We’ve been on the mountain for three days now. Wind whips past us, and through us. The path is occasionally marked by wooden stakes driven into the ground, some mostly covered by mud and rocks, so low that I can’t imagine they are useful at the higher altitudes under snow. Every so often it’s not a wooden stake, but a preserved body, a climber, or explorer who met a grisly fate while scaling the mountain, now used like a signpost. Some aren’t so well-preserved.
We have two local guides, they won’t tell us their names. One leads us at the front, I guess he’s in charge, and the other takes the rear. He doesn’t speak, the man at the back, but I’m positive he understands.
We should have reached the temple by now, I’m sure of it, but the guides keep holding us back, saying we need to rest, even when there are hours of daylight remaining. They won’t travel during the night, or even any time approaching the evening.
My cheeks are so cold that they burn. I wish I hadn’t shaved off my beard.
I round the corner, the guide is ahead of me. He’s stopped, crouched down, waving his hand at us, trying to make us stop.
“What is i—“ I begin, but the guide turns, finger to his lips.
A Risen Corpse
Ah, zombies. This one was sat on the list for a while as the incredibly enticing — yet uninformative — “Himalayan Zombies.” It sounds a little like the title to a bad movie.
I intended to go out and hunt down accounts of people seeing strange figures on the horizon, of mountain guides staying away from certain locations, of Tibetan or Nepalese communities imbued with fascinating folklore. And while there was some of that, there wasn’t as much as I was hoping.
I wish I could remember where I heard that phrase, “Himalayan Zombies.” Maybe then, I might have had more to go on.
That being said, I did come across some fascinating religious and folk histories of these creatures, known as ro-langs. In Tibetan, “Ro” means corpse, and “Langs” means to “rise up,” therefore: “ro-langs.” Literally meaning “a risen corpse.”
Coop tugs at my sleeve. I turn to look at him, his hands are raised level with his shoulders, palms up, questioning. I shake my head, then something runs into me from the back. Our guide is pushing me, and the others, back around the corner.
“What the fuc—“ Coop starts, but the guide clasps his hand over his mouth, placing his other index finger over his lips. Mila waves at me from the back of the group, clamouring for explanations I don’t have. I just shake my head at her.
The guide’s assistant, I suppose that’s what he is, runs up the side of us, and talks with the guide in hushed tones. The rest of us sit back against the rocky outcrop, waiting for them to tell us what is going on. Martin and Jon have stayed quiet the whole time, but I can see in their eyes they’re eager for the expedition to be over.
The guide turns to me, grasping me by the shoulders. “We go back, tomorrow, rest tonight in cave back there,” he speaks in hurried whispers. He snaps a finger back down the path, toward the cave we’d left not a few hours before. “We go,” he asserts.
“Hang on now, we are pressing on,” says Jon, with surprising force. Normally, a very meek man, I’ve not heard him speak so firmly before. “We paid you to get us to the temple, and we damn well want to…”
The guide crosses and uncrosses his arms, firmly. “No,” he says, locking eyes with Jon, then successively with each member of the group as he speaks, “it is not safe, we must go.”
Spirits
To understand the mechanics of a ro-langs — that being, how they operate, how they are created — we need to jump back, back to before Tibet was introduced to Buddhism.
The animism of Tibet makes reference to numerous spirits, notably, the gdon. Characterised by their proclivity for demonic-possession, these beings brought about harmful ailments and other misfortunes to the unfortunate people they inhabit1. One story tells of the possession of the seventh ancient king Dri-gum-btsan-po, who was driven mad by a gdon, pushed to anger, and engaging in unwarrented argument with his minister, Long-ngam.
Tantric Buddhism is credited as being brought to Tibet by the Indian tantric Buddhist Vajra master, Padmasambhava2. After arriving in Tibet, Padmasambhava is said to have subdued the gdon spirits. He also banished demons that were inhibiting the construction of a Buddhist temple by causing earthquakes.
It took us two hours to get back to the cave — an hour less than our ascent — driven by the manic pace maintained by our two Tibetan guides. It was getting dark in the last thirty-minutes of our journey, which did little but accelerate our descent. By the end, the guides were barely checking back to see if we were still with them.
We make camp, placing our sleeping bags in the same spots as the night prior. Mila comes to sit next to me on my sleeping bag. We have our backs to the guides, who are locked in fervent discussion with each other in the mouth of the cave. Coop is setting up to our left with the others.
“Grant,” she says to me, gazing into me with her huge brown eyes, “what is this? What’s going on? I’m not giving up on this trip because of some guide’s superstitions, we’re too far in for that. What are we going to do?”
“I know,” I say, “I’m going to try and talk to them, I just wanted to let them calm down a bit first, they’ve been jumpy ever since we got this high up.” I pull off my beanie and rub my head, “honestly, I’m kind of feeling like there’s something off too.”
Mila pulls off her glove, and then removes one of mine. She holds my hand in hers, her stare intensifies. Her skin is much softer than mine. “It’s going to be fine, it’s just some superstition, some ghost story or something,” she squeezes harder. “It’ll be fine, I promise.”
I smile, we’ve been on the mountain for a few days, but in Tibet for months. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little starved of human contact, that I wouldn’t miss the touch of Mila’s hand.
“Let’s get some sleep.” I say, making an effort not to cling on as Mila withdraws her hand. “Hopefully, clearer heads will prevail in the morning.”
—
According to ‘Ro-Langs: The Tibetan Zombie’ by Turrell Wylie3, ro-langs may be divided into two types, trantric, and demonic.
Tantric Ro-Langs
Most closely related to the Voodoo zombie, a tantric ro-langs is a corpse, animated via the rituals and incantations of a necromancer. The best illustration of this variety of Tibetan zombie, is the story of the founding of the O-tanta-pu-ri temple, which I’ve adapted from Wylie’s text, here.
In the Magadha region of ancient India, there was a non-Buddhist yogin named Na-ra-dā, who we will henceforth refer to as, the heretic. The heretic wished to become a siddha — a realised being — via the use of mantric power. To accomplish this, he had to master eight siddhis, known as the mahasiddhis4.
These are eight powers, granting the user various abilities, and control over reality. Different yogic practices interpret these siddhis differently: some view them as consequences of spiritual progress, whereas other schools, such as that of Jnana Yoga, consider them merely simple illusions, also to be transcended.
One such power is control over life and death, or in the case of our heretic, the conjuration of a ro-langs. But, to realise this machination, he required an assistant.
This assistant had to be strong, without illness, possessing the qualities of a hero, and devoid of deceit. He found a Buddhist votary, who ticked all his boxes, and of whom he attempted to enlist the help. Fearing that he was being brought into something dark, and unnatural, the votary refused. The heretic persisted, eventually convincing the votary to ask his teacher, who encouraged him to aid in the heretic’s pursuit.
Once they were ready to proceed with the ritual, a corpse laid before them, the heretic issued his instructions to the votary: “The tongue of the ro-langs will waggle and stick out. You must seize it! If you catch it on the first time, the power will be great. If on the second time, it will be middling. If on the third time, it will be small. If you fail to catch it by the third time, the ro-langs will devour us both, and then the countryside will be brought to desolation.”
The votary failed to catch the tongue on the first and second times, so, pursuing an interesting new tactic, he put his mouth to that of the corpse. On the third time, the tongue lashed out in to the votary’s mouth, and he caught it with his teeth. Upon withdrawing, the tongue turned into a sword, and the body of the corpse turned to gold.
The votary held the sword, and used it to soar into the sky. The heretic, who claimed the sword as his own, for it was the result of his conjurations, called to him, telling him to come down and return the sword. The votary refused, saying he was going to see the sights. He flew to the top of Sumeru mountain, and circled the four major and eight minor continents.5
Upon completion of his journey, the votary returned the sword to the heretic, and in return, the heretic gifted the votary the golden corpse. He told the votary that should he only spend the flesh on deeds of virtue, it would replenish itself, providing everlasting wealth.
And so, the votary used the golden corpse to build the great temple of O-tanta-pu-ri. When he died, he proclaimed “This gold will benefit no one else now, but it will be of benefit to future creatures,” and it was buried in concealment.
What these two summoned was a tantric ro-langs, for the furthering of Na-ra-dā’s own spiritual power. When a ro-langs of any kind is summoned, a gdon spirit is called to inhabit the corpse, animating it again. But, you probably remember from earlier that all the gdon were subjugated by Padmasambhava, so what are they doing taking over these dead bodies? Well, it is said that tantric ro-langs summoned in this manner are bound by a vow to defend the Buddhist religion, thus not breaking any promises with Padmasambhava.
That being said, not all ro-langs are raised this way. Occasionally the spirit isn’t quite so benevolent.
I’m woken during the night by a scream. No, the echo, an aftershock of a scream. I look over and see our guide with his hand clamped over Coop’s mouth. Mila is already awake, eyes wide, chest heaving so heavily that her thick coat is undulating along with her breath. I turn to look at the mouth of the cave, and have to suck down screams of my own.
The first light of dawn is breaking through the grey sky. The walls of the cave are shrouded in shadow, outlining the mouth, which is lit by the morning light like a glowing maw. Two figures stand in the opening, silhouetted against grim grey clouds, edges touched by the purple glimmer of morning.
One figure is the guide’s assistant, arms pinned to his side, whole body shaking with fright. The other, a figure I don’t recognise, stands upright, rigid as a board, left arm outstretched, hand clasped in an iron grip over the guide’s head.
The other guide, the one still trying to silence the group, holds his finger to his lips, but he is trembling. He’s crying, eyes pinned wide.
Somewhere above the mountain, the clouds part, lighting the front of the cave in terrible definition. The…creature, I suppose, I don’t know what to call it, looks at us. Its eyes are mad, unblinking. Skin crushed and marred by deep frost-bite. A long tongue slithers, lashing from its mouth, waving and writhing in our direction. It slowly turns its head, and waves its right hand.
The man, the one trapped in its grasp, is in streams of tears, his mouth is moving, but no sound comes out. His arms, no longer clasped to his sides, are thrashing, clamouring for freedom from the creature’s grip. Suddenly, he shakes, stiffens, and stops. His arms drop once more, slack and lifeless. He is still. Held in the creature’s grasp like a limp doll.
We move around the wall of the cave, coats and equipment catching on rocky outcrops. We have to leave most of our belongings behind. Although I can hardly look, our guide never takes his eyes off the creature, which still has its hand wrapped around the man’s skull. I think he is…was, our guide’s brother. They shared the same nose, similarly stern expressions.
Demonic Ro-Langs
The word “soul” is too closely associated with the Christian interpretation of an eternal soul to be useful when discussing Buddhist mythology. However, we do have rnam-shes: consciousness. Around three days after death, the rnam-shes leaves the body through the brahmanic aperture, located at the crown of the skull.
When this happens, the corpse is left “uninhabited”; a vessel that is ripe for reanimation by a vow-breaking gdon, or, a bgegs, a spirit that was not subjugated by Padmasambhava. Funeral services were often lengthy, stretching for days or weeks, way past the time that a body could become a ro-langs. In order to safeguard against this, the body is continuously watched, usually by a monk. This practice was known as “pillow-guarding.”
Distinctive from our tantric ro-langs, the demonic variety are not quite so generous with swords and gold, but instead are hell-bent on turning other humans into ro-langs.
It does this by placing a palm on the head of its victim, causing the subject to develop ro-langs sickness: a deathlike pallor, incoherency, and impaired muscular control. Once this has run its course, that person is thought to be inhabited by a gdon-demon; an incurable ailment, unless they can be brought before a lama who is well-versed in the parapsychological doctrines of the Gcod-pa.
I’m out of the cave, the rocks on the path are slippery, I have to stamp my feet down and grip as best I can to maintain my balance. I let out a shriek as something bumps in to my back, but it’s Mila, similarly panicked, scrambling down the rocky ledge. Our guide overtakes us, turning his head every now and again, beckoning to Coop, Jon, and Martin, who haven’t made it as far as us.
We join the guide as he is resting around a small outcrop. When he sees me, he grabs me and holds me against a rock, his face is wet with tears. A rock juts into the small of my back.
“I told you we should go! He’s gone now!”
“I know,” I hold up my palms, panting against the cold, “I know, I’m sorry. What was that…that thing?”
He doesn’t reply, he’s fighting the elements, and the altitude, to regain his breath, but his eyes are wild with rage. I grab him, much as he has a hold of me. “What was that?” I repeat, shaking him.
“Grant?” It’s Mila, she’s not looking at me. I’m not looking at her.
“What was that?!” I’m yelling now.
Mila comes over to us. “Grant!”
“What?!” I don’t mean to shout at her, I think she knows that.
“Where’s Jon?”
The guide’s eyes grow wider again. He fights off my grip and scrambles away.
“What?” I say to Mila.
“Jon,” she repeats, stumbling as the guide bumps into her, resuming his escape down the mountain. “He’s not here,” she continues. “He was on the path behind us, but he’s not here now.”
Coop comes over and plants a hand on my shoulder, firmly. “Let’s get the fuck out of here,” he says. “Jon probably just ran past and didn’t see us, right?”
Physical Characteristics
When reading about ro-langs, one of the first tidbits of information you’ll come across is the notion that they aren’t the bendiest of beings. Apparently unable to bend over, they have a limited range of motion in all of their limbs, which is unsurprising given their recently-deceased nature. Taking advantage of this deficiency, parts of Tibet, particularly the Lho-kha region, feature half-height doors. As a ro-langs cannot bend over, these low entry-ways act as a kind of architectural defence against the undead.
Another prominent physical trait of ro-langs are their tongues. Unable to speak, the ro-langs will use a combination of tongue and arm movements to communicate. For example, should someone approach a demonic ro-langs in the process of turning a victim, it will wag its tongue and wave its right hand, letting the onlooker know that they should be silent, or they will be turned instead.
To Fall Over
Being already dead, one cannot “kill” a ro-langs, but it may be made to “fall over” (brgyal-ba). So, let’s say we’re faced with a ro-langs intent on introducing us to a homeless gdon, what do we do? Well, again according to Turrell Wylie, ro-langs may be divided into five classes, based on the manner in which they may be caused to fall over.
lpags-langs or skin-zombie;
khrag-langs or blood-zombie;
sha-langs or flesh-zombie;
rus-langs or bone-zombie;
rme-langs or mole-zombie.
Listed in ascending order of difficulty, each is classified based on the way a would-be ro-langs-slayer must tackle the challenge. A rus-langs must have a bone broken, a khrag-langs must be made to bleed, a rme-langs is vulnerable only to punctures of a single mole on its body…you get the picture. On doing this, the ro-langs will fall, and be unable to pursue you further.
We run out on to the path. Mila, Coop, and Martin head straight down, but I turn to look back. The wind has picked up, dust and leaves and dirt blow across the path, making it hard to see. But, there’s something up there.
I take a step forward, I can hear Mila calling to me, but there’s something there, coming through the maelstrom. Three figures, rigid, upright.
I clamp a hand over my mouth, turn, and run as fast as I can.
An Unfortunate Awakening
What I found so interesting about ro-langs is how specific a lot of the lore surrounding them is. The five classes which are defeated by specific means, the physical nature of them being unable to bend over or speak, or how the funeral-process has ro-langs protections built into it with diligent pillow-guards.
Of course, there’s (almost) always an explanation, so I’d like to finish off by touching on a class of ro-langs stories that Wylie mentions, known as the Comatose Ro-langs.
These tales turn up as recently as the 1950s, and they tend to follow a particular format. A person ‘dies’, and is laid on a bed while their rnam-shes leaves their body, and their funeral is prepared. One night, a pillow-guard is watching over the body, and it suddenly wakes. Others run in fear, but the brave monk, using his heavy, wood-bound copy of Bar-do-thos-grol — the Tibetan ‘Book of the Dead’— hits the recently awoken ro-langs in the head. It bleeds, and falls over, of course meaning that the monk has felled akhrag-langs.
I’m sure from Wylie’s name for this group of stories, you can see a logical explanation as to what happened here: a person falls ill, lapsing into a coma, then waking again a few days later, only to be bludgeoned to death with a book by a concerned monk. There are similar stories of dead bodies bloating after death, which is misinterpreted as breathing, or other-worldly consumption.
As stories permeate through the ages, they become more extravagant, more embellished with the supernatural. An assumed dead loved-one, suddenly waking, perhaps stiff from the cold, and hobbling over to you, would instil a deep and profound fear if you don’t possess the tools to explain it scientifically. As they are proliferated between towns, and beliefs, these tales get twisted, and exasperated. The story itself becomes possessed with the spirit of superstition, until it has risen as something new, and much more terrifying.
Thanks for reading!
After the odyssey that was researching number stations for Islands in the Storm, I wanted to dive into something more historical. I’ve always been fascinated by religious histories and mythologies, and would love to explore more things like this, so if you’ve got any suggestions, please leave a comment!
This won’t be the end of Grant, Mila, and the gang’s story, so stay tuned to see if they escape the ro-langs, and what other strange phenomena might befall them next!
If you enjoyed this mixture of story and research write-up, please do consider subscribing, and I’ll see you someplace spooky soon!
According to a few sources, including Encyclopedia Britannica.
Take my interpretations here with a pinch of salt. I’m no expert on Buddhism or yogic teachings, and I had to cobble some of this together from a few different places, such as Wylie’s text on ro-langs here and this webpage here. There’s a lot of very intense academic work on Buddhist histories, beliefs, and teachings, and I don’t claim to be any authority.
This journey is referring to a number of constructs in Buddhist cosmology. At the centre of the Buddhist universe, sits Sumeru (also called Mount Meru), which is surrounded on four sides by the major continents: Purvavideha, Jambudvipa, Aparagodaniya, and Uttarakuru. Each of these is flanked by two subcontinents, which form our eight minor continents.
Spooky indeed - look forward to reading more