The highway is a constant companion on road trips. But to wake up right next to it is a magical experience, like waking up next to a person you’ve adored for a long time and who suddenly becomes your lover in a night of rain and passion. On those mornings you tend to smile before you open your eyes, knowing you are about to wake up to something beautiful; knowing, in the thrill of that moment, that life will never again be the same.
We awoke to the twilight and to the silence of dawn. It seemed to hold its breath over the emptiness of the highway. We sat on our rough wooden cots, backs hurting unnoticed, lost in a vacuum of thoughts. It was one of those moments that stretch and stretch, until you make a conscious effort to break out of an invisible reverie.
When the Sun broke over the horizon we fell back to sleep, only to be rudely awoken by the cacophony of a large Punjabi family demanding breakfast. Disoriented, I walked around until I found the Sun and found identity. A train hooted and appeared and disappeared in a rush behind the Dhaba – a railway line ran right behind where we had been sleeping, but we hadn’t noticed in the night. I looked around and found the faces of my friends, each one of them equally taken aback. The sudden appearance of the train added to the charm of that place, and we sat down to a hot breakfast talking about that night we slept between a highway and a railway track. At this point in the road trip, we are slowly acquiring the sometimes annoying trait of a traveler to be enamored by the smallest detail of his journey. We are slipping into love.
As we ate, two very old and very thin farmers rolled in on their brand-new, shiny, blue tractors. Glancing at the bikes and our luggage strewn over two of the cots, they smiled at us and, understanding we were on a trip, pulled us into a lengthy but happy conversation. They told us the story of how, when they were younger, they had taken their tractors (not these new ones) down all the way to Bangalore and had visited Lalbagh, and we listened to the old men like children do.
When we realized it was time for us to leave, we continued the conversation as we packed our bags and readied the bikes. Sumanth and I climbed the tractors and took a few snaps. After a final cup of tea, we said our goodbyes and they wished us luck. We started the bikes, rolled to the edge of the highway, turned left and roared into the sparse, morning traffic. There is always a fresh breath of air in the wind when the ride begins anew in the mornings. There is, especially on long road trips, a newness and a tiny sense of exhilaration, as we launch ourselves again into the unknown.
A few kilometers beyond Kiratpur Sahib, we entered Himachal Pradesh and the long, long climb began that would only end at Khardung-La. It was a relief to leave the heat of the plains behind, and it was heartwarming to see the land rise and turn into green hills. The ghat sections immediately began, and after a quick and fast ride to Swarghat, we stopped to pull over our raincoats as a heavy rain began to fall. Through sheets of icy rain, we saw - captivated - the hills give way to distant mountains and the mountains gain detail with every passing hairpin turn.
Thirty minutes into a slow and wet ride, the rain stopped, leaving the air cool and fresh and smelling like mud. The trees started to change as the altitude changed. The leaves were healthier and lusher, the branches longer and slimmer, and the trees themselves seemed taller in their eagerness to reach the sky. And because of the rain, each limb of every tree was a darker shade of brown and each leaf a darker shade of green.
There was a small problem for which we had been trying to find a solution - we hadn’t showered since leaving Manoj’s room four days ago, back in Bangalore. We carried the dust of India upon us. So when we spotted the fast flowing river and the bridge at Gambhar, we stopped to consider a plunge in the river.
Approaching Gambhar Pul after a long c-shaped curve, you head down a straight, sloping road and suddenly there are tiny shops to your right and trucks parked to one side of the road and the bridge appears, miniscule in front of the looming hill that it connects to.
You can hear and see the river on your left. We parked our bikes near a tea shop, on a narrow, inclined access road parallel to the highway and waited for Sumanth. Riding in the ghats, Sumanth had been floored by the mountain scenes and had stopped at every opportunity to take photos, so he was about ten minutes behind us. As we unpacked soaps and shampoos and towels, a truck came in and parked right in front of us. Moham and I looked at the truck, looked at each other and then suddenly realized that if Sumanth happened to pass by, he would not be able to see us behind the truck and wouldn’t know to stop, and we ran out from behind the truck exactly as Sumanth zoomed past, got on the bridge, took the sharp left and disappeared into the mountain foliage. We shouted and raved over the sound of the roaring river, trying to grab his attention, but he couldn’t hear us. And we couldn’t reach him on his cellphone because there was no network in the mountains. Moham and I walked back and informed 3, and we cracked up when we realized that off the four of us, Sumanth had been the most desperate for a good, cleansing rinse.
There are steps built into the earth to descend to the river. While Moham secured the luggage, 3 and I gingerly climbed down the wet, muddy steps. They are not exactly steps, but a goat track that has widened since humans started using it. To the left and right of the track is a thick growth of shrubs and weed that blocks your view. The track descends steeply, so it is best to descend slowly. And as we did, I glanced to my left and did a double-take. A leaf stared back at me, green and shaped like a star. Its five-pronged shape surprised me, and I leaned in to get a closer look. My doubts confirmed, I turned to 3 and pointed at the shrub. He turned and saw the same five feet tall stalk of Marijuana that I had been surprised by.
Everywhere, Cannabis grew.
We stood there inspecting the plants until Moham came and jolted us out of our reverie. We started walking down again, and we could see many, many more clones of the plant. Smiling, I said to 3, ‘It grows like a weed.’
‘Bad joke, dude,’ he said, shaking his head.
It was around ten o’clock in the morning, the traffic on the bridge light, the sky cloudy and balmy, the air cool and playful, and the river valley filled with the sound of the rushing river and flitting birds. We reached the sandy banks, and found thousands and thousands of smooth grey pebbles under the clear blue waters. The river was cold, but not cold enough to bother us. We spent an hour in it, undisturbed by the passing world, laughing about Sumanth each time we thought of him, wondering where he must be, and how we were going to explain our absence to him.
We found him waiting for us outside Barmana and decided not to tell him right then. He was already miffed that we were late and had made him wait for over an hour. The road and the weather were becoming increasingly fresh as we rose in altitude, and all distances seemed to grow short in effort but long in time as we savored every scene, every fold of the mountain and every hanging breath of fog. United again, we rode in rigid formations in the Ghats, enjoying the rules of the formation, informing each other with signals and helping each other through blind turns.
We entered Sundarnagar around one and settled down in a tiny hotel for hot cups of tea. In the table opposite ours, an ancient sadhu sat smoking his chillum. Openly. We stared and he stared back. The thick, pungent smoke from his chillum began filling the hotel. His long and dirty salt-and-pepper beard remained unmoving like cardboard in the strong breeze that flew into the hotel, and his eyes remained focused on us as he pulled on his chillum until what little of his face could be seen became red, and then, almost luxuriously, released clouds of Marijuana smoke into our dumbstruck faces.
Without taking my eyes off him, I said to 3, ‘Is this really happening?’
‘Looks like it.’
‘How come he's smoking weed publicly?’
‘Isn’t it part of his job?’
‘Nice job.’
Moham and Sumanth sat opposite to us, in the same direction as the Sadhu was, so they couldn’t see what was happening, but they could definitely smell what was happening. Sumanth kept touching his nose and grinning, while Mo
ham repeatedly kicked me under the table, each time more urgently, as I tried to tell him without speaking what 3 and I were witnessing.
After about ten minutes, the Sadhu gave up on us and left without paying the bill. The owner didn’t seem to mind. In fact, we noticed he was treating the sadhu with a lot of deference. We drank our tea in silence, occasionally glancing out at the thick, rolling clouds and the people near the Sundarnagar Lake, boating and laughing and eating from small road-side shops. There was a general holiday air in Sundarnagar that Tuesday, and you can’t help but fall in love with unhurried places like these.
Five minutes after we left the hotel, we were forced to stop again at a busy intersection in the city as a crowd of girls came out of a women’s college, laughing and looking like a bouquet of flowers with their sun-yellow dupattas and moss-green churidars. We did not mind one bit. We sat on the bikes, not speaking, but simply watching as scores of kohl-lined eyes glanced at us and we replied. If you’ve gone swimming in the glory of another eye for a long, long time you’ll know this – you will know how things around you rise like dust and fade like old monochrome memories. You will know, in the steady gaze of eyes holding eyes, how the world disappears and only you exist and she exists, suspended. I knew then how easily hurried, stolen glances turn into long, unhurried contests, and then turn into the shadow of a smile.
We left behind aptly named Sundarnagar and the highway lead us on a meandering path to Mandi. There we stopped for a late afternoon lunch, and entered a small restaurant. As we ate, we saw the pictures Sumanth had taken riding alone. After about thirty minutes, we got up to wash hands but couldn’t find the washroom. The owner led us to the back of the restaurant, where a small hose acted as the washbasin. When I bent down to collect the hose, I did a double take, the second of the day, and saw that the backyard was choking with weed, and not your usual kind. I turned to 3 and by the look on his face realized he hadn’t missed them either.
‘What is happening?’ I said quietly, slightly numb.
‘Ganja,’ said the owner with a happy smile.
The zigzag ride from Mandi to Pandoh through tiny tree-lined hamlets and villages we spent in the game of ‘spotting Cannabis’. We saw them everywhere. And this may not come as news to people who live in the northern parts of India where marijuana grows commonly, but it did take us by surprise. It is a taboo subject here in the south, although I am not sure how open the discussions of marijuana and its effects are in the north either. I learnt later that different species of marijuana is found in the Kullu valley, with evocative names such as ‘Parvati’ and ‘Kasol’ and ‘Shivjanya’, and of course, a modification of Marijuana - hashish. Trying to spot as many marijuana plants as I could, I fell into observing the tiny road-side shrubs that grew all around in the fertile, moisture-laden earth. But more than the plant, I saw entire constellations of wild flowers, some as tiny as buttons, some as blue as turquoise stones, some as red and ripe as pomegranates and some yellow like the sun. The memories of Sundarnagar’s blue lake and kohl-lined eyes were still fresh in my mind, and when I saw the array of colors nature displays, and the way they are used in the cosmic dance of dawn and dusk, of spring and fall, in the play of clouds and sun and in the way nature expresses through them the sheer, brimming energy of life, I couldn’t help but think that god must be psychedelic.
The Anatomy of Journey Page 14
