It has been a couple of months since this blog has become subdued and has lacked regular updates. The excuses are many and perhaps best left unsaid. But hopefully it is a thing of past, and hopefully I will have regular updates here in the days to come. Let me begin with a set of images of children from the mountains—Himalayas to be precise—all the way from Jammu and Kashmir to Arunachal Pradesh.

When I was about to begin this post, my plan was to hastily post a few images of children from my recent trip to Lahaul and Spiti region. Looking through the impressions of those innocent faces, a thought passed to me that the children from many parts of the Himalayas look a lot alike. They all come bundled with a twinkle in their eyes and a charming innocence in their faces. I then thought it would be worthwhile making a larger compilation of images from across the mountains. Here we go!

Let me begin with an old image from Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh. It is a photograph that made me happy and gave me some boasting rights. It was one of my very first images to get licensed for a reasonably good price.

On a crisp morning when we were searching for breakfast in the main street of Tawang, only to find that most restaurateurs were too lazy to serve what we wanted and preferred to offer us nothing more than a sandwich. Left without choice, sandwich is what we had to order and even that was bound to take some time to make. While the lazy cook took his time on the sandwich, I wandered the streets with my camera over the shoulder. It was the hour of the day when Indian Army bus was to come and pick up school children from their homes. This girl waited for the bus, while her little brother gave her company. I watched them chat with each other fondly for a while before making this picture.

Two years later, it was used by UNICEF for their annual calendar that had pictures of children from various ethnicities from across the world.

Happy, carefree children can be seen everywhere in Arunachal. All these four kids were riding on a bicycle—just one bicycle—at Jang Village on the way to Tawang. The tallest of the kids seemed to be the ‘leader of the gang’ who dictated what games they play and how they spend time. While the elders in this small village were away working, these kids were having a ball and posing happily for tourists.

While the four kids above were having a good time, this girl was performing her duties nearby, taking care of her siblings. They seemed amused to see us, a little confused about how best to interact with us. The little kid riding on the back of her sister was shy and unsure what to do, occasionally peeping out to have a better look at us.

It is common to see little monks like this one—monklings as a friend once described them—giggling and running around chasing each other in the courtyard of the monasteries. We stopped by to have a chat with this fellow and his friend, but they turned from ebullient to shy when we spoke to them.

The image of this little fellow in Thangu Village is northern parts of Sikkim is perhaps the only image I have, of children in Sikkim. It is long time since I backpacked in Sikkim, a place I long to go back to but the the ordeal of reaching there keeps me out. Those were the days when I was shooting with a film camera and focused on photographing landscapes and only landscapes. Hopefully I will return there soon someday to get another dose of this beautiful mountain state.

Uttarakhand is another region in Himalayas, from where I have no images of children. It is also another place that I visited a few times long ago, when my focus was largely on photographing landscapes. And similar to Sikkim, I hope to go back and backpack again some day soon, but haven’t made it so far  thanks to the ordeal of getting there.

Next, when I was looking for images from Himachal Pradesh, the first that came to my mind was this little Thomas Alva Edison experimenting with his (rather dangerous) toy that was soon taken away from him. At Darcha Village, the last permanent habitation in Himachal Pradesh on the long road to Ladakh, I was tired and was not really keen to take my camera out. But one look at this guy, I knew I wasn’t left with that choice.

At Langcha Village in Lahaul and Spiti, we were invited for a cup of tea at the house of our guide Lara. It was a day when most of the village was in Kaza for the annual fair, having a good time watching performances. While Lara’s last daughter had no idea of the fair, she still was pleading with him to take her to Kaza, to enjoy a jeep ride. She was pacified by her father till she forgot about it.

Eldest of Lara’s children, Lobsang must be about ten years old or less. Unlike other kids in the village, she had a much serious demeanour and seemed to have matured beyond her age. She also appeared obedient and spending a lot of time helping the elders with household chores besides going to school. I do not know why, but I had a feeling that she had lost her childhood sooner than one would.

Among all the children of the mountains I have seen, the Ladakhi kids are perhaps the naughtiest and the bravest. Here is a bunch of them having a good time at Korzok Gustor Festival, when monks wearing demon-like masks were performing at the courtyard of the monastery. Korzok Gustor Festival is an annual celebration at the monastery at Korzok Village, located on the banks of Tso Moriri Lake.

These kids were playing with stones near Lamayuru Village when I was out for a long walk. They became very conscious on seeing me and stood next to the wall, looking at me awkwardly. They were good for the camera anyway, awkward or otherwise.

We had an awesome awesome time playing with kids in Zanskar during a cold winter season. Some of us played football with them (when the temperatures were somewhere ten degrees below zero), dragged the sledges for them or just laughed and ran around with them. In a season when Zanskar is completely cutoff by road from rest of the world and buried in snow, people of Zangle Village—kids and elders alike—were happy to have some visitors. These little siblings watched us play from their terrace. This girl called us as we were walking away and we had happy conversations in languages incomprehensible to each other.

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At a height of 8,586 meters, Kanchenjunga (Khangchendzonga, Kangchenjunga) is the tallest mountain in India.

The picture was taken about 7 years ago during the 7-day trek to Goecha la (gochela). We woke up on a freezing morning at 5am and walked up to a ridge near Dzongri log hut for this view. It was cloudy and we were doubtful about seeing the peak during the sunrise. Thankfully the weather got better at about 6.30am, when this is what we got to see.

Shot using a fuji sensia colour transparency.

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I woke up bleary eyed, took out my toothbrush and casually pulled the curtains before heading to the bathroom. One look outside the window, I threw away the toothbrush and rushed down with my tripod and camera. The view of the orange skies and sun surfacing over jagged ridges was something I did not want to miss. Toothbrush could wait.

Sunrise at Mashobra

I can go on to explain how the sky changed colour, how the ridges were stacked up below a brilliant sky and how I felt exalted after witnessing the drama. But words can make the whole affair dull and stilted.

Birds arrived soon after sunrise. A small bunch of black throated tits took fancy to a tree next to me, where they hopped on from branch to branch, probably looking for breakfast. A pine tree hosted a brown thrush-like bird, which glittered on a shaft of sun rays that penetrated through the leaves. I don’t know the names of much of Himalayas bird species, but sometimes names do not matter. It can be like watching a little girl run around and giggle in a nice quiet place; it doesn’t matter what she is called.

Waking up early in the morning has its good effects on you. But on this particular day, goodness did not last beyond breakfast. I was spending my days at Mashorba, a village near Shimla on invitation from Club Mahindra. Holidaying with a small bunch of travel writing fraternity, I had four good days spent amidst the mountains. The holiday had a few dull moments too, and it was one such day of dullness. A filling breakfast later, we spent a good hour waiting to be rescued from a traffic jam in Shimla and drove further on a seemingly never ending highway past hundreds of vehicles, ugly towns, a terrible accident before finally reaching Kasauli in the middle of the day.

Kasauli was recommended as a great place to go by one of our fellow travellers who himself decided to go elsewhere that day. “It’s a nice place, go to Kasauli,” he had told us, and we had immediately finalized our plans for the day. One of us asked our driver as we approached the town, “what is there to see in Kasauli,” for which he had casually replied, “market hai, mandir hai, sunset point hai” – ‘there is a market, there is a temple, there is a sunset point’. We had arrived there on mid-day and were planning to be back in Shimla by the hour of sunset. I understood why our man who recommended Kasauli to us decided to go somewhere else himself. But not to undermine the beauty of the place, it is a quiet and nice cantonment area – a great location provided you are an army major and have a cozy house to live there. Not otherwise.

After a quick walk around Kasauli, we were back to what we were doing before – driving through a highway past hundreds of vehicles, ugly towns and waiting to be rescued from a traffic jam in Shimla.

They say you have to go through some pain to be able to appreciate all good things in life. Indeed, remaining days in Shimla were spent appreciating those good things. In the small town of Chail where we went next day, I appreciated the beauty of deodar trees growing tall on the slopes carpeted with lush grass. I watched grey wagtails hop skip and jump on the road doing what they are best at – wagging their tails! I eyed on a Eurasian Jay in the thick woods and felt happy seeing them for the first time. I argued with people for calling a magpie something else, and cursed myself later for not bothering to accept a bet and missing out on some fortune. I happily shot pictures of ridge lines, knowing fully well that some of my friends will accuse me of coming back with stereotype images. It turned out later that my friends were very predictable!

Deodars forest on the way to Chail

Chail was a place I looked forward to seeing again. I had fallen in love with its thick cedar forests when I was there three years ago (Read: my previous visit to Chail). When I first saw the market in the center of the town, it had given me an impression that there could be a large sprawl of shops out there. But I was taken by surprise to see the buildings vanish on a bend making way to another expanse of cedars. With a blanket ban on construction activity here, the quiet woods, the tall trees, the idle village had remained unchanged and unaffected by the rush of tourists since my last visit. Except for a minor addition. Someone had added an addition zero to the entry fee to Chail Palace, which then used to cost Rs.10/- Now, a fading sign at the gates said 100/- and helpfully mentioned that it can be reimbursed against accommodation charges. I reminded myself not to forget the reimbursements the next time I come here to stay at the Maharaja Suite. Just for the record, it costs about 15,000.

The palace built by Maharaja of Patiala in Chail

I was still thinking about Chail when we went camping in the middle of cedar trees next evening. It was a tad luxurious for a camp, but was a cozy place for a good conversation around the warmth of the fire. Much food was consumed as the well read and well travelled folks prattled on William Dalrymple, Amitav Ghosh, Gerald Durrell, Che Guevara, Twain and Dickens and more. A smattering of that night’s conversation is documented here. I am told that the chatter progressed into a raucous cacophony till small hours of the morning, but I slept peacefully in my tent dreaming of cedar trees.

Next morning, strengthened by a breakfast of best ever Aloo Parathas I have ever had, we walked through a stretch of one such cedar forest to get back to the resort, loosing our way briefly before getting back on track and resisting insistences of one of us to try and chalk out a straight line path to the resort through the steep slopes. The rewards of the walk came in the form of a few encounters, like the one with a congenial elderly shepherd who conversed fondly with his dog, a few birds and a waterfall. Not to forget is the ‘feel good’ of the deodar forests.

Viceregal Lodge, Shimla

Later in the day, we did what the tourists must do in Shimla – make a visit to the Viceregal Lodge and a walk up and down the mall (Read more: Walks in Shimla Mall Road, spending a day at Shimla Mall). While mall was a familiar territory, Viceregal lodge impressed and surprised me by its efficient construction and tastefully built exteriors. Raj Verma, the guide at the lodge showed us the furnishing and woodwork, electrical wiring and switches and decoratives that have survived the 121 years since the lodge was built. The foresighted architects of the lodge had implemented rainwater harvesting and had made provisions for electric wiring in the walls at a time when Shimla had no electricity at all. No wonder that the lodge is still used with very little modifications.

At the end of the touristy venture to Shimla, we were enslaved in the evening by the preparations of sous chef Vikas. I wonder what addictives he puts into his appetizers. I came to the restaurant every night with a resolve to eat very little, but never manage to stop before I could take no more. And when it comes to saying ‘thank you,’ I must not forget the tireless resort manager Mohnish.

The visit to Shimla and Mashobra ended just the way it started. We journeyed through the highway that seemed never-ending on a day that is easily the most boring one in the entire trip, even surpassing that uninspiring day when we waded past Shimla’s traffic towards Kasauli.

About Mashobra and Shimla

Mashobra is a small village, about 10km from Shimla on the Hindusthan-Tibet highway. The place has beautiful deodar forests and some great views of the mountain ranges. Read more about Shimla and surrounding places in an earlier post.

About the resort

Club Mahindra Whispering Pines Gables in Mashobra is a resort owned by Mahindra Holidays. Read more about the resort on Club Mahindra website.

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