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After the orations that followed the cricket match with the Udahampur ministers were over, we were packing up the bus to head to the mountains. We three brand ambassadors were in very good spirits, despite the cricket loss, because we had been lead to believe that today, day three of our "trek" we actually were going to begin walking.
Over the course of the previous three days i had become acquianted with a Punjabi man named Kuku who seemed to be somehow affiliated with our group. Kuku didnt ride the bus with rest of us. He showed up to all of our important ministerial and press ceremonies in a Toyota Innova (a suv/station wagon popular with VIPs in India) with Punjabi pop music blaring from the speakers while copious in-cab DVD screens broadcast dance videos to no one in particular.
Kuku is a good man and a damn good Punjabi, the official ethnicity of big-pimpin lifestyle in India. He apparently runs several businesses in several countries, non of which I was ever able get a mental hold on. But who cares -- a little timely conversation landed us three seats in the back of the Kuku party wagon, which turned out to be one of the best things that had happened to the brand ambassador crew yet.
The drive from Udhampur to the mountain village of Mongri was a long beautiful ride. The Innvoa careened out of town as the Bollywood beats came on and a bottle of Johnnie Walker magically appeared from an in-cab cooler. The drive took us up some steep mountain switchbacks into mountain meadows and through stands of 150-foot deodar trees. (The deodar is a kind of cyprus tree reminiscent of redwoods in CA that grow only in the Himalaya.)
Out of Udhampur we were quickly in a rural world, passing farmers with their oxen and endless stepped hill-side fields of sparkling yellow grain. Kuku's car was like a turbo charged pop music time machine. Future dance hits on the inside, 18th century agronomy on the outside.
On a steep forested hillside, the road-builders had inadvertently created a nice flat spot just above the roadbed. In India, anywhere that is remotely flat is a cricket pitch, and so of course a couple of kids were pitching and batting on this little oasis of flat ground in high hill country. After that morning's loss and some good libations, I needed more cricket. We screeched to a halt, and man did these kids stare. Apparently turbo charged pop music time machines don't make it to these parts that often. We played 5 overs each by the time the stupid bus that we were supposed to be on came lurching up the road.
After another hour or so of driving, we arrived at the place we were supposed to start walking. We met the group (heard a speech), put on our packs, and started off on the long trail ahead. I was a bit surprised and bummed at how late it had gotten. But I figured we had a few good hours of walking ahead.
About 100 yards up the road, there were some stairs which we were directed to clime by the enthusiastic waving and pointing of three silent, smiley fellows.
Then and there I started seeing the signs: flower petals had been intricately arranged in the dirt into "welcome" signs. There was fresh colored chalk dust lining a trail. Damn it, not again -- the drums and trumpets started to sound and . . . low and behold, another dance and speech extravaganza had begun. Just 10 minutes into our trek and: yup, time for a rest while the local officials welcome us.
Truth be told, I had a blast at the Mongri welcome. I dont know if it was just how cool the locals were (they danced a mean Kashmiri Chicken Dance in these parts) or if I was just so loopy from the complete absurdity of the situation (this was literally the 20th round of welcome celebrations in four days). I had also become good and liquored up in Kuku's car which helped everything a great deal. (Kuku, by the way, disappeared without a trace at the first mention of actually walking somewhere. We didn't see him again for another 4 days.)
So we spent that night in Mongri. I danced my face off for about 30 minutes at the welcome celebration to the sheer elation of the local population.
The next day we were awoken bright and early. The trek was to begin! no wait, first get on the bus. The bus stopped at a trailhead! No wait, thats just a pathway to another town. Whats in the town? ANOTHER welcome ceremony. So on and so forth for about an hour. I will fast forward:
At 10:00am on the 5th day of our trek we actually began walking away from civilization. Two wonderful things happened immediately: 1) all the ridiculous characters that had been following us all over the place began to disappear. Up until this point there were at all times approximately 30 people swarming around our little group and acting very official. I haven't the faintest idea who all these people were, but one by one, as we walked away from that last village, they called it quits on their escorting duties until finally, and splendidly, it was just us, the trekkers and our faithful local guides out on the trail.
And here is the most pleasant surprise of all: the hiking was hard and the terrain was expansive and beautiful. We walked 8 full hours that first day and I was happily exhausted at the end.
We collapsed into the little village we were to sleep in that night after -- you guessed it -- loud drumming, dancing and hearty handshakes. Here is the hilarious bonus: after an 8 hour walk to this mountain town, the town had organized a volleyball game challenging us to compete against the local champions. Thankfully three friends from Delhi had arrived in this town to meet us and, having beat us there by about an hour, had taken up the volleyball responsibilities, allowing us to sit back and watch the show.
That night we slept in a newly constructed camper's hostel. I have never slept in a stranger bed than this. There were approximately fifty people, all associated with our inaugural trek, and we fifty shared two beds. Imagine a long narrow room with wooden platforms -- the beds -- on either side head in to the walls and a long narrow aisle down the middle. We slept shoulder to shoulder, our heads against the walls and our feet at the aisle. And just for the sake of specificity, one of those two bed platforms was not a bed at all but rather a bunch of mats lined up on the floor. Fifty snoring (stinking) people sleeping in the complete absence of light. It was my first night at high altitude and those of you who know me well may know that altitude does not treat me well. It was a miserable night for me. Enough said.
At dawn the next morning we awoke, and walked up to a hillside where a camp breakfast was being prepared outside. We had arrived after nightfall the previous night and as I walked up this green hill I was struck by the early morning peace and empty beauty of the place. Just then I was also struck by a loud thump on my back.
"GOOOODMORNINGS SIRS, yes good mornings!"
I had no idea who this person was. He grabbed my hand and anxiously pulled me along after him up the hill.
About 50 paces up at the top of the hill there was a small hindu shrine and a truly beautiful panorama. a thick morning mist was creeping up the valley and the sun shone across the grassy hills at a beautiful low, early morning angle making wet grasses shimmer.
My companion apparently was enjoying the site as well. He was bubbling excitement as he embraced my shoulder with his right arm and swept his outstretched left arm out across our collective field of vision, palm up with full, heartfelt grandiosity. "This is THE natural beauty!!! This is THEEEEEE natural beauty, nah? This is theeeeee MISTS!!!" He emphasized the "the's" with long whining eeeee's, bending his knees as he wound up, and giving a little jump of joy for added emphasis.
I started to laugh, and he started to laugh and it was a good morning. I gave it a try: "Theeeeeee naturalbeauty!!!" he blew a gasket of joy: "THEEEEEEEEEEEE naturalbeauties!!!"
*****
We had three great days of hiking, walking down one valley and along a trail that lead through several villages. Most of the time us three foreigners were able to split off and hike alone with only our guides and guards.
People in Jammu's villages were a little more than surprised to see us three foreigners walking around. I think it is highly probable that no white people have ever been to any of the villages that we hiked through, and we were treated appropriately. Walking into a new village we would first encounter little kids who would scurry to gather more little kids to stare. Word would reach the adults who would also come out to peer at us completely dumbfounded and, I think, very nervous.
The interactions went something like this:
Me [with a smile]: "Namaste"
Little Kid [mouth agape, eyes wide, completely motionless]: " ...[silence] "
Me [with a smile]: "Hello"
Little Kid [mouth agape, eyes wide, completely motionless]: " ... [silence]"
Me [with a smile]: "Salaam Alekem"
Little Kid [mouth agape, eyes wide, completely motionless, whispering]: " ... Alekuum Salaam"
The same exact interaction would then occur with the adults and then with other entire groups of people as I got into the center of the villages. They looked at me like people in the movie look at ET for the first time.
Then I would break out the camera and people's mouths and eyes would get even larger. Snap a few and then flip it around to show people the image. This is the best ice breaker in the world. The parents would prod their kids to get closer and so the kids would daringly approach me to have a look.
Down along the valley and up the hillside, we walked to a long, rolling ridgeline that we followed for most of our third day hiking. It was a beautiful view from the ridge, bald hilltops and green, forested valleys as far as the eye could see. In the far distance towards Kashmir and the north, the snowy Pir Panjal Himalaya stabbed at the sky above, microclimate storms crowning the peaks.
On the second and third days of the hike we got some pretty nasty weather. At one point, in the middle of a blustering rain shower, it was apparent that the large group of guides and guards we were following around were completely lost.
Taking charge, and using the various tidbits of information that we had picked up over the course of the day, the brand ambassador crew decided to separate from the group and march up over the top of the big hill between us and the valley that had been pointed towards when guides had earlier described our camp for the night.
After several hours and not insignificant periods of fear, we marched into camp wet and exhausted from a seriously long day. The camp was in a magnificent setting with pointy white horizon sprawling out beyond grassy hilltops. In fact, apart from a few farmer's mud-brick cottages, there was only one small cluster of construction anywhere in view in this pristine domain. It was an ugly military post with a few concrete buildings and several large communications towers. In perfect keeping with all the previous decisions of our trek organizers, our tent camp had been established right next to these unpleasant edifices.
Coming in cold, wet and exhausted from a near 12-hour day of walking, our camp could not have looked more appealing. Traditional canvas military-style tents were our accommodations, and we immediately sprawled out to relax in our spacious new homes.
It quickly became very cold once we stopped moving and the sun dipped to the horizon. Everyone passed out soon after our early dinner. I curled up in all the layers of long underwear I had brought under a thin Chinese sleeping bag that had been provided. As I fell asleep, wind began to howl outside and rain began to fall again -- drops driven hard against the tent making a pleasing, loud, white noise that squeezed the tent into a preciously cozy haven.
My dreams that night were lucid. Swirling memories of the day's vistas mixed with strange, loopy social scenarios and manic emotions –- feelings that were no doubt the product of the angst and excitement we had experienced over the course of a day spent arguing with trek directors and marching around lost and alone in a wet wilderness for several hours.
In one part of a dream the raindrops on my face were more menacing than any real raindrops can be, tickling me furiously and damn cold biting against my cheeks. The sogginess coming into my jeans as I hiked along in my dream were getting very uncomfortable and when I reached to adjust the cold damp against my skin down there, I felt something horrible that smashed me out of sleep into reality: I wasn’t touching jeans, only the silky tafetta of a cheap chinese sleeping bag. What had woken me up was the fact that It was raining in our tent and I was getting very wet.
I jumped to consciousness to find that both of the big flaps on either end of our tent had blown wide open. Our tent had become a wind tunnel and hard wet hail was accompanying the wind that was blowing right through my long-undies as I scrambled to tie down the flaps. Screams and shouts outside in the darkness from afar and then from right around our tent were the strange part of this. I distinctly remember a woman's voice, screaming who-knows-what in Hindi run by the outside of the tent as flashlight beams flashed onto the canvas walls.
Wait, am I still dreaming? No, no, it is never this pitch black in my dreams. Hmmm. Why are people screaming then…
I was getting very wet now and the blustering wind was making tying the canvas flaps down surprisingly difficult. I shouted loud for my two tent mates to get up. Nothing. Confused and wet, I managed to get the flaps tied down tight, shed some clothes and put on all the fry ones I could locate as I shivered and collapsed back into my bed where I managed to find a dry end to curl up in and eventually return to sleep.
Coming out of the tent in the morning was an eery sight. Our tent was one of only two that had weathered the storm intact. Tarps and poles were strewn about. Thick fog had encapsulated our hillside and piles of hail and ice had accumulated around yellow and orange tent anatomy that was strewn about. Mist obstructed the upper reaches of the military communication towers and the cool, damp world was completely silent.
A walk up to one of the concrete structures revealed everyone else in our group huddled up, sharing blankets as shawls, grouped around a fire in the single room. Most people hadn’t gotten much sleep after their tents had blown away. I was feeling pretty lucky.
After another day and another night, a bunch of photo shoots, a 30-minute interview with CNN on the potential for tourism development in Jammu, and after several thousand hand shacks, niceties and back slaps were exchanged, the trip in Jammu was coming to an end. Our departure ceremony was filled with the pomp that was to be expected but also with a level of emotional weight that I certainly had not anticipated. Many of our local Jammu hosts were so sad to go that teary hugs replaced the words they had scripted to deliver.
I loved Jammu. I found it one of the most endearingly quirky places that I have ever visited, and now, several months later, I still think back to those weird, fun moments in Jammu and am thankful.
From the ceremony that marked the end of the ceremony that marked the end of our trek, I hopped on a bus to a train that would take me to a bus to find a Passover seder in Dharamsala...
