Essay: ‘I stood and watched a place I loved vanish’

For 11 years I stayed in the same hotel during my visits to Syabru Besi, a small Nepali town that sat high on a ridge where the trail to the Langtang Valley begins. Langtang is one of Nepal’s most beautiful trekking routes, a path that climbs until the valley opens up and the mountains fill every direction, close enough to feel like you could reach out and touch them. In all that time, the hotel room never changed, and neither did the sound. At night I could hear the Trishuli River, but I could never see it. It ran down the gorge, far below the village. Just to catch a glimpse of that thin silver line of water, you had to walk out to the edge of the village, lean over the ridge, and search for it.