Leave Bhim's family today and head to Darjeeling. It is a family affair getting down the hill to meet the jeep which starts me on my journey to Darjeeling. Bhim leads the way and we make a few more photo stops along the way, to take pictures of family members that we haven't seen in the past few days. Giwan, Bhim's brother, has another trek for which he must cook and he needs to catch the same jeep I do. Bhim's father also goes down the hill carrying my big pack. I feel ashamed that I am not carrying my own pack but the reality is that any of Bhim's family, probably including his mother, could carry more than me and go faster so this really does make the most sense.
We are still 500 feet above the road and the jeep arrives, and I need to pee in the worst way. A quick deliberation ensues. If I don't pee, I'll be in the jeep for hours and I will burst. Not an option. On the other hand, the occupants of the jeep are watching Bhim and I scurry down the hill and I don't really want to stop for all the world to see. Whew, I find a spot where the trail switchback's out of sight of the jeep.
I say a hasty good-bye to Bhim and his father while they drape a golden silk scarf around my neck. The tradition of draping a silk scarf has its roots in India, where flower garlands are used for this purpose. However, in Tibet, they have very few flowers so the tradition evolved to use silk scarves instead. This modified tradition is standard practice today in Nepal and Sikkim.
Before leaving this morning I give Bhim my headlamp. I believe that out of all my gear, this will be of most use to him. Both while trekking, where having a hands free light is a Godsend, and at his home, where unscheduled power outages happen with regularity, and having light be instantly available is quite useful. However, I feel it is a pretty meagre exchange compared to the beautiful blanket made by his mother. I hope that a large packet of photos will compensate.
Our average speed to Jorthang over very rough road is 15 km/hr as we descend from 6000 feet down to 1800 feet on very steep switch backs. Jorthang is on the Sikkim border and I catch another jeep headed for Darjeeling.
The vegatation changes almost as soon as we leave Sikkim. It is wild forest, almost jungle in Sikkim, while on the Darjeeling side of the border, the tea plantations soon start. The hills are still steep, but instead of the long shaggy look of Sikkim, the hills look like they've received a military crew cut. To be totally accurate, the tea plants grow in 5 foot diameter clusters about 2-3 feet high, so following the hair analogy, Darjeeling hillsides look like they were bald at one time and got sprayed with a lot of Rogaine.
Bright green tea plants are used for green tea while dark green plants are used for black tea. The processing steps for tea are far more complex than I realized. The temperature and humidity are carefully controlled after picking in order to dry the leaves. When the proper moisture content is achieved, the leaves are allowed to ferment, which is necessary to unlock the flavor.
After a few miles of slow going, the driver switches to first gear and we proceed up the longest continuous section of road requiring first gear that I've ever seen. The rise is from 2000 feet to above 6000 feet. The jeep conveniently overheats at a small community which has a tea house. While the driver douses his engine with water, the passengers have tea and snacks. I buy a couple bananas and a few pieces of the hardest cheese I've encountered. It takes 15 minutes in my mouth to break down a 1cm cube of this cheese. I'm concerned that it might damage my teeth.
After checking in to the Dekeling Hotel, I go to an internet cafe and print out the list of questions I may be asked when I go for my US Immigration interview. Answering 80 correct out of 100, with no studying, makes me feel more confident about the upcoming interview. Read more on this in the April 15 post.
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Friday April 4 - Darjeeling
Back in December 2007, before heading off on this trip, Raj Patel at Xilinx tells me that if I make it to Darjeeling, I must have tea at Tiger Hill while watching the sun rise on Kanchenjunga. I catch a jeep at 4:30AM to take me up the hill. There is a regular convoy with between 50 and 100 jeeps making the run up the hill every day. I can't see any stars so I'm a bit skeptical but figure it will be an interesting experience at a minimum.
My skepticism is warranted as Tiger Hill is shrouded in cloud. 249 people have their eyes riveted on the place where the sun would appear should the clouds lift. One person has his eyes riveted on the 249 people watching for the sunrise.
My jeep carried 10 people up the hill, but 8 of them are a French group that is walking down the hill back to Darjeeling, leaving Mia and I as passengers on the way down. She is Korean, with remarkably good English. Most Koreans I've met over the years have difficulty with English pronounciation. I later learn she is a coordinator for English teachers in Korea... She tells me that to teach English in Korea, you MUST be from one of UK, US, Canada, Australia, NZ or South Africa. Others need not apply.
We chat about many things and I ask her to walk around Observatory Hill, especially as it is 7AM and the restaurants in Darjeeling don't open till 8AM. Instead of mountain views, we watch the trees and prayer flags emerge from the mist. We are amused by the monkeys, until one comes close to stealing Mia's backpack and camera. She's had a dream to see the world and has taken a year off to see it before she gets too old.
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Saturday April 5 - Darjeeling
I must be a glutton for punishment. I do the jeep ride to Tiger Hill again today, although I can see some stars so the odds of a clear morning are much higher.
249 pairs of eyes are looking east and watching the sunrise. One eye is glued to a viewfinder pointed west, watching the early morning rays bathe Kanchenjunga with orange and yellow. Several people ask if I am with the press. Tiger Hill must attract more of the camera-in-cellphone crowd than the camera & tripod crowd. Some old ladies ask if they can look through my long lens and I do my part to counteract George Bush's US PR campaign. Thanks Raj for the good tip to come here!
The walk back from Tiger Hill affords even better views of Kanchenjunga than from the hill itself. An old chalet on the ridge is boarded up and half burned. With the date of 1916 above the door, it looks like it would fit in Stephen King's, "The Shining". The back road to Darjeeling has very little traffic as it winds its way on the steep hillside.
The Darjeeling zoo has some interesting cats, many colorful birds, red panda and a few antelope-like ungulates. The Himalayan Mountaineering Institute, just down the street from the zoo, has some great Everest memorabilia donated by Edmund Hillary, Tenzing Norgay and a host of other famous climbers. The history of Everest climbing is well documented, with supporting news-clips, stories, anecdotes, period climbing gear and a three dimensional topographic map of the Himalaya.
But the highlight of the afternoon is Kiran's "Hot Stimulating Cafe". I found this place on my walk to the zoo late this morning. Kiran takes great pride in having the best momos (pot stickers) and the best tea in Darjeeling. It is a hole-in-the-wall place that is perched precariously on long stilts over the steep hillside. It sticks out from the side of the hill and a small wooden deck in the back has awesome views of the southern side of Darjeeling. Kiran has Bob Marley tunes cranked up and the only thing missing from the afternoon is a supply of beer. After asking Kiran about this, he points me to the nearest beer store and says, "I'm in!"
A good afternoon just got much better. The sun is warm, the view is great, the tunes are perfect, food is excellent, company is good, my feet are up on the railing and I'm leaning back in my chair feeling a good buzz from the beer. Doesn't get much better than this! I feel so relaxed, so content, things have just come together.
Kiran shuts his shop at 6PM and we head into the city for dinner and a couple beers. Like most people in India, he wants to move to the US. He figures his ticket might be the fact that he is the best momo cook in the world (his words, not mine). The US is always interested in new cuisine and he thinks he could talk a high end restaurant into bringing him across. I don't tell him that a momo to him looks just like a pot sticker to me and there are plenty of chefs in the US who know how to make pot stickers.
We go to one of his favorite haunts and I take photos of the kitchen staff and some of the patrons. They all get a big kick out of it. After a couple more beers I share some of the Nepali words that I learned from the trekking crew. Laro-ca (suck my dick), in particular, causes him to break into huge guffaws and tears stream down his face. As we wander around looking for a suitable bar after eating dinner, he keeps seeing friends and wants me to repeat my Nepalese words to them. Every time he hears me say them, it brings a new round of laughter.
I tire quickly of this and have had enough to drink by now and head back to the hotel, where I pack for the journey home.
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Sunday April 6 - Darjeeling to Delhi
A driver picks me up at 6AM and drops me off at the Bagdogra airport at 8:30AM, in plenty of time for my 11:30 flight to Guwahati, connecting to Delhi. Reach Delhi by 4PM and check into the Ajanta Hotel providing basic accommodation for the night.
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Monday April 7 - Delhi to San Francisco
Up at 5AM, go to the roof terrace and with lots of dust in the air over Delhi, I watch a red ball sunrise. Finish reading my book, "Eat, Pray, Love", by Elizabeth Gilbert. It's taken since India to complete the book but what a gem! Gilbert writes about her life with an openness and candor that are refreshing and her sense of humor aligns closely with mine. I can see many parallels between parts of her life and parts of mine. The past few days I have deliberately put the book down after reading only a few pages, so that I could enjoy it for longer.
At 7AM a waiter comes to the roof terrace and asks whether I would like some coffee. He has not shown up by 8AM when I finish the book and I figure the coffee would likely be cold even if he did come, so I head off.
I've arranged to meet Ramona, who lives in Delhi. We met while staying at the Cherapunjee Resort. We have lunch at a beautiful outdoor cafe (Ramona tells me it is refreshingly cool today - we are lucky). She spends the afternoon showing me the best places to buy things in Delhi. There is one store which sells funny T-Shirts. Ramona points to one with a picture of an auto whose meter breaks whenever it detects a foreigner stepping into the auto. We burst into laughter realizing that the joke only makes sense to someone who has traveled in India. Send me a note if you don't get it.
The Kahn market is one of the trendy shopping places. Ramona says it used to be where flight attendants would come to purchase things to take back with them. Now it is full of locals, foreigners, ex-pats, anyone with money to spend. We find what must be the trendiest coffee shop in Delhi, full of 15-22 year old kids. Ramona and I stand out as oldies, but we don't care. I have the first proper espresso I've had in three months.
When parking in this sort of place, you find the lots are full, but if you wait for a minute someone comes and will park your car. They leave the cars parked in neutral so they can shuffle them about and create openings for more cars. It reminds me of the cheap plastic games with 15 tiles and 16 slots, you keep moving the empty slot around in order to arrange the tiles in a particular pattern.
We part ways as I have to catch a flight to the US.
It's been a good day, which is good, because the next 24 hours are going to be rough. Let's just say Delhi airport is not particularly user friendly (massive construction), the airline employees in Delhi are not particularly user friendly and American cancelled their flight to Chicago yesterday so today's plane is way overbooked and I need to get booked on another airline and it takes 5 hours of waiting in lines past 2 AM, shuffling back between American and Indian Airline counters before I finally have a boarding pass in my hand. I make it back to San Francisco, tired but safe and healthy.
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