yet another..!!

Fortunately it was summer.. not the winters, like the one I came in March.. in comfortable temperatures but amid dust storms, we were driving through the rough roads to a remote village in Changthang, on a camper.. my job this season was to meet the villagers and setup up homestays in the offbeat places where we installed power.. and also this time find appropriate site for setting up telescopes and identify women to be trained as part of our astronomy for development project.. As we entered the gravel roads, the first stone avalanche board appeared.. we just drove, humming the songs on my playlist, when we heard some rumblings on the roof.. fortunately it was just the front glass that cracked little, nothing major happened.. drive continued, and the music, and also continued this fortunate adventure.. the brakes were behaving abrupt, so we stopped a while for the machine to cool down.. there I spotted some interesting bird species in the Indus that flowed beside that gravel we drove on.. I pulled out my camera and clicked a few pics.. few miles later, we offered our ride to the laborers that were passing by.. and then came Kiari, my last memories from this place were bizarre to put in right words, an army settlement with lines of fuel drums, a helipad, an engine of an airplane that crashed here, a series of branding by the numerous battalions that were stationed here since the Chushul war of 1962, the bunkers on mountain tops, huge cremation grounds of soldiers who lost their lives, the security guards with their aviator glasses and shining AKs holding key entry positions, and offcourse the four village houses and few old ladies (‘amaleys’), who were hard to spot around all that green military camps and equipment, their voices lost to the sounds of moving cavalry and convoys. The memory was revisited and refreshed, but it was going to get deeper as we ended up spending a night here..

welcome to Kiari

It was just when we entered Kiari, on a steep slope we lost our brakes.. not too deep on the slope, not too early, we had a skid on it when Stanzin, my fellow friend and driver, realized we are in soup.. deep soup as we had 12 people sitting on the back.. fortunately, we had the mountain on the left to support us.. our best option to stop the vehicle was to climb it on the rocks and collide it against that wall.. Success! Scary success!

Another brink in the Himalayas, another heart in mouth moment, another smile that followed minutes later.. fortunately, the vehicle stopped without colliding or overturning or injuring anyone, fortunately, 0Km from Kiari, fortunately, it wasn’t yesterday when we were passing through the Changla-pass at 17500 feet and the steep downslope we crossed where this mountain or this control wouldn’t have helped us.. the inevitable would have happened..

The ubiquitous BSNL wasn’t working today.. the army men watched our misery.. I stepped forward to shake a hand and talk.. and seek help, but they couldn’t do much apart from their cribbing of the conditions and phone connectivity.. fortunately, we were not too far from a satellite phone, just 10Km away.. so we can call a rescue, if we reach Nurnis..

An 'Amaley' (local Ladakhi word for Mom) came with shining borosil glasses and offered us a tea.. and shelter for the night as well.. another lady from a nearer house invited us to have dinner once we are done with our rescue call.. Fortunately, another camper driver cum mechanic turned up too.. he has been providing services to the army supplies.. he opened up the car front wheel and helped us decipher what actually happened.. the brake shoe was lost, the rim broke and the brake fuel hydraulics broke as well.. so we needed all that to fix this..

Our vehicle on a jack and we on foot, my playlist continued.. it was 5 in evening but somehow there was no panic, there was something in the air that said, hey, am alive, in a place never imagined, on a road that sees humans rarely.. we walked for about 3Km when a ride came.. fortunately, only one guy in the car, so we're not a trouble..

Stanzin talked in Ladakhi with sir, acquainted ourselves and our situation.. minutes later we were at Nurnis, more green and beautiful than many places I had seen in Changthang..

Nurnis

The curious villagers looked at the unexpected guests as we went from house to house (through the farms) to find the sat phone.. and we did, fortunately it worked, fortunately the friend Stanzin has been counting on, picked it up (after a few tries). And then we waited for her to reach the spare part shop so that we call her again to explain our needs..

Those 30 minutes Stanzin smoked his goldflake, while I was checking out on the storm building up on the massifs around us. After a tea with the house owners, we had our final sat call with Chorol who was at the workshop and got all the stuff we needed. Some more complications later (her bf and family), she was on road with her cousin. It was somewhere unbelievable for me. A young girl will be driving in that darkness, through those remote roads to reach us around midnight.

We were done now, was 8.30pm when we started our walk back to Kiari. The wind was harsh and chilly, typical to Changthang, and it started to snow as well. Any vehicle on this remote road was very unlikely, so it seemed we may end up walking the entire 10Kms in this snow storm. Fortunately, we spotted a camper near the village when we started the walk. After about half a km walk, my brain had a shine, I thought it is worth checking out the village houses to get to the owner. I was fine to shed some money to get out of this chaos. Fortunately again, the first door we knocked was of Gurmet, the camper owner who happily agreed to give us the ride, but before that, a cup of tea. He lives alone here while his wife and children are in Leh. He was watching some crazy shit about the North Korean dictator, on India TV (I wondered whether it was worth getting another life today, in a world where India TV exists). I had some deep breaths and ended that contemplation.

Moments later we were on road, pitch dark and snow storm. I played some music again, carefully observing the patterns of snowflakes illuminated by our headlight and as the wind played with it. Meanwhile, Stanzin and Gurmet immersed themselves in their never-ending Ladakhi talks (I never get this, two Ladakhi strangers who just met have so much to talk about!). Gurmet dropped us to Kiari and he was kind enough to just take the cost for his diesel, but I handed him some extra for his rescue (to say the least)..

worst capture

Back to Kiari, we were welcomed by the village lady who offered us an amazing dinner. She and her husband, both are school teachers, and their young kid, 8yrs old I guess, had a deep relation with TV. Although he never stuck to one channel for more than 10min. Soon we realized, the village had no electricity and the power to the house was through a diesel generator personally owned by the family. It was time for some usual talk by Stanzin, how many houses, the local counselor and then some plans for installation.

Meanwhile, I finished another chapter of ‘the god of small things’. Powers were turned off to save fuel, I went to bed to catch sleep, although still anxious about when will Chorol reach here, safe and sound. After the TV went off, our kiddo showed his energy, all of it directed on a fight with a blanket (he was pretending to be some superhero). I just ignored him as I was too tired (but he wasn’t, so that fight continued for a while), and at about 11.30pm, Chorol and her young cousin entered the scene. I faked the sleep coz I wanted to give these friend their space where they can catch up. They had a long talk, only in the morning I realized, the majority of it was about the bikers who followed her for about an hour while she was maneuvering her alto through those gravel roads in the night. Fortunately..

Guess the scariest part of the story is over, not completely sure though. Next day after hours of banging brains, and offcourse the car, Stanzin and the mechanic couldn’t completely fix the brakes of the left tire.

(technical) Although the brake shoe was replaced, broken disk as well, but the cylinder that holds hydraulic fuel for brake pressure was damaged so it cannot be fixed. We had to hack out, so the hydraulics supply was stopped to this tire and hence fail one brake and survive with 3 for our return.

This sounded fine, so we said adieu to everyone.

 I offered some money for the food and stay, to the family, and especially to the mechanic who spent his half day with us. But no one accepted a penny but were happy to pose for a selfie.

The family at Kiari

Stanzin (left), the cool Mechanic Dorjay (middle) and Me

We then drove to our destination Mahe to finish the work. It was fun meeting a few of the villagers, who mostly will remain absent from their home owing to their nomadic lifestyle. The kids were enthusiastic and happy playing with mud. I remembered Tanzin, the one super active kid I met 2 years back. He has grown up but he’s still the same in terms of energy. He was happy that I remembered his name..

Stanzin and his sister

We setup 2 homestay rooms here. Selecting the houses was a tricky task, but the villagers handled it. Then was another task of the day, to select some village women for training. Training to look into the sky through sophisticated telescopes.

We left back to Kiari where Chorol’s car was parked. The brake was still giving trouble as Stanzin had to pump multiple times before it gets enough pressure. We had a long 160Km journey ahead, and I could just imagine the hack we did will fail (it was just a screw that was stopping the fluid pressure), and we’ll hit the rocks or fall into Indus. Frankly, am not a big fan of falling into rivers.

This mental torture continued for the next 5 hours as we passed through some very steep sections. I time and again reminded Stanzin to remain slow especially when we are on a steep downhill. He tried but at times the momentum is too much I guess. The scariest section came near a village called Hema. I can’t tell exact speed, but we were very fast and it was never-ending downhill slope. I could feel the anxiety, both me and Stanzin were dumb silent and he was the one trying his luck with brakes.

We escaped! Fortunately.

A breather, A memory, A wiser life.. i look back to my last near life experiences

• The edge! on which my bag fell, at Visapur fort, western ghats..
• The slip from the Talakona waterfall.. scariest of all..
• The scary cliffs from Khireshwar to Harishchandragarh, followed by a flood river crossing to pachnai.. western ghats again..
• The Ratangarh climb in the monsoon night.. and river crossings..
• The double capsizing of the raft in Zanskar as we opted for the riskiest section, Zangla to Nimu..
• The pneumonia episode..