It's harvest time in Askole. Sekina helps with the winnowing and threshing of the wheat. Everyone in the village grows wheat. Sekina's family has fields scattered around the village. During the year, she goes with her cousins and sisters to weed the fields. They carry small baskets to collect the weeds in, then later feed them to the goats and cow. Nothing gets wasted. Yet Sekina really likes the harvest time because there are lots of fun things to do. They can throw the dry wheat down a hill and make a slippery slide. She has so much fun sliding down the hill on her stomach!

In the late afternoons Mosa and his brother Mohammed go out and lead their yaks and dzo back to their shelters. Yaks are really big and have huge horns; they are adapted to living at high elevation much better than cows. Dzo are a cross between a yak and a cow and are VERY strong. In the winter months some of yaks live in the shelters, but also, some of the yaks are sent to a winter pasture up near the Biafo glacier, one of the worlds biggest glaciers. In addition to taking care of yaks, Mosa goes to school and plays with his friends. They go to school from March to December every year, only taking two months off in the winter when it's too cold to go outside. During the winter break, they stay at home and have more time to play and help their families.

In the spring and autumn all the animals wander through the fields near Askole. In the village there are yaks, dzo, sheep, and goats. There are some cows and a few horses, but not too many. Yaks and dzo live much better in this climate. Each day, girls and young women like Halima go out to collect animal dung in their baskets. Instead of wood for cooking, they use dung for burning in the fires that heat the houses and over which they cook food. Although there is some wood available, there isn't a lot nearby the village, so they try to make use of all burnable materials. Women and girls usually go out to collect dung with their sisters and friends in small work groups. They laugh and joke around while they do their work, and although it's a chore, it is also time to spend enjoying the companionship of other women.

Each summer Sadjat spends three months in the high pastures of Askole. He likes going to the pasture. His tasks there are important: He tends to his family's goats, sheep, yak and dzo. It takes him about an hour to walk to the pasture. Sadjat's mother, brothers, and sisters stay in the village. The animals up at the pasture are his responsibility. When he's not watching the animals he plays soccer with other boys or slides on the big rock near the pasture huts. A lot of the other villagers move up to the pasture for the summer, it's kind of like a smaller version of home.

Every day Essa walks twenty minutes to school in Korphe from her home in Askole. She crosses the Braldu river on a bridge, then walks up the steep hill to her classroom. She likes her teacher Master Hussein. He teaches her Urdu, English, mathematics, and religious studies.Essa is in the 4th class and hopes that when she reaches secondary school, her father will send her to boarding school about four hours away in he village of Shigar. When she's not in school, she helps her family with the animals. In autumn, Essa misses helping out tending the yaks since they need to thresh the wheat at that time. Wheat is the most important crop in Askole. Although she likes to work with her family, Essa feels education is equally important.

Fatima and the rest of the village look forward to the wedding season, usually sometime in early winter. She puts on new clothes, wears lots of jewelry, and paints her hands red with henna. With her friends and family, she walks to the edge of the village to greet the new brides that come to live in Askole. When she marries, she'll move to a village across the river from her village. Fatima's new home will be much like her old one. She'll do many of the chores that she has been doing in Askole. Each day she's responsible for making her family's chapattis (bread), washing dishes, helping with the field work, and watching her young cousins. Fatima lives with her mother, father, grandparents, brothers, aunt and uncle, and four cousins in one house, so there are lots of people around to chip in with the household work.