SHORT SUBATHU SOJOURN

                                 

Can the term 'Dickensian' be used in association with a market? Literary purists might shudder and maybe others might find it pretentious, but for reasons I don't know walking up and down the main market - don't go by its size please - of Subathu, the small cantonment town in Solan district,  Himachal Pradesh, Dickensian is what I was stuck on! Was it because one had heard it being described as an imperial legacy which, the British had annexed from the Gurkha kingdom of Amar Singh Thapa, who was said to have built forts to keep away the very same British? Could the colonial connections be the reason?

No, not exactly to be honest. I think it was more to do with the fact that the entire market was paved! It was a cheek-by-jowl affair with decrepit ancient wooden structures heaving and gasping to hold up alongside newer concrete affairs put up without much attention paid to any architectural elements forget aesthetics. Everything looked somewhat run down as if in desperate need of fresh oxygen despite being surrounded by hills and greenery all around.  To me it was somehow very Dickensian.

Beginning from the temple, clearly dedicated to Krishna going by the paintings all over the walls, the market rolled downhill, branching off into narrow gullies here and there. Interestingly, the temple lies above two shops, both with shutters down, one announcing a cement brand and the other a mobile service. Did that signal direction communication with the one above? The shops too were a mix of relics from the past to ones like those in any other small town market. Then suddenly it was there, a tiny jewellery store  bearing a board announcing its name as Nepali Ganesh Jewellery,  followed by everything else in Nepali!

With a Nepali cap perched on his head, the proprietor-jeweller, Ganesh tinkered away bent over a small cauldron of dying coal embers with tools that appeared centuries old. In the glassed display box were an array of typical Nepali jewellery right down to khukri shaped ear tops. He is more than happy to chat insisting that we sit down for a cup of tea, which we politely turn down keeping in mind the time factor. The usual where are you from and what are you doing here conversations follow. Ganesh is someone who clearly lived an itinerant life and suddenly he mentions Shillong, as one of the places he had lived in for sometime and breaks out into a sentence or two of Khasi as if to substantiate his claim! Still to get out of my recent Shillong visit mode, it certainly was an Alice in Wonderland moment with me fumbling with my forgotten Khasi and he throwing in more sentences.  On the way out of the market we actually lost our way and had to retrace our steps to find the exit.  We had meandered off to a section that contained tiny little houses on both sides of a lane, yes paved to eternity!

 

If Ganesh had a traditional Nepali jewellery shop, it is because of the substantial Gorkha population in the area. Subathu's link with the past remains and today it is home to the 14 Gurkha Training Centre. That's also the reason why we took a sudden on the whim detour to Subathu on the drive down from Shimla to Delhi. The locals around will tell you that's where the majority Gorkhas are in Himachal Pradesh. Or rather 'Gorkhe' as they say. Considering my roots, the plan had been to visit it someday and that someday had finally arrived, though the time available was less  than half a day. The drive to Subathu is like a drive in any hill station, winding roads, greenery around, though more brown than green considering that winter was still not over in the hills. The atmosphere suddenly change as you approach the cantonment area. It's spiffy and clean,  all bright paint, everything and everyone in its place. They say there's an army joke that goes, if it moves salute it and if it doesn't, paint it! The entry checkpoint bears a board that says, 'Roko aur Toko". If you check up Google God for English translation, it reads, 'Stop and Interrupt'.  Love the army humour.

The smile however vanishes as one sees pictures of martyred heroes, really young jawans, along the road. Remember the famous inscription at the Kohima (Nagaland)War Cemetery that says:
When you go home
Tell them of us and say
For your Tomorrow
We  gave our Today
Do we do that? Do we honour the tragic loss.....

There seem to be lots of youngsters in olives and camouflage, with a no nonsense air about them. Naturally so, after all their motto as boldly painted all over is:  Kayar Hunu Bhanda Marnu Ramro, which translates into, ' better to die than be a coward'. It is not for nothing that the Gorkha's battle cry is the simple but chilling, "Ayo Gorkhali'.  

There's also a Gurkha Fort, said to be have been built by Amar Singh Thapa and a Gurkha museum, but unfortunately that had to be put on hold.  Maybe that will be reason to go back.






     







 


 

KINNOW WHO TOOK THE ORANGES ?

The Shillong oranges may be on the smaller side but they are deliciously sweet. A sweetness that one can't get enough of. But suddenly they seem to have vanished, vamoosed, vapourised into thin air. Just nowhere to be seen. Instead, there seemed to an orange invasion of another kind, the bigger sized kinnows. In Delhi, kinnows are for juices, period. So what were the juicy numbers from North India or rather Punjab doing in the February cold in Shillong. And worse what they had done to the homegrown sweet somethings?  

What was painful, to me at least, was that nobody seemed to be missing the local beauties. It could be because the kinnows were way cheaper than what the local oranges used to cost. Since there seemed to be a proliferation of kinnows - hawkers carting bamboo baskets bearing the fruit seemed to have taken over the whole city and pushing them up your noses - one could actually manage to bargain and bring the price down! That for Shillong oranges would have got you a mouthful! 

The how and who behind the kinnow invasion of Shillong remained hazy. Maybe some smart entrepreneur saw a flourishing market, maybe some of the North Indian oranges said to be exported to nearby Bangladesh got diverted into the Meghalaya market. There were many 'maybes' which was fine by me. All I wanted to know where my old local orange friends had disappeared and nobody seemed to know! That was really painful. It was a winter visit after decades and binging on local oranges was what I was really looking forward to. Some had stolen my oranges and nobody seemed to be bothered.  That hurt more.

What was that filmi dialogue? If you wish for something fervently, even the universe conspires to deliver it you! (Sounds better in Hindi!) And there it was, in the car park of a governmental office building a lone soul stood hawking Shillong oranges. I am not sure if he has figured out as yet why I did a one-foot jig, why I was so exuberantly happy at seeing him and why I almost enveloped him in a crashing hug. I had my kind of oranges and that's all that mattered.

While still on a fruity platter, does mulberry ring a bell? It is not something easily available everywhere. Also the immediate association with cocoons and silks and all that, I think doesn't make it a sought after fruit. Braving the frosty February early morning cold for a walk, I walked into the silk farm on a rambling uphill slope and it seemed quite desolate.  There were no mulberry bushes on that frosty morning (So why did they make us sing 'around the mulberry bush on a cold and frosty morning' in kindergarten!), just puny skinny plants sprouting tender leaves here and there. Only a lone valiant peach tree stood upright draped in white blossoms.

Out of the silk farm, on to the steep climb leading to the defence area and the short cut to Shillong Peak.There's a new addition, an U Mawbynna (Memorial Stone) put up by Seng Khasi Dong Lawsohtun. The memorial consist of three stone pillars with rounded tops, of different heights and at the base of the tallest one, placed in the centre, is a low circular altar like table. The memorial is primitive but so beautiful in a raw, natural way. It instantly takes one back to times when organised religions hadn't cleaved human society into pockets distrustful of each other; when it was just the one above and nature and us. In Khasi 'maw' translates into stone and come to think of it, there are several localities in Shillong whose names being with 'maw': mawlai, mawiong, mawlat, mawklot, mawlong, mawroh and many more maws. The one I really like is mawprem; that's clearly Khasi and Hindi coming together. Stone love indeed!

With frost on the ground - the few green grasses were more white than green - haze all around and chill in the bones,  one tree on the long stretch downhill appeared to be in a celebratory mood as if lit up by candles all over. Couldn't figure out what it was. Asked three track-suited middle aged men, one bearing a baton, briskly trotting by if they knew the tree's name. They said a polite, sorry no but their expressions said something. Does wanting to know the name/species of a tree make people think that you are fit for the loony  bin? Never mind. Wished the nameless tree 'happy birthday'  and moved on and looked up and realised that it would be a sunny day finally.

There are lots of flower pots in Shillong, every house -big, small, poor, rich - grow plants in all kinds of containers from mud pots to discarded product tins to abandoned tyres. And there it was, a flowering orchid; simply divine, so majestic. Looked around and hoped that the three briskly trotting track-suited gentlemen would appear so I could ask them about the name of the orchid. Spoilsports, they seemed to have vanished!

If 'maw' precedes the name of many localities, so does 'um' (water in Khasi) Water is a precious commodity alright, but unfortunately sometimes the same water can be a source of contention, enough to give sleepless nights. Umngot is a river that originates in Meghalaya and flows to Bangladesh. It is also one of the most stunning pristine natural beauty with its dazzling green waters so crystal clear that the bottom is visible from a distance. In fact, photographs of certain sections of the river on the Internet have always drawn awed gasps. Check out one sourced from the net below!

But for many living in the villages on its banks it is turning out to be a river of sorrow. Once again it is a story of progress versus poverty. The Umngot Hydroelectric project by the Meghalaya Energy Corporation Limited means several of those villages would be submerged. Once again it is a controversial story of who is to be blamed - the villagers for not wanting the dam because their whole life and everything else is at stake or the government seeking to tap the state's resources. In such stories sadly, it is not about who is winning or who is losing but what price is to be paid and by whom. At least that's what I feel. 

One of the voices emerging from one of the villages to be affected is that of a young Khasi woman.  Lets call her 'M'. Just another inconsequential person, just another face among the many faces that join the throng of humanity setting out every morning to make a living and livelihood. In other times, M  who lives on her own in Shillong while her family lives in  one of the villages,  could have been a young woman looking forward to an evening of friends and laughter after work, may be even a movie or window shopping. She can no longer afford to do that. I meet M just two days before she will go to Guwahati to raise the dam issue, to seek help and support. We are sitting in the office of someone, who M feels can help her on how to go about raising the issue and what points are to be highlighted. She lugs a bag too big for petite frame. The bag is stuffed with papers. She and those like her have been meeting residents of the villages that will be submerged by the proposed dam and are charting out ways to make the government hear their voices.  I don't know if they will ever succeed. There have been too many stories of development versus small time landholders and I fear that the Umngot one will be one more addition. The only thing  I can do is wish M 'donbok' or good luck.   

Walking out and waiting to cross the road, I suddenly hear joyous cheering and whooping. A tempo packed with youngsters wearing  traditional Khasi attire passes by. They are all yodelling 'Hoi Kiw'. 
Maybe that's a good sign for 'M' too I say and move on....