A place like none

There are beautiful places, there are more beautiful places , there are most beautiful places and then there’s Leh…and that’s where the superlative ends!! Trying to capture the mystic and raw beauty of Kashmir and the Himalayas is one Herculean task and I am left with no choice but to start on the ‘you have to see it to believe it’ note…

This escapade started on a high, hot and dry note in Delhi…Delhi as always took me to its midst like an old friend….a familiarity that almost brushed me as I roamed through Delhi ..the patriotic ramparts of ‘red fort’ greeted me that hot afternoon and the red glistened and shone under the cruel Delhi summer sun…dehydrated and waterless , I prodded on in awe of the architectural wonder that lay before me…a bumpy rikshaw ride then took me into the heart of Chandni Chowk and its famed streets ..you cannot help but be a foodie as the aroma of ‘parathas’ wafts through the ‘gallis’ of the chowk…nothing to beat street food and the hustle bustle of the tradition that is Chandni Chowk…the trip was finally rounded off with a salute and bow at the glittering India Gate…a truly proud monument that stands tall and proud in the heart of the country!

The next morning, we were taken on a magical ride through a heavenly white of clouds and snow capped mountains and we swooped down to the little air strip at Leh and that first ‘face to face’ view of the mountains still gives me goose bumps…..

Leh is probably the closest synonym to the terms heaven and paradise put together ….it’s your one on one with nature…just you and god’s classiest creations…..majestic mountains………the Indus river….a palate of plains, steeps , troughs and pebbles in colours that are unseen…almost unreal…..no eye souring concrete structures in between..no teeming humanity jostling for air….just unadulterated oxygen , water, earth and skies.. this surely must have been the creator’s  ‘show stopper’!

Two days were spent exploring the monasteries and palaces of little Leh… simple and elegant structures perched on top of lofty pinnacles….the  hum of Budhist chants and the sound of breezy winds and a few silent moments at the top can transform you into a spiritual being…

Our next ride was to the picturesque Pangong lake and that journey and destination would probably be a moment that would be difficult to repeat and surpass in a lifetime…………it was an uphill ride from Leh town through a terrain like none …the hills got steeper…the colours became more vibrant…the snow became thicker…higher higher we rose….almost as if we left behind humanity and civilization in search of a holy grail…and it was a truly a treasure worth waiting for….and the end of that colourful maginificent ride…there stood our treasure…..a gigantic water body…..blue from one side…indigo as we go closer…..a shade of green when the sun’s rays teased the waters….a beautiful silver when it dawned and I can probably continue to describe that little piece of paradise forever………….something like a lifetime moment…that moment when you say a silent prayer that you were alive to see the sight and all the world’s material possessions cannot come any close to that simple pleasure!

We rounded off our trip with a cozy tea at a Ladakhi home and shopping at the Leh bazaar….Two content souls boarded the flight to Srinagar but a ‘filmy’ break and ‘burst engines’ show grounded our flight ( ‘averted a disaster’ as the papers said the next morning)..after a long and painful and ‘thankful’ wait, we finally landed at Srinagar alive……!

A beautiful shikara ride on Dal lake was the dream start to our next leg….The ride was as extraordinary as told and retold by people before us….but what was equally amazing was an entire business kingdom that stays afloat over the waters………..a pot of tea comes from one side….a flower man rows from the other….an entire arcade of dry fruits, pashmina shawls and all things beautiful, exotic and Kashmiri is up for grabs in that floating market….!

The next day took us on a panoramic ride into India’s very own  ‘Switzerland’ …Gulmarg…. white mountains beautifully bordered with coniferous trees and laced with spring flowers…almost like a page out of ‘enchanted kingdom’…the cable ride and a steaming hot chocolate overlooking the mountains was the ‘picture perfect’ end to that bewitching journey ….

Just as we thought we had seen it all…..Kashmir threw its next gem at us…Pahalgam………….our first rafting experience was the freezing and thrilling start in that little fairy land….another fascinating drive through a valley of flowers, ice and trees took us to Chandanwari……….a mountain of snow where I finally shed my ‘middle class’ obsession with Switzerland……………….I bounced and crushed snow under my boots…..screamed and sleighed down a slope…..and that white afternoon, I finally satiated my never ending love for snow………….!

Our tryst with mountains, valleys, rivers and snow drew to a symbolic end with a night in a house boat on Dal Lake…as the sun slowly peeped out of the mountains  and our morning tea was being downed.. the reality called ‘end’ broke on us…… the snowy and misty sights in front of us slowly melted away ………..we snapped out of that hypnotic experience  to land in our urban civilization………..the claustrophobic catastrophic jungle that we have created for ourselves…. I looked up in vain to see a tiny speck of the night sky and a menacing array of neon lights stared back at me in disdain! I was truly back to civilization!

Hanging up my boots

Half a decade of familiarity with a workplace is difficult to snap with an unassuming letter called resignation! Resign from what? Your long hours of toil for a cause called career? Your path that was drawn through the ladder till the end?  Your relationship with the faces that smile and heads that acknowledge you each day?

Over the years, the ‘lines of work experience’ that adds to your resume also inadvertently seeps into our friendships, your habits and your outlook in general. Terming that basket of experiences as a job would be undermining its overarching influence…That three letter word called ‘job’ walks with you over calls and mails through dawn and dusk…sometimes asserts itself in your personal decisions….and in extreme cases takes one-sided arbitrary decisions without hearing the little voices emitted from the corner of your mind!

But I guess every person has a ‘limen’……… beyond which all the p’s of corporate world -  power, promotion, perks  do not matter and what matters is the capital P that evades your professional existence – the magical P word of PEACE!

Peace takes different meanings at different points in time……it’s a frame of mind that defines and crystallizes within you and when that music hits the right note………all the voices around you …of career, of money, of opportunities vanish into muted silence……. where your business suit no longer protects you from the cold biting accusations of the heart…where your corporate make-up starts giving way to the lasting black circles of long hours….Suddenly sunshine and simple meals at home take over your decision-making…

But years in a floating ‘on the wheels job’ is difficult to bid farewell to……….a relationship with the ‘float’ and the ‘churn’ difficult to snap out….but sometimes the head follows the heart and as the cliché goes…some things in life just fall into place??