Friday, September 16, 2005
last tango in delhi
arrived this morning back in delhi. staying in paharganj (a bazaar near the new delhi railway station, very dirty and indian) and loving it. i am staying at the HOTEL FANCY, and fancy it is not. have been stuffing myself the whole day with yummy indian foods (masala dosa, curd, burfies and spicy samosas) i could not get for the last 2 months up in the mountains. no more yak meat for this man. life is a feast.
spent most of the day in old delhi, bought some calenders for pressies and watched a total anarchic ganesh (the hindu god with the elephant body) parade with music bands and fireworks.... must be his birthday or something.
also watched a real crappy bollywood movie, called JAMES. a very sexy actress was throwing her body around, while the hero was beating up half the baddies of india, including corrupt police. some of it was already softporn. whats happening to this country??
took a bicycle rickshaw back and wondered why all these girls were waving at me from the second floor, for a one kilometre stretch. thought i must be some kind of stud, until my rickshaw driver told me they are all prostitutes looking for business. what a letdown....
i just have to come back to india. this country is just so full on, loving every minute of it. had real difficulties leaving manali, to say goodbye to the farmers daughter and many friends. but what the heck, 2 months germany and when argentina. i can always go back to india next year and marry her if i should feel too horny.
spent most of the day in old delhi, bought some calenders for pressies and watched a total anarchic ganesh (the hindu god with the elephant body) parade with music bands and fireworks.... must be his birthday or something.
also watched a real crappy bollywood movie, called JAMES. a very sexy actress was throwing her body around, while the hero was beating up half the baddies of india, including corrupt police. some of it was already softporn. whats happening to this country??
took a bicycle rickshaw back and wondered why all these girls were waving at me from the second floor, for a one kilometre stretch. thought i must be some kind of stud, until my rickshaw driver told me they are all prostitutes looking for business. what a letdown....
i just have to come back to india. this country is just so full on, loving every minute of it. had real difficulties leaving manali, to say goodbye to the farmers daughter and many friends. but what the heck, 2 months germany and when argentina. i can always go back to india next year and marry her if i should feel too horny.
Thursday, September 15, 2005
taking the high road to leh
have been trying to remember what i did over the last 4 weeks, all to no avail. looks like finally all the bad habits have caught up with me. one thing i do remember is that i spent most of the time above 3500m in the land of ladakh, freezing my arse off and gasping for air like a fish out of water, thinking my last minute had arrived.
i remember i was quite happy leaving beautiful manali in a 20 year old bus, being told to be there at 5 am in the morning, only to wait for 3 hours in the rain before it arrived...ah india, always full of surprises..... the road from manali to leh is quite a stunner, going over 5000m high passes, along fertile valleys, hanging glaciers and raging rivers. of course it didnt help that a beautiful horny israeli girl was flirting with our driver sanchee, keeping his eyes off the hairpin bends, the abyss only a few seconds away. these are the times when one mutters a few prayers and starts believing in the gods.
2 days later we reached beautiful leh (3500m), the capital of ladakh, only to be greeted by hordes of package tourists, having arrived by plane from delhi, demanding facilities that are almost impossible to provide, in a high altitude desert area which is short of power and water. for the next 3 days i had a mind blowing migraine and felt very sick: altitude sickness had caught up with me. of course that didnt stop me to fantasize about the highest motorable pass in the world (5602m) leading to the beautiful nubra valley and only 4 hours away from leh. being so near to the border sensitive area of pakistan and china, one needs a permit. a few hundred rupees solved that problem. 2 days later i was in nubra, staying in a beautiful small village called hunter (3100m), in between gurgling streams and surrounded by fruit orchards and fields. truly a shangri la. i was invited into the houses, drinking chang (fermented barley beer), the locals starring at me, and of course me starring at them.
ladhaki, a language similar to tibetan, seems to consist mainly of one word, the all purpose JULE, which means hello, goodbye, please, thank you and probably anything else. for the next few days i was juleing my way through the village, always ending up drunk on the chang.
one day a travelling tibetan witchdoctor visited hunter, and i was invited to witness how she went into a trance and started "healing" by sucking out strange fluids from sick peoples bodies, filling up a 1 litre jar in about 20 minutes. i have seen a similar trick in the philippines before, a healer regurgitating the stuff from his stomach. people seemed to believe it. what doesnt kill you makes you stronger, i suppose.
i liked the place so much that i ended up forging the date on my 7 day permit, staying nearly 2 weeks, before going back to leh, just in time for the leh festival, created by the ladhakis to keep the tourists in town for another 2 weeks, as the season is only 3 months long. for the next 3 days i watched local dances by traditional dressed women, most of them in slow motion (must be the altitude), drunken archery competitions., and 2 very exciting polo games on tough little zanskarie ponies, with the players riding into the viewer crowds or wherever the ball went, injuring a little boy.
the days went cooler and i missed good old manali. i didnt feel like another 2 day trip, instead i went for the 1 day jeep trip. BIG MISTAKE.
we meet at the bus station at 2am, and of we went, myself and 5 adventurous indian gentlemen. for the next 18 hours we raced across wobbling bridges (one collapsing 3 hours later, stopping all the traffic from leh to manali), passed tar covered road gangs (mostly from bihar and nepal, trying to make a dollar or two day), police- and army checkpoints, barren moonscapes and snow covered peaks, mostly over 6500m high. one of the indians was throwing up all the way and i didnt feel good either.
amazingly since i arrived back in manali, i have this fantasy about walking the whole way from manali to leh. it would be the journey of a lifetime. maybe next year, when the snow starts melting. anyone interested in coming along?? it might kill you, but what a way to go.
in manali i have met a 68 year old english gentleman, the last "bohemian", as he calls himself. he used to hang out with kerouac and burroughs in the 50s and later on had a few joints with paul bowles in tangier, morocco....just my kind of hero. one of the survivors. have never seen anyone smoking so much of the black stuff, and the guy looks healthy like a baby. the people one meets while travelling.....also the beautiful farmers girl is back in the picture.
luckily its back to delhi, and on september 21 time to say goodbye to india. not for very long hopefully. germany is waiting....
i remember i was quite happy leaving beautiful manali in a 20 year old bus, being told to be there at 5 am in the morning, only to wait for 3 hours in the rain before it arrived...ah india, always full of surprises..... the road from manali to leh is quite a stunner, going over 5000m high passes, along fertile valleys, hanging glaciers and raging rivers. of course it didnt help that a beautiful horny israeli girl was flirting with our driver sanchee, keeping his eyes off the hairpin bends, the abyss only a few seconds away. these are the times when one mutters a few prayers and starts believing in the gods.
2 days later we reached beautiful leh (3500m), the capital of ladakh, only to be greeted by hordes of package tourists, having arrived by plane from delhi, demanding facilities that are almost impossible to provide, in a high altitude desert area which is short of power and water. for the next 3 days i had a mind blowing migraine and felt very sick: altitude sickness had caught up with me. of course that didnt stop me to fantasize about the highest motorable pass in the world (5602m) leading to the beautiful nubra valley and only 4 hours away from leh. being so near to the border sensitive area of pakistan and china, one needs a permit. a few hundred rupees solved that problem. 2 days later i was in nubra, staying in a beautiful small village called hunter (3100m), in between gurgling streams and surrounded by fruit orchards and fields. truly a shangri la. i was invited into the houses, drinking chang (fermented barley beer), the locals starring at me, and of course me starring at them.
ladhaki, a language similar to tibetan, seems to consist mainly of one word, the all purpose JULE, which means hello, goodbye, please, thank you and probably anything else. for the next few days i was juleing my way through the village, always ending up drunk on the chang.
one day a travelling tibetan witchdoctor visited hunter, and i was invited to witness how she went into a trance and started "healing" by sucking out strange fluids from sick peoples bodies, filling up a 1 litre jar in about 20 minutes. i have seen a similar trick in the philippines before, a healer regurgitating the stuff from his stomach. people seemed to believe it. what doesnt kill you makes you stronger, i suppose.
i liked the place so much that i ended up forging the date on my 7 day permit, staying nearly 2 weeks, before going back to leh, just in time for the leh festival, created by the ladhakis to keep the tourists in town for another 2 weeks, as the season is only 3 months long. for the next 3 days i watched local dances by traditional dressed women, most of them in slow motion (must be the altitude), drunken archery competitions., and 2 very exciting polo games on tough little zanskarie ponies, with the players riding into the viewer crowds or wherever the ball went, injuring a little boy.
the days went cooler and i missed good old manali. i didnt feel like another 2 day trip, instead i went for the 1 day jeep trip. BIG MISTAKE.
we meet at the bus station at 2am, and of we went, myself and 5 adventurous indian gentlemen. for the next 18 hours we raced across wobbling bridges (one collapsing 3 hours later, stopping all the traffic from leh to manali), passed tar covered road gangs (mostly from bihar and nepal, trying to make a dollar or two day), police- and army checkpoints, barren moonscapes and snow covered peaks, mostly over 6500m high. one of the indians was throwing up all the way and i didnt feel good either.
amazingly since i arrived back in manali, i have this fantasy about walking the whole way from manali to leh. it would be the journey of a lifetime. maybe next year, when the snow starts melting. anyone interested in coming along?? it might kill you, but what a way to go.
in manali i have met a 68 year old english gentleman, the last "bohemian", as he calls himself. he used to hang out with kerouac and burroughs in the 50s and later on had a few joints with paul bowles in tangier, morocco....just my kind of hero. one of the survivors. have never seen anyone smoking so much of the black stuff, and the guy looks healthy like a baby. the people one meets while travelling.....also the beautiful farmers girl is back in the picture.
luckily its back to delhi, and on september 21 time to say goodbye to india. not for very long hopefully. germany is waiting....
