Vacation Report - Days Three, Four and Five

Kolkata is steaming hot. For the next 8 days we will attempt to cool off in Sikkim. We leave tonight - train it up to New Jalpaiguri and then motor to Pelling. I've been to Sikkim before - as a child. Have only a few memories: for instance, playing badminton with a tall Sikh officer gentleman in the BSF colony. I have no recollection of Gangtok.

It was just as hot and humid in NJP. My phone conked out and had to buy a new one simply because the idea of not being 'connected' made me break into a cold sweat, which, in the circumstances made a disagreeable cocktail of sweats.

As we drove up I got reminded of small incidents from earlier encounters with hill folks. The one uniform memory is that hill people are surly and not talkative. While I noticed that trait almost immediately in our driver, I also realised that between then and now my appreciation of their taciturnity had undergone a 180 degree reversal. I now see the condescension, the aggression that the travellers from the other parts of the country heap on. This is especially true for my friends from the north-east - from Mizoram, Nagaland, Assam and Manipur - the stories they tell of everyday life in Mumbai is a treatise in cultural over-simplification and of plain, unadulterated gracelessness. So if were a Sikkimese, I would be seething inside and looking for the first opportunity to bash a few knuckles with the car door. Instead what I see is a once-bitten-twice-shy kind of wariness which, depending upon the encouragement one gets, very soon gives way to delightful smiles and an eagerness to help that has so much niceness that it makes me feel very happy indeed!

Before making the plans, everyone whom we asked advised us that this being peak season, it would be impossible to get good hotel rooms. Now that we have booked and that we are here in Pelling, it does seem bustly (too many loud Bongs everywhere), but there still are many rooms available, the restaurants are fairly empty, the shops are moderately busy. So the question is: why is it so? Is Sikkim over-designed for tourists? Or is something else at work that we are unable to spot?

Yesterday we had the local toddy called Chhang; it is a hell's brew cooked out of a millet. The fermented grain is placed in a bamboo tumbler and hot water is poured on top; we are encouraged to sip from a wooden straw - the liquor is warm, sour and piquantly fragranced - altogether an OK experience. Today I had a dish made of Yak's cheese - I loved it!

Both Pemayangstye and Rabdantse were terrific! I felt a strange emotion to see children in the monastery playing 'lagori' with gusto and unbridled merriment of kids everywhere - and at the same time think of the nature of their chosen path. Many among these would choose to be full-time monks. Perhaps it is beyond the comprehension of a person like me - someone who is wordly but not wise, someone who empathises but is actually not connected.

Tomorrow we leave for Gangtok. Bright lights and a fully functional tourist town awaits me, or so I have been warned. So it is going to be an early morning with a hurried cup of tea and packed sandwiches. What is important is that sweet-smiled chaps in the kitchen remember to pack both the cucumber and the cheese.