win a stay at the grand hyatt goa

The last word in travel th INDIAN EDITION OCT-NOV 2016 | 150 Anniversary Special WHY WE 6 TRAVEL Sakshi Malik Manu Joseph Siddhartha Mukherjee melinda gates Suketu Mehta SANDIP ROY

Agent of change Priyanka

BuildingCho bridges,p notra walls PC on US politics & film 242 RAVEL f E T o W r ADVENTURE a river of stories Manu Joseph treks the frozen River in and finds there is magic, beauty and humour even in the most arduous journey. Photographs by Olivier Föllmi

243 Frozen river, brown cliffs and other trekkers: this is a world that is

244 quiet. In places, a fluid strand of the river roars and vanishes below the ice

245 e says magic is a himself as a creature with the upper believed to have formed close to lazy way of telling a half of an ass and the lower half of a 1.5 billion years ago. In their youth, story. It is reasonable, Tamil software engineer. But a moment those mountains may have stood then, that he would later, a more aesthetic, classical image thousands of metres high, but now have quarrels with came to him—of the upper half of a they are mere mounds or city pebbles. supernatural tales, muscular man and the lower quadruped Is this the fate of all great mountains? like The Famished Road by Ben Okri, body of a horse. That was how he learnt Centaur is going from the tip of Hwhich opens with these words: “In the he was Centaur. ’s oldest mountain range to its beginning there was a river. The river Centaur was passing through a youngest, the , which are became a road and the road branched out period of strife, the astrologer said. believed to have formed about 50 to the whole world. And because the road “Is it then an inauspicious time for million years ago. was once a river it was always hungry.” him to be walking on a river?” is a tiny human settlement in How can a river become a global “There is no such thing as the Himalayas, about 11,480ft above road, and how can it be hungry? As inauspicious,” the astrologer said. sea level. The air is clear, the sun harsh, in sports, he says, doping should be “There is only time.” the day lit like afterlife. Centaur feels condemned in literature, too. But there The walk is known as the Chadar as though his eyesight has improved. are times when even a person like him Trek. ‘Chadar’ means blanket in Hindi. The eye sees great distances in Leh and accepts that magic poetry may describe A trail on a blanket of ice over the what it sees are vast flatlands and desert an irrefutable reality. A truth that can moving waters of the Zanskar River mountains and many hues of brown. A be framed by a poet’s hallucination has in the region. That is what it notice in the tiny airport dissuades new to be exquisite—or terrifying. At the is. If the ice is not well formed on the arrivals from any exerting activity. It moment, what he feels is terror. He is river, the blanket is deceptively thin in reminds him of an unfamiliar fatigue in about to walk on a road; the road was places and one may fall into the cold his chest, as though he is in the embrace once a river. waters. If the ice is obviously thin, the of a large, invisible woman. The fatigue In the winter, the rivers of the trekkers have to walk on the walls of grows as he reaches the hotel in the Himalayas freeze. There is one that steep cliffs to reach the firmer parts of heart of Leh, a tourist district that is becomes a narrow, serpentine road of the river. On some stretches of the river, filled with cafés and shops on narrow ice. Beneath the ice, the river trickles, the cliffs are too steep for humans to lanes, most of them shut for the winter. flows, gushes, but the surface is hard walk on, so they have to wait for days Somewhere an ice hockey game is and the mountain people who live before hard ice forms. According to a underway; two girls with long, flailing near its banks have learnt how to walk legend, if a couple makes love on the hair glide with the boys. on it. And they walk great distances Zanskar, the ice on the river would not In the modest hotel, a small team for mundane reasons. Sometimes they be thick. Centaur has faith in the ability of trekkers is assembled on the lawns, burst into a run even though they of women to abstain from sex in almost drinking hot tea. Among them are two have time for everything. They carry extraterrestrial conditions, but he does men who suspect they are alphas. They enormous things on their backs or in not trust men to be wise. are an uncle-nephew pair separated a sleigh on which, among the utensils A week after Centaur realised he by less than 20 years, who possess the and vegetables, sit their children, who was Centaur, one cold night in Delhi, absolute Punjabi confidence in their have blood-red cheeks as though as he shuddered beneath four layers of assumption that everyone is interested they’ve been slapped. The snow clothing, he checked the temperature. in their anecdotes. All conversations are leopards and foxes, too, know how It was 4ºC. In the Zanskar region, the about their previous and future treks. to walk on the ice road. temperature can dip to -30 at night. After Chadar, they say, they are flying He has, after not much thought, The freezer of his refrigerator is at -18. from Leh to Srinagar to snowboard on decided to walk on the frozen river for What tropical Centaur had agreed to the slopes of Gulmarg. eight days. Much can go wrong. Because was a walk inside a gigantic freezer for The uncle is in his mid-forties and the road was once a river, it would be several days and nights. He wondered has a large paunch, which should always hungry. if he should abort the walk. He needed reassure everyone that adventure need When he told his wife about the an honourable reason to cancel the trip, not be the privilege of the fit alone. walk, she took him to see an ancient like a fracture or a relative’s death. Everyone calls him Mamu because astrologer. Is there a fault in his stars, But there were no misfortunes, and that’s what his nephew calls him. Mamu Masterji, that indicates death by this morning he sits in a packed flight manufactures crankshafts in Aurangabad, drowning? Or by falling hard on ice, to Leh, a town in the Ladakh region where he lives. His nephew is Bhanja, perhaps? Such mishaps have occurred of Jammu & Kashmir. This is his who imports chemicals. Bhanja, who is on the river. The old sage, wearing a first trek. bearded, stylish and lean, with a mop of shirt too large and billowing trousers, As the plane soars over Delhi, he silky hair, is in his late twenties. He is made some rough charts and said, as can see a small ridge below. The Delhi asthmatic, but the condition does not though stating an obvious fact, “He is Ridge, just a few metres high, is the dissuade him from long arduous treks. half-man-half-horse”. Across the table, final, tame end of the oldest mountain He once walked to Kangri, one of the half-man-half-horse imagined range in India, the Aravallis, which are the few summits in the Himalayas

246 247 that can be reached without rock- The trekkers would carry only a daypack ashamed, because he has read that the climbing even though the peak is over and their boots. They are in the care of sickness can strike even Olympic athletes. 16,400ft above sea level. He realises that one of the finer adventure companies in In a few hours, Laughing Buddha, too, is his achievement is diminished by the India, Aquaterra Adventures, which is struck. The next day, Cleo falls. fact that he could get a mobile signal on expensive. The company charges about But on the third morning, everybody the summit. “Very faint signal and only 84,000 to take a person on the trek. appears to be in good health. They are on in one spot,” he says. After over 10 days Most outfits do the job in under 20,000, but the phone, saying goodbye to their families. of trekking, when he finally reached the as would be evident in the days to come, their After this moment, they would not be summit, he took out his phone and called trekkers would get what they paid for. speaking into a phone for over a week. his girlfriend, who said, “Can I call you Aquaterra’s trekkers would stay in Leh They leave Leh in cars. On the way, they see back? I am in a meeting.” After he got off for two nights to acclimatise in high altitude a group of men burning something on the the mountain, he broke up with her. before setting out. They would take two or back of a pick-up truck to warm the frozen He is on Tinder, and observes that three hours from Leh to reach the part of fuel below. It is that cold, but it is day, the there are some women in Leh who are the river where the trek begins. Long before sun strong. It is many degrees warmer than on the dating app. “But they are girls that, they would lose mobile signal. From a normal winter night on the river. from Delhi who are probably here for the there, for eight days and eight nights, as they The road built by the Army runs Chadar Trek.” walk about 80km on the river, they will be dead straight for many miles through Among the trekkers are two farmers. completely cut off from the outside world. wasteland towards barren mountains. In One grows rice and genetically modified If they suffer a serious injury, they will about two hours, they are driving beside the cotton in Haryana. The other was once have to be carried in the arms of villagers winding Zanskar River, on a road carved out an insurance executive. (“Housewives are for hours, or even days, to a vehicle. If of cliffs. The river is frozen, but they still have not insured for high sums because they anything bad happens back home, they some way to go before the trek begins. The Their world is now simple. Bare, conical mountains, sheer cliffs, frozen river, ravens in the clear blue sky. And them would get murdered.”) All through his may not know for about a week. The road turns into a broken road, which leads working life he saved, never bought a car handlers do not have the licence yet to to a dirt track, which begins to narrow. Their (“I never buy anything that depreciates in use satellite phones, banned in India for world is now simple. Bare, conical mountains, value.”) and accumulated over 100 acres civilian use. sheer cliffs, frozen river, ravens in the clear of land in Andhra Pradesh where, in a As night falls in Leh and the blue sky. And them. That’s it. At least as portion, he grows eucalyptus trees. temperature dips, a mountain gloom fills far as the eye can see. And there is one middle-aged the air. And there is the miasma of fear. The trek will begin where the motorable Gentleman from Delhi. (“It is politically On WhatsApp, the news coming from the dirt track ends. The government plans to incorrect to use the term ‘Eskimo’. ‘Inuit’ is frozen river, through trekkers who have build a road that would stretch all along better.”) He procures organic produce from just returned to other hotels in Leh, is the river. It would transform the region, villagers and sells it to the urban consumer. grim. The ice is not well formed. (People enrich children and bring jobs—but it A young woman, an ad film-maker from have been fornicating on the river, surely, would end the Chadar Trek. “Who would Mumbai who was once a state-level rower, Centaur mutters.) The ice is so slippery, want to walk on a frozen river watching is missing at the table. She enters the scene many trekkers have fallen. A triumphant trucks go by?” Laughing Buddha says. But a few minutes later, without disturbing the middle-aged woman reveals that she had he has faith in the incompetence of the air around her. She exhibits the amused fallen badly thrice. It appears that a fall government. “They may take more than acceptance of a woman who has always is inevitable. What happens after that is 10 years to build that road. They may even been regarded as ‘one of the boys’. And she a matter of luck. You may rise and pat take forever.” plays the part. (“I never use sunscreen.”) your buttocks, or you may not rise. There Down a bend, all of a sudden, the In a few days, an old Dutch trekker on the is a white woman stranded in a village seeming isolation of the trekkers ends. frozen river, struck by her face, would call on the frozen river, who has dislocated There is a long line of vehicles carrying her Cleopatra. her shoulder and is awaiting a helicopter other trekkers and there appears to be Cleo, Mamu, Bhanja, Bt Cotton rescue. Sooner or later, everyone realises a traffic jam on the narrow track. The Farmer, Eucalyptus Farmer, Gentleman a simple fact about the Chadar Trek—the trekkers get off the vehicles and begin to and Centaur would be led by two smallest misfortune would escalate into a walk. To their left, many metres below, guides, one of whom is stout and jovial, serious condition. is the frozen river. Scores of trekkers are and closely resembles a Laughing After dinner, Centaur throws up. He already on the ice, shuffling along. Centaur Buddha. There would be three cooks, has acquired altitude sickness, which sees a boy fall on his back. “There must be and 19 porters to carry the luggage and is an impact of low air pressure on a thousand trekkers on Chadar right now,” provisions that would include over two the body. The other trekkers are a bit someone says. Someone else says, “I hate hundred eggs and meat. As required worried because they wonder if Centaur to say this, but the government should by law and common sense, the porters is one of those fragile people who would make this trek expensive; that is the only would be locals of the Ladakh region. be a burden on the rest. But he is not way to save Chadar.”

248 249 250 The seven trekkers reach a point on have just begun their trek wonder if this suffering. Camping is abject poverty. the bank where, if they wish to proceed, is their fate, too. There are two people in every synthetic they have no choice but to walk on the Night falls and, the temperature tent, which is about 4ft high. One has frozen river. And just like that their dips so low that when Centaur spits on to crawl in, leaving one’s feet outside Chadar Trek begins. his sunglasses to clean them, he only to remove one’s shoes, crawl further in, The river is solid. It is, without scrapes saline icicles on the glasses. The try to unzip the sleeping bag with numb doubt, firm ground. But the ice is wet gadgets that the trekkers have brought lifeless fingers, remove some layers and the slightest loss in concentration to measure the temperature are not of clothes, wear a thin sleeping bag would result in a fall. They walk slowly, working as they should because of the liner, and entomb oneself inside trekking poles stabbing hard ice, boots cold. The guides guess that the figure is the bag, parts of which may feel damp. scraping the ground in a slow penguin probably -20ºC. To urinate, men may aim at a pee-bottle shuffle, as though the penguin is In a high canvas tent, the trekkers sit unless they wish to crawl out into the searching for its lost house key. So this in a huddle around a steaming kettle. extreme cold and head towards the is what it is. It has begun, they accept. Mamu and Bhanja talk about their toilet-tent, which is a hole in the ground They walk upstream. They would be favourite topic: Mamu and Bhanja. with a toilet seat on top. Women, too, walking upstream for another three Gentleman has assumed the role of can use a pee-bottle, but they have to or four days, covering over 40km and their fan. Eucalyptus Farmer, whom then urinate into a funnel. The Chadar Trek is as much about fellow trekkers as it is about the frozen river. Much can go wrong climbing a few hundred metres in Mamu and Bhanja have pronounced Centaur is distraught at having to the process; then they would begin team jester, gets deeper into the part as share a tent. He says you go into a tent walking back downstream. Often, they he narrates stories of his global travels, as trekkers and come out as spouses. are overtaken by a current of porters, which includes his stay in a luxury tent As the night grows, everyone sleeps carrying huge backpacks or pushing that had a “swimming pool inside”. listening to discreet farts, triumphant sleighs, yelling to each other in a good- Bt Cotton Farmer is a quiet listener farts, animal snores and fully formed natured way or singing to themselves. whose opinions are not known. Cleo sentences about deep wishes. But they It is as though the porters are walking thinks it is polite to laugh at the jokes are in the lap of luxury compared to on a very different terrain. On occasion of the men. most of the other trekkers on the bank. female porters would glide past as fast Centaur watches everyone with The cheap operators have stuffed three carrying objects as massive. hawkish eyes and a face that never or more per tent. At least the sardines The first day is going to be light. smiles, probably to masquerade hysterical have a tent. An hour ago, Gentleman had A few hundred metres after they begin laughter deep inside his being. He hopes met a group of young men and women the trek, they reach their campsite. They that they don’t start singing, or worse, who were lost because they could not would walk no more for the day. The playing antakshari. He dreads the sight find their guides and porters. They were porters and cooks, who had reached of men drinking, licking pickles, nibbling wandering on the bank of the frozen ahead, have set up tents. The rocky junk and singing badly. He particularly river with no food or shelter or any bank is littered with dozens of tents. As loathes the moment when a quiet social idea what they were going to do in evening grows, there is a steady stream underdog unleashes his soaring voice for the night. Hundreds like them, who of trekkers who are going downstream, his imagined moment of fame. had paid low-budget operators, would which means they are returning to the The Chadar Trek is as much about spend the next few days falling on finishing line. Their trek is over, but there fellow trekkers as it is about the frozen ice because of poor guidance, and is no euphoria on their faces. They look river. Much can go wrong, not only on subsisting on Maggi and eggs. Team as though they are walking to a lecture the river in the daytime, but also in the Aquaterra, on the other hand, would on ‘Does the Subaltern Speak?’ After tents in the night. In stressful conditions, be served chicken biryani, cheese over a week of walking, falling, sleeping people tend to gang up and find someone omelette, pasta, pizza, dal-rice and even in tents, defecating in extreme cold, as to bully. Or drunken fights can break out. desserts, including rasgulla. their ordeal ends, nothing shows on their There is news from another campsite that In the morning, the trekkers set out faces. Centaur wonders if most known a few Kashmiris have begun to annoy wearing cheap gumboots that they human expressions are, in fact, inventions their teammates by raising slogans against had bought in Leh for 400 a pair. The of melodramatic actors. What if the truth India. Centaur shakes with laughter. fancier trekking boots they had brought is that humans, in their deepest moments, The trekkers step out to see the night along are tied to their backpacks, do not make faces at all? sky, which always startles city people. adding to the weight they carry. The Among those who are returning is For several minutes, they are unable to news is that the river is slushy in parts, one young man whose hand is in a sling. take their eyes off the stars. Someone hence the cheap gumboots. What they do He is in pain. As he walks slowly on the sees a falling star. Another claims to not know right now is that they will be frozen river, a hundred pairs of eyes have spotted the International Space walking in gumboots all through the trek, observe him from the bank. Those who Station. This is joy, everything else is except for a short stretch on the

251 final day. That would mean, according to Centaur’s calculation, he would have carried the trekking boots more than the boots carried him. Before they start the walk, they sit on the rocks and wear crampons, which is probably the ugliest word in the English language. Spikes that are fitted to the shoes, these vastly improve one’s grip on ice, and most people who fell may not have fallen if they had been wearing crampons. The arch-guide on the trek is a local named Dorjee, who is now introduced to the team. He is about 40, beautiful and has red teeth. He is in several layers of tattered clothes and is carrying a huge backpack that may weigh about 20kg. He walks ahead carrying a stick, with which he strikes the river to deduce from the sound if the ice is as hard as it appears. He does not wear a crampon, none of the locals seem to respect it. They begin to walk in a file behind Dorjee. They are now accustomed to the fact that their world is just the frozen river, brown cliffs and other trekkers. And this is a world that is quiet. In places, a fluid strand of the river roars and vanishes below the ice. Their peace is shaken when they reach a bend in the river. There are scores of trekkers on the wall of the cliff. The ice on the river is too thin and everyone has to scale the foot of the cliff and walk across the slope until they reach firm river again. The cliff wall is steep and the trekkers move along a narrow path with great care. A slip can send them tumbling 50ft below, into the river. There are trekkers in both directions. The path is so narrow and there are so many people that someone screams, “Odd-Even please!” That is the only moment of mirth. Otherwise, the situation is tense. A young man screams, “Let us pass, my cousin is bleeding, my cousin has fallen, he is bleeding!” Beyond the narrow pass, the river is solid, but the ice is very slippery. A young woman falls hard and sits on the ice in shock or pain. Cleo slips into a puddle of cold water. Mamu, too. Laughing Buddha, too. Centaur walks with great care behind Dorjee watching people fall every now and then. A porter, who is running, overtakes him and says something to Dorjee, gesticulating that someone behind us has fractured his hand. After a few minutes, Dorjee careens and falls. But he rises. Several hundred metres later, Centaur finds a cluster of red spots on the ice. Laughing Buddha appears behind him and says, “It’s nothing, just tomato juice.” “Would someone be walking on the river drinking tomato juice? Wouldn’t it be frozen?” “It’s tomato juice. Keep walking.” There are two choppers in the sky. Centaur wonders if they are on a rescue operation. “Just sorties,” Laughing Buddha says. “Keep walking.”

252 253 A file of young men overtakes them. Everybody on the banks thinks, or survey him. Still, nobody introduces They are in smart gear and walking fast hopes, they are going to fall. They don’t. them. Centaur cannot take it anymore. on crampons. They are a gang of winter The trek has the quality of family life; He is about to introduce them when studs in dark glasses. One of them is a your opinion on whether it is beautiful Eucalyptus Farmer walks into the tent. short, bearded man who takes a long or miserable can keep changing in the When he sees Stud in their midst, he look at Cleo. The stud gang races ahead. course of a single day. The trekkers lets out a laugh, looks at Cleo and Later, as they are resting by the rocks, have figured out how things are going smiles at Stud. Stud is shamed. He Bearded Stud would approach the men to be. In the day, the trek would be leaves without a word. But in the of Team Aquaterra. Just a friendly chat nervous, thrilling and beautiful. The days that follow, he finds the courage in the hope that they would introduce trek would be the easy part. The nights to return, he finds ways to greet the him to Cleo. But Indian men don’t would be tough. trekkers and he throws glances at Cleo, easily introduce a feral stud to a woman They slowly make their way into the who would be fighting with her gloves in their caravan. Over the next few hypnotic visual monotony of the gorge, or cap, or shooting pictures. days, the Bearded Stud would surface watching cliff faces, stunning waterfalls, On the final day, 10 days after they a few times; he would approach the gushing waters that appear to dive landed in Leh, they walk the final men and throw long glances at Cleo, into the ice, and strange ice formations stretch towards the end of the trek. but she would not come to know of as though Superman has hidden Centaur tries to imagine his own face. his existence. She is often preoccoupied Kryptonite here. On the days when the He accepts that there is no expression with adjusting her inner gloves, outer ice is dry and easy to walk on, they chat on his face, nothing that shows gloves or cap, or studying the display of as they go. Cleo is telling someone that his happiness at having witnessed her serious camera. the toughest part of shooting a hair-gel extraordinary beauty, walked on a When night falls, the temperature dips so low that when Centaur spits on his sunglasses to clean them, he only scrapes saline icicles on the glasses In the night, Team Aquaterra seeks ad is anticipating hairstyles months treacherous, frozen river for eight days refuge in the high tent. They sit in a in advance, because the ads are shot and completed the expedition without huddle around the steaming kettle. that much before they are released. becoming crippled. He wonders, once And they talk, chiefly, of course, about Often, the styles of actors and Indian again, if most human expressions are Mamu and Bhanja. cricketers who endorse gels are decided farces invented by actors. “I am done with one-night stands,” by their contracts with corporations. If In a few minutes, they step away from Bhanja proclaims. “I want a steady they ever shave off their hair, as one the frozen river onto a dirt track. And relationship.” actor did, when their ads are released, just like that, the Chadar Trek is over. “Why do you want to bring home they lose a lot of money. When they reach Leh, they will a cow when you can get milk in the Finally, after four days of walking, be reacquainted with their faces, and shop?” Mamu asks. Centaur finds it they reach a village called Nyerak. naked bodies that they have not seen amusing that the boy’s uncle must Here, on the slope of a mountain, there in full length for over a week. And they make this statement, which is an old is a huge campsite where scores of will bathe and bathe and bathe. They Hindi saying. trekkers have pitched their tents. Team will check their mail and realise that Bt Farmer, in one of his rare Aquaterra will stay in a small house, their lives have not been transformed in utterances, says, “But a time comes in which smells of jaggery. It seems like the days they were away. the life of a man when he needs his an exceptional luxury to sleep under At the Leh airport, Bearded Stud, own cow.” a concrete roof. now clean-shaven, finds Cleo. This “Guys,” says Cleo, who has had When day breaks, they begin their time, he does not waste time with the enough of the masquerade of ‘one retreat. By a frozen waterfall, Centaur unreliable medium of men. He goes of the boys’. “What’s going on?” is struck by the face of a young man. up to her and talks. At some point, it The topics change through the There is something wrong with that appears he is taking down her number. night. They try to keep talking as long face, but Centaur cannot figure out He grins wide. Not every face is the as possible to delay the misery of what it is. Finally, it occurs to him. He invention of actors. sleeping in these conditions. But the goes up to the young man and says, mornings are exquisite. A golden light “You shaved? You shaved in this cold? falls on the cliffs. The river glows. A tall How?” The man, a bit wounded, walks Dutchman walks by, whistling, hands in away mumbling, “I used hot water.” getting there Fly to Leh with GoAir (www.goair.com) or his pockets. A girl walks downstream Bearded Stud stalks the gang, but Jet Airways (www.jetairways.com) from with a porter—she’s had enough of the he still does not manage to alert Cleo New Delhi. The 11-day trip with Aquaterra trek and is going back home. A newly to his existence. One evening, as Team costs 84,000 per person, and includes married couple on the river is taking a Aquaterra is huddled around the airport transfers to the hotel, three nights selfie. The man, in pink trousers, carries steaming kettle, Stud walks in on the in Leh, all meals, guided sightseeing and the woman in his arms. She yelps, more pretext of chatting with the men. Cleo porter fees for up to 15kg of baggage. than she needs to. Look, she is so happy. is in the huddle and finally, her eyes

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