MAY 11: ECO CAMP
Drinking chilled Fosters in Noel's one-bed thatch-roof bungalow is immensely pleasurable. Noel was one of a gang of bright kids from St Edmunds who made it to Delhi, India's premier University. Now he reads omnivorously. A friend from Delhi days, a leading literary critic, passes on books sent to him for review. Books pack shelves, form piles on every table, overflow into unlikely corners. Add sculpture, paintings, even a David Bailey portrait of Noel's sister, and the sitting room should feel overcrowded. It doesn't. It feels comfortable. And it is a reminder of my early 20s in Kenya and visiting British District Commissioners in the Northern Frontier District or the hills, men who are routinely mocked today as buffoons or twits but ruled over vast areas not by force but through wisdom and a desire to benefit the people. They were cultured men with First Class Honours degrees from good Universities in a day when a First was hard to come by and demanded original thought. Above all, they were incorruptible and believed a career of service was more rewarding than accruing wealth. So there I am, revealed in my true colours: an old fashioned Brit Blimp! The Colonel in Rajen Bali would be proud of me. So would the writer...
Showing posts with label Nameri. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nameri. Show all posts
Friday, May 14, 2010
ONE OF THE GOOD ONES
MAY 11: ECO CAMP
Noel sits on a bamboo bench on the central lawn in company with an Sikh army officer dressed in shorts, sandals and a T-shirt. The Indian Army in the North East States is in two parts. The main Army guards India's frontiers against possible Chinese incursions. Other units specialise in counter-insurgency. Of the latter, the good ones do much of the crime-fighting that the police can't or won't do. Illegal logging, brigandage, etc. This Sikh from the Punjab is one of the good ones. He is a big burly bruiser of a man, soft spoken, newly married, angered by Civil Administration's incompetency in law enforcement.
MAY 11: ECO CAMP
Noel sits on a bamboo bench on the central lawn in company with an Sikh army officer dressed in shorts, sandels and a T-shirt. The Indian Army in the North East States is in two parts. The main Army guards India's frontiers against possible Chinese incursions. Other units specialise in counter-insurgency. Of the latter, the good ones do much of the crime-fighting that the police can't or won't do. Illegal logging, brigandage, etc. This Sikh from the Punjab is one of the good ones. He is a big burly bruiser of a man, soft spoken, newly married, angered by Civil Administration's incompetency in law enforcement.
TEA GARDEN ENGLISH
MAY 11: ECO CAMP
The camp lies a few Ks down a dirt track through forest. I don't see animals. I do pass elephant dung. The camp is a circle of large tents under thatch. Each tent has a bathroom at the rear. The bathrooms are tile and have geysers. The manager is Noel to his family and school friends, Ronnie to everyone else. He is tall, slim, grey haired, was educated (along with most every other male I meet in the North East States) by Irish Christian Brothers at St. Edmunds, Shillong, and speaks Tea Garden English. Tea Garden English is English Public School with a 1940s vocabulary and a slight Indian accent. Tea Garden society was hard work and the Club (tennis, billiards, dances, decorous flirtations). Terrorism did for the Club - Assamese Nationalists building personal fortunes from kidnapping. Noel opted out. He remains out. Way out – though with contacts world wide.
The camp lies a few Ks down a dirt track through forest. I don't see animals. I do pass elephant dung. The camp is a circle of large tents under thatch. Each tent has a bathroom at the rear. The bathrooms are tile and have geysers. The manager is Noel to his family and school friends, Ronnie to everyone else. He is tall, slim, grey haired, was educated (along with most every other male I meet in the North East States) by Irish Christian Brothers at St. Edmunds, Shillong, and speaks Tea Garden English. Tea Garden English is English Public School with a 1940s vocabulary and a slight Indian accent. Tea Garden society was hard work and the Club (tennis, billiards, dances, decorous flirtations). Terrorism did for the Club - Assamese Nationalists building personal fortunes from kidnapping. Noel opted out. He remains out. Way out – though with contacts world wide.
DUMB DOLT
MAY 11: GUWAHATI
I admit to Baby at breakfast that I am a dossa addict. So is Baby. A restaurant on the next street serves great dossas – though not for breakfast. We will lunch there on my return from Arunachal. Baby also promises pork with bamboo shoots and Naga chilies. Naga chilies are rated the hottest in the world. Yum...
I am traveling light, one back pack. The rest stays under the bed. Having a base makes life so much easier.
“Remember the turn at Balipara,” warns Baby of my route to the Eco Camp.
I miss it. Yes, I check with locals for Nameri. Locals have little interest in Game Sanctuaries. They do know of the Nameri Tea Plantation which is why I find myself 35 kilometers down the wrong road. Dumb? Yes, of course.
Worse is to return to Balipara and stop at the cross roads to consult the road atlas. “You are going to Eco Camp?” asks a young man – where he works and will report my stupidity. This, in turn, will reach Baby's ears. I imagine the conversation. “How you can be so silly? And after I was warning you.”
Ah, well...
I admit to Baby at breakfast that I am a dossa addict. So is Baby. A restaurant on the next street serves great dossas – though not for breakfast. We will lunch there on my return from Arunachal. Baby also promises pork with bamboo shoots and Naga chilies. Naga chilies are rated the hottest in the world. Yum...
I am traveling light, one back pack. The rest stays under the bed. Having a base makes life so much easier.
“Remember the turn at Balipara,” warns Baby of my route to the Eco Camp.
I miss it. Yes, I check with locals for Nameri. Locals have little interest in Game Sanctuaries. They do know of the Nameri Tea Plantation which is why I find myself 35 kilometers down the wrong road. Dumb? Yes, of course.
Worse is to return to Balipara and stop at the cross roads to consult the road atlas. “You are going to Eco Camp?” asks a young man – where he works and will report my stupidity. This, in turn, will reach Baby's ears. I imagine the conversation. “How you can be so silly? And after I was warning you.”
Ah, well...
DUMB DOLT
MAY 11: GUWAHATI
I admit to Baby at breakfast that I am a dossa addict. So is Baby. A restaurant on the next street serves great dossas – though not for breakfast. We will lunch there on my return from Arunachal. Baby also promises pork with bamboo shoots and Naga chilies. Naga chilies are rated the hottest in the world. Yum...
I am traveling light, one back pack. The rest stays under the bed. Having a base makes life so much easier.
“Remember the turn at Balipara,” warns Baby of my route to the Eco Camp.
I miss it. Yes, I check with locals for Nameri. Locals have little interest in Game Sanctuaries. They do know of the Nameri Tea Plantation which is why I find myself 35 kilometers down the wrong road. Dumb? Yes, of course.
Worse is to return to Balipara and stop at the cross roads to consult the road atlas. “You are going to Eco Camp?” asks a young man – where he works and will report my stupidity. This, in turn, will reach Baby's ears. I imagine the conversation. “How you can be so silly? And after I was warning you.”
Ah, well...
I admit to Baby at breakfast that I am a dossa addict. So is Baby. A restaurant on the next street serves great dossas – though not for breakfast. We will lunch there on my return from Arunachal. Baby also promises pork with bamboo shoots and Naga chilies. Naga chilies are rated the hottest in the world. Yum...
I am traveling light, one back pack. The rest stays under the bed. Having a base makes life so much easier.
“Remember the turn at Balipara,” warns Baby of my route to the Eco Camp.
I miss it. Yes, I check with locals for Nameri. Locals have little interest in Game Sanctuaries. They do know of the Nameri Tea Plantation which is why I find myself 35 kilometers down the wrong road. Dumb? Yes, of course.
Worse is to return to Balipara and stop at the cross roads to consult the road atlas. “You are going to Eco Camp?” asks a young man – where he works and will report my stupidity. This, in turn, will reach Baby's ears. I imagine the conversation. “How you can be so silly? And after I was warning you.”
Ah, well...
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