On an unassuming detour from the winding road to Lansdowne lies a hamlet that the locals call Dura. It eludes the map, hiding bashfully under canopy.
Having hiked for miles into the woods further from the village, we came upon a clearing where the path forked. What was once a majestic cedar tree lay fallen across a bed of leaf-fossils and tufts of grass.
Boulders, large and small, squatted on both sides of the tree, paying their respects to it in haunted silence. The air was drowsy, dissolving into its own motionless stupor. Time itself stood at the fork, lost in indecision.
And then, to brighten the mood, a youthful breeze glided in joyfully from the valley below, bringing with it a hint of mist, shaking the solemn trees out of their mournful trance. With the stillness gone, birds and crickets began to tweet and chirp, in perfect sync to the mist gushing through the trees and their shadows chasing after it.
Somewhere from afar, a faint tinkle of bells was heard as mountain goats must have welcomed the breeze in their midst, inviting their friend to partake of the rich spread on the turf.
The boulders, unimpressed by all this, sat there stoically, wise in their moorings, having seen these little episodes enact themselves for millions of years by now.
My attention returned to the fork in due time. A sprightly young boy, discernibly from the village, had told me that the path on the right led to a secluded waterfall. One that only the locals knew of. The path was the narrower of the two, and snaked its way slightly uphill, further and further away from the spoils of civilisation. As I made progress, the grass grew longer and closed in on the path. An abandoned cemetery slumbered peacefully by the wayside. I wondered what its spirits would do to pass time when the weather wasn't spooky.
With every twist and turn of the path, the distant sound of the jharna emanated slowly from the deep. There's a whole lot of life in the word jharna, in the way it sounds when one pronounces it - A musical onomatopoeia that conjures up an image of a rollicking mountain stream as it cascades through rocks; and an excited crowd of green foliage crane their necks to have a better view at the parade as it drifts downhill.
It was truly a find - a waterfall shaped like a horse's tail. It slid over a gorge formed through a rock, and emptied into a clear pool. Not to plunge into the pool or soak under the thick curtain of falling water would have been rude to the hospitality of the forest itself. So we obliged, splashed about, swam and meditated for hours. The mist then gathered into clouds and it began to drizzle. It was time to repair townward.
On the way back, we spotted an empty bottle of whiskey and some plastic wrappers of chips outside the cemetery. The ghosts must have been having a gala time, I thought. Perhaps the afterlife had in store for them yet another bottle for the after-party.
But it was not until the lyrics of, "DJ waale babu mera gaana chala do...", rippled across from somewhere nearby, that my opinion of ghosts improved considerably.
I mean, here was a group of frenzied spirits, mixing madly with the mist and making merry and what-not! But more encouragingly, its womenfolk had a voice of their own to request DJs (who for some reason are babus), for music tracks even from the beyond! Elated, I buried my grave concerns of facebook feminism right there in the cemetery, enormously comforted in the idea that the other side of the veil had it all figured out.
Suddenly and without warning, a selfie-stick popped out of nowhere on the forest path, as if the cemetery had decided to operate a toll gate for souls to pass. As the flash went off, we came face to face with a group of homo sapiens urbana assoholica - a species of Party Animals from the city who are of a markedly assoholic disposition.
They happened to be the real force behind the spirited wails of DJ walle babus being invoked in the Garhwal forests. I also realised to my dismay that the spirits of the cemetery had been asleep all this time, and the elevating mental images of their progressive utopia withered away.
Like a zoologist who had struck gold, I watched the party of homo sapiens urbana assoholica with wide-eyed interest, and made some quick observations on the fauna:
Appearance:
The members of the species have a human origin. They were dressed in flashy, flamboyant attire that stood out starkly against the sober backdrop of the woods. The chromatic allure of the Bird-of-Paradise and the Scarlet Macaw pale in comparison. Unbeknownst to them, the prowling man-eater of the Jim Corbett National Park had already spotted the colourful urbana assoholica from faraway, when the mist had cleared for a few minutes in between.
Group behaviour:
When the selfie-stick was retracted, whistles and howls filled the air, and loud guffaws followed. The members of the species then exchanged the choicest expletives, and called into question each others' parental legitimacy. Whistles, howls and guffaws filled the air again. This behaviour showed repetitive tendencies.
The brash cry of the urbana assoholica that jars the quiet forest and sends little animals retreating into their shells, is how the species marks its territory. It also marks territory by leaving a trail of empty alcohol bottles and plastic food packaging, but the loud cries are foremost a fight for dominance.
Nocturnal gatherings with speakers blaring party music into the hills have, in fact, brought Himalayan boulders out of their deep meditative state, dislodging them from penance, causing landslides and avalanches. Silent reflection intimidates the assoholica.
Natural habitat and migratory behaviour:
The city is what the urbana assoholica considers as its home. The species migrates for short durations that surprisingly coincide with weekends.
While some philosophers describe this migratory habit as 'Travel' and 'Soul-searching', the average assoholica aims for mere physical displacement of its own living room conditions. It builds a bubble of the city around it, and carries it wherever it goes, unable to face any other habitat for what it is.
Why then this migratory behaviour at all, one may ponder.
Well, the journey to the forest offers an unobstructed means to dissipate a certain existential angst for the urbana assoholica, a psycho-biological phenomenon closely understood in relation to musth exhibited by male wild elephants. A release is sought from the harsh inanities of city life, which is dissipated into the great wild. Unlike the unpredictable course of the jharna in the forest, the chronicled moments of dissipation predictably flood social media.
As the mist gathered again over the skies and the western horizon broke into a palette of crimson, peach and gold, I whispered to the leader of the species that tigers are known to be at large in the vicinity. That the cemetery is built to the memory of those who, while forgetting to respect the forest, were mauled by the striped cat of Jim Corbett.
 |
| Sunset at Dura |
Boulders, large and small, squatted on both sides of the tree, paying their respects to it in haunted silence. The air was drowsy, dissolving into its own motionless stupor. Time itself stood at the fork, lost in indecision.
And then, to brighten the mood, a youthful breeze glided in joyfully from the valley below, bringing with it a hint of mist, shaking the solemn trees out of their mournful trance. With the stillness gone, birds and crickets began to tweet and chirp, in perfect sync to the mist gushing through the trees and their shadows chasing after it.
Somewhere from afar, a faint tinkle of bells was heard as mountain goats must have welcomed the breeze in their midst, inviting their friend to partake of the rich spread on the turf.
The boulders, unimpressed by all this, sat there stoically, wise in their moorings, having seen these little episodes enact themselves for millions of years by now.
My attention returned to the fork in due time. A sprightly young boy, discernibly from the village, had told me that the path on the right led to a secluded waterfall. One that only the locals knew of. The path was the narrower of the two, and snaked its way slightly uphill, further and further away from the spoils of civilisation. As I made progress, the grass grew longer and closed in on the path. An abandoned cemetery slumbered peacefully by the wayside. I wondered what its spirits would do to pass time when the weather wasn't spooky.
With every twist and turn of the path, the distant sound of the jharna emanated slowly from the deep. There's a whole lot of life in the word jharna, in the way it sounds when one pronounces it - A musical onomatopoeia that conjures up an image of a rollicking mountain stream as it cascades through rocks; and an excited crowd of green foliage crane their necks to have a better view at the parade as it drifts downhill.
 |
| Yours truly immersed in the yogic technique of pool-asana |
It was truly a find - a waterfall shaped like a horse's tail. It slid over a gorge formed through a rock, and emptied into a clear pool. Not to plunge into the pool or soak under the thick curtain of falling water would have been rude to the hospitality of the forest itself. So we obliged, splashed about, swam and meditated for hours. The mist then gathered into clouds and it began to drizzle. It was time to repair townward.
On the way back, we spotted an empty bottle of whiskey and some plastic wrappers of chips outside the cemetery. The ghosts must have been having a gala time, I thought. Perhaps the afterlife had in store for them yet another bottle for the after-party.
But it was not until the lyrics of, "DJ waale babu mera gaana chala do...", rippled across from somewhere nearby, that my opinion of ghosts improved considerably.
I mean, here was a group of frenzied spirits, mixing madly with the mist and making merry and what-not! But more encouragingly, its womenfolk had a voice of their own to request DJs (who for some reason are babus), for music tracks even from the beyond! Elated, I buried my grave concerns of facebook feminism right there in the cemetery, enormously comforted in the idea that the other side of the veil had it all figured out.
Suddenly and without warning, a selfie-stick popped out of nowhere on the forest path, as if the cemetery had decided to operate a toll gate for souls to pass. As the flash went off, we came face to face with a group of homo sapiens urbana assoholica - a species of Party Animals from the city who are of a markedly assoholic disposition.
They happened to be the real force behind the spirited wails of DJ walle babus being invoked in the Garhwal forests. I also realised to my dismay that the spirits of the cemetery had been asleep all this time, and the elevating mental images of their progressive utopia withered away.
Like a zoologist who had struck gold, I watched the party of homo sapiens urbana assoholica with wide-eyed interest, and made some quick observations on the fauna:
Appearance:
The members of the species have a human origin. They were dressed in flashy, flamboyant attire that stood out starkly against the sober backdrop of the woods. The chromatic allure of the Bird-of-Paradise and the Scarlet Macaw pale in comparison. Unbeknownst to them, the prowling man-eater of the Jim Corbett National Park had already spotted the colourful urbana assoholica from faraway, when the mist had cleared for a few minutes in between.
Group behaviour:
When the selfie-stick was retracted, whistles and howls filled the air, and loud guffaws followed. The members of the species then exchanged the choicest expletives, and called into question each others' parental legitimacy. Whistles, howls and guffaws filled the air again. This behaviour showed repetitive tendencies.
The brash cry of the urbana assoholica that jars the quiet forest and sends little animals retreating into their shells, is how the species marks its territory. It also marks territory by leaving a trail of empty alcohol bottles and plastic food packaging, but the loud cries are foremost a fight for dominance.
Nocturnal gatherings with speakers blaring party music into the hills have, in fact, brought Himalayan boulders out of their deep meditative state, dislodging them from penance, causing landslides and avalanches. Silent reflection intimidates the assoholica.
Natural habitat and migratory behaviour:
The city is what the urbana assoholica considers as its home. The species migrates for short durations that surprisingly coincide with weekends.
While some philosophers describe this migratory habit as 'Travel' and 'Soul-searching', the average assoholica aims for mere physical displacement of its own living room conditions. It builds a bubble of the city around it, and carries it wherever it goes, unable to face any other habitat for what it is.
Why then this migratory behaviour at all, one may ponder.
Well, the journey to the forest offers an unobstructed means to dissipate a certain existential angst for the urbana assoholica, a psycho-biological phenomenon closely understood in relation to musth exhibited by male wild elephants. A release is sought from the harsh inanities of city life, which is dissipated into the great wild. Unlike the unpredictable course of the jharna in the forest, the chronicled moments of dissipation predictably flood social media.
As the mist gathered again over the skies and the western horizon broke into a palette of crimson, peach and gold, I whispered to the leader of the species that tigers are known to be at large in the vicinity. That the cemetery is built to the memory of those who, while forgetting to respect the forest, were mauled by the striped cat of Jim Corbett.
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