A SPLENDID VIEW BUT WOULD YOU TAKE THIS JOB?

      

          This is definitely not a job for an acrophobic or someone with apiphobia (fear of bees). I love heights, it has no effect on me. I was the lovely daughter after 2 rascals, so I grew up with 2 older brothers. I climbed trees and swung off branches like “mini Tarzan” in my shorts and over-sized T-shirts (hand-me-downs from the rascals). Every evening between 5 - 7, Mieeee.. (that's what we called our mummy) would “kick” us out of the house (I presumed she really had enough of us), we would then be dangling from tress and monkey bars with the other kids, like bats around the neighbourhood.

        That is Sassy JAM aged around seven years-old hanging around.

         These young fearless men are the honey pickers in Nepal. They scale hundreds of metres up the mountains hunting for beehives. 

    Beehives equate to honeycombs and these monstrosities jut out from the cliffs like bright yellow flying parachutes. 

      

    Forget about the safety of harnesses and the latest in rock climbing gears (helmets, carabiners, quickdraws), it is simply all the way up using ropes and bamboo poles. BE BRAVE. 

             With feet balancing precariously on bamboo rope ladders and both hands slicing the honeycombs and transferring them to dangling baskets, tis’ not the same as dangling like a bat from a sturdy tree.

          The pickings are thick, pure, sticky, wild honey just dripping away – but the bees are thick and plentiful too. The air is smokey from the smouldering grasses to keep the bees "dizzy" and not sting the hunters. 

With a few thousand bees swarming around, I am sure there were many bees who were not dizzy, but ready to give these gusty boys some painful stings for stealing their hives. 

Wish I could taste the honey from the mountain cliffs, they are either not  exported or I have not seen any on my supermarket shelves. So I use my favourite brand, Capilano.

           No dizzy bees and bamboo ropes for us “qigong puppies.” We did walk on the glass corridor in the Tianmen Mountains, Zhangjiajie in the Hunan Province of China. But this was a poor comparison to the bold honeycomb hunters of Nepal. 

Note: Acknowledge to "Be Young" video for some of the pictures.