THE LAND OF FLYING LAMAS & OTHER REAL TRAVEL STORIES FROM THE INDIAN HIMALAYA

by GAURAV PUNJ

  The Land of Flying Lamas

  The Land of Flying Lamas

  And other REAL travel stories

  from the Indian Himalaya

  Gaurav Punj

  westland ltd

  61 Silverline Building, 2nd floor, Alapakkam Main Road, Maduravoyal, Chennai 600095

  No. 38/10 (New No.5), Raghava Nagar, New Timber Yard Layout, Bangalore 560026

  93, 1st Floor, Sham Lal Road, New Delhi 110002

  First published in India by westland ltd 2013

  First e-book edition: 2013

  Copyright © by Gaurav Punj 2013

  All rights reserved

  ISBN: 978-93-83260-52-2

  Typeset by Ram Das Lal

  Illustrations: Shreyas Navare

  Photographs: Gaurav Punj

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, circulated, and no reproduction in any form, in whole or in part (except for brief quotations in critical articles or reviews) may be made without written permission of the publishers.

  CONTENTS

  Foreword: A few words by Harish Kapadia –

  the mountain man

  The Why, What and How of This Book

  Prologue: The Other Himalaya

  Story 1: Kashmir – Second Chance

  Camping in Lidder valley and high drama in a Chaupan hut

  Story 2: The Ladakh Blues, Whites and Browns

  The Khardung La adventure and patriotism at 4500m

  Story 3: The High of Kulu Valley

  A path less travelled and the lost city of Thava

  Story 4: Surreal Spiti

  The pastures of Kara and the ‘friendly spirit’ phenomenon

  Story 5: Rupin-Supin – the Descendants of the Kauravas

  A village of tattooed women and surviving a Himalayan thunderstorm

  Story 6: Nanda Devi – More Than a Mountain

  A never-ending day and the veil of the Goddess

  Story 7: Darma Valley – the Land of Flying Lamas

  The four meadows of Nagling and the

  Himalayan Viagra

  Story 8: Darjeeling Hills and the Story of a Brave Girl

  The day we ran for the ant-eaters

  Story 9: Sikkim and the Art of Tourism

  The trek cake and Nimo ke momo

  Story 10: Arunachal – a Preview

  Epilogue: Trekking – the Way of the Wise

  By Rujuta Diwekar

  Appendix:

  Altitude Sickness

  Common Trekking Terms

  The Next Ten

  Acknowledgements

  Foreword

  Any trip to the mountains, to the Himalaya or otherwise, generates a variety of experiences, from the mundane to the unforgettable, and interactions within the group and with locals on the way create memories worth holding on to and narrating at the next campfire. You follow directions, look at the peaks and enjoy beauty, but it’s the human interactions, which we call stories, that let you understand the land and its people most intimately.

  This is what Gaurav Punj, the author, has done in this book, and he is eminently qualified to write such a book. An engineer by education, corporate honcho in his first avatar, he decided to give up the humdrum, but well-paying life, for the uncertainties of mountains as a means of living. In a way it was in his blood, having been born in the foothills of the Himalaya, in the Shivalik range. Perhaps to him the high profile CV appeared miniscule compared to the grandeur of the mountains. But while roaming the hills your banker cannot help, so he set up his own company, appropriately named ‘Connect with Himalaya’. Since then he has not looked back, being connected with the mountains all through the year. He enjoys it, as I have seen him in action once in the mountains.

  For lifelong passion for mountains there are a few hurdles. You finish education and you are supposed to toe the line; join work or business. If you still continue to trek, then various circumstances are likely to challenge your chosen life. For the survivors, the hardest hurdle to cross is choosing a partner with whom to live the rest of your life. A companion with less understanding of your passion can lead to many conflicts between the social life in a city vs. the hard life of mountains. Gaurav has succeeded in solving this riddle by choosing Rujuta, a celebrated author and a passionate trekker herself, as his life partner. Their marriage, realized in a small temple in a remote Himalayan village, is an example of their love for the Himalaya.

  This book contains many things of interest to a Himalayan lover and trekker. There are maps and trivia, suggestions of local service providers for those interested in travelling to the places covered in the book and, what I like most, references to read and research further for a discerning trekker. Many important aspects are covered in appendices, particularly about altitude sickness, which cannot be less emphasized.

  But the main strength of this book remains in the narrative that blends the real experiences and folklores. Whenever lecturing, one principle to be followed to make it interesting is to narrate stories. Presentation of the history of the peaks, lay of the land, politics and scenes of bravado are useful, but it is the interactions with locals and humour experienced on a trip that keeps the audience interested. So this book with its stories of human aspects and attractive presentation will be of interest to many.

  Harish Kapadia

  Mumbai

  May 2013

  The Why, What and How of this Book

  A wise man once said, ‘Books are written through you, not by you’ – as good a disclaimer one can conjure and one that fits particularly well in case of recreational writers like me.

  My claim to writing fame so far has been an essay on ‘A rainy day’ in Class 7 and a one-pager on ‘How I taught Physics to undergraduates’ during my Berkeley stint. The writer inside me – and make no mistake, there is one inside everyone – held on to those few lines of spontaneous outburst of miraculously connected sentences for all these years. And then I started travelling in the Himalaya, Indian Himalaya to be precise (and you will catch me harping on this difference throughout the book). I travelled and I got inspired, sometimes enough to write a blog on the place I’d visited. Those few, irregular blogs caught the attention of my editor (or rather I ensured they caught her attention, she travelled with me on one of my trips you see), and the publishing house, in their infinite wisdom, felt a book on ‘the other Himalaya’ made sense. Just thought I should briefly share the story behind the book you are holding in your hands. And by the way, thanks for doing that; I do hope this book written through me entertains you.

  Book introductions provide the writer one last chance to influence the reader and I am going to grab this one. So here is the why, what and how of this book.

  Why another book on Himalaya?

  Well, it’s a book on the other Himalaya, and frankly there aren’t enough. About ninety per cent of visitors to the Indian Himalaya go to the same ten per cent places year after year. This book tries to cover parts of the remaining ninety per cent and attempts to convince you, the reader, that it’s very much possible to travel there, on a family holiday or as pure adventure, and does it through stories of people like you and me who have done just that.

  It’s these stories that form the crux of the book and differentiates it from the usual ‘guidebook to the Indian
Himalaya’. Of course, there is information as well, but I don’t intend it to form the basis of your plans to travel on your own in the Himalaya. For that, there are genuinely good guidebooks, and I must mention the ones I have read and gained from:

  –The Outlook Traveller books covering Uttarakhand and Himachal. Also, the monthly Outlook Traveller magazine, which remains the only authentic travel magazine in India, covering off-beat Himalaya in addition to the rest of the country.

  – The Driving Holidays in the Himalaya series by Koko Singh, covering Ladakh, Zanskar, Himachal, Uttarakhand and Sikkim.

  –Lonely Planet’s Trekking in the Indian Himalaya.

  – www.indiamike.com, regardless of its name, is a superb online forum where some of the best trekkers discuss and offer advice about almost everything related to travel in the Indian Himalaya.

  This isn’t a book about climbing either. I have never done any and have no qualification whatsoever to write about it. Again, there are some terrific books about climbing in the Indian Himalaya but without doubt the best of them are the ‘Across Peaks & Passes’ series by Harish Kapadia, covering Ladakh, Zanskar, Himachal, Garhwal, Kumaun and Sikkim. He has written about almost every climbing option (and many trekking ones as well) that currently exists, and along with his observations on the place, people and history these books are veritable encyclopaedias. When I quit my corporate job and was planning and conceptualizing CWH, I spent most of my time reading these books and they have obviously influenced the way I look at the Himalaya, its inhabitants and also the way I write.

  What IS this book again?

  This book is a book of stories, real stories of real people who have travelled with me to the Indian Himalaya over the last five years. Weaved into the stories are facts about the people and places we visited, their past and present, and their way of life. There are ten stories from ten different regions of the Indian Himalaya, from Kashmir through Ladakh, Himachal, Uttarakhand, Sikkim and Arunachal.

  And since five of the ten stories are about treks we did in those regions, I can perhaps say that this book also tries to bust some of the myths and the mystique surrounding this glamorous form of walking. The doctors, homemakers, IT professionals, graphic designers, retirees, school kids, etc. who trekked with me, most of them for the very first time, were not people you would look at and say ‘now that’s a fit guy/girl’, but, as they too realized, on a trek fitness counts for very little. It’s the ability to enjoy being in the wilderness, being away from your phone and laptop, being out of your comfort zone (yet well looked after) and most importantly the ability to feel humbled by the sheer scale of the Himalaya that matters. Strangers become friends, families strengthen their bonds, people think clearly, appreciate the small things that they take for granted and overall return with a higher respect for their abilities, and of their achievements. But it’s not all hunky dory while you are actually on a trek; it’s a constant challenge. People cry, shout, scream and unintentionally say and do things that they (and others) laugh at for a long time afterwards. This forms a crucial part of my stories – how people react to situations when in the mountains.

  How best to read/make sense of it?

  The most important thing you should know is that the ten stories are not interconnected and therefore can be read in any sequence. You can even chose to read only about the areas that interest you or places you are planning to visit some time soon. Okay, so that out of the way, here is how I have structured the stories:

  Imagine you are standing on top of a very high mountain with a very powerful zoom telescope. What you see with your naked eye: the smaller mountains, the valleys, the rivers, jungles, basically the landscape of the place then becomes ‘the setting’ of my story. Now, you peer through your telescope and zoom in by 5X. You can now focus on one of the valleys with a river flowing through it, its small villages with their tiny wooden huts, the flower-filled meadow and birch forest along the river, basically ‘the stage’ on which the story will take place. Zoom in further, to 10X, and you can actually make out tiny figures moving along the river on a trail, ponies carrying their luggage, maybe even flashes from their cameras as they try – unsuccessfully! – to capture the ethereal landscape around them, ‘the cast’. And finally, using the super zooming magical abilities of your telescope, you zoom right into their conversations, even their thoughts and become part of ‘the act’ that is playing out. This is how each of the chapters is divided – from the setting, to the stage, to the cast and finally to the story itself, or the act.

  What else? There is also a ‘map’; not the type that reminds you of your geography textbook so that you want to just quickly flip the page, but hopefully a more engaging one. It’s a sequence of maps actually, following the same ‘zoom in’ funda I explained earlier. Then there are the ‘boxes’, a concept I borrowed from Rujuta’s books, which allow me to write about something interesting without disturbing the flow of the story. ‘Reality check’ is the space where people who are portrayed in the story get a chance to corroborate or dispute what I’ve written about them, and what they think of this whole big deal I am making of their holiday. And finally, each chapter is wrapped up with ‘Raju, the guide’, wherein I play the ubiquitous Raju guide and dole out no-nonsense travel advice for that region. There are also references to books, guides, websites and, most importantly, to what I feel are authentic local organizations with whom you can plan your travel (assuming you will be inspired enough to travel to the region after reading my stories).

  I cannot not mention the chapters that come before and after the stories. The first chapter comprises my ramblings on what I call ‘the other Himalaya’, how it’s the real Himalaya and how most of the people claiming to travel in the Indian Himalaya have somehow managed to miss out on it. What is it, where is it, why is it the real deal. And the last chapter, written by Rujuta Diwekar, by far the best and most passionate trekker I have come across, is essentially the biggest endorsement of trekking itself. Rujuta talks about why you should follow the path of the wise when travelling in Himalaya and the physiological benefits your body reaps as a by-product of travelling in high altitudes. I can safely say that this chapter is the single-most important piece of information you can read to convince yourself to trek.

  Parting thoughts

  All right, by now you must be itching to turn the page to the first chapter (did I tell you I am an eternal optimist), but I must hold you back for one last thing I want to share with you – writer to reader. For all the 2500 or so words I mugged up while preparing for my GRE vocabulary exam a long time back, when it came to describing the Himalaya the way my eyes saw it, I fell woefully short. Apart from ‘spectacular’, ‘splendid’, ‘awesome’, ‘amazing’, I could barely conjure up anything that does justice to the Himalaya. So please, understand this shortcoming, and read between the lines. To help you do that I have put up ‘capability alerts’ and directed you instead to look at the relevant photo on such and such page. The photograph is my description of the scene and the place, and though I understand it’s slightly irritating to flip pages, do take a look before reading on.

  And yes, the name of the book is actually the name of one of the stories and since I couldn’t come up with a super cool name for the book, it made its way to the top. If you are sufficiently intrigued, jump straight to story number seven and read about the flying lama.

  Lastly, I got to write this book ‘luck by chance’, and I am sure many of you will have better descriptions of even more spectacular places in the Indian Himalaya. I’d love to hear and read about them, and perhaps even add them in future editions of this book. You can share them with me at landofflyinglamas@gmail.com.

  I can almost smell the fresh scent of the flower-filled meadows and feel the chill of the Himalayan mornings calling out from the pages ahead. I won’t keep you from enjoying that any longer.

  Happy reading.

  Gaurav Punj

&
nbsp; Mumbai

  July 2013

  Prologue

  The Other Himalaya

  The sacrifice of Tethys

  Himalaya rises

  High five

  Trekking 101

  When I say ‘the other Himalaya’ it automatically implies there is more than one Himalaya. This of course is not true, there is only one Himalaya, but I mean it from the point of view of a visitor. I should perhaps call it ‘the other side’ of the Himalaya, a better description considering the Himalaya I refer to is beyond the lower hills. As mentioned earlier, a study on Himalayan tourism pointed out that ninety per cent of visitors to the Indian Himalaya go to only ten per cent of the places. I should add ‘again and again’ to this. What are those places? No prizes for guessing: hill stations and religious places (largely, the Char Dhams).

  Not to take anything away from them, they became popular for a reason; they provided the perfect mix of what one wanted from a Himalayan holiday – cool climate, lots of greenery, quiet, solitude, basically a world away from the hustle and bustle of city life, and in the case of religious places, a feeling of attainment after a struggle to reach there. However, long after all of the above (except perhaps the cool climate) disappeared from their résumé, they still maintained their status as ultimate tourist hubs, primarily because the commercial interests of too many people were tied with them. Hotels, travel agents, transportation agencies, etc. that set up base there were in no mood to look beyond. Not that their clients were clamouring for change: everyone wanted (and still wants) a honeymoon in Nainital, an adventure holiday in Manali, a weekend getaway to Shimla and a super-quick pilgrimage to the Char Dhams.

  Anyway, so where is this other Himalaya I speak of? It’s not in the high snow-covered peaks that are great to look at but inaccessible to most, rather it’s in the valleys, meadows, passes, villages, glaciers and lakes that all of us can reach and experience. Just add a few more hours to your travel from any of the hill stations and you are in this other Himalaya, suddenly realizing that all you wanted out of your holiday – in fact much more – is here. Through the stories in the next chapters we will get to know this Himalaya and the effect it has on unsuspecting visitors. But before that, a quick refresher course on the origins of the Himalaya. Trust me, I will not make it boring. In fact I am going to tell you a story, the first story there ever was.