Written by Nawang Chhoetso
A folktale from Spiti.

As I recall, it’s a story of five birds. But a friend of mine insisted that there were more than five birds, however even she wasn’t clear about the details. So this story will be about the tale of 5 birds.

Like all other folktales from Spiti, this too starts with the sentence ” yoyo metuk”- I don’t know what this means but every folktale starts with this sentence followed by “yul jaga chenmo na” -( in a big village). And then the story follows.

So in a big village five birds named
Lakta-tha( lakpa-hands, tha-thin),
Jhocho Margam( jhocho-dear, Margam-Butter), Olta-tha( olle-neck, tha – thin),
Kangta-tha ( kangpa-legs, tha-Thin) and Tsil-tsil Darmo(I don’t know its meaning ). Their names have a significant role in this story as they describe specific physical features of the birds.

So one fine winter these five birds decided to come together for “Duihor“,it’s a cultural practice on the occasion of which friends come together on any particular day fixed by them to enjoy their time together, where they pool resources and cook special dishes. These birds decided to make “Chinduk thukpa“.
Chinduk thukpa is a traditional local dish; it’s not very common these days, but I have had it during my childhood. Back then it was a very common breakfast during winter.
Thukpa is still very common, it’s cooked with boiling water and barley powder to thicken it a little. You can also add churpe(a kind of dried cheese), meat, or any vegetables according to availability and taste.

But “Chinduk” is a special ingredient that’s added to thukpa. It’s made by roughly crushing wheat or barley, cooking it and then letting it freeze. Later you add it to your thukpa while preparing it.

So after deciding to make Chinduk Thukpa, they distributed the work amongst themselves.
Lakta-tha(with a thin hand) was incharge of crushing wheat using two huge stones. In the process of crushing wheat with the heavy stones, her weak hands got injured and she succumbed to death.

Now only four birds were left.
Jhocho-Margam(with butter-like features), was in charge of making a fire. But due to the heat of the fire she melted and died there.
Later Olta-tha(with a narrow neck) while checking whether the Chinduk was cooked or not, choked because the grain was uncooked and died there.

Seeing all three friends die, Kangta-tha( the one with thin legs) started jumping as she couldn’t control her happiness now that she had only one friend left to share the Chinduk with.
However, due to her weak legs, she got injured and died there.

Tsiltsil-Darmo the only bird left was saddened by her friend’s death. After having her meal she went to the nearby water stream to drink water. As the water was cold, her wings froze into ice and she was unable to fly.

Later a wolf who was passing by that stream approached Tsiltsil Darmo. Tsiltsil proposed to the wolf to let her entertain him with a song for a while, until then the wolf could sharpen it’s teeth.
The wolf wasn’t very hungry so he agreed to it.

So Tsil Tsil started singing:

“Tsiltsil tomtom”
rhyming her name

“Gha la Neema sharsena”
When the sun rises from the mountain

“Chichung shoppe thoe sena”
Tiny bird’s wings will be free

“Nam ka phurte hale”
Then I will fly to the sky

After singing it once the sun didn’t rise. So Tsiltsil offered to sing again but faster, as it would be more fun this way. She did this multiple times until her wings were free from ice. And then she flew back to her home.

Written by Nawang Chhoetso, a resident of Kaza, Spiti.Grew up in an environment with a close cultural and traditional touch.