Author: RA

मुनादी हुई है कि आज सुबह से दूकान का नाम बदल दिया गया है। ये “हिंदुस्तान की पहली दूकान है , पहली चाय की दूकान”। सनद रहे आज तड़के ही एलान किया गया है कि अब इलाकों की पहचान ऊपर से नीचे होगी। सीमा या बॉर्डर से लगे गांव आख़िरी नहीं पहले कहलायेंगे। माणा गाँव हिंदुस्तान-चीन सीमा में पहला गिना जायेगा। चलिए बदलिये सब।  आज 21 अक्टूबर 2022 को बद्रीनाथ से लगे माणा गावँ में प्रधानमंत्री जी ने ये घोषणा की. 

​How even an inconsequential object or a disagreeable sight can trigger fond and precious memories. Just like us, a chair also has a lived past – this one too has seen its days of power and desire. As I reminisce, this innocuous looking image startles me by morphing to a pair of ghosts floating in and out of time and space. The still-life drips lapsed moans echoing through the ficus called life. An abandoned whisper curls up to my ear like the serpent in Eden. Images float in and out of eyes barely holding back the past. The chair sings ‘Celebrate’. Celebrate you must, year-after-year

 – for you never know when the powdered ‘footprint of time’ trample this ephemeral life.

The footprints tell us that two distinctly different people mounted this chair together or at the same time. For what? Only this chair can tell. 

A part of the wider crow family but not really a crow, this yellow beaked bird is a  Himalayan Thrush, mistaken by many as a crow or a raven. 

And now for some real stuff. On the morning of 11th the Sun shook off its slumber and swallowed the clouds, though briefly. As we descended from higher reaches of Chamoli district and waded through lower valleys of Alaknanda river system, a near crescent of snow covered peaks opened up in the north north-east. This is a small view of the north section.

Smitten by the mountains, the weather behaves like a jealous beloved. Rain, snow, storm, thunder, landslide, avalanche – you name it – the weather uses all at its disposal to thwart any attempt at getting any closer to the mountains. It doesn’t want anyone to come near the white chadar hiding its beloved. While the romantic mountains enchant and hypnotize, the frigid weather dissuades, warns and even threatens to keep one away. Precisely that’s what happened with us this time between Mana (via Ghastoli & Deotaal) and Niti Passes (via Tapovan, Reni, Lata & Malari) on the Indo-Tibetan borders. Five days of incessant rain, lost trails, a near white-out and an absolute No from the ITBP deprived us of some of the finest trails and views in this part of the world. However, we did explore some other valleys in lower Himal and some touristy locations. The saving grace was the bewitching full moon – Sharad Poornima – and the chandni-soaked kheer. (picture: the mountain range extending beyond Mana village towards Satopanth and Swargarohini peaks)