MAY 13: TAWANG
Power returns. I take a bucket bath and dress in everything that's dry in my rucksack. I need an umbrella. Maybe tomorrow, if the rain continues. I make a run for an Chinese restaurant three buildings down on the same street. A notice on the wall forbids smoking and alcohol. Two tables of inebriated chain-smokers provide local colour. I cross the street to a second choice. The choice is up an exterior circular steel staircase. My ascent is watched from the balcony by the owner. I reach the top. He says, "Restaurant closed."
Yes, Tawang is fun.
The last option is an archway lighted with multi-colour bulbs. Can't be the local whore house. Whore houses don't advertise. Possibly a night club?
Monday, May 24, 2010
INDIAN MATTRESSES
MAY 13: TAWANG
I am wet and cold. There is a promise that Power will return to Tawang at 7 p.m. One hour to wait and a further half hour for the geyser to heat sufficient water for a bucket bath. The Tawang hotel has mattresses that Indians believe to be orthopedic and a nail-bed Fakir might find comfortable. Normal mortals prefer something with more give than a concrete roadway - roadways liberally spread with bumps. I drag one mattress on to the other, spread the padded cotton duvet off the spare bed on top, change underwear for dry and cover myself with the second duvet and two blankets. How is it?
Cold and damp.
I am wet and cold. There is a promise that Power will return to Tawang at 7 p.m. One hour to wait and a further half hour for the geyser to heat sufficient water for a bucket bath. The Tawang hotel has mattresses that Indians believe to be orthopedic and a nail-bed Fakir might find comfortable. Normal mortals prefer something with more give than a concrete roadway - roadways liberally spread with bumps. I drag one mattress on to the other, spread the padded cotton duvet off the spare bed on top, change underwear for dry and cover myself with the second duvet and two blankets. How is it?
Cold and damp.
SPECIALISTS IN CELLAR AMBIANCE
MAY 13: TAWANG
Tawang in the rain does not impress immediately as a party town, wrong vibes.
A few open umbrellas scurry up Main Street. Very few. A bright tartan number covers two soldiers holding hands. A good friend from Assam recommended two hotels. I choose the Tawang as the cheaper of the two. It is a modern building and should be waterproof. Two young women show me a single room at the back on the first floor designed by a specialist in B movie cellar ambiance. The women apologise for that old Indian faithful, Load Shedding. I point out that a window might help. They show me a double room with twin beds and a hot water geyser in the bathroom that will heat water once the Power provider stops shedding load. The room opens off a covered walkway and on a fine day would have a fine mountain view. For now the view is black cloud, rain, parked eight-seater jeeps and even fewer umbrellas.
WATERPROOF KEEPS OUT WATER
MAY 13: TAWANG
$7 WallMart waterproof trousers give adequate protection against a light drizzle when strolling slowly round a municipal golf course on a warm summer's evening. I am riding a motorbike (all be it a small one) up a cold mountain in a downpour. Maybe I should be grateful that the pants act as a sieve and break some of the force of the storm - or learn to buy upmarket, say $10, or even $15. The final kilometer into Tawang is a mud slide. Tawang would look less depressing in sunshine - though not much. Tasteless concrete construction is tasteless concrete construction. Cheap paint is cheap paint. My wet WallMart pants should feel right at home.
$7 WallMart waterproof trousers give adequate protection against a light drizzle when strolling slowly round a municipal golf course on a warm summer's evening. I am riding a motorbike (all be it a small one) up a cold mountain in a downpour. Maybe I should be grateful that the pants act as a sieve and break some of the force of the storm - or learn to buy upmarket, say $10, or even $15. The final kilometer into Tawang is a mud slide. Tawang would look less depressing in sunshine - though not much. Tasteless concrete construction is tasteless concrete construction. Cheap paint is cheap paint. My wet WallMart pants should feel right at home.
KICKED IN THE CROTCH
MAY 13: UP TO TAWANG
The ride down from Sela has been too joyous. Punishment is inevitable. Look across the valley and a faint mist smokes the road up to Tawang, a climb of 5000 feet in 34 kilometers through steep fields and villages. The town is shrouded in dark grey cloud. So, now, is the Sela Pass. Down in the valley an iron girder and steel-plate bridge spans true white water. The road up is mostly rock, mud and potholes. The tires slither and bounce. The seat kicks me in the crotch. I got my second wind riding down. Second winds are temporary. Tired? Very...
Rain falls. The road has collapsed in a couple of places. Women road workers carry baskets of aggregate on their heads. Others squat beside the road chipping boulders in the rain. Female liberation to do a man's work – or a machine's work. Children too (why aren't they at school?), armed with a heavy hammer. Their homes, shacks built of rust-decayed tin made waterproof with road tar. Hill people, they grin as I pass, answer my greetings with a lifted hand and a Hi. My anger on their behalf won't improve their lives...
TRIBALS?
MAY 13: SELA PASS
Lunch is rice with vegetables midway down the Pass. Passengers from two eight-seater jeeps crowd the three tables in a tin-shack cafe. Two girls serve and wash plates outside at a hand pump. The girls are joyful and pretty – surely qualifications for Tribal status? I pose for cameras while waiting my turn for a seat. Look, guys, this is me with that bearded foreign Oldie and this is so-and-so sitting on the seat of his bike. The photographing happens everywhere – and more often now than in the first weeks. People recognise me from TV and newspaper coverage. Fame? I don't believe so. More a freak status. That's OK...
GOOD-NATURED YAKS
MAY 13: SELA PASS
The mountain has got bored with being kind. No more gentle slopes, more a sheer drop and an end to the good road (good as in reasonable rather than good as in actually good), mostly dirt with 350° hairpins ripped to bits. Yaks grumble good-naturedly at being requested to move aside. Brave enough to peek over the edge and there's a village within spitting distance. Getting there takes half an hour as the road zigs and zags a half K one way, half a K the other and so on and so on. The first few fields are bare reddish earth. Drop further and a few green shoots grab for sunlight and white rhododendrons are in flower. Down another thousand feet and the fields are carpeted with emerald green while harvest is approaching near the valley bottom, the fall approximately 8000 feet in 38 kilometers - the climb to the Pass from Dirang was steeper by 8 Ks.
DOWN IS EASIER THAN UP
MAY 13: SELA PASS
The ride down begins in sunshine with an easy stretch of reasonable tar down a glorious upland valley, two lakes on the left, a few stunted high-altitude pines, a proper mountain burn with short, white-water runs over smooth boulders into crystal pools where a worm dangled might tempt a trout. Drop a little and the road begins to zigzag, at first only a few small rhododendrons all in bud, then a couple of deep reds in bloom. Minute almost white, wild flowers speckle the turf, moss on rocks, a few tiny ferns.
Drop further and I am in yellow rhododendron territory, small and bright by the road, tree-size and pale pink through the scattered pines above sheets of drum-stick cowslip primulas the far side of the burn.
Saturday, May 22, 2010
SELA PASS
MAY 13: SELA PASS
I've been on the road two and a half hours, uphill all the way. And I've been scared much of the time. Now I've made it. I am at the top, the Sela Pass.
The pass is the narrows between two mountain peaks.
My legs threaten to crumble when I dismount. A cafe on the left advertises tea and food. A woman serves at a small shop counter inside. A corridor leads to a circular space with seats and tables and with windows all the way round. I sit there a while. Nothing happens, no tea. I don't have sufficient energy to go find someone. I sit a while longer, then go back out to the bike. My legs are steadier. I lean against the cafe wall to steady my arms and photograph the sign board as proof that I made it. Then I mount, press the start button and ride on down the mountain towards Tawang.
UP AND UP
MAY 13: SELA PASS
I rode through deciduous forest early this morning in joyful sunshine, then tall conifers. The sun continues to shine. The trees are stunted high altitude pine. The white peaks that were way up there have become close neighbors. I stop on each corner to photograph them. Why? Mostly because photographing mountain peaks is what travelers do. I remain astride the bike while photographing. Dismounting would require trust in my legs. I stopped at an army-run cafe a while back. The cafe was a hundred yards uphill from an army camp. A sentry at the gates of the camp waved me to park on round the next corner. No cup of tea is worth walking back down to the cafe and then back up from the cafe to the bike – not at this altitude. Truth is that I am beat. The pain in my right side may be a stitch caused by holding my breath when under stress – and I am stressed. The Sela Pass is stressful.
NOT FUN - SCARY
MAY 13: SELA PASS
The Sela Pass is not fun. Some stretches of the road are being widened. A few short stretches have been widened. The new stretches, freshly tarred, already have deep craters. Not surprising given that the tar is less than an inch thick. Someone is making money. Lots of money.
Most corners are loose rock and dirt with rain-gouged ravines on the inside of the bend. Truckers keep to the outside which is OK if that is the driver's side of the road. Tough if it is my side. Do I go over the edge or dump myself into the ravine? At least the ravine is safe.
Parapet? Yes, in some short stretches and the mountain is near vertical. Look down and I feel sick. Worst is the wind. Come round a corner and it blasts you in the face, cold as a cold beer but minus the welcome factor. The wind comes off those snow peaks that were distant this morning and way up there. Now I am way up there with no sign of the expected gap.
THE TWO Hs - HEIGHTS AND HOSPITALS
MAY 13: SELA PASS
I expected to follow the river. The river becomes a trickle. A near vertical mountain bars the route. Water streaks mountains left and right, thousand foot falls plunging through pine forest - or two thousand foot falls. It should be beautiful. It is beautiful. However that mountain face ahead scares me. There is no gap. A faint white line zigzags up through the pines. The many gaps in the zigs and zags must mark an absence of safety parapet. Did I write before that I don't like heights? Or, truthfully, that heights scare the shit out of me? The two Hs, Heights and Hospitals...
Even in movies, I close my eyes and shrink down in the seat.
WHITE PEAKS
MAY 13: SELA PASS
Dawn and I open the curtains to the Dirang valley, forested mountains on each side, in the far distance white peaks tinted by sunrise with a faint pink wash. Somewhere up there lies the Sela Pass. I am out of the hotel and on the road by 7 a.m. Lower Dirang has charm with balconied houses along the main street decorated with pots of primulas. Stone walls coral neat, freshly-tilled fields the far side of the river. India's roads in and through and out of towns are always rough. The Sela road continues rough for a few kilometers, loose stone surface and narrowed by piles of boulder each side. Road workers squat on the boulders. Most are women, ages ranging from fresh faced teenager to crinkle faced grannies. Female Liberation to do a man's work? Or India's standard use of women as beasts of burden?
Yes, it angers me pretty much every day of this journey.
The one plus is that the women here respond to my Hi and Good morning.
Wave and smile down on the plains and they cover their faces against the evil eye. Or against the evil Fat Old Blimp.
Friday, May 21, 2010
BOLIPARA PASS
MAY 12: TO DIRANG
Heading down hill now into a fierce bitter wind that tares small rents in the cloud. The cloud thins and lightens. Sunshine blotches the tar. The last cloud clears. A winding drop leads to a river then the next climb first following the river then up through thin broad leaf to pines and rock to the Bolipara Pass at 10000 feet with higher peaks spiking the blue, cascades on naked cliff flashing sunlight. Bolipara is one of those charmless concrete hill towns India excelles at. The many Army camps come of a different culture, clean, properly planned, respect for trees, lots of white paint, no garbage. See what staying ten days with a retired Colonel does to a Liberal!
Cross the pass and plummet down through sparse pines to Dirang and the Hotel Pemaling where I negotiate a 50% discount with the owner for a room with a superb view down the river valley. A patchwork of small fields covers the right bank and lower slopes of mountains already dark in late afternoon, peaks hidden in cloud. A kindly maid brings a Tata Sky box for the TV and the dinner menu – orders must be in by 7 p.m. Hot shower and I watch BBC World News. The receptionist brings dinner on a tray, chicken soup and vegetable momos.
“You look too tired,” he says.
Too tired to go down stairs to the dinning room for dinner and I intend climbing Sela Pass in the morning.
“Will it be fine?”
“Maybe...”
Heading down hill now into a fierce bitter wind that tares small rents in the cloud. The cloud thins and lightens. Sunshine blotches the tar. The last cloud clears. A winding drop leads to a river then the next climb first following the river then up through thin broad leaf to pines and rock to the Bolipara Pass at 10000 feet with higher peaks spiking the blue, cascades on naked cliff flashing sunlight. Bolipara is one of those charmless concrete hill towns India excelles at. The many Army camps come of a different culture, clean, properly planned, respect for trees, lots of white paint, no garbage. See what staying ten days with a retired Colonel does to a Liberal!
Cross the pass and plummet down through sparse pines to Dirang and the Hotel Pemaling where I negotiate a 50% discount with the owner for a room with a superb view down the river valley. A patchwork of small fields covers the right bank and lower slopes of mountains already dark in late afternoon, peaks hidden in cloud. A kindly maid brings a Tata Sky box for the TV and the dinner menu – orders must be in by 7 p.m. Hot shower and I watch BBC World News. The receptionist brings dinner on a tray, chicken soup and vegetable momos.
“You look too tired,” he says.
Too tired to go down stairs to the dinning room for dinner and I intend climbing Sela Pass in the morning.
“Will it be fine?”
“Maybe...”
AHHHH...
MAY 12: TO DIRANG
I crawl for a further half hour through mostly minimal visibility. The road is narrow tar with potholes only seen at the last second. Bits of the road have fallen down the mountain. Other places boulders have fallen on the road. One light in the murk could be a bike but is more probably a truck with a faulty head lamp. Trucks keep to the center. Fear weakens bladder control. Gloves off, dig under waterproof pants, trousers, slinky black Alpinestar Long Johns, underpants. Hurry. Hurry. Where is the damn thing? Ahhhhh...
I crawl for a further half hour through mostly minimal visibility. The road is narrow tar with potholes only seen at the last second. Bits of the road have fallen down the mountain. Other places boulders have fallen on the road. One light in the murk could be a bike but is more probably a truck with a faulty head lamp. Trucks keep to the center. Fear weakens bladder control. Gloves off, dig under waterproof pants, trousers, slinky black Alpinestar Long Johns, underpants. Hurry. Hurry. Where is the damn thing? Ahhhhh...
KISSES FOR TWO COPS
MAY 12: ROAD TO DIRANG
The kitchen stove is truck drivers' privilege. The cafe is smaller than a double bed. I sit at a wooden table. A small window in the entrance door lets in a smidgen of light. My age and nationality are common knowledge. Two young cops dressed in combat camouflage approach. “Grandfather,” one calls me and leans across the table. Face close to mine, he mimes drinking. He is already drunk and armed with an automatic rifle.
“Drink,” he says.
“Tea,” I say.
His companion, also drunk, leans even closer. “Kiss me.”
Never resist a drunk cop carrying a large gun.
I kiss both cops on the cheeks.
A large-breasted woman elbows the cops aside and sets my tea on the table. One of the cops fetches a pack of sweet biscuits from the tiny shop counter. The biscuits are a present.
Tea with two cops at the kissing stage of inebriation differs from my memories of tea with my grandmother – Georgian silver and bone china on a white lace tablecloth.
This is not a good day.
The kitchen stove is truck drivers' privilege. The cafe is smaller than a double bed. I sit at a wooden table. A small window in the entrance door lets in a smidgen of light. My age and nationality are common knowledge. Two young cops dressed in combat camouflage approach. “Grandfather,” one calls me and leans across the table. Face close to mine, he mimes drinking. He is already drunk and armed with an automatic rifle.
“Drink,” he says.
“Tea,” I say.
His companion, also drunk, leans even closer. “Kiss me.”
Never resist a drunk cop carrying a large gun.
I kiss both cops on the cheeks.
A large-breasted woman elbows the cops aside and sets my tea on the table. One of the cops fetches a pack of sweet biscuits from the tiny shop counter. The biscuits are a present.
Tea with two cops at the kissing stage of inebriation differs from my memories of tea with my grandmother – Georgian silver and bone china on a white lace tablecloth.
This is not a good day.
Friday, May 14, 2010
VERY OLD, TOO OLD
MAY 12: TO DIRANG
Nechipu Pass is 5000 feet above sea level. The road climbs towards thick grey cloud. Creepers cascade from the swaying giants of the forest, clumps of orchid on a bough, bromiads. Great leaves drip and droop from beneath the trees. Bananas compete with tree ferns, black rip of a land slide. The road is mostly tar with potholes, rough dirt on some hairpins, but OK, manageable – and the thick rich warm scent of the cloud forest welcomes. I feel good. Continuing was the right decision. A small notice on the right side of the road advertises tea with a cup and arrow. I am traveling at less than ten KPH. And I am tired. No excuse for grabbing the hand brake. The front wheel stops dead. Over I fall. I have only the one bag and can lift the bike. Freewheel down hill to restart and punish myself with no tea. Clouds close in. Visibility 30 feet. The road is narrow two-lane. No safety parapet. Trucks loom out of the fog. I crawl for an hour, stop for tea at a shack with a jeep and two trucks parked outside. The drivers crouch over a stove in the kitchen. One driver speaks a little English. “No good,” he says of the visibility.
“No good,” I agree.
“Road no good,” he continues.
“Road no good,” I agree.
“Road bad,” he says.
“Road bad,” I repeat.
“Road very bad.”
“Very bad, yes...”
“Where you come?”
“England.”
“How old?”
“Seventy seven.”
“Seventy seven...” In surprise, “Very old.” Then, “Too old,” he says.
Not encouraging...
Nechipu Pass is 5000 feet above sea level. The road climbs towards thick grey cloud. Creepers cascade from the swaying giants of the forest, clumps of orchid on a bough, bromiads. Great leaves drip and droop from beneath the trees. Bananas compete with tree ferns, black rip of a land slide. The road is mostly tar with potholes, rough dirt on some hairpins, but OK, manageable – and the thick rich warm scent of the cloud forest welcomes. I feel good. Continuing was the right decision. A small notice on the right side of the road advertises tea with a cup and arrow. I am traveling at less than ten KPH. And I am tired. No excuse for grabbing the hand brake. The front wheel stops dead. Over I fall. I have only the one bag and can lift the bike. Freewheel down hill to restart and punish myself with no tea. Clouds close in. Visibility 30 feet. The road is narrow two-lane. No safety parapet. Trucks loom out of the fog. I crawl for an hour, stop for tea at a shack with a jeep and two trucks parked outside. The drivers crouch over a stove in the kitchen. One driver speaks a little English. “No good,” he says of the visibility.
“No good,” I agree.
“Road no good,” he continues.
“Road no good,” I agree.
“Road bad,” he says.
“Road bad,” I repeat.
“Road very bad.”
“Very bad, yes...”
“Where you come?”
“England.”
“How old?”
“Seventy seven.”
“Seventy seven...” In surprise, “Very old.” Then, “Too old,” he says.
Not encouraging...
SEPTUAGENARIAN TEENAGER
MAY 12: THE ROAD TO DIRANG
A Hornbill sounds reveille at the Eco Camp. Hornbills whistle sweetly. The whistle ends with a deep and very loud honk. Think rubber valve water-pump. A Woodpecker is next to wake and goes on and on. The only Indian cookoo is surprisingly gentle in his call. Perhaps he has a hangover. I feel fine.
Noel and I have been invited to early breakfast by the Sikh Commander at the tented army camp. The Commander has been operational all night and hasn't had time to change. I depart with a warning that the road is bad. Bad is a ludicrous understatement. Two hours to cover the first ten Ks is good progress through a mess of slush, mud and boulders. Two locals ahead of me take falls – mud from head to foot. My survival is luck – and following outriders. I know through most of those two hours that I should turn back. Turning back makes for a poor last Hurrah. So on I go. Yes, I am aware that I am repeating the idiocy that earned me a smashed ankle in Tierra del Fuego. However I remain what I was then: the only septuagenarian teenager.
RED NECK BIKERDOM
MAY 11: ECO CAMP
Four chilled Fosters and what did Noel and I discuss? Most of it is private or sensitive. The source requires camouflage – a lesson learned on my trip North through Central America. Be wary of what you put on the Web. I had insulted the outer reaches of Red Neck Bikerdom in reporting the beliefs and opinions of Hispanic Americans viz a v the US. Spot him, went out the message, smash him off the road. Ouch...!
Four chilled Fosters and what did Noel and I discuss? Most of it is private or sensitive. The source requires camouflage – a lesson learned on my trip North through Central America. Be wary of what you put on the Web. I had insulted the outer reaches of Red Neck Bikerdom in reporting the beliefs and opinions of Hispanic Americans viz a v the US. Spot him, went out the message, smash him off the road. Ouch...!
DRINKING CHILLED FOSTERS
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...
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...
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