Intimidation, Part One: Mountains
I'm sitting at my trusty internet cafe, account freshly replenished with rupees, wondering how the heck I'm going to summarize the past three and a half weeks. I could toss out a quick summary detailing nothing but the places we visited and leave it at that, but that's so not me. I fiercely want to remember everything I saw and did. No, I didn't change the world or get proposed to (ok, not really anyway...), but it blew my mind. Completely. The least I can do is set aside the hours that it'll take to record it all. So. Let's see how much I remember. My verb tenses will be all over the place, since I'm taking some bits from my hand-written journal but most from memory.
We started off on October 5th, taking a train from Pune to Ambala in the Himachal Pradesh. We left in the afternoon, and I was preparing for a sixteen-ish hour trip. Due to a mix-up with the tickets, we had to switch around so that all three of us were in the same car. We were told that we'd be getting in around one in the morning, I was surprised but happy to hear how soon we'd be arriving. Sara, Danielle, and I found our seats, chained our luggage, and started talking about our goals for the trip. In typical ex-overachiever fashion, I started to calculate what time we'd actually arrive at our destination, which was one train and three buses away. I started talking about the upcoming evening, saying that I'd probably just stay awake until we arrived. Danielle asked me what I was talking about. "Well, if I only get an hour of sleep or so, I'll be all grumpy." Sara looked at me with a mixture of confusion and pity, saying, "Sarah... we arrive at one in the morning the day after tomorrow." As in.... "Yep. This is a thirty-seven hour train."
Oh.
With this (incredibly obvious) knowledge in mind, I decided to explore our new home for the next day and a half. Walking into the bathroom, I found an Indian (squat) toilet. However, the bathroom seemed pretty well-ventilated, considering that the only window was latched shut. That's when I glanced into the toilet and saw the tracks rushing by below. I guess I should've known, eh?
Surprisingly, the time passed fairly quickly. I'd never been on a train before arriving in India, and even then my only experience was a brief journey on the local Mumbai trains. I made friends with the man who walked through the cars selling chocolate ("Madam! Toblerone! For you only! You want? Yes, you want! Fifty rupees only!") and struck up conversations with those traveling around us. I spoke with a father of two who wrote me notes of caution about train rides and told the boys next to us to stop staring. I slept (sort of), I ate (technically), and Steri-Penned water to my heart's content. For the record, a Steri-Pen is a water sterlization deviced that looks like a cross between a light saber and a knife. Very encouraging for the passengers around me, I'm sure.
In the second day of our journey, we made friends with some guys from the Indian Army. Obie, as one called himself (what's with the Star Wars references in this entry?), was also getting off at Ambala and then going to Chandigargh. We de-trained (is that a word? It is now..) at Ambala at around one in the morning. Obie helped us find our bus to Chandigargh, where we deleriously watched the passing nightime scenery. Our student visas forbid us from entering Kashmir or Punjab, so the large "WELCOME TO PUNJAB" signs passing by the window were somewhat surprising. True, we were only in the state for about thirty minutes as our bus passed through, but I still felt like a secret agent, only sleepier.
Getting down at Chandigargh, Obie made sure that we got our tickets for our bus to Aut. He shook our hands and hopped into a cab. It turns out that he'd gone about thirty mintues past his stop in order to make sure that we found our final bus. From Chandigargh, we took yet another bus to Aut, a small and slightly sketchy mountain town on our way to Jibhi, our final destination. After a few garbeled Hindi-English exchanges, we caught our final bus to Jibhi. One of our ACM leaders had arranged a place for us to stay, so the owner of the hotel picked us up from the bus station. Mr. Kapil, as we called him, looked like a cross between a hippie liberal arts professor and an Indian hair model. He didn't talk much (at all) on the car ride to his hotel, which we soon learned was actually a yoga ashram. Nestled deep in the Kullu/Manali Valley area, this tiny ashram housed three other foreigners and looked like something out of an REI advertisement. After forty-eight hours of travel, we'd arrived.
Stepping down the crooked stone steps to the ashram made everything worth it. Jibhi, the town that the ashram is located in, is really a village of about fifty people. There's a temple, an STD (phone) booth, and a few snack stores. Any direction I turned, I saw nothing but the Himalayas. It's like being in a complete vaccum of fresh air and even fresher silence. The only sounds are crickets, a babbling brook, and children laughing in the distance. After living in Pune for three months, I thought I'd grown used to the noise and pollution and careening rickshaws. But here, in the foothills of the Himalayas, I could feel myself growing lighter, and not just from the lack of oxygen in the air. Time actually seemed to slow down as I sat on a boulder and just stared.
The ashram we stayed at was nothing like the Osho ashrams. These are spartan rooms with healthy meals cooked by the eighteen-year-old live-in cook, Billy. The bathrooms are outdoors, which is refreshing, especially since there aren't railroad tracks beneath. However, I'm avoiding them at all costs ever since I found a spider the size of my fist the last time I used one. Sara saved me from my shrieking paralysis and comfortingly infomed me that at least I hadn't run into one of the really big ones. Apparently she'd bumped into one the size of an open hand. Dear God.
But, here we are. Since our arrival two days ago, I've climbed mountains, dangled my sore feet into a frigid mountain stream, seen what looked like walking haystacks everywhere, and squeezed with three other girls into a double bed in order to stay warm. The air feels like a Minnesota autumn, which has made me finally recognize that it's not summer anymore. Honestly, being dumped into this land of chilly air and crunchy leaves was exactly what I needed. For the Woodward-Lees reading this, picture what Georgian Bay would look like in the fall. It's wonderful.
One of our treks took us up to the Jhelori Pass. On our way up the mountain from Jibhi, we found out that we'd missed the bus. However, a family of four offered to take us up in the back of their pickup truck for twenty-five rupees each. One hour of careening and jostling later, we arrived at the Pass. We hiked for four hours without seeing another person, our only company a black-and-white dog who served as a perfect guide. She showed us hidden nooks that gave me some of the most amazing views I've ever experienced. We reached our turnaround point, a lake, around noon. Just before the lake, we bumped into a chai stand. Only in India could you find a hot cup of tea in a completely unpopulated area. (P.S. It was the best tea I've had over here so far).
Just beyond the tea stand was the lake. I was so happy to see water that I sat on a rock near the shore for half an hour, watching a cow graze next to me as my feet went blissfully numb.
The mountains were like nothing I've experienced. The crisp air and beautiful vegitation reminded me of Georigan Bay and Wolsfeld Woods, two of the places in this world that I love the most. But there was another element in the air, one that I can't put my finger on. It's been strange over here, since even though so many things seem foreign, I keep feeling like I've been here before. It's happened more in nature, since that's more universal than the rickshaw-choked cities. But now, more than ever, I feel like I was supposed to come here. A part of me is very glad that it's almost November, since there are so many things at home that I look forward to seeing. But there's also no doubt in my mind that this is where I'm supposed to be right now.
All for now.. time for yoga. Tomorrow, the desert!
Love,
Sarah!
iPod: "All You'll Ever Need," Forever In Fall, "The Bagman's Gambit," The Decemberists
We started off on October 5th, taking a train from Pune to Ambala in the Himachal Pradesh. We left in the afternoon, and I was preparing for a sixteen-ish hour trip. Due to a mix-up with the tickets, we had to switch around so that all three of us were in the same car. We were told that we'd be getting in around one in the morning, I was surprised but happy to hear how soon we'd be arriving. Sara, Danielle, and I found our seats, chained our luggage, and started talking about our goals for the trip. In typical ex-overachiever fashion, I started to calculate what time we'd actually arrive at our destination, which was one train and three buses away. I started talking about the upcoming evening, saying that I'd probably just stay awake until we arrived. Danielle asked me what I was talking about. "Well, if I only get an hour of sleep or so, I'll be all grumpy." Sara looked at me with a mixture of confusion and pity, saying, "Sarah... we arrive at one in the morning the day after tomorrow." As in.... "Yep. This is a thirty-seven hour train."
Oh.
With this (incredibly obvious) knowledge in mind, I decided to explore our new home for the next day and a half. Walking into the bathroom, I found an Indian (squat) toilet. However, the bathroom seemed pretty well-ventilated, considering that the only window was latched shut. That's when I glanced into the toilet and saw the tracks rushing by below. I guess I should've known, eh?
Surprisingly, the time passed fairly quickly. I'd never been on a train before arriving in India, and even then my only experience was a brief journey on the local Mumbai trains. I made friends with the man who walked through the cars selling chocolate ("Madam! Toblerone! For you only! You want? Yes, you want! Fifty rupees only!") and struck up conversations with those traveling around us. I spoke with a father of two who wrote me notes of caution about train rides and told the boys next to us to stop staring. I slept (sort of), I ate (technically), and Steri-Penned water to my heart's content. For the record, a Steri-Pen is a water sterlization deviced that looks like a cross between a light saber and a knife. Very encouraging for the passengers around me, I'm sure.
In the second day of our journey, we made friends with some guys from the Indian Army. Obie, as one called himself (what's with the Star Wars references in this entry?), was also getting off at Ambala and then going to Chandigargh. We de-trained (is that a word? It is now..) at Ambala at around one in the morning. Obie helped us find our bus to Chandigargh, where we deleriously watched the passing nightime scenery. Our student visas forbid us from entering Kashmir or Punjab, so the large "WELCOME TO PUNJAB" signs passing by the window were somewhat surprising. True, we were only in the state for about thirty minutes as our bus passed through, but I still felt like a secret agent, only sleepier.
Getting down at Chandigargh, Obie made sure that we got our tickets for our bus to Aut. He shook our hands and hopped into a cab. It turns out that he'd gone about thirty mintues past his stop in order to make sure that we found our final bus. From Chandigargh, we took yet another bus to Aut, a small and slightly sketchy mountain town on our way to Jibhi, our final destination. After a few garbeled Hindi-English exchanges, we caught our final bus to Jibhi. One of our ACM leaders had arranged a place for us to stay, so the owner of the hotel picked us up from the bus station. Mr. Kapil, as we called him, looked like a cross between a hippie liberal arts professor and an Indian hair model. He didn't talk much (at all) on the car ride to his hotel, which we soon learned was actually a yoga ashram. Nestled deep in the Kullu/Manali Valley area, this tiny ashram housed three other foreigners and looked like something out of an REI advertisement. After forty-eight hours of travel, we'd arrived.
Stepping down the crooked stone steps to the ashram made everything worth it. Jibhi, the town that the ashram is located in, is really a village of about fifty people. There's a temple, an STD (phone) booth, and a few snack stores. Any direction I turned, I saw nothing but the Himalayas. It's like being in a complete vaccum of fresh air and even fresher silence. The only sounds are crickets, a babbling brook, and children laughing in the distance. After living in Pune for three months, I thought I'd grown used to the noise and pollution and careening rickshaws. But here, in the foothills of the Himalayas, I could feel myself growing lighter, and not just from the lack of oxygen in the air. Time actually seemed to slow down as I sat on a boulder and just stared.
The ashram we stayed at was nothing like the Osho ashrams. These are spartan rooms with healthy meals cooked by the eighteen-year-old live-in cook, Billy. The bathrooms are outdoors, which is refreshing, especially since there aren't railroad tracks beneath. However, I'm avoiding them at all costs ever since I found a spider the size of my fist the last time I used one. Sara saved me from my shrieking paralysis and comfortingly infomed me that at least I hadn't run into one of the really big ones. Apparently she'd bumped into one the size of an open hand. Dear God.
But, here we are. Since our arrival two days ago, I've climbed mountains, dangled my sore feet into a frigid mountain stream, seen what looked like walking haystacks everywhere, and squeezed with three other girls into a double bed in order to stay warm. The air feels like a Minnesota autumn, which has made me finally recognize that it's not summer anymore. Honestly, being dumped into this land of chilly air and crunchy leaves was exactly what I needed. For the Woodward-Lees reading this, picture what Georgian Bay would look like in the fall. It's wonderful.
One of our treks took us up to the Jhelori Pass. On our way up the mountain from Jibhi, we found out that we'd missed the bus. However, a family of four offered to take us up in the back of their pickup truck for twenty-five rupees each. One hour of careening and jostling later, we arrived at the Pass. We hiked for four hours without seeing another person, our only company a black-and-white dog who served as a perfect guide. She showed us hidden nooks that gave me some of the most amazing views I've ever experienced. We reached our turnaround point, a lake, around noon. Just before the lake, we bumped into a chai stand. Only in India could you find a hot cup of tea in a completely unpopulated area. (P.S. It was the best tea I've had over here so far).
Just beyond the tea stand was the lake. I was so happy to see water that I sat on a rock near the shore for half an hour, watching a cow graze next to me as my feet went blissfully numb.
The mountains were like nothing I've experienced. The crisp air and beautiful vegitation reminded me of Georigan Bay and Wolsfeld Woods, two of the places in this world that I love the most. But there was another element in the air, one that I can't put my finger on. It's been strange over here, since even though so many things seem foreign, I keep feeling like I've been here before. It's happened more in nature, since that's more universal than the rickshaw-choked cities. But now, more than ever, I feel like I was supposed to come here. A part of me is very glad that it's almost November, since there are so many things at home that I look forward to seeing. But there's also no doubt in my mind that this is where I'm supposed to be right now.
All for now.. time for yoga. Tomorrow, the desert!
Love,
Sarah!
iPod: "All You'll Ever Need," Forever In Fall, "The Bagman's Gambit," The Decemberists
posted by Sarah! at 3:05 AM
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