Shepherdess of the Glaciers (La Bergère des glaces)

2015, Stanzin Dorjai and Christiane Mordelet, France/India, 74 min. English subtitles.

Way up in Ladakh—at 16,500 feet, somewhere in the Gya-Miru Valley—lives a shepherdess on an isolated, rock-strewn mountain. Her flock of 250 sheep and goats are her only companions, except for the troubling presence of wolves and a snow leopard; her only link with the outside world is a little transistor radio. This documentary presents an intimate portrait of a disappearing way of life—one marked by challenges and isolation, but also beauty and spiritual grace.

Following the screening, Ladakh native and Smith College student Tsewang Chuskit will share her experience growing up in the region and answer visitor questions.

Presented in partnership with the Siddhartha School.

About the Speaker

Tsewang Chuskit is a sophomore at Smith College in Northampton, MA. She also leads a summer program back in her homeland that gives girls’ health education and leadership empowerment presentations at government schools. She hails from a remote area of Ladakh, near the Chinese border, called Changthang. Her ancestors were nomads, but recently her family settled in a tiny village called Mudh with around 60 more families. When she was a little girl studying in the small village school, she had no idea her destiny would be different from all the other girls in this area who came before her. Chuskit says she owes this opportunity to her mother, who took her at age eight to a private school six hours away. Chuskit believes that even though her mother is not educated, she saw in her daughter an opportunity she did not have for herself. Khen Rinpoche, a respected Ladakhi lama who is the founder of the Siddhartha School (grades K-10), met with her mother, and recognizing that the woman had very little income, enrolled Chuskit with a full scholarship. The school had no residential dormitory at the time, so Rinpoche’s sister provided her with a home. After graduating from Siddhartha, Chuskit went on to become the first girl from the Changthang region to complete high school in the United States, as a scholarship student at the Rockland Country Day School. She is honored to speak this evening at the Rubin Museum’s showing of Shepherdess of the Glaciers.