Life of a Nepalese Porters in Himalayan locale

My dear companions let us spare some time, sit back and go through this post. As many of us live our lives in a comfortable environment and we enjoy our life in a luxurious way. But have you noticed there are also some people in our human community who are struggling to live their lives, struggling for food, struggling to secure a good life for their family, and the people who exhaust themself to the limit to earn their daily bread just simply to survive in this world? Well my dear friends I am talking about those people who carry enormous loads on their back using a head strap called Namlo in the local language and head towards their destination either in rainy, summer, or bone-chilling winter seasons. Yes, I am talking about the Porter’s (Bhariya Dai in local language) who sacrifice their health to earn some amount of money to give their family a better future. In my hometown Kurseong (Land of White Orchids) we get to see a lot of Porter’s walking on the roads carrying enormous loads on their back. Lots of them sitting near the roadside and some of them loitering around the Motor-station waiting for the customers to start their daily work by offering their services as a carrier or a bearer. They are an essential part of Hill’s daily life as they ship almost every item like furniture, ration goods items, and other heavy goods. Most of the Porter’s in the hills come from the neighboring country Nepal to secure a better life for their family back at home. And among them, 30 percent are women porters. We normal people cannot imagine living a life of a porter. In our hilly region we see them working from the crack of dawn to the late hours of darkness or in other words, a life of a porter is hilarious and miserable as they have to engage themself in all kinds of odd jobs starting from carrying heavy luggage in Railway stations, grocery shop, ration shop with a meager charge which is often bargained to further lower.  Although technology has advanced to a far-reaching level and slavery has decreased, the role of carriers for specialized transport services remains strong to date.

One day early morning I rush to the LPG distribution agency in my home town (Kurseong) to book a gas after finishing the procedure I was able to get new refill gas and I came out of the agency and started looking for a porter(Bhariya Dai) and mostly all of them were engaged with their work and waiting outside for quite a long time a middle-aged man approached towards me and start talking with me and offered a service to carry the new refill gas from the agency to my home but as I saw that person he was old and I asked him twice thrice that will you be able to carry this load and able to walk several upstairs and the porter replied yes but still, I was not sure to hire him for this work and I replied to him that you will not be able to carry and walk almost 20 minutes from here to my place but this man started telling me that he is not able to get a job because of his old age and health. He requested me many times and kept on telling me if he did not engage himself for work he will not be able to feed himself as well as his family. I offered him some money as a help to him but this person refuses to accept the money as a kind help and again said me to hire him to carry the refill gas and as there was no option for me but to hire him and he brought his head strap (Namlo in local language) and put it around the gas cylinder and tied it and I helped him to carry it on the back. While heading towards my home I was also helping him from the backside as there was many upstairs to walk through and we finally reached home and then invited him inside my house and told him to relax for a while because he was out of his breath and sweating and I offered him a glass of water to drink and some food to eat as I watched him his hand was trembling and was not able to hold the glass properly  and I told him that why are you engaging yourself in such hard work. He looked at me smiled and simply answered just to survive and then again he said this is our life as a porter.

Last but not least a small request to my dear companions please respect people and their job and try to put yourselves in their shoes and see the world through their prospective.