I've recovered now from my bout of negativity. I still don't think Darjeeling is so great, but it's surrounding landscape is quite nice and I'm feeling slightly better about it. We went rafting yesterday, which, although not quite as mental as previous rafting experience in Colombia (you can read about that here), was quite cool the same. I've thrown in some random pics of Darjeeling and rafting below.
Tomorrow, I'm starting out on a ten-day trek to the base camp of Kangchenjunga, the third highest mountain in the world. It's supposed to be quite challenging and I haven't ever done a trek of ten days, so I'm slightly nervous about it. Also, it's the first time that I'll be trekking at sustained altitudes, with this trek bringing me up to the 5000m mark. See below for the itinerary.
So I'm out of radio contact for the next ten days but will hopefully have something mildly interesting to say upon my return on the 2nd of June.
B gud people and I'll be smellin' ya later (although after ten days without showers, it may be that you'll be smellin' me)
C.
GOECHALA TREKKING
(KANCHENDZONGA BASE - THIRD HIGHEST MOUNTAIN IN THE WORLD)
DAY 01
YUKSOM TO SACHEN. (1785M/5400FT) (8 KM, 5 TO 6 HRS.)
IT IS A GRADUALCLIMB. STAY AT SACHEN FOR THE NIGHT.
DAY 02
SACHEN TO TSHOKA. (3000M/9840FT) (9 KM, 6 HRS.)
THIS WILL BE A STEEP CLIMB .WE WILL SPEND OUR NIGHT AT TSHOKA, SURROUNDED BY SHEPHERD HUTS.
DAY 03
TSHOKA TO DZONGRI (4030M/13218 FT) (10 KMS, 5 TO 6 HRS.)
ON THIS DAY THE TRAIL PASSES THROUGH THE VILLAGE OF TSHOKA AND CONTINUES TO CLIMB NORTH THROUGH THE FOREST OF RHODEDENDRON TO THE ALP OF PHEDANG (3650 M) TAKING AROUND 03 HRS TO COMPLETE THE ASENT. CONTINUE FURTHER TOWARDS DZONGRI. ON ARRIVAL SET CAMP SIDE FOR OVER NIGHT STAY.
DAY 04
DZONGRI
THIS DAY IS FOR REST AND ACCLIMATISATION. ON THIS DAY ONE CAN SAVOUR VIEWS OF THE MOUNTAIN PEAKS BY CLIMBING UP TO DZONGRI TOP WITH A PANOROMIC VIEW OF KABRO (7353M), RATHONG (6678M), MT. KANCHEN DZONGA (8848M), KOKTHANG (6147M), PANDIM (6691M) AND NORSING (5825M) TOWARDS THE WEST. THE SINGHILILA RIDGE WHICH SEPARETES SIKKIM FROM NEPAL CAN ALSO BE SEEN. OVERNIGHT IN TENT.
DAY 05
DZONGRI TO THANGSING (3800M/12464FT) (7 KMS, 4 TO 5 HRS)
THE TRAIL FROM DZONGRI CONTINUES EAST ALONG THE RIGHT BACK OF THE RIVER. AFTER CRESTING THE HILL, THE PATH DROPS INTO THE VALLY AND THEN CROSSES A BRIDGE OVER THE PREKCHU RIVER. AN HOURS CLIMB BRINGS YOU FROM THE BRIDGE TO THANGSING (3800M), LOCATED ON THE SLOPES OF MT PANDIM. OVER NIGHT IN TENT/HUT.
DAY 06
THANGSING TO SUMITE LAKE/ LAMUNE (4500M/14760 FT) (7KMS 3 TO 4 HRS)
THIS IS A HIGH ALTITUDE MODERATE WALK. THE TRAIL FROM THANGSING CLIMBS GENTLY NORTH AND FOLLOWS A STREAM AND ALPINE MEADOWS. ABOUT AN HOUR ABOVE THANGSING WE REACH ONGLATHANG, WITH A SUPERB VIEW OF THE SOUTH FACE OF MT. KANCHENDZONGA. IN ORDER TO CAPTURE CLEAR VIEWS ONE HAS TO REACH ONGLATHANG EARLY. THE TRAIL THEN SKIRTS THROUGH A SERIES OF GLACIAL MORAINES BEFORE CROSSING OVER MEADOWS AGAIN, AND ARRIVES AT THE EMERALD LAKE AT SUMITE. OVERNIGHT IN TENT.
DAY 07
SUMITE LAKE TO GOCHALA (5000M-16406FIT)
THE CLIMB TO GOCHALA BEGINS FOR ABOUT HALF AN HOUR WITH A GENTLE GRADIENT EASTWARDS. THEN A STEEP ASCENT STARTS; THE TRAIL FOLLOWS THE GLACIAL MORAINE NORTH-EAST AND THEN DROPS TO A DRY LAKE AT ZEMATHANG. A TOUGH SCRAMBLE OVER ROCKS AND BOULDERS RISING 400 METRES WILL BRING US TO THE TOP OF THE GOCHALA PASS. THE PASS IS FORMED BY A DEPRESSION BETWEEN THE SPURS OF MT PANDIM AND MT KABRU. IT OVERLOOKS THE TALUNG VALLEY AND COMMANDS A VERY IMPRESSIVE VIEW OF THE SOUTH FACE OF MT KANCHENDZONGA. IN THE AFTERNOON WE RETURN TO THANGSING VIA SUMETI LAKE. OVERNIGHT IN TENTS/HUTS AT THANGSING.
DAY 08
THANGSING TO LAMPHOKRI (4200M/13800FT) (7KMS, 6 TO 7 HRS)
THANGSING TO LAMPHOKRI EXCURSION TO SEE THE HIGH ALTITUDE HOLI LAKE. RETURN TO THANGSING AND OVERNIGHT IN TENTS/HUTS.
DAY 09 THANGSING TO TSHOKA VIA PHEDANG (11KMS, 7 TO 8 HRS)
OVERNIGHT AT TSHOKA IN TENTS.
DAY 10 TSHOKA TO YUKSOM (17 KMS, 7 TO 8 HRS)
RETRACE STEPS TOWORDS YUKSOM ON THE FINAL DAY OF THE TREK.THE GOING IS EASIER AS THE PATH IS MAINLY DOWNHILL. ARRIVE BACK IN YUKSOM
View Goecha La Trek in a larger map
Photos of Darjeeling
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Limited Darjeeling
Some of you may be surprised to learn that Darjeeling, despite the tea-sipping, colonial-balcony-dwelling romantic imagery it ushers to mind, is in actual fact, a bit of a shithole!
As a town, it suffers from colossal over-development, its windy roads dominated by honking jeeps stuck in eternal jams. Since I’ve arrived here, it’s more or less pissed rain non-stop, yet the town suffers a shortage of water the likes of which I’ve never witnessed before. This water shortage manifests itself (perhaps not surprisingly) in an absolute lack of water. All toilets are closed, with taps in my own bathroom not working for nine out of ten attempts; laundry prices are extortionate and the smell of undiluted effluent invades your olfactory senses.
As I mentioned, my time here has been marred by bad weather. Not only has it been wet, but it’s been quite cold as well (the town is at an altitude of 2100m). Coming from the heat of the lowlands, this has been quite a shock to the system, and I’ve had to invest in winter wollies and wear shoes and socks for the first time in a while. The mountains have been covered in mist, meaning that the only peaks visible are those of the mountains of rubbish which line the pathways.
I suppose I’m not in the best of humour either, and perhaps this is tainting my experience here. It’s now a certainty that any exposure to air conditioning leaves me with a cold. My most recent case of the snuffles was contracted on the 3AC train trip from Varanasi, and now I’m leaving a trail of snot behind me wherever I go and generally feeling like shit.
Also, I appear to have arrived here at some kind of peak tourist season. On the first night of my arrival, I had to spend an hour and a half traipsing around the town looking for a hotel with an empty room. This is unheard of during my travels so far, with any traipsing just being a question of finding a nice room at the right price. But here, I’ve had to settle for what must be the shittest room in the history of the hospitality industry. And what’s more, I’m paying through the (runny) nose for the privilege of ‘a view’, although you can’t see your hand in front of your face most of the time. There are marauding hordes of Indian tourists; families with the loudest, most obnoxious little shits as children. How I haven’t thrown one of the little bastards off the side of the mountain yet, I don’t know. It must be a sign of my deep rooted altruism.
This irritability extends also to bureaucracy and a phenomenon I have elegantly termed “fucking retarded Indian gobshite syndrome”. I swear to God, how I haven’t murdered someone here is beyond me. Myself and a friend took this toy train thingy the other day (a kind of silly little tourist steam driven thingy) to see a town a bit down the road. We had shelled out for first class tickets for the hour long journey, for shits and giggles. When we went to the (toy-) train station, which has a grand total of one departure per day, it took us about an hour to find the train, carriage and seats we had booked. We must have asked all 100 people who worked in the station, from station manager to ticket clerk to luggage carrier and got 100 different responses. I had to give my friend the ticket and charge him with solving the problem as I was going to explode.
This one clerk guy we showed our ticket to, just generally pointed into the ether with his finger… I fucking snapped and in the middle of the railway station I started jumping around pointing everywhere with my eyes crossed and my tongue hanging out, trying to communicate to him that I considered his intellect on a par with that of the iron girding lining the tracks.
My only solace in this time of snuffly-nose induced misery is that I’m really enjoying Rushdie’s Midnight Children. The protagonist also has a perma-cold, so at least I can identify.
I got my permit for Sikkim today. On a positive note, it only took an hour and was a surprisingly easy bureaucratic hurdle. Sikkim is a small Indian state sandwiched between Nepal and Bhutan so I’m gonna head up there in the next day or two when I start feeling better. Maybe Darjeeling will unveil some hidden beauty in the meantime, lets wait and see.
Signing off for your correspondent with a big red nose…
As a town, it suffers from colossal over-development, its windy roads dominated by honking jeeps stuck in eternal jams. Since I’ve arrived here, it’s more or less pissed rain non-stop, yet the town suffers a shortage of water the likes of which I’ve never witnessed before. This water shortage manifests itself (perhaps not surprisingly) in an absolute lack of water. All toilets are closed, with taps in my own bathroom not working for nine out of ten attempts; laundry prices are extortionate and the smell of undiluted effluent invades your olfactory senses.
As I mentioned, my time here has been marred by bad weather. Not only has it been wet, but it’s been quite cold as well (the town is at an altitude of 2100m). Coming from the heat of the lowlands, this has been quite a shock to the system, and I’ve had to invest in winter wollies and wear shoes and socks for the first time in a while. The mountains have been covered in mist, meaning that the only peaks visible are those of the mountains of rubbish which line the pathways.
I suppose I’m not in the best of humour either, and perhaps this is tainting my experience here. It’s now a certainty that any exposure to air conditioning leaves me with a cold. My most recent case of the snuffles was contracted on the 3AC train trip from Varanasi, and now I’m leaving a trail of snot behind me wherever I go and generally feeling like shit.
Also, I appear to have arrived here at some kind of peak tourist season. On the first night of my arrival, I had to spend an hour and a half traipsing around the town looking for a hotel with an empty room. This is unheard of during my travels so far, with any traipsing just being a question of finding a nice room at the right price. But here, I’ve had to settle for what must be the shittest room in the history of the hospitality industry. And what’s more, I’m paying through the (runny) nose for the privilege of ‘a view’, although you can’t see your hand in front of your face most of the time. There are marauding hordes of Indian tourists; families with the loudest, most obnoxious little shits as children. How I haven’t thrown one of the little bastards off the side of the mountain yet, I don’t know. It must be a sign of my deep rooted altruism.
This irritability extends also to bureaucracy and a phenomenon I have elegantly termed “fucking retarded Indian gobshite syndrome”. I swear to God, how I haven’t murdered someone here is beyond me. Myself and a friend took this toy train thingy the other day (a kind of silly little tourist steam driven thingy) to see a town a bit down the road. We had shelled out for first class tickets for the hour long journey, for shits and giggles. When we went to the (toy-) train station, which has a grand total of one departure per day, it took us about an hour to find the train, carriage and seats we had booked. We must have asked all 100 people who worked in the station, from station manager to ticket clerk to luggage carrier and got 100 different responses. I had to give my friend the ticket and charge him with solving the problem as I was going to explode.
This one clerk guy we showed our ticket to, just generally pointed into the ether with his finger… I fucking snapped and in the middle of the railway station I started jumping around pointing everywhere with my eyes crossed and my tongue hanging out, trying to communicate to him that I considered his intellect on a par with that of the iron girding lining the tracks.
My only solace in this time of snuffly-nose induced misery is that I’m really enjoying Rushdie’s Midnight Children. The protagonist also has a perma-cold, so at least I can identify.
I got my permit for Sikkim today. On a positive note, it only took an hour and was a surprisingly easy bureaucratic hurdle. Sikkim is a small Indian state sandwiched between Nepal and Bhutan so I’m gonna head up there in the next day or two when I start feeling better. Maybe Darjeeling will unveil some hidden beauty in the meantime, lets wait and see.
Signing off for your correspondent with a big red nose…
Saturday, May 16, 2009
The smell of charred human flesh
Would you be very surprised if I told you I was on a train… The Mahananda Express picked me up in Mughal Sarai, just outside Varanasi, last night at midnight. It had come from Delhi and was packed with people. I had to eject someone from my upper berth before I could claim it, but that’s fairly standard practice. The family in my compartment appear to be moving all their earthly belongings with them, so there’s no room for me anywhere except in my upper berth haven.
The trip to Mughal Sarai from Varanasi was knicker-gripping. I got a very enthusiastic auto-wallah who immediately gave me a fair price, despite all his colleagues being upset with him for not ripping off the gora. He proceeded to make the 1 hour journey in about 35 minutes, driving at breakneck speed, although he was a good driver. We crashed thrice (the Injuns still use that term); once into a cycle-rickshaw, once into a cyclist, once into an old man. Although my driver was at fault each time, he insisted on further molesting the victims with a torrent of abuse… the cyclist was even honoured with the term behenchod, the only Hindi swearword that I’ve learned to recognize: sisterfucker!
I arrived back in Delhi from Kashmir to a wedding that my friend Vikram had invited me too. It was a pretty opulent affair. Being part of the groom’s side of things, we had to dance in front of his white horse for about three hours, the objective being to slow down his nuptials as he made his way towards his bride. Eventually the horse reached the bridal party and after some mock-arguments as to whether the groom was to be permitted entrance and as to whether his dowry had been sufficient, he finally made his way into a decorated army mess (his dad was a Major) where he sat on a throne-for-two awaiting his beloved (it was not an arranged marriage, it was a love marriage… ain’t that just purty!). Eventually the bride was led in with her family holding a silk sheet over her head. She was presented to her husband and took her seat beside him. Photos ensued, with every permutation and combination of relatives besieging the happy couple. The bride looked like she was going to faint. After that, the couple moved outside where the religious rites were read by an aging saddhu under a silk canopy. We left before this as the whole thing went on for… pardon my French… fuckin’ ages. Excellent food was served in a beautifully lit and immaculately decorated garden patio during all this, and the six-hundred odd guests knocked back juices and multicoloured drinks by the gallon. It was a great night, but I was banjaxed by the time I hit the hay.
After that I had a good few days in Delhi. I met up with some friends and ate like a king. Between Indian fast food in Neruli’s on CP, fish in Blanco’s at Khan Market, Mughal style legs of lamb at Karim’s in Old Delhi or mango milkshakes in Gianni’s, I generally spent the week stuffing my face.
Then I overnighttrained it to Varanasi, one of the oldest permanently populated cities in the world, and sacred pilgrimage place for Hindus and Buddhists alike. I’m happy to inform you that I’m now clean, not clean in the sanitary sense (I’m far from that after twelve hours of train), but clean in the spiritual sense rather. Varanasi is on the Ganges river (Ganga) and a quick dip is supposed to clean your soul and absolve your sin. When I say it was a quick dip though, I mean it was lightning. The river is fairly manky. When you walk along the ghats at the river, some of them are for swimming in and some are burning ghats, where bodies are burned in Hindu funeral rites. So if you’re unlucky, you can have a half charred human foot or hand float past you while you’re bathing. I didn’t give it the time for that. See below for some pics of Delhi and Varanasi.
The Mahananda Express is running four hours late. It’s supposed to be arriving into New Jalpaiguri now (1pm), but it’s gonna be more like 5pm. Then I’ll jump onto the ‘toy train’ which will bring me up to Darjeeling, ex-hillstation of the Brit’s and tea plantation zone. The weather in Darjeeling should be nice, compared with the heat of Delhi or Varanasi. Everyone warned me that the heat would be unbearable and although it has been hot, with temperatures wavering around the 40 degree mark, it’s been fair from unbearable. You wouldn’t want to be running a marathon in a plastic bag in the midday sun, but then again, you wouldn’t want to be doing that anyway. You find yourself unconsciously jumping sunny hurdles between shadowed straights during the day. At night, you can sleep well as long as you have a decent fan above you (one that isn’t too loud; first thing to check in a new room!).
In other news, I’ve gotten fed up of being told what to do and what not to do by random Injuns with or without a uniform. There’s mad security everywhere here, in cinemas, train stations, shopping malls and just about anywhere where wealthy Indians could possibly congregate. Every shop has its own private army and there are security ‘systems’ in place everywhere. I emphasise systems, because none of them actually work. You’ll have fifteen armed guards and four metal detectors supervising and controlling the entrance to the train station, frisking people, going through bags etc. and then ten feet away someone will have left another door open through which people will be filing into the station unperturbed. Every corner you turn, there’s some little wallah with a private security uniform on telling you that you can’t walk here (even though the entire population of India could be walking in front of you). If you sit down in a train station, you can be assured someone with stripes on their arm will ask you to move. So I’ve given up, I’ve now added security men to the growing list of people I ignore in India (beggars, touts, policemen, salesmen, religious people etc.). Not surprisingly, nothing has actually changed. If I just ignore them, then they (like everyone else) will eventually go away and leave me alone… hihihi. Oh, the irony… as I write this a man approached attempting with body language to lay claim to my seat. I showed him my ticket (not letting him touch it, just see it) and now I’m happily ignoring him while he’s rattling on about something.
It sounds like I’m a bastard, but honestly, I’m not! You’ve got to stand up for yourself here, or you’ll be walked all over. Even in terms of safeguarding your private space and sanity of mind, you have to assert yourself. If you engaged with everyone who tried to engage you in conversation, you’d actually never move off the spot.
Ur man on his way to the mountains again…
The trip to Mughal Sarai from Varanasi was knicker-gripping. I got a very enthusiastic auto-wallah who immediately gave me a fair price, despite all his colleagues being upset with him for not ripping off the gora. He proceeded to make the 1 hour journey in about 35 minutes, driving at breakneck speed, although he was a good driver. We crashed thrice (the Injuns still use that term); once into a cycle-rickshaw, once into a cyclist, once into an old man. Although my driver was at fault each time, he insisted on further molesting the victims with a torrent of abuse… the cyclist was even honoured with the term behenchod, the only Hindi swearword that I’ve learned to recognize: sisterfucker!
I arrived back in Delhi from Kashmir to a wedding that my friend Vikram had invited me too. It was a pretty opulent affair. Being part of the groom’s side of things, we had to dance in front of his white horse for about three hours, the objective being to slow down his nuptials as he made his way towards his bride. Eventually the horse reached the bridal party and after some mock-arguments as to whether the groom was to be permitted entrance and as to whether his dowry had been sufficient, he finally made his way into a decorated army mess (his dad was a Major) where he sat on a throne-for-two awaiting his beloved (it was not an arranged marriage, it was a love marriage… ain’t that just purty!). Eventually the bride was led in with her family holding a silk sheet over her head. She was presented to her husband and took her seat beside him. Photos ensued, with every permutation and combination of relatives besieging the happy couple. The bride looked like she was going to faint. After that, the couple moved outside where the religious rites were read by an aging saddhu under a silk canopy. We left before this as the whole thing went on for… pardon my French… fuckin’ ages. Excellent food was served in a beautifully lit and immaculately decorated garden patio during all this, and the six-hundred odd guests knocked back juices and multicoloured drinks by the gallon. It was a great night, but I was banjaxed by the time I hit the hay.
After that I had a good few days in Delhi. I met up with some friends and ate like a king. Between Indian fast food in Neruli’s on CP, fish in Blanco’s at Khan Market, Mughal style legs of lamb at Karim’s in Old Delhi or mango milkshakes in Gianni’s, I generally spent the week stuffing my face.
Then I overnighttrained it to Varanasi, one of the oldest permanently populated cities in the world, and sacred pilgrimage place for Hindus and Buddhists alike. I’m happy to inform you that I’m now clean, not clean in the sanitary sense (I’m far from that after twelve hours of train), but clean in the spiritual sense rather. Varanasi is on the Ganges river (Ganga) and a quick dip is supposed to clean your soul and absolve your sin. When I say it was a quick dip though, I mean it was lightning. The river is fairly manky. When you walk along the ghats at the river, some of them are for swimming in and some are burning ghats, where bodies are burned in Hindu funeral rites. So if you’re unlucky, you can have a half charred human foot or hand float past you while you’re bathing. I didn’t give it the time for that. See below for some pics of Delhi and Varanasi.
The Mahananda Express is running four hours late. It’s supposed to be arriving into New Jalpaiguri now (1pm), but it’s gonna be more like 5pm. Then I’ll jump onto the ‘toy train’ which will bring me up to Darjeeling, ex-hillstation of the Brit’s and tea plantation zone. The weather in Darjeeling should be nice, compared with the heat of Delhi or Varanasi. Everyone warned me that the heat would be unbearable and although it has been hot, with temperatures wavering around the 40 degree mark, it’s been fair from unbearable. You wouldn’t want to be running a marathon in a plastic bag in the midday sun, but then again, you wouldn’t want to be doing that anyway. You find yourself unconsciously jumping sunny hurdles between shadowed straights during the day. At night, you can sleep well as long as you have a decent fan above you (one that isn’t too loud; first thing to check in a new room!).
In other news, I’ve gotten fed up of being told what to do and what not to do by random Injuns with or without a uniform. There’s mad security everywhere here, in cinemas, train stations, shopping malls and just about anywhere where wealthy Indians could possibly congregate. Every shop has its own private army and there are security ‘systems’ in place everywhere. I emphasise systems, because none of them actually work. You’ll have fifteen armed guards and four metal detectors supervising and controlling the entrance to the train station, frisking people, going through bags etc. and then ten feet away someone will have left another door open through which people will be filing into the station unperturbed. Every corner you turn, there’s some little wallah with a private security uniform on telling you that you can’t walk here (even though the entire population of India could be walking in front of you). If you sit down in a train station, you can be assured someone with stripes on their arm will ask you to move. So I’ve given up, I’ve now added security men to the growing list of people I ignore in India (beggars, touts, policemen, salesmen, religious people etc.). Not surprisingly, nothing has actually changed. If I just ignore them, then they (like everyone else) will eventually go away and leave me alone… hihihi. Oh, the irony… as I write this a man approached attempting with body language to lay claim to my seat. I showed him my ticket (not letting him touch it, just see it) and now I’m happily ignoring him while he’s rattling on about something.
It sounds like I’m a bastard, but honestly, I’m not! You’ve got to stand up for yourself here, or you’ll be walked all over. Even in terms of safeguarding your private space and sanity of mind, you have to assert yourself. If you engaged with everyone who tried to engage you in conversation, you’d actually never move off the spot.
Ur man on his way to the mountains again…
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Oh those beautiful boys...
Back in Delhi. Met up with Signe and Pelle (Danish louts) and their friends... Had a few beers last night and listened to CocoRosie... nice songs, particularly this one:
Monday, May 4, 2009
Kashmir pics
I’m back from my three days trekking in the Kashmir valley, back snug as a bug on my little houseboat. This time there’s no music, there’s only the baying of the minarets calling the faithful to prayer.
The three days was good fun. Unfortunately the weather didn’t really play along and it lashed down for days two and three, leaving me only the afternoon of day one for actual trekking. (Your correspondent doesn’t like getting wet). But our tent was sturdy and comfy. It kept us dry despite the driving rain and we had a little harem-type set up inside, with loads of cushions and blankets. There were three of us. Babloo, son of the houseboat owner, playboy of the Eastern World and general money-spinner, was the brains behind the operation. He was the guy I met in Delhi, who insisted I put his number in my phone just in case I made it up to Kashmir. His friend, the aptly named Omelette, also accompanied us as general handyman. I say aptly-named, as the quantity of charas he smokes seemed to mix him up a little. His eyes looked like someone coated them with varnish and his speech was a concoction of random interjections. Nice enough guy though, when he could scrape together cohesion.
The scenery was pretty awesome though. I was expecting to see similar sights to the Karakoram Highway, which isn’t too far away on the other side of the line of control. (BTW, while I’m writing this I have Babloo’s uncle chatting away to me… he speaks excellent English but he’s as barmy as the bathroom door and makes absolute zero sense. The family try to shoo him away from me, but he’s a happy man and I’ve taken to reciprocating his nonsense with some of my own and generally giggling with him… ok, back to the scenery). But it was quite different here. First of all, we were able to drive quite high (dunno how high) and our lift dropped us off only twenty minutes away from our campsite. You have rolling hilltops in the shadow of larger, jagged, snowcapped mountains. This time of year, the snow is melting and the valleys below (one of which we were camped in) have roaring rivers, fed by innumerable streams and cascades coming down from the glaciers and peaks. Fir trees line the valleys sides, soaring up to the tree line beyond which are high-level grassy fields awaiting their release from a snowy burden.
The first evening was spent chowing down on some good chicken and aloo gobi, followed by several bottles of whiskey in preparation for the next days walk. Some of Babloo’s friends were camped beside us with another tourist, a French guy, and we all sat around the fire chatting and singing. A supposed bear sighting freaked the shit out of the Kashmiri guys and they were too scared to go back to their own (fireless) camp. Only upon my discovery of a stray dog while pissing could they be coerced into departure.
The second day was spent sitting in the (admittedly very comfortable and warm) tent, while the heavens opened outside. I read the first few chapters of Midnights Children, a book by the Kashmiri-born Salmon Rushdie set (by absolute chance timing) in around Dal Lake where I am staying. The guys caught a few trout which we chomped down for dinner, along with some mutton and leftovers from the day before.
Having not been economic with the previous nights fuel supplies, we were left high and dry and eventually fell asleep without the aid of booze. When I woke up this morning, it was still raining so we decided to use a short break in the downpour to pack up camp and head home, back to H.B. Raja’s Palace, my current aquatic abode.
I’ve become accustomed here to introducing myself to people as Khana, which is the Kashmiri word for food. It helps people easily memorise how to imitate an anglosized word and it’s close enough to my actual name to keep me in my comfort zone. (Considering ‘Conard’ in French means asshole, it ain’t too bad!).
The family I’m staying with here are “luvly” altogether. Babloo’s sister’s name is Frieda and chats away to her hearts content. His brother, Tariq, has the biggest smile this side of the Indus and is without doubt the Kashmiri equivalent of Mrs. Doyle; he plies with me more tea than my kidneys can handle.
Oh dear Jesus Christ… you’ll have to excuse me! I simply can’t believe that I’ve written this long a post without mentioning the military here. From what I can gather, every ten metres squared has it’s own army-man, and I mean not only in the city, but in the country as well. I think I saw twelve men today guarding a hayfield no bigger than my back garden at home…(although not quite as beautiful ;-). Eh, OK, so it’s not quite that bad, that was a liberal sprinkling of hyperbola… but there are a lot of guns being pointed around up here!
Kashmir was a princely state under the British Raj. It enjoyed special privileges which other Indian states didn’t at the time. From what I gather, the royalty of Kashmir kept full control of land, but paid tithes to the British for that achievement. Anyway, somewhere along the line (click here for details of that line), Kashmir somehow found itself in a strategically quite important geographic position when it came to Partition, and drawing a line between an India and a Pakistan ‘to-be’. Both sides grabbed for it and haven’t let go since. (Actually, China jumped in on the show as well according to certain stories). The border between Pakistan administered Kashmir and India administered Kashmir, the infamous Line of Control, must be one of the worlds most disputed boundaries (although I admit, now I’m just musing… maybe I should click on that link myself ;-). Anyhow, long-story short, when I see a man standing in a field beside a road, up to his ankles in rice paddies, with a gun slung over his shoulder, looking immensely bored, then I think that surely this cannot be productive use of a mans time. I wonder to myself about the families who have been honored because their sons have to gone to the military… and stood in fields getting sunburned!
Right, that’s enough now… I’m getting sleepy and I have to get up at 4am (weather permitting) to go to a floating vegetable market (or some such malarkey). I booked a flight (yes… that’s right, you heard me correct… I booked a flight) from Srinagar to Delhi for Wednesday. I know that its cheating on the whole overland thing, but then again, so was flying home for Christmas so let’s not kid ourselves on this one. I’m invited to a wedding in Delhi, but I want to ensure that I spend maximum time in Kashmir (and minimum time on a crappy bus), so on Wednesday, I’m arriving in at 1pm and the wedding starts at 8pm.
Ur Correspondent on the Subcontinent (UCotS)
C
Post-Ed: Back in Delhi now... please marvel at Kashmir pics below ;-)
The three days was good fun. Unfortunately the weather didn’t really play along and it lashed down for days two and three, leaving me only the afternoon of day one for actual trekking. (Your correspondent doesn’t like getting wet). But our tent was sturdy and comfy. It kept us dry despite the driving rain and we had a little harem-type set up inside, with loads of cushions and blankets. There were three of us. Babloo, son of the houseboat owner, playboy of the Eastern World and general money-spinner, was the brains behind the operation. He was the guy I met in Delhi, who insisted I put his number in my phone just in case I made it up to Kashmir. His friend, the aptly named Omelette, also accompanied us as general handyman. I say aptly-named, as the quantity of charas he smokes seemed to mix him up a little. His eyes looked like someone coated them with varnish and his speech was a concoction of random interjections. Nice enough guy though, when he could scrape together cohesion.
The scenery was pretty awesome though. I was expecting to see similar sights to the Karakoram Highway, which isn’t too far away on the other side of the line of control. (BTW, while I’m writing this I have Babloo’s uncle chatting away to me… he speaks excellent English but he’s as barmy as the bathroom door and makes absolute zero sense. The family try to shoo him away from me, but he’s a happy man and I’ve taken to reciprocating his nonsense with some of my own and generally giggling with him… ok, back to the scenery). But it was quite different here. First of all, we were able to drive quite high (dunno how high) and our lift dropped us off only twenty minutes away from our campsite. You have rolling hilltops in the shadow of larger, jagged, snowcapped mountains. This time of year, the snow is melting and the valleys below (one of which we were camped in) have roaring rivers, fed by innumerable streams and cascades coming down from the glaciers and peaks. Fir trees line the valleys sides, soaring up to the tree line beyond which are high-level grassy fields awaiting their release from a snowy burden.
The first evening was spent chowing down on some good chicken and aloo gobi, followed by several bottles of whiskey in preparation for the next days walk. Some of Babloo’s friends were camped beside us with another tourist, a French guy, and we all sat around the fire chatting and singing. A supposed bear sighting freaked the shit out of the Kashmiri guys and they were too scared to go back to their own (fireless) camp. Only upon my discovery of a stray dog while pissing could they be coerced into departure.
The second day was spent sitting in the (admittedly very comfortable and warm) tent, while the heavens opened outside. I read the first few chapters of Midnights Children, a book by the Kashmiri-born Salmon Rushdie set (by absolute chance timing) in around Dal Lake where I am staying. The guys caught a few trout which we chomped down for dinner, along with some mutton and leftovers from the day before.
Having not been economic with the previous nights fuel supplies, we were left high and dry and eventually fell asleep without the aid of booze. When I woke up this morning, it was still raining so we decided to use a short break in the downpour to pack up camp and head home, back to H.B. Raja’s Palace, my current aquatic abode.
I’ve become accustomed here to introducing myself to people as Khana, which is the Kashmiri word for food. It helps people easily memorise how to imitate an anglosized word and it’s close enough to my actual name to keep me in my comfort zone. (Considering ‘Conard’ in French means asshole, it ain’t too bad!).
The family I’m staying with here are “luvly” altogether. Babloo’s sister’s name is Frieda and chats away to her hearts content. His brother, Tariq, has the biggest smile this side of the Indus and is without doubt the Kashmiri equivalent of Mrs. Doyle; he plies with me more tea than my kidneys can handle.
Oh dear Jesus Christ… you’ll have to excuse me! I simply can’t believe that I’ve written this long a post without mentioning the military here. From what I can gather, every ten metres squared has it’s own army-man, and I mean not only in the city, but in the country as well. I think I saw twelve men today guarding a hayfield no bigger than my back garden at home…(although not quite as beautiful ;-). Eh, OK, so it’s not quite that bad, that was a liberal sprinkling of hyperbola… but there are a lot of guns being pointed around up here!
Kashmir was a princely state under the British Raj. It enjoyed special privileges which other Indian states didn’t at the time. From what I gather, the royalty of Kashmir kept full control of land, but paid tithes to the British for that achievement. Anyway, somewhere along the line (click here for details of that line), Kashmir somehow found itself in a strategically quite important geographic position when it came to Partition, and drawing a line between an India and a Pakistan ‘to-be’. Both sides grabbed for it and haven’t let go since. (Actually, China jumped in on the show as well according to certain stories). The border between Pakistan administered Kashmir and India administered Kashmir, the infamous Line of Control, must be one of the worlds most disputed boundaries (although I admit, now I’m just musing… maybe I should click on that link myself ;-). Anyhow, long-story short, when I see a man standing in a field beside a road, up to his ankles in rice paddies, with a gun slung over his shoulder, looking immensely bored, then I think that surely this cannot be productive use of a mans time. I wonder to myself about the families who have been honored because their sons have to gone to the military… and stood in fields getting sunburned!
Right, that’s enough now… I’m getting sleepy and I have to get up at 4am (weather permitting) to go to a floating vegetable market (or some such malarkey). I booked a flight (yes… that’s right, you heard me correct… I booked a flight) from Srinagar to Delhi for Wednesday. I know that its cheating on the whole overland thing, but then again, so was flying home for Christmas so let’s not kid ourselves on this one. I’m invited to a wedding in Delhi, but I want to ensure that I spend maximum time in Kashmir (and minimum time on a crappy bus), so on Wednesday, I’m arriving in at 1pm and the wedding starts at 8pm.
I really honestly believe that when you go to bed tonight, you will have the sweetest dreams and wake up in the morning feeling better than you ever have. I wish this for you… and all the happiness that life can bring.
-The Kashmiri Way
Ur Correspondent on the Subcontinent (UCotS)
C
Post-Ed: Back in Delhi now... please marvel at Kashmir pics below ;-)
Friday, May 1, 2009
Floating on a cloud
I wish I could transfer to you some kind of appreciation of how beautiful it is here. I’m in a place called Srinagar, it’s the capital city of Indian Kashmir. I’m sitting on the back terrace of a houseboat called “Raja’s Palace”. Behind me, the terrace is decorated with carved walnut wood and the curtains are blowing gently in a light afternoon breeze that kisses your skin. To my fore, I have the vista of Dal Lake and its houseboats, with the snow-capped peaks of the Himalayas stretching out into the distance beyond that. I’m listening to George Benson and sipping on cardamom and ginger tea. In an attempt to overcome the limits of sensory transmission, a small pic has been included below, but believe me, it just don’t do it justice.
Getting here however, was not quite as tranquil an experience: From Dharmshala, I jumped on an eight hour local bus to Jammu on Wednesday morning. Jammu was hot and unpleasant. My usual knack of good timing had my departure for Kashmir coincide with elections here, and for those of you who know a little about Kashmir, you’ll recognize that election time here is not considered a time of guaranteed stability. There was a curfew in place in the Kashmir valley, so all buses had stopped running from Jammu. Luckily I managed to squeeze into a jeep with eight other people, all heading for Srinagar, and they told me it would take 12 hours. The local shepherds however, had other plans for me.
The shepherd community sought to take advantage of the election and the curfew, and in the assumption that not many people would be traveling into the valley on that count, they had decided that they would use that night to monopolise the infrastructure to move all their livestock to higher ground. When I say all their livestock, I mean at least two or three hundred herds of cattle, goats, sheep and horses. The 3km long tunnel, which links the valley with the rest of Kashmir, was therefore closed to traffic with this mass migration of animals making an assortment of general farm noises (the pig, being a notable exception).
Having left Jammu at 8pm, we arrived at the tail-end of the tunnel at 3am the next morning. The tunnel was packed with fluffy sheep and other such livestock though, so we had to sleep in the jeep until 11am the next day. I eventually arrived into Srinagar at 3pm that afternoon, a good thirty hours after I had left Dharmshala, and absolutely fookin’ knackerooed.
But it was all worth it, this had got to one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. It would be unbelievably romantic place but unfortunately, I’m here on my tod. However, I do I know the owners nephew from Delhi, and he’s taking me around, showing me the sights with his friends, so all is good. I’m taking it easy today, but have arranged to go trekking with him tomorrow for three days. Having been in Pakistani Kashmir six months ago, I know that I won’t be disappointed by the mountains here.
The Kashmiri’s have a bad reputation in India. They’re Muslim and separatist, neither quality endearing them to the general Indian public. The Kashmiri region acts as a stage for ever-deteriorating Indo-Pakistani relations. The people here have a reputation for doing ‘business’ and not always in a fair manner. However, I’ve been lucky here so far. I’ve fallen into the bosom of a local family in whose house boat I live. They live just behind me and all speak good English. I’m hanging around with the guys in the family; I lent the daughter some face moisturizer for her sunburn and had dinner with the father last night, where we came pretty close to finding the meaning of life. It’s very pleasant altogether.
Also, the people in Kashmir are beautiful… I mean, really, really beautiful… both the guys and the girls. They are fair (in a dark way ;-), with brown or black hair and they all have fantastic faces with deep blue eyes. The guys have high cheekbones combined with quasi middle-eastern features and the girls have an elegant rotundity to their faces. I guess it’s something about where they’re located. In the northwest of the subcontinent, the gene pool has North Asian, Middle Eastern and Eastern European elements to it.
I’m listening to John Coltrane now. I have to get off this jazz buzz, it doesn’t make for very amusing writing. I promise I’ll listen to Abba next time.
Signing off for your correspondent on the Indian side of the LOC (line of control – the de facto, albeit disputed, border between Pakistani and Indian Kashmir)
Getting here however, was not quite as tranquil an experience: From Dharmshala, I jumped on an eight hour local bus to Jammu on Wednesday morning. Jammu was hot and unpleasant. My usual knack of good timing had my departure for Kashmir coincide with elections here, and for those of you who know a little about Kashmir, you’ll recognize that election time here is not considered a time of guaranteed stability. There was a curfew in place in the Kashmir valley, so all buses had stopped running from Jammu. Luckily I managed to squeeze into a jeep with eight other people, all heading for Srinagar, and they told me it would take 12 hours. The local shepherds however, had other plans for me.
The shepherd community sought to take advantage of the election and the curfew, and in the assumption that not many people would be traveling into the valley on that count, they had decided that they would use that night to monopolise the infrastructure to move all their livestock to higher ground. When I say all their livestock, I mean at least two or three hundred herds of cattle, goats, sheep and horses. The 3km long tunnel, which links the valley with the rest of Kashmir, was therefore closed to traffic with this mass migration of animals making an assortment of general farm noises (the pig, being a notable exception).
Having left Jammu at 8pm, we arrived at the tail-end of the tunnel at 3am the next morning. The tunnel was packed with fluffy sheep and other such livestock though, so we had to sleep in the jeep until 11am the next day. I eventually arrived into Srinagar at 3pm that afternoon, a good thirty hours after I had left Dharmshala, and absolutely fookin’ knackerooed.
But it was all worth it, this had got to one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. It would be unbelievably romantic place but unfortunately, I’m here on my tod. However, I do I know the owners nephew from Delhi, and he’s taking me around, showing me the sights with his friends, so all is good. I’m taking it easy today, but have arranged to go trekking with him tomorrow for three days. Having been in Pakistani Kashmir six months ago, I know that I won’t be disappointed by the mountains here.
The Kashmiri’s have a bad reputation in India. They’re Muslim and separatist, neither quality endearing them to the general Indian public. The Kashmiri region acts as a stage for ever-deteriorating Indo-Pakistani relations. The people here have a reputation for doing ‘business’ and not always in a fair manner. However, I’ve been lucky here so far. I’ve fallen into the bosom of a local family in whose house boat I live. They live just behind me and all speak good English. I’m hanging around with the guys in the family; I lent the daughter some face moisturizer for her sunburn and had dinner with the father last night, where we came pretty close to finding the meaning of life. It’s very pleasant altogether.
Also, the people in Kashmir are beautiful… I mean, really, really beautiful… both the guys and the girls. They are fair (in a dark way ;-), with brown or black hair and they all have fantastic faces with deep blue eyes. The guys have high cheekbones combined with quasi middle-eastern features and the girls have an elegant rotundity to their faces. I guess it’s something about where they’re located. In the northwest of the subcontinent, the gene pool has North Asian, Middle Eastern and Eastern European elements to it.
I’m listening to John Coltrane now. I have to get off this jazz buzz, it doesn’t make for very amusing writing. I promise I’ll listen to Abba next time.
Signing off for your correspondent on the Indian side of the LOC (line of control – the de facto, albeit disputed, border between Pakistani and Indian Kashmir)
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