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  • We're driving through a river right now in the Jeep.

  • For thousands of years,

  • humans have drawn lines on the Earth, dividing the planet into nations, but

  • there are some parts of the world that no empire, nation, or state has been able to tame.

  • Just the geography here is completely unruly.

  • Land that is so high,

  • so rugged, that states have found it impossible to exert control.

  • We're about to hit 4,000 meters, feeling the effects.

  • These are called non-state spaces.

  • Definitely feels like humans were never meant to be here

  • And the people who

  • settle in these places sought refuge from borders.

  • But even here, among the highest mountains in the world,

  • this stateless lifestyle is coming to an end.

  • Non-state spaces have always existed, all over the globe. They're usually high

  • up in mountains, far from the reach of any government and the people who live

  • here didn't come here by chance. Most of them are communities who fled into the

  • mountains to evade expanding government forces, some communities were escaping

  • capture like those in Africa fleeing from the Arab and Atlantic slave trades.

  • Other groups retreated to remote regions to escape ruling powers who they

  • opposed, from the Inuit and the Arctic, to the Berbers in North Africa, to the

  • Jivaroan in the Amazon rainforest. Examples exist all over the globe of

  • people who chose rugged terrain over taxes, war, famine, and subjugation from

  • state powers. Today, there are some 5,000 indigenous groups living in 90 countries,

  • numbering in total around 370 million people worldwide. 70% of those are in

  • Asia. Most of these groups have integrated into countries, but for those

  • who reside deep in the mountains, geography has largely held off the

  • influence of any kind of centralized government.

  • So I came up here to visit

  • one community that fled to the mountains 1,200 years ago. Back then the Tibetan

  • Empire, which was just north of here was pursuing its own state-making project,

  • its own empire, and it was growing. As the Tibetan Empire grew, its borders

  • eventually encompassed the Bon religion. This was a religious group that predates

  • Buddhism. The Bon fought to preserve its culture within the Tibetan Empire. They

  • resisted the Empire, but eventually failed and instead of assimilated to

  • this new Empire, they fled and they came here to these mountains, where they

  • created a life away from the militaries, the taxes, the religion, and the control

  • of the Tibetan Empire and that life continues today.

  • Eventually this whole area would be drawn into a modern state, the state of

  • Nepal. And Tibet, where these people came from, would become China. But these people

  • don't identify as Chinese, or necessarily Nepali. People here, they wanted the kids

  • to learn to Tibetan, like as their language, because we are more related

  • with the Tibetan culture.

  • The 25 families that live here have their own distinct identity.

  • They speak their own dialect of Tibetan. They mainly live off the land,

  • farming and raising animals to survive.

  • The Himalayan mountain range is particularly rich with these examples of

  • non-state spaces. So many examples in fact, that a group of anthropologists

  • argue that this place should actually be its own region. They use the term Zomia

  • to describe this long range of mountains where people have set up for thousands

  • of years without the help of governments of states.

  • The borders of this Zomia

  • concept encompass a hundred million people. It runs through eight countries,

  • but is on the periphery of each. The diverse set of peoples living here have

  • a varying degree of interaction with their country governments. I came to this

  • region, one of the most remote zones within Zomia, but even here you can feel

  • that Zomia's stateless days are numbered.

  • Everywhere you go up here, you see herds of animals, shepherds guiding them

  • through the mountains. After leaving this Bon village I moved north and came

  • across a different community, where this family's lifestyle is based almost

  • entirely on the movement of their animals. We're at 4,200 meters, Tibet is

  • just right over this hill.

  • And I'm hanging out with some yak today.

  • This family's actually nomadic, they're constantly

  • moving around throughout the year, so they'll be in this pasture for a little

  • bit while the yak will graze here and eat this grass, and then they'll move on

  • to another place. Meanwhile the grasses here will have time to regenerate, the

  • dung from these yak right now will help fertilize the land, and they'll

  • eventually come back here, maybe next year, and they will find a pasture full

  • of really wonderful grass that's full of nutrients that their yak can graze again.

  • And there's no external inputs to this, there's no fertilizer or irrigation infrastructure.

  • And this whole process and technique hinges on their ability to be

  • able to move freely throughout this region, which hasn't been a problem for

  • hundreds of years as this place has been basically rid of any sort of borders or

  • control. But that's changing very quickly.

  • This is where the Tibetan language is spoken. The many communities in these

  • mountains have always considered themselves Tibetan, moving freely into

  • Tibet for trade and religious practices, but in 1950 China controversially

  • annexed Tibet. They eventually negotiated this border line with Nepal. Notice that

  • it goes right through what these people think of as Tibet. The yak grazers I met

  • are mostly based down here on the Nepal side, and luckily for them this border

  • only existed in theory. The yak grazers continue to graze their animals deep

  • into Tibet, as they had for hundreds of years, but over the

  • years China started getting rich, which came with a renewed desire to project

  • its influence and protect its borders, especially in Tibet where people were

  • fleeing to get away from Chinese rule. China now had the money, technology,

  • geopolitical motive to start taming this region. They started crushing protests

  • from Tibetans and setting up military infrastructure on the Tibetan Plateau

  • and in 1999 they built this fence on the border, marking the end of the unfettered

  • mobility that these people had depended on for centuries in this non-state space.

  • This place that had been too high for borders, suddenly had to adapt to the

  • first concept of boundaries and control coming from far away governments.

  • I wanted to go see this fence. At over 15,000 feet above sea

  • level, it has to be one of the highest borders on Earth.

  • So I'm on the windy

  • Tibetan Plateau, looking at the border but we're half a kilometer away and

  • something really weird has happened. My driver who's Nepali stopped and said we

  • can't go any further. I was like well we're on Nepali sovereign territory, why

  • would why couldn't we just go up to the fence? You'd be able to do this at every

  • other country I've ever been to. He said no, the Chinese will come over and they'll

  • snatch us. Now we're still very much on the Nepali, side but the Chinese come in

  • here routinely to ask questions, to even detain people randomly. They have

  • surveillance, they have watch towers even on the Nepali side. China now has

  • the technology and political motive to exert control in this remote and rugged

  • region, to militarize its border here.

  • This isn't the only effort by a faraway government to tame this region. The

  • governments of Nepal, India, and China are also building the first roads here.

  • It's a lofty goal.

  • So we've got a landslide on the road, which means we can

  • go no further in the Jeep. And we're gonna have to hike. The thinking here is

  • that a road system could serve as a trade artery through the Himalaya Mountains,

  • eventually. We're stuck again, this time on a waterfall with a 200-foot

  • cliff by the side of it. And so yes, while these state forces are slowly

  • encroaching on this terrain, it's going to be long work and it's not going to be

  • easy. They're slowly chipping away, but man this place just was never meant to

  • be tamed.

  • Nepal is sandwiched between

  • the two largest countries on Earth, divided by these massive Himalaya Mountains.

  • A road would create an enormous trade opportunity between these countries.

  • So there's been a blitz of construction

  • projects aimed at creating a viable road through this mountain pass. The Indian

  • government is funding projects like this bridge, and locals told me that the

  • Chinese government routinely sends building materials to help construction.

  • The road still has a long way to go before it can sustain large flows of

  • goods, but even now the road is reshaping the relationship that these communities

  • have with the outside world, shifting their economy from bartering to cash-based

  • markets where residents can create businesses around cheap goods from China.

  • And as always with change, there are winners and losers.

  • Everything here is made of yak.

  • This tent, which is made entirely of yak wool.

  • Yak cheese,

  • Tea with yak butter in it.

  • Drinking yak milk, which is extremely delicious.

  • These people who are used to bartering and are used to living off of the

  • products of their animals, are having a hard time integrating, having a hard time

  • finding a space in this new economy that is based on cash, is based on big

  • international flows of goods.

  • That Bon community whose customs had been so well preserved in these

  • mountains, have also felt the effects of this road.

  • People are leaving. Children especially. Parents want to educate their

  • kids and they are sending them to India or to Kathmandu to get educated. A lot of

  • these kids will go their entire childhood without actually being in this community.

  • You have to remember these people set up in the mountains

  • specifically to preserve their tradition

  • and culture, and so to see it disappear overnight

  • due to these modernizing forces, is giving people a lot of anxiety. The way

  • they've solved this is that they're building this school, that is based on

  • educating children in the Bon tradition and the language of this community.

  • But despite the disruptive effects of the road, most people I talk to are still

  • happy it's here.

  • For centuries people have escaped

  • modern civilization by fleeing to the mountains, but now generations later, for

  • some these mountains can feel more like a trap than a refuge.

We're driving through a river right now in the Jeep.

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