Harkidun
It's amazing how far eight hours in a rickety bus on narrow, winding mountain roads gets you--it doesn't get you anywhere at all, looking at a map. But from Mussoorie it got me and a pack of middle-aged Woodstock alumni to the village of Sankri deep in the Garwal Himalaya, where we joined the trail to the 12,000-foot high Harkidun valley.
We weren't wasn't roughing it by most backpacking standards. Each night we slept in austere but sheltered concrete rest houses, two school cooks prepared our noodles, rice, and tea, and donkeys carried our food and most of the alums' backpacks. I wasn't sure about this--a lot of my favorite trekking memories with friends center on things like scavenging for campsites before running out of daylight and warmth, or cooking soup on an outdoor stove by flashlight. The alumns weren't so keen on the Thoreauvian simplicity that I love about backpacking, but we got along anyway.
I wasn't really the leader, Nathan and Kathy were. They're a couple from Vancouver who now live on the hillside, send their kids to Woodstock, and run a private trekking business for Westerners wanting a taste of Indian mountains. So they know the Harkidun region well and have great rapport with the villages we passed--villages that may be more stunning than any snowpeak in the world.
Untouched by road or electricity, spared by geography from most of the outside world, these places were almost entirely self-sufficient. The industrial revolution hasn't gotten there yet. Villagers live in three and a half-story houses made of stone and large wooden beams: cattle on the bottom, then goats and sheep, then the hearth and the people, and a waterproof attic for firewood. Like plenty of Indians, the men sit by the fires drinking chai and smoking bidis, but here they also knit while the women tend the fields, hauling in loads of grain double the size and weight of my pack. They practice an ancient, animistic Hinduism and tattoo their chests. Nathan got us invited into a few homes and answered some of our questions while we sat around the hearth, protected from the wind by Garwali carpentry and hospitality.
On the trail locals sped past us as we turned our heads back and forth from mountain peak to old-growth cedar, from snaking river to steaming donkey dung. I had lots of good empty time to daydream about the future, and had conversations with American doctors and social workers, a UK computer programmer, a Candadian park ranger. I'm still terrible at articulating to strangers what I want out of a career.
On the drive home, Nathan had the bus driver stop and told us that we could get out and ride on the roof if we wanted to. For the next hour I held onto the luggage rack, let my bottom go numb from its rumbling floor, and rode under a bright sky through cool forests, above and down into valleys full of green terraced fields and kids playing makeshift cricket. It was one of those moments. It was great.
It was one of those moments in which I found myself asking, is this what it's all about? Is it all about the wind, the green fields, the thrilling brakes when an oncoming truck meets us on a blind curve? Or is it all about slogging it out back at school, bandaging a the hand of a kid who's been punching windows after a fight with his girlfriend, arguing with kids why try to cook noodles in the dark after their bedtime? Is it about telling stories with friends around a campfire in south Texas, or about marching and writing in the hope that our country elects decent leaders? Not the kinds of questions I'm expecting answers to, but the kind I'm trying to keep in my pocket, to accept as companions. I'm try to not leave them behind in the mountains too, though we seem to find quality time there.
We weren't wasn't roughing it by most backpacking standards. Each night we slept in austere but sheltered concrete rest houses, two school cooks prepared our noodles, rice, and tea, and donkeys carried our food and most of the alums' backpacks. I wasn't sure about this--a lot of my favorite trekking memories with friends center on things like scavenging for campsites before running out of daylight and warmth, or cooking soup on an outdoor stove by flashlight. The alumns weren't so keen on the Thoreauvian simplicity that I love about backpacking, but we got along anyway.
I wasn't really the leader, Nathan and Kathy were. They're a couple from Vancouver who now live on the hillside, send their kids to Woodstock, and run a private trekking business for Westerners wanting a taste of Indian mountains. So they know the Harkidun region well and have great rapport with the villages we passed--villages that may be more stunning than any snowpeak in the world.
Untouched by road or electricity, spared by geography from most of the outside world, these places were almost entirely self-sufficient. The industrial revolution hasn't gotten there yet. Villagers live in three and a half-story houses made of stone and large wooden beams: cattle on the bottom, then goats and sheep, then the hearth and the people, and a waterproof attic for firewood. Like plenty of Indians, the men sit by the fires drinking chai and smoking bidis, but here they also knit while the women tend the fields, hauling in loads of grain double the size and weight of my pack. They practice an ancient, animistic Hinduism and tattoo their chests. Nathan got us invited into a few homes and answered some of our questions while we sat around the hearth, protected from the wind by Garwali carpentry and hospitality.
On the trail locals sped past us as we turned our heads back and forth from mountain peak to old-growth cedar, from snaking river to steaming donkey dung. I had lots of good empty time to daydream about the future, and had conversations with American doctors and social workers, a UK computer programmer, a Candadian park ranger. I'm still terrible at articulating to strangers what I want out of a career.
On the drive home, Nathan had the bus driver stop and told us that we could get out and ride on the roof if we wanted to. For the next hour I held onto the luggage rack, let my bottom go numb from its rumbling floor, and rode under a bright sky through cool forests, above and down into valleys full of green terraced fields and kids playing makeshift cricket. It was one of those moments. It was great.
It was one of those moments in which I found myself asking, is this what it's all about? Is it all about the wind, the green fields, the thrilling brakes when an oncoming truck meets us on a blind curve? Or is it all about slogging it out back at school, bandaging a the hand of a kid who's been punching windows after a fight with his girlfriend, arguing with kids why try to cook noodles in the dark after their bedtime? Is it about telling stories with friends around a campfire in south Texas, or about marching and writing in the hope that our country elects decent leaders? Not the kinds of questions I'm expecting answers to, but the kind I'm trying to keep in my pocket, to accept as companions. I'm try to not leave them behind in the mountains too, though we seem to find quality time there.
posted by Jonathan Hiskes at 1:51 PM
2 Comments:
Jon,
I finally took the time to catch up on your blog postings. I'd love to just sit and talk for hours over the thoughts you have shared and questions you have posed. Since blogging is not ideal for this, I'll eagerly await a time for sharing in person and resort to a just few short thoughts here.
Wanderlust - Humans were created with a desire to explore and experience. We just have a habit of doing it poorly and ruining things in the process. There is so much of God's goodness to experience, and it is legitimate to want to soak it in. Of course, tradition says we can experience God in the everyday, ordinary tedium. But often our deaf ears are unable to hear until we take the trek into the mountains. Here we hear the still, small voice and are amazed. And we can't wait to hear it again.
Pictures - Hate taking them, for many of the reasons you cited. But for those of us with less power of language, they're a nice aid to description.
Keep posting.
Pete
Pete, wonderful to hear that you're still out there. We'll find our way to the mountains together again, it's only a matter of time. Ya hear that, Paauw?
Post a Comment
<< Home