Difficult yet so easy to describe the countryside, which still remains fresh in my mind. But that wouldn’t do justice to the importance of that place in my mind.ive always felt highly inadequate in the words department when I need them the most, but try I will to capture those feelings I get when I remember that place. A pale reflection im sure, but something never the less. Its barren spread was life giving to me, like fresh air sucked into oxygen-deprived lungs after spending hours in a claustrophobic room.
Melting blue skies and feathery white clouds, braving the winds. The blue was so blue that it hurt the eyes. Absolutely no pollution. Well a bane for my skin, as I had to invest in tons of sun block crème to prevent myself from burning crisply like a kebab.
The roads and narrow streets, primitive mud and rock houses and spires and domes of the local ‘gompas’ and ‘stupas’ housing relics of lord Buddha) all seemed faintly familiar…yet I’ve never been there before. The quaint little shops with treasures in terms of local art and handicrafts like gems…precious, semi- precious, Chinese silks, wooden masks and carvings etc.however at that stage what caught my attention was not the local shops but the local scenery and people.
There is no better way to observe the local color than on foot. I was like a maniac let loose. Not a word to anyone and I walked the streets alone and safe in the knowledge that if the locals could walk around wearing Rs 4 lacs worth of jewellery encrusted apparel without any mishaps, then I would court no harm.
I saw the beautiful trees...springs and rivulets of the Leh city, which is the only green city in the whole of Ladakh.A place that boasts the highest airstrip in the whole world and a radio station.
It was the month of June; peak of summer and purple passionflowers and daisies dotted the fields. Just then I realized how naïve I was, for I was running around collecting and making little posies of flowers to take with me, but the next moment almost they would wither away. My own little garden in a paradise .I thought that was still undiscovered and untouched.
Oh! I needed to apply for a patent soon!! Well jokes apart I really did pray that instant that it would forever remain that way untouched and beautiful. The cherry, almond and peach trees were in bloom and fruit laden. Blossoms everywhere and lush green branches waved in the wind. A conveniently bent willow tree served as a bridge across a swift moving ice cold streams, one of the many that go and merge into the Indus, feeding it with their life blood, gushing and bubbling with all their splendor even as they die out into non existence and merge into a much larger whole.
There on that very bridge I sat down and dipped my feet into that tempting water and imagined what it would feel like to be fully submerged in that crystal clear and of course bitingly cold water-probably instant HYPOTHERMIA!
It was like Alice in wonderland. I spent I spent unbelievable 6 hours just walking about the streets and sniffing the air and plain just reveling in life. Another moment of ecstasy for me was later that night… we had dinner in the Mess amidst the throng of people all discussing the various places of interest and treasures. All of them sadly sounded like plundering raiders come to rob the place to showcase in their homes like dead and lifeless replicas of the originals, which could never be reproduced. My soul cried in outrage at this invasion, at this violation and with disgust I walked off from there.
Strangely though the temperatures really dip at night. I was wearing a simple gray pullover and a skirt with my sturdy sneakers…and I walked on to the farthest boundary of the premises. Alongside the barbed wire enclosure there was a huge boulder as if suspended over the edge only held by those fragile looking wires… I sat on that boulder and added my weight to it, tempting it to roll over along with me.
But at that moment I thought nothing. I was mesmerized by the sky as never before. A moonless night with cold gusts of wind. Not a sound for miles except the wind groaning through the few trees that dotted the landscape and the stars twinkling so close as if I could just reach up and pick a few of those dazzlers.
I leant my back against that rock that still held some warmth it had collected during the day and blanked out my thoughts. All I could feel at that moment was immeasurable peace and calm, a sense of freedom, a feeling of being one with my surroundings. Like I had merged into the soil, dissolved into the atmosphere, flown up to the stars and just ceased to exist. That was the one moment when I wished to die and grant permanence to that beautiful feeling of being there yet not there. A supreme indifference to my surroundings and yet a heightened awareness of each grain of sand around me, as though it was a part of my very being.
Unfortunately at that moment my bliss was shattered and my parents called me to turn in. tomorrow would be another day and another place to see… more memories to make or was it revisit and refresh my memories (I never could tell…all seemed oh so familiar). But whenever I searched, wherever I went I could not recollect that feeling ever. That one moment was the closest I ever came to my God, the closest ever to oblivion, the closest to this universe. The true meaning therein, in me ,and all around me…
We travelled extensively through the length and breath of Ladakh… shades of brown, gold, occre, silver predominated everywhere. Colourful prayer flags, shaggy long haired dogs with blood shot eyes, wild as their surroundings, free as they were born to be… gompas with mysterious monks chanting prayers oblivious to our presence… their yellow and maroon robes rustling as they walk past and disappear into equally mysterious cavernous dark monasteries in search of the higher plane… a never-ending quest which I too have discovered… the smell of the burning incense and yak milk grease, yellow beaked huge ravens, their ugliness not a blot on the surroundings but in perfect harmony… fighting and screaming raucously for scraps of food that tourists throw to them…shy exquisitely dressed maidens with smooth blushing cheeks and dainty feet clad in raw hide moccasins, grave faced men with skin like parchment all wrinkled and deeply lined…but with the innocence of childhood I their eyes combined with the maturity of a lifetime… their unhurried movements and the smooth way they glided across the ground…effortlessly plodding on to unknown destinations… miles of walk… I could connect with them without language, without gestures, with just a look and felt warm cherished and loved. Simple people with simple lives…no need to give freely to me, yet freely they did give their love and in return got mine. How strange for all this to happen to me in that short 40 day spell… a slip of a girl was I…barely fledged and scared at the magnitude of the emotions I was feeling till I looked into the mirror and saw a face so young with eyes so old…perplexed I looked away to see the world.
To me it was all a love beyond a love…a celebration of humanity, just a smile and nothing more and yet the whole world.
And so I moved on to newer places as I cynically smiled to myself mocking myself and the way my senses were playing tricks with me…brawny yaks, a and their chiming bells, the curly horned sure- footed sheep climbing steadily up the mountainsides in search of scraps of grass, the chiru, and the silver bellied trout that comes home every year to spawn…HOME!!! I’ve stopped thinking and only feel now… lest I go mad with the thousand and one deja vus I am getting.
The soft bloom on the fresh peaches, dewy red cherries, lush apricots…well just then reality bit …vegetables came at a certain price-Rs50 per kilo of onions or potatoes or a chicken for 300 bucks…I think after a month or two one would be reduced to consuming the local fare at this rate. Thankfully we were putting up in an army establishment that took care of all our requirements so we only needed to supplement our diet with fruit. The rest all came out of tins. I was eternally grateful for the forethought that made me buy my huge stock of chocolates.
I must mention something about the queer burial rituals of the local people…without which my account would be incomplete. Like most Hindus the ladakhis cremate their dead, but unlike the usual funeral pyre they construct mud ovens (what I called tandoors) around the dead person who was conveniently made to sit and then lit under him. Afterwords when it would all be over, by that I mean when the body is reduced to cinders they seal the top and white wash the exterior structure. Numerous such structures dotted the countryside and I once posed for a picture leaning nonchalantly against one, till I came to know the significance.
My visit to Choglamsar, the Leh City Palace, Thikse, Hemis, Zanskar and Pangong Tso Lake were all filled with color, history and beautiful breathtaking scenery. But such heavy dollops of culture began to pall until one day I struck gold once again in the Hemis Monastery that houses the statue of the reclining Buddha made in gold and of immense proportions.
Also that monastery contained priceless murals and frescoes of the tirthankaras. At that tie the next reincarnation of the lord Buddha was to be born in some quaint village in Tibet and the monks the world over were preparing for that great day and offering prayers to the gods. The atmosphere was redolent with incense, smoke and strange chants in a foreign language. But the spirit was the same … that of prayer, of peace, of solitude, of sanctity…
And out of that smoke a young priest beckoned to me and motioned me to go before a priest sitting in the dim recess of the rear end of the monastery’s main hall. Dad and I went forward and with some degree of trepidation I walked closer. But the monk smiled kindly and extremely lovingly as though he understood my fears and was amused by them. That calmed me instantly. He had the most powerful stare I have ever encountered, one from which I couldn’t pull away, deep brown eyes that shone with some kind of inner radiance…
He touched the top of my head and my right palm and said something in a language indecipherable to me … but the message was clear…blessed me …and sure enough much to my surprise the young monk confirmed it in English. He also mentioned a few things I don’t need to mention here, but which have ever since perturbed me…mentioned having as long wait…and having lost something…things at time I never knew and still I don’t… maybe he meant I will loose my faith and get it back again…maybe he understood my quest for peace …something I had just discovered to my surprise …
What caught and wove a web around me was the quality of his smile and a strange look in his eyes…maybe I misinterpreted it… but it almost seemed like respect, and reverence and even saying such things seems arrogance to me and sheer sacrilege… but maybe, maybe I was wrong just that time… it was the look of an equal given to an equal…not man to woman not father to daughter not any gender but equal to equal.
A certain peace descended on me and I moved away from him like in a trance and walked back into the bright sunshine… a changed person yet the same. I must acknowledge the fact that that was the day I started acknowledging my restlessness…28th June 1994.
Someday I will go back again and just relive that moment of perfect communion between us… don’t know if he will recognize me or if I will recognize him for that matter…I don’t even know his name…just a nameless faceless monk whose essence I’m sure will be still be there like those who lived before him.
The rest of the trip was a mixture of unforgettable and forgettable beauty, campfires, impromptu parties, fairy lights, dancing under the stars, food, fun frolic, donkey and mule rides. White water rafting, and other adventure sports, plain good old trekking and rock climbing…
But all this one can get anywhere. To sum up what Ladakh gave me was the essence of purity, tranquility, peace, freedom, and of course the real me…on the other side it awakened my senses and made me go wild with a frenzy of thoughts questions and pure unrest…
So much packed in so few days…40 to be exact…
A lifetime I plan to relive someday with the one I will share my soul with…if God is kind
And Destiny wills it…till then it’s a wait…long wait as he said…
No comments:
Post a Comment