Telling old lives' tales

For the past three months a new rhythm runs through the days of Kwoico Salil Mukhiarsquos life in Kathmandu Nepal The 35yearold who founded Acoustic Traditional an organisation which promotes oral storytelling and tribal folklore spends all his time meeting NGOs and historians who work with Nepalrsquos indigenous tribes drawing up meticulous maps of remote hilly regions and having long chats with locals over teaAcoustic Traditionalrsquos founder Kwoico Salil MukhiaOn May 1 Mukhia launched the project Stories On The Verge which looks at ldquorecording and retelling some of the last stories and storytellers of critically endangered cultures in Asia with a specific focus on Eastern HimalayasrdquoHis team with Merek Lepcha second from right the oldest shaman in upper Dzongu Sikkim PicsKwoico Salil MukhiaOver the next three and a half years Mukhia will travel across Nepal NorthEast India Bhutan Burma rainforests of Asia and other Southeast Asian countries where he will organise storytelling sessions and help the project culminate in a feature film on the communitiesAcoustic Traditional is working with NGO Nirbhaya Manch and the National Foundation for Development of Indigenous Nationalities in Nepal However for the project to achieve the unprecedented Mukhia must fight against timeldquoIn most cases merely 80200 members of these critically endangered tribes remain which means that we must reach them before their last storytellers pass away Moreover we donrsquot want these stories to simply end up in our Indian archives so we will disseminate these tales on the way through storytelling sessions and workshopsrdquoTale of two storiesStories On The Verge is inspired by two incidents in Mukhiarsquos life which haunt him till date Three years ago Mukhia heard of the death of one of the last shamans in SikkimHe was the sole practitioner of an 800yearold tradition of rituals of the Lepcha community and the only one who knew a specific form of rites to worship Mount KanchendzongaldquoWe had begun documenting that ritual a few days before he passed away and had a long way to go Now his tradition those stories and the ritual is lost foreverrdquo says Mukhia regretfullySoon after another shaman who was believed to be the guardian of Eastern Sikkim and was the last worshipper of the river Teesta passed away before Mukhia and his team could document his storiesldquoI knew then that if I have to do anything worthwhile to preserve tribal storytelling it has to be done fastrdquo says Mukhia He decided to start in Kathmandu where he was a music teacher in his 20sldquoIf yoursquore doing anything related to Himalayan cultures Kathmandu is the place to begin Our cultures are porous and juxtaposing our ancient stories throws up startling similarities in nature and formrdquo he addsIn Nepal Mukhia will kickstart the documentation process with the Raute community Only 1000 members remain of this nomadic tribe and the population is scattered in Nepalrsquos remotest regionsOver June Mukhia will travel to Mustang district where the Rautes are believed to reside Next he will document the stories of the Kiranti group of tribal communities who have a distinct tradition of oral storytellingldquoThe Kiranti group has many a Naso storyteller both men and women who may be shamans too They have a robust tradition wherein Nasos relate the Mundum which are their scared verses much like the Vedas in HinduismThe Mundum are not religious ndash they focus on how life must be lived They have never been written down so I hope to reach out to the Nasos and preserve this oral traditionrdquo says MukhiaReturn to the rootsFor Mukhia Stories On The Verge is as much about finding his own roots as it is about documenting endangered cultures As a child Mukhia heard folklore of his community Kwoico from his grandfather who was a Naso ldquoHis fables were delightful but did not include many myths such as my communityrsquos version of the myth of creationWhen I began travelling across India for Acoustic Traditionalrsquos sessions I realised that most other Himalayan tribes had their mythofcreation stories intact Nepal like India has members of my tribe and I plan to meet storytellers and Kwoico mythsAlong the way Mukhia is prepared for an arduous time Stories On The Verge is largely selffunded and Mukhia is now looking at crowdfunding Secondly as he moves into remote areas of Nepal and other Southeast Asian countries later common dominant languages will be of no help ldquoIt is a struggle to find translators and those who speak different dialects of that language more sordquo he explainsThe essence of stories also lies in their nonverbal aspects which will be Mukhiarsquos biggest challenge ldquoThatrsquos the reason I want to record these stories not just write them down Many stories I will come across will be rooted in rites and rituals and that cannot be translated accuratelyrdquoMukhia takes much solace in the fact that we are all connected by stories and that will aid support and understanding on the way ldquoAll stories for instance are rooted in nature Its role in our psyche in our spirituality is always implied Our stories indicate that we are interrelated and I never forget thatrdquo smiles MukhiaLog on to wwwfacebookcomacoustictraditionalorg to fund the project or email salilmukhiagmailcom