Amazing problems trying to reach Jammu for Kashmir, with long fruitless queues and rudeness, so I decided to train it to Srinagar via Amritsar. One night’s stay there, (I will return to explore later) with the crazy but friendly Punjabi people and then bus to Jammu at the base of the mountains for another night. Then a tortuous twelve hour, bumpy, ear popping, knee crunching, gear crunching bus journey up over the arid, stark mountains – army posts reminding us that we were in a particularly sensitive area politically – through a 3km tunnel under an insurmountable snow laden ridge, and then bursting out into quite another world – the eerie, stunningly beautiful, frozen Kashmir valley and the delightful city of Srinigar. This was the first time I had even seen a sweeping landscape of only deciduous trees bare in winter.
Harmonies of many browns against the blue and purple background hills, and distant snow peaks, with the mists over the lake beginning to rise. Superb !
The naked, pruned (for firewood) stumpy trees silhouette weird shapes before the wintry pale sunset. There is a shortage of diesel here, too, and stranded buses block the road causing a four mile traffic jam – so we sit, waiting, in the amazing cold. Then a lone houseboat hawker rescues me on his motorbike, and shortly I am thawing in front of a pot bellied stove, in one of the strangest accommodations so far on my travels - a Kashmir houseboat.
After a good sleep, I wake, huddled in my sleeping bag, to warm Kashmiri bread and aromatic Kashmiri tea listening to the singing of beautiful verses from the Koran on my little pocket radio, and the mournful cries outside of a “shikhara-wallah” (the operator of a small paddled boat) lost in mist and trying to sell somebody something. The toilet is a hole straight into the icy waters of the lake and my host has provided a bucket of warm water, steaming in the zero degrees, for my ablutions.
Minibuses crammed full of macho mustachioed Kashmiri men wearing the Muslim cap and dark serge capes (ferins) and with remarkable, long, curved, black eyelashes and dramatic sweeping eyebrows that resemble Persian script. They each carry firepots (congri) of embers smoldering in earthenware bowls enclosed by wickerwork baskets complete with handle. Everyone seems to have one, under their ferins. They take these portable heaters into the cinema, and smoke cigarettes, so that the picture is projected through a cloud. I was fascinated to watch the titles of a black and white film cutting through the smoke in three dimensions.
One day I had the unique opportunity to visit an outlying village and stay in the home of a Brahmin family, the friends of an elderly Dutch woman I met on my travels. Puzzled stares and friendlier wide-eyed kids followed us around the frozen streets. Ducks and geese, and trout streams, and ponies steaming. Here’s a beaut sign: “Hair Dressing Ceylon”. Knitted bright woolen tea-cosy hats on the kids of Indian tourists coming back into Srinagar.
The only time I’ve ever been sea-sick, and it was in the most beautiful and placid lake you could ever imagine. Lying on brocaded cushions in a shikhara, slowly rocking from side to side as the shikhara-wallah paddled with his heart shaped oar, through the early mists that late rose to warm winter sunshine. (Maybe it had something to do with the funny cigarettes I had consumed.) Lonely wailing / singing by young boatmen paddling their way through the mist, a combination of foghorn and entertainment. Suddenly an island with four huge chana trees (from Persia) looking like golden elms – four trees on a tiny island and nothing else. Silky reflections of the lake life – a barge overloaded with golden straw with a couple of grinning kids lying on top – avenues of spindly poplars stretching along the shore – five shikhara-wallahs fanned out in their flat bottomed boats meeting to play cards and gossip, squatting in their ferins over their congris, and occasionally taking a pensive puff on their hubble bubble hookah pipe. The sign on my boat proclaims “Young Rajah, Full Sping Seats, 5 Star, Lovely Ha Ha”.
I explore the wintry and Moghul garden – they must be splendid in summer – and watch a cricket match on the top (Royal) level of the gardens. Then there were the delightful floating gardens – they really do float, as my cold wet feet and trousers would attest.
If you send a greetings telegram in India with “sixteen” as the message, it will be delivered as “may heaven’s choicest blessing be showered on the young couple”. Such a custom would certainly take all the fun out of reading al the wedding telegrams! Others: 1. Heartiest Diwali Greetings. 7. Congratulations on the distinction conferred on you. 12. Heartiest congrats on your success in the election. 19. Sincere greeting for the Republic Day – long live the Republic! 27. Heartiest Gurpah greetings! Entertaining reading about local values while killing some time at the telegraph office. There you will also find the “pin-codes” of every post office in India (there are thousands) carefully hand-painted on the wall in official red and white.
The first day after Mrs. Gandhi’s arrest, results in 5 deaths, 18,000 arrests, several burned buses, a hijacked plane, M.P.’s going on indefinite fasts. Ah! Such is political life in the sub continent.
Fish and chips in Srinagar seems somewhat poetic. I entertained on my houseboat a saffron salesman for breakfast. Could I trust him? The sounds of Chopin on late night radio make me wistful. I exchanged my cheap camera for some jewelry (for hopeful later resale) with a very clever Kashmiri salesman. The day we were to conclude the protracted deal, he tells me his father has just died. He seemed so distressed. “A father is a father”, he lamented.” And business is business” I replied, refusing to lower my price by this somewhat apparent ploy. But he may have been genuine, so I of course offered him my condolences. I think I didn’t get cheated in the end. But I did.
Two excursions into the frozen countryside: one to Phalagam, the picturesque base for trekking in better
weather. Ice on the paddy fields with tufts of the last harvest sticking through; thousands of cricket bat blanks stacked to dry; haystacks in the forks of the leafless trees, out of reach of the animals; holy fish in the holy springs with women washing their unholy clothes in the midst of it all; rugged mountains with snow and pine forests. Other travelers from Kenya, Canada and Singapore mercifully dilute the dominance of the odious Indian Tourist arrogantly exercising their wealth.
The second delightful trip was to Gulmarg, at 2650m billed as a “fast developing ski resort”, which was a bit of an overstatement. During the warmer months there are fields of wildflowers, but today there is plenty of snow, and good entertainment, watching the crazy Indian Tourist negotiating sleds and ponies, throwing snowballs at each other and generally getting fleeced by the enterprising Kashmiris, who probably identify more with Pakistan than India.
A rather melancholy Christmas with a failed phone call to my family, despite a 5.30am rise and 3 hour wait in a dirty, freezing, telegraph office. And then an incomprehensible Christmas church service mainly in Urdu – I recognized the Apostle’s Creed as it was raced through (as usual) but was thoroughly garbled in a mixture of Urdu, Hindi and English. The few carols were strained and in the wrong key (how different I found it in Fiji with their uninhibited musicality!) But I guess the worse thing that day was the attitude of my hosts – a Muslim family, who felt obliged to “give” me Christmas dinner, although Christmas of course meant nothing to them. There are people who naturally give and there are the opposite and I got taken! Despite my pleas, they did not join me for the meal (for which I had paid extra). So I dined on the half cooked chicken (that I had provided to them), alone. Nobody likes to be alone at Christmas. Ah sigh.
However it certainly was a white Christmas for me – frost, not snow. Radio Moscow intrigued me as I was walking into town, crunching the frost with my boots, for the early morning phone call – it must have been for ballet exercises, a Russian voice counting and cajoling and exhorting to the strains of a bouncy rhythmic piano. Russian aerobics perhaps? And later I was able to meet up with some friendly Canadians with whom I shared some Christmas cake. The main purpose for staying in Kashmir for so long was the booked Christmas phone call which never eventuated – well, now it was time to move on, thankful that I still has some possessions and money. I had earlier bought some leather boots (the zips failed not long afterwards), a knee length leather coat (the buttons fell off not long afterwards), and some grey serge flannel trousers in preparation for the Great Winter European Experience (which I never experienced as I ended up in the tropics instead!) A greasy woollen hat and gloves knitted in Nepal completed my ensemble.
28/12/1978
On the long bus trip back to Jammu, a zealous anti-smoking American lady missionary tried in vain to get the local people in the bus not to smoke. She may as well have tried to convince them to throw out their ferins and congris or not to hoik and spit or urinate in the street. The only other European, a 20 year old guy in the seat directly in front of me nervously remarks: “I wish the driver would keep his engine on!” as the bus hurtles down the narrow mountain road, overtaking anything in its path. What a small world – it turns out he went to the same high school as I in Sydney, and he recognized my name from many hours of staring in boredom at the Honour Board during school assemblies. But judging by his appearance, attitude and standard of education, it seems Asquith Boys’ High standards have slipped considerably since my day! The rest of the trip was flooded with memories from school days 15 years earlier – you daydream about some crazy things on a long bus trip. But even the pleasant daydreaming did not prepare for the next experience on arriving at Jammu.
The challenge was to obtain a train ticket to Amritsar that night. Two and a half hours in various “queues”, with bad manners that you’d never believe. I certainly knew I was “back in India”. My height and stage voice was put to some advantage: “YOU! Get to the back of the queue! YOU – do not push in!” I was somewhat concerned that a riot might break out as the people push and shove to force their way to the booking windows. I was eventually lucky to obtain a “sleeper” (sharing with 6 others a small compartment open to 100 others). But don’t count on getting any sleep on an Indian Railways sleeper – there always seems to be some rowdy happy group in the same compartment ignoring the needs of their fellow passengers. Sikhs in coloured turbans and impressive curled wax moustaches keep asking inane questions. I find myself retorting “Yes, and how many rupees a month does your father earn?” A boy plays “sitar” music for me twanging his nose while humming. So in return, I play my flute and most in the crowded compartment seemed appreciative.
That night we crossed some big rivers – there are some enormous rail bridges in India. (I can recall one earlier near Madras, where I went to the toilet (open hole), showered and shaved and returned to my seat before the train even reached the end of the bridge span.)
29/12/1978
Amritsar, close to the Pakistan border, the city of Sikhs and the famed Golden Temple – the building not as grand as I had hoped for – but pilgrims and the surrounding activities were fascinating. A pleasant afternoon, sitting in the wintry sun, head respectfully covered, feet respectfully bare, watching the thousands of splendid, slender Sikhs joyfully wash (a symbolic cleansing of the soul) in the holy waters of the sacred Lake or tank, surrounding the temple, from which came the continual sounds of sacred Sikh music.
(not my photo !)
I discovered what Sikhs have beneath their turbans – hair! Not as long as I had imagined but usually tied up in a knot (traditionally Sikhs must not cut their hair, must wear a turban, carry a small wooden comb, wear a silver bangle on the right wrist, and carry a kris or dagger. (The five K’s). It seems that only the turban is strongly adhered to these days, but some of the more devout dress in ancient costume and carry spears (the guards in the temple carry automatic rifles). One such attired elder sat down beside me and wordlessly scrutinized me for a while before apparently deciding I wasn’t a threat to his religion and his Golden Temple was safe. There was a rather blood-thirsty exhibition in the Sikh Museum with gory portraits of martyrs – a memorial to the gallant and their tortuous, fearless history. It is very hard to imagine the slaughter following partition in 1947 by these people who today seem relatively friendly. But a glint of aggression can still be gleaned in their smiling eyes. [Postscript: less than six years later, in an effort to create an independent Sikh state, Sikh terrorists seized the Golden Temple shrine. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi ordered a military to drive out the terrorists, and hundreds were killed. Tension between the Sikhs and Hindu majority remain high.]
I treasure a copy of “Freedom at Midnight” – an excellent introduction to India’s long road to independence.
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