtyard, many of whom I recognized from the village of Kalpa and other surrounding villages. They were drinking sweet milk tea and catching up with their friends, family, and neighbors who had converged from different villages around Kinnaur to attend the wedding. Some of the younger women were on their mobile phones, texting, taking selfies and posting their images on social media.

I followed Prema Ji to the orchard behind the house where clusters of neighbors and family members had assembled in different groupings preparing the wedding feast. Large pots of food including rice, dal, chicken, and lamb were steaming over open fires tended by men who were sipping glasses of a local apple and apricot alcoholic brew on the side, becoming merrier by the minute. The smell of fresh rotis filled the atmosphere. Prema Ji joined a group of women under the shade of some apple trees. She sat with them in a circle around a large bowl of dough, joining a few of the women taking a handful of dough, flattening it first with their hands, then with a roller. They passed the flattened dough to another group of women who dropped the rotis into a flat pan on an open fire turning them from side to side. The hot steaming bread was then placed inside a basket that was covered with a thick cloth to preserve the heat.
 
 

 
Amidst the rich aromas, the familiar stench of burning plastic permeated the air, a smell that is sadly pervasive in this rural area. Two large barrels smoldered, and all the wedding garbage, including plastic items and aluminum-lined paper plates, were being dumped inside the burning barrels. After all my years in the Global South, the incongruity of the burning garbage, especially plastic, in the middle of the raw beauty of the landscape, was still inconceivable to grasp.

Here in this Himalayan region, despite the grip of the market economy of the last three to four decades, there is no viable option for discarding non-biodegradable waste. Villages of Kinnaur, and elsewhere in remote Himalaya, still lack in proper waste management system. Instead, much of the garbage is either burned, or dumped in rivers, creeks, and other waterways. People in the Himalaya, like so many others around the world who live with pollution, have learned to live with the smell and presence of the toxins.

Back in the courtyard, while sipping another cup of sweet tea and waiting for the next event, a traditional Kinnauri dance, the two young women next to me, Nilhi and Adhita, introduced themselves; they were from Kalpa. In between looking at their Facebook and Instagram pages, we engaged in a conversation.

“Do you have any chilgoza trees?” I asked, pointing to their basket filled with strands of chilgoza garlands.

Nilha, looking up from her phone, answered. “Yes, once we had about 60-70 trees. But now we have about 40 to 45 trees.” She clicked a selfie of herself and Adhita, then smiled at me. “After we planted our new apple orchards several years back, we had to cut some of the chilgoza trees because the area was too shady for the apple trees.”

“We also have to cut the chilgoza branches every year to get light for our orchard,” Adhita added. “In the past, we were harvesting 60 to 80 kilos of chilgoza, but now we’re harvesting maybe about 25 to 30 kilos.”

I had witnessed similar accounts myself of people either completely removing their private chilgoza trees, or regularly cutting the chilgoza branches to provide light for their newly developing apple orchards. After frequent chopping of branches, a tree will eventually stop producing all together.

“But chilgoza is part of your Kinnauri culture and identity,” I said.

“Yes, very much so. It’s true that people are focused on their apple orchards and making money from apples,” Adhita gestured toward the apple orchards in the distance. “This doesn’t mean that chilgoza is no longer important for us.”

The conversation stopped when we noticed a group of people preparing for a dance. My friends went back to taking selfies in tens of different configurations and angles in flirtatious poses, which they then posted on social media. Despite their geographical remoteness, the Kinnauris have been as integrated into the global telecommunications culture as many around the world, and perhaps, with time, this social connection may lead to economic opportunities mitigating the threat of climate change. But for now, that transformation is slow as the Kinnauris retain their distinct cultural identities.

The chatter quieted and a procession of men and women sauntered down the stairs and into the courtyard to entertain us with a Nati. Men with hand-woven traditional stoles around their necks and their adorned Kinnauri hats led the procession, followed by women festooned in customary Kinnauri ornaments of silver and gold and dressed in their fine traditional garb of typical green and maroon colors including green velvet jackets, long woolen skirts, and beautiful hand-woven shawls around their shoulders. All wore the chilgoza garlands, which symbolize the linking of different families through marriage unions. Forming a human chain with their arms crossed before them and their hands linking them together and with coordinated steps, they danced in a circle around the courtyard, singing folksongs in high-pitched voices, their heavily-adorned bodies dipping and bowing to the rhythm of the songs. These dances, performed during festivities, religious ceremonies, and times of abundant harvest, tell a story of the natural beauty of the surrounding mountainscape, including the rushing highland streams and the cooling alpine breeze.

When the dance ended, a large blue tarp was placed on the ground in the middle of the courtyard. Two long runner carpets were placed on the edges of the tarp parallel to each other. The bride and groom, including their close family members, trickled in taking their seat on the carpets. As the son of a traditional polyandrous union, the groom’s two fathers sat together, proud of their son’s marriage despite it being a modern monogamous one.

With the start of the next event, the groom’s mother, Ms. Shyam Sarani Ji, embellished in her beautiful woolen shawl and long woolen skirt, made her way around the circle of family members. She was accompanied by her daughter who carried garlands of chilgoza and apricot kernels. As they approached the people sitting on the carpets, the groom’s mother placed a chilgoza garland around each person’s neck and pinned the dried seed pods to each of their Kinnauri hats, sealing the marriage with this exchange.
 
 

 
This ceremony and the garlands held the stories of continuity and change, the stories of once abundant chilgoza forests that covered the area expansively, stories of communal bonding and hours of skilled labor, and stories of the group of women in the village of Roghi. Each garland holds a story, and thus each represents an ancient history.

Once the groom’s mother weighted everyone down with the garlands, it was time for the rest of the guests to do the same and within minutes the courtyard turned into chaos. The guests lined up, each woman draped with heavy strands of chilgoza garlands and seedpods. As they waited their turns, the women patiently untangled the garlands preparing them for their offerings. About 50 chattering colorful women approached each of the bride and the groom’s family members, and one-by-one, they first draped a garland around each person’s neck, then pinned colorful seedpods on their hats.

The receiving family members were gradually loaded down under the bulk of the garlands, the colorful seedpods dangling from their hats. It was a festive spectacle. Others around the courtyard were watching from the staircases and balconies as they sipped milk tea. I felt gratitude for the opportunity to witness this generations-old custom right here at my neighbor’s home and recognized all that it held. Lavish weddings such as this one mark the changing culture of Kinnaur. The prosperity that has reached the region is only as secure as the apple trees themselves. Should apples no longer produce, such weddings too, may no longer be as lavishly planned.
 
 

 
Kinnauris continue to praise the chilgoza because it is an important part of their cultural identity, and while the treasured cones are no longer their primary source of subsistence, they continue to provide a supplementary source of income. Yet, even that addition to their economy is threatened as the drive for modernity and expansion overshadows the preservation of the chilgoza pine forest. The wedding left me wondering how much longer will people be able to continue to use chilgoza pine nuts for their traditional rituals given the current deteriorating health of the chilgoza forest.

This decline has been noted beyond the Himalaya. In 1998, the chilgoza forests were placed on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species under the category of Lower Risk/Near Threatened, and in 2013 they were reclassified as “Near Threatened.”

Although the wedding ceremony would continue for many more days and nights, I bid goodbye and walked down the path returning to my room. Clouds had gathered, the way they did every late afternoon, and a light breeze cooled the air. Others hurried back to their homes from their orchards. A group of laborers conversed happily, relieved that their hard day of work had come to an end, and that now they would be able to clean up and enjoy a simple meal before starting another long day of work again in the morning. Expanses of apple orchards of various sizes spread into the upper reaches of the mountains and the forestlands, the warming climate having made it possible to grow apples in altitudes that just fifteen to twenty years before, would have been unthinkable. Even these areas will soon grow too warm for apples.

I gazed at the newly developed roads that meandered up through the forest, bringing more erosion and loss of forest cover to the region. What will be the fate of all this progress and development with the looming water problems? I fear the future may be a dark one, as climate change threatens the tenuous agricultural economy. Still, the Kinnauris have survived for centuries in these fragile mountains. Will their resilience enable them to overcome any threats from climate change they face? One thing is certain, however. At this high elevation, so close to the sky, the Kinnauris may be among one of the first to answer that question.
 
 

 

Author’s Note

Regarding people’s titles, it depends on the person’s age, gender, and relationship to me. I have provided “Mr.” to all elder men. Ms. Shyam Sarani Ji, the groom’s mother, is an elder, so she receives the “Ms.” Other folks in the essay are younger than me, so culturally, they wouldn’t receive “Mr. or Ms.” However, I have added “Ji” to Prema’s name throughout the essay. “Ji” is a gender-neutral honorific term of respect.

 

Aghaghia Rahimzadeh is a Fulbright Fellow with a doctorate in Environmental Science, Policy, and Management from UC Berkeley. She has spent the last decade conducting research in remote mountain communities in Kinnaur, Western Himalaya, that investigates the social implications of climate change. When she is not researching or writing, she takes educational tours to the Himalaya, practices Iyengar Yoga, backpacks, and hikes the trails on beloved Mt. Tamalpais.