They talk about the journey they made from the hot lowlands into the mountains and how they would walk back again when the earth began to freeze beneath their feet, a journey their ancestors made long before anyone began keeping records. They tell me about plants in the valley, what could grow there, what to encourage, what to fear. They talk about their lives, the tribal lands they know, the animals they raise, the children they worry about-should they send them to a state boarding school or raise them as nomads without formal education?-and the many other challenges of being a herder in the 21st century. Over the next couple of days, the nomad family introduces me to their valley and their people. Barefoot and slightly sunstruck, I pull out a pencil to note the pure quality of light in the blue sky, the way yellow flowers pop in the green valley and the sudden chill that descends as soon as the sun drops behind the crest. The rumble of water is punctuated by the clunk of stones, the buzzing of bees, the whistling and whooping of men bringing the flocks in for the night. Slanting sunbeams tint the mountains pink and cast gold across the surface of the stream. The remarkable story of how nomads have fostered and refreshed civilization throughout our history BuyĮverywhere there is beauty. Nomads: The Wanderers Who Shaped Our World I smile in return, swept up by the excitement of the Bakhtiari tribe’s annual migration from the lowland plains into the mountains in search of summer pasture. The family smiles as they lead their sheep and goats along the rock-strewn track toward me. There are few trees at this altitude, but the snow has melted, and there is excellent grazing in the valley, which is blanketed with irises, dwarf tulips and other spring flowers. Other donkeys carry their belongings, bundled inside heavy rust-and-brown cloth that the women have woven and will soon repurpose as door flaps when their goat-hair tents are set up. They look like strong women, but then it is a tough life beneath the peaks of the Zagros Mountains in western Iran. Behind him are two women on donkeys I guess they are his wife and daughter. He clicks his tongue to encourage the flock. An older man follows, weatherworn but still strong, a rifle over his left shoulder. A young man walks toward me with a stick slung across his back and a flock of sheep at his feet, which carry him down the path like a crowd of rowdy children.
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