“And in the still of the night when nothing stirs, I awoke…”
-Bright Eyes, “The Vanishing Act”
Locations:
Photos:
Temperature:
Morale: 9
Spinning: Delhi: The New Pornographers – Challengers; Kashmir: Bright Eyes – Noise Floor (if you haven't heard this album/listened to it at least ten times through, please do so as soon as you can manage. It is amazing.)
Reading: Homes and Other Black Holes by Dave Barry (ok, ok, so not the most sophisticated of literature, but there is something to be said for a book that makes you laugh out loud, over and over again, even when you really don't want to, like when you're sitting next to a big scary Kashmiri dude on a plane), and of course my Lonely Planet guidebook and The Economist
What's next (I think):
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So, it’s been a somewhat unpredictable start to this admittedly loosely-planned trip. My flight to
I arrived at the
Sure enough, as the quotation I chose for the subject line hints, I woke up around 5am after sleeping for less than 3 hours, though not because of any noise (Delhi, and even crazy Paharganj, is eerily quiet at 5am on Saturday morning—probably about the only time it is). I got up and went downstairs to the hotel reception and the first person I met was a Kashmiri guy who inevitably began to talk to me about visiting his brother in
At first I would have none of it, but then he asked me to tell him my itinerary (south to Agra and Rajasthan, then north to Punjab and McLeod Ganj, then back south to south India), and he said it made no sense because it would get cooler in Agra/Rajasthan every day from now till October, and so obviously I should go north first, where it was cool, and then go south later. As someone who dislikes arguing with reason, I said “OK” and decided I would head north to
But he kept up about how beautiful Kashmir was (I asked him if it was safe, and he said yes, and I didn't believe him, but I also didn't really care because there is no way it could be as dangerous as driving around Delhi in a taxi. Hi mom!) and then showed me some reviews of people who had gone and some pictures of the place, and they looked amazing. But we still had the issue of the flight, which, booked well in advance, was ~$200 according to my book. I imagined it would be far more if I tried to book the day of. But the guy made some calls and found me a ticket for $75 including taxes, an offer which I insta-lifted. Apparently some new airlines have entered the fray since my book was published. Sweet.
The highlight of a visit to
I had to be back to the hotel to get my taxi to the airport at 10, so that gave me four hours to wander around
I took an auto-rickshaw from
The Indian parliament and President's palace are tan stone buildings built by the English during colonial times. The English viceroy lived in the palace before Indian independence (in 1947).
After the Rajpath I walked to Indira Gandhi’s former residence, where she was assassinated. On the way I passed about 50 monkeys that were just walking the streets among the people, motorbikes, and cars. I think I'm going like this place.
I saw Indira's house, which is now a museum of her assassination, from the outside, but the museum wasn't open yet and I had to get back to my hotel anyhow, so I jumped in an auto-rickshaw and headed back to Paharganj. I packed my bag and then the Kashmiri guy put a Lithuanian couple (who were in their 30s and would also be staying on my houseboat) and me into a cab bound for the domestic terminal of Indira Gandhi airport.
Our flight was delayed a couple hours, which was annoying, but it did mean that we got a free lunch in the airport (the same thing happened when I was delayed in Brussels on the way back from Senegal—apparently only American airlines think it is acceptable to delay a flight without giving a good reason and then to refuse to feed their delayed passengers).
The flight was quite pleasant—a full meal of really good Indian food, and amazing views of plains, then hills, and finally mountains. Looking out the window while flying over the
The
But, seriously, things have recently calmed down in
A quick bit about the Lithuanians: they were horrid. They spoke little English, but they drank a whole hell of a lot of vodka, and they smoked maybe a pack of cigarettes every 6 minutes. At dinner the first night the dude tried to pour me a GLASS of vodka. In short, they made most American tourists look like angels, which is not an easy feat.
We finally made it out of airport security (and here I thought airport security was for people getting *on* the plane) and went outside to find the guy we'd be staying with on the houseboat. To my excitement, I saw my name (actually, the last ten letters of my name, but really, who am I to complain) on a card, limousine style. That's a first.
Our host, named Bashir, spoke decent English and gave me a good background on Kashmir in the cab on the way to
When we got to the lake, we were paddled out to the houseboat (there are hundreds of houseboats on the lake) in a shikara, which is basically the Kashmiri word for gondola. The houseboat was quite fancy—definitely worth the money I paid—and a huge step up from my
Anyhow, the houseboat was maybe the nicest accommodation I’ve had on any of my backpacking trips; my room had a big bathroom, lots of mirrors, two double beds, and even a chair I could sit and read in. But I didn't spend much time in the room because the porch outside the houseboat was even better—it overlooked the lake and the mountains, and the view, especially at sunrise and sunset, was stunning.
Soon after arriving I took a shikara to the nearby Mughal gardens (Mughals ruled Kashmir for many years a few centuries ago) with my guide for the two days, Omar, who was Bashir's son and lived in the same houseboat that I was staying in (although he refused to let me see the family's part of the house—I'm guessing it may not have been quite as luxurious as my part).
Omar is a 20 year old Kashmiri who I got to know pretty well over the next two days. He spoke exceptional English and seemed to be fully capable of doing anything he wanted to do... except for the fact that he lived in
Anyhow, the Mughal gardens. They were constructed by Shah Jahan (who also commissioned a building in
After the Mughal gardens Omar took me by his friend's Kashmiri handicrafts shop (lots of reciprocity in this society, clearly).
Omar shikara-ed me back to the houseboat and I ate a tasty Kashmiri dinner with the Lithuanians at our fine English dinner table. A fine English dinner table in the middle of a lake in
After dinner I sat on the porch and watched an engagement party that was happening on a neighboring houseboat. There was music and dancing and, at the end, makeshift fireworks over the lake.
Before bed I talk to a couple Japanese travelers who were staying in the houseboat next to me and were around my age. They had hair down past their waists (one guy, one girl), were way into yoga and perhaps Buddhism, and they made me feel like a complete materialist by comparison. They had done a lot of traveling, and we had been to many of the same places around the world, and we even had some surprising shared experiences—they had also tried, and failed, to climb the Great Pyramid at night only to successfully climb the smaller one the next day before getting kicked out (Sorry Adam and Ian—I guess we’re not so original after all). Anyhow, they were some of the most chilled out people I had ever met. They were heading to Leh (in Ladakh, which is over the Himalayas from Kashmir and near the
I showered, washed my clothes in the sink, and went to bed, but once again I couldn't sleep past 5am. So I got up before dawn, borrowed a shikara, and paddled out to the middle of the lake to watch the sun rise over the mountains—definitely an awe-inspiring moment.
That morning I realized a few things about my trip. First, I have to abandon my oft-held view that most people I meet will be uninteresting and not worth talking to. For one thing, it isn't true here the way I thought it was in
Second, I realized that this trip was particularly exciting to me because I'm fully on my own. Sure, if I make an attempt to talk to people as I’ve just suggested I will, I’ll probably manage to meet some fellow travelers along the way and probably not spend all of my time alone, but where and when I go is totally up to me. If I decide I want to bag
Third, I realized that I needed to write a lot on this trip to get everything that is going through my head down on paper. I tend to have thoughts during my travels that I don't have while working, simply because my mind is freed up from thinking about where FN 745932 clears today (t+3 carry inclusive, of course), etc. But lots of times when I get back I forget everything I thought about on the trip. So this trip I'm going to journal everything important in these emails, which may make them long and somewhat unreadable for you all. But in the end, I'm writing these more for myself than for you (I always found the Conor Oberst lyrics “I do not read the reviews—no, I am not singing for you...” to be pretty condescending and self-righteous, and I guess I still do, but I guess now I realize a little more where he's coming from). So if you don't read all this stuff, I really won't be offended. Though of course I still hope you do.
So there I sat in the warm Kashmiri sun, thinking about how glad I was that I had run into that random Kashmiri guy in
I also thought about how much better this trip was going to be now that I had ditched the itinerary, however rough it may have been. Schedules are for jobs, and real life, and
When the Lithuanians finally woke up (most likely in a drunken stupor), we all had breakfast in the houseboat. Omelets and toast—and surprisingly good. What do Kashmiris really eat for breakfast?
After breakfast I changed into my “hiking shoes” (I actually only brought one pair of shoes along, so they’re multipurpose) and assumed the Lithuanians were doing the same, considering we were headed to Pahalgam, at the foot of the western
I figured our host/guide would let it slide since a) Kashmir is too dangerous to get many tourists these days and so the locals have to be nice to the ones they do get, and b) in that vein, he had pretty much let us do whatever we wanted to do so far, however insulting it was, including the time when the Lithuanian dude interrupted him during the third prayer time of the day to ask where the ketchup was.
But, surprisingly, he (politely) asked the dude to ask his wife to change “because the villagers would be uncomfortable.” I guess that's how offensive it really was. Nevertheless, she seemed put off by the request. Tough life, lady.
Luckily my guide Omar and I had our own van to Pahalgam so I was spared more time with Beckham and Posh. And it was a two hour ride, so we had plenty of time to delve into all the touchy Kashmiri issues, from political self-determination (most Kashmiris still want independence, but the chances of India and Pakistan ever giving it to them is slim, I gather) to religion (most of Kashmir is Sunni Muslim, while Jammu (part of the same state) and much of India proper are mostly Hindu and Ladakh (also, perhaps stupidly, part of the same state) is mostly Buddhist) to the link between Islam and militancy/terrorism/jihad (“They do not truly follow God”).
I also pried into Omar's own religious views—he said that Kashmir was mostly Muslim, but had never stated his own beliefs, so I point-blank asked him, and he somewhat ashamedly admitted he was Muslim, and then quickly said that he thought I (being American) wouldn't like that. I assured him that I didn't dislike (or like, for that matter), anyone solely for their religion, which he seemed to find relieving. Thank you for that one, George Bush.
Pahalgam was beautiful, especially when Beckham and Posh were bathing half-naked in the otherwise-picturesque rushing mountain river (fed by melting snow atop the
We didn’t really do a lot in Pahalgam—mostly just ate our picnic lunch and walked around. I did manage to ride a pony for a while, which was good fun until my butt started to hurt, and I went on a hike with Omar, though we had to cut it short because the Lithuanians were ready to go home. They were having trouble hiking in their designer sandals. Go figure.
The most interesting part of the excursion was the number of times I was strip-searched on the way from
One more thing about the Indian military presence: the Kashmiris do not particularly like the Indian soldiers, and vice versa, which was easy to see in the strained interactions I observed between soldiers and civilians. Basically, the Kashmiris see the Indian military as an occupying force (much like how many Iraqis view the American military), and the Indian soldiers see the Kashmiris as a bunch of terrorists (despite the fact that only about 700 militants are still active in the Kashmiri valley). This situation could be mitigated by a reduction in Indian troops (despite a recent trend of less violence in the region, the Indian military presence in Kashmir is still over 500,000 troops), but so far
On the way back to Srinagar we stopped for Kashmiri “tea” (which tastes more like hot cocoa), and then Omar had our van driver drop us off at the local cricket fields so we could catch the end of his cricket game (which he had missed to take me to Pahalgam). I sat on the sidelines trying to figure out what was going on, but to no avail. Cricket is confusing.
I met Omar's team after the game (they won, and collected the Rs 500 ($12.50) bet), and sure enough they were disappointed that I was from the
We headed back to the houseboat after the game, and I was so tired that I fell asleep during the 10-minute shikara trip. Maybe I'll manage to sleep past 5am tonight. I ate my Last Supper with Beckham and Posh (so sad), during which I helped them plan their
I planned to wake up at 6:45 the next morning to get a shikara to shore, an auto-rickshaw to the jeep stand, and then a jeep to
But the stone is me, and I don't want my blood sucked out! Until that moment I had nothing bad to say about Kashmiris, and still I understand their tough economic situation, but the scene couldn't help but call up the specter of
Anyhow, I woke up at 5am again, still not over the jet lag. But like my first day in
So Bashir called some of his friends and determined that a) there was no flight today, and b) the next available flight, tomorrow, was full. Oh well—we headed to shore in the shikara,
But just to be sure I asked Bashir, and he said that, actually, some jeeps had started to do the trip in one day because the roads had gotten considerably better in the last year or so. Hmm, what to do. I asked if the jeeps left from the same place, thinking I could delay the decision to the last minute. Nope, they didn't, and I had to decide right now. I thought for five more seconds and then said “Ladakh.” Bashir couldn't believe it. He started slapping me on the back, saying “You make fast, fast decision!” and laughing like a crazy person. I'm glad I could be of entertainment.
So we rerouted to the Leh jeep station, and I bought a ticket for the front seat of the Tata Sumo (basically the Indian equivalent of a Toyota Land Cruiser). The J&K government, which operates the Sumo “taxis,” had been smart enough to set different prices based on seat location within the Sumo—the front seats, of which there were two in addition to the driver, cost Rs 1200. The middle seats, of which there were three, cost Rs 1100. The back seats, of which there were four, in the form of two benches that faced each other and cut off all possibility of leg room or comfort, cost Rs 900. It was a nice attempt at price discrimination by a monopolist, but ultimately a futile one given that the trip was 14-17 hours, and so a Rs 200 difference was just not enough to make anyone sit in the back (other than Kashmiris who most likely paid far less than Rs 900). The price discrimination essentially caused each Tata Sumo to be filled with paying foreigners in the front two seats and non/underpaying Kashmiris in the back. Oh well.
My Sumo had four Kashmiris already in the back, plus the driver and me in the front, plus three other foreigners we had yet to pick up in the middle. But we still needed one more person to sit in the front with me, and the Sumo driver was determined not to leave until we found another body. So we sat on the side of the road for half an hour until I realized that it wasn't another person, but another Rs 1200, that we needed. Problem solved—I thanked Uncle Morgan, bought a second seat, and guaranteed myself a speedy departure, plenty of leg room, and a far more comfortable journey. Best decision of the trip so far.
Then we set off to pick up the other foreigners, who turned out to be Brits, and the best of their kind. Much more on them later, but for now I'll call an end to this post and begin another.
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