My first Himalayan Trek

Higher camp at Tilgan - Home

The stars smile calmly looking at me, with elegance, of the days gone by as I sit and wonder at the middle of night with my fellow spirits by my side. Oh there, I remember that one, the star with the biggest grin of all. I did see him before at Tilgan, my home and I do see him today from my room too, where I lived half my life.


Yes, there are lot of ‘best days’ of my life, just like everyone else, days with the special one, days with excitement of new beginnings, days with best buddies, but of all these, the seven odd days I spent in HIMALAYAS with some 40 odd strangers will endure forever in my heart. I met people, special people who are hard to forget, I made memories, special memories that are even harder to forget. I met a friend, whom I thought was my long lost brother. I met a girl, a chatter box which I completely loved listening to. I met a 40 year old woman, who literally was half her age, a cute lawyer whom I call her as my lovely ‘naani’, a jerk from Andhra who definitely was a crazy idiot AF ( how do I describe those hilarious banters between him and He-man ) and so on. All the dirtiest of things, the cheapest of thrills we did together.

Megh and Me

To travel and trek isn’t only about having fun, it’s also about learning along the trail. Such lessons no textbook would mention nor this write up could ever justify. Having to do such things with strangers turned friends is thrilling there were scores of incident I can mention, getting to find previous batch’s girl’s spaghetti top in Megh’s bag, missing underwear scenes, A for Anushka and Santhosh’s numerous selfies, Adithya’s drunken naagin dance, Ruhani’s Alien powers, Vyoma’s meow meow, Lokesh and Anudeep’s fucking tincture that nearly killed me, Anjali’s jacket (please do not ask me about this!) and her nose that covered the whole of Manali, Neeraj’s superbly timed counters, Modiji’s (Amruth uncle’s) gyan and his sense of humor, few of us dancing on the road, sneaking out of the camp around midnight,  stealing apples from a farm near a police station, having to clean our butts in freaking cold water, go river rafting as we broke the rules, rolling on the slope and eventually losing our minds.

Akku !! Such an angel

Naaaaaaniiii !

Yo-mama with her kids

Our Camp leader at Sethan!

There were few instances…. who am I kidding? Actually I never took my out box for breakfast nor lunch nor dinner. I would pick out a roti from one’s plate and sabzi from another’s and couple of times someone would force feed me when I did not feel like eating ( me? not feeling like eating? That’s such rarity). These, were the same guys who were completely strangers to me until a day or two back but then yes we all fought with each other for the extra ‘gulab jamun’ at peak-base camp.

Lokesh, Anudeep and He-man himanshu

I kept calling people with barrage of names, exchanging insults while we all belly laughed, all in same vein leaving every bit of worries in our lives behind.


I do have to tell about the 40 year old woman whom I mentioned was literally half her age. It's been sometime since I came across someone this adventurous like her whose enthusiasm knew no boundaries. How many of the 40+ year olds would dare to roll down the slope just for the fun of it? Would you?
"I came here to enjoy and want to be myself” she said in our first interactions. I didn't take her seriously, it's not my first time meeting some 40+ year old person saying that same line but then again succumb to doing things as plainly as before, dancing within the mere boundaries that remained same as before. My Kaku danced beyond those boundaries. I refused to call her aunt or mam excusing the initial interactions, Kaku, a Marathi term I am told, is pretty sweet sounding word just as the woman whom I meant to call so.

Ain't she cute? She was excited seeing herself in the camera

Whenever I go trekking, sometimes I don't take the ordinary and normal trails (paths) my fellow trekkers take, it makes me feel recursive and super boring. Aren't we here for some adventure? I might slip twice or thrice, maybe the new trail I explore would suck a lot of energy of me but the sense of completing it when I successfully do so, fulfills my purpose of trekking. And then I look back I find my Kaku behind me, following me. You should see the big grin on my face whenever she followed me while I make a new trail. This woman is awesome. We were to reach our base camp at Sethan, I recall most of us 7-8 people were tired yet I said let's dance in the middle of the road although people weren't around to watch our 'nautankis', everyone did and boy Kaku too did join us. She's full of ' let's rock it ' attitude. It is obvious we all group had to have a lot of fun and there are quite a few times we (we as in youngster) were far too mischievous yet Kaku was so sweet and understanding that sometimes she played along with us.

my kaku.

You would expect any other elder woman would have made a big scene out of it, but my Kaku didn't in fact she is so much fun. Looking back, if it wasn't for Kaku, I think we would have been far less mischievous and had far less fun.

Awesome rafting experience

My only purpose of the trek was to touch snow I never before have touched it. While I was on my way to touch it, Kaku caught my attention, she was sliding on the snow patch. I wish words could render what my eyes observed. She looked super cute whilst her childish charm was evident. She was blushing, her cheeks were high and laughter uncontrollable. It was as if she was truly remarkable discovering herself. Well, you simply had to stand and observe her go through the moment. That moment, honestly, stands out for me.

The night at Tilgan is the particularly the one I think would stick with me forever. Imagine yourself at a higher camp ( say at 9000 feet ) with the valley of Manali glowing with lights at your feet and at the parallel view you find partially snowcapped mountains with the sun about to set around 19:30 Hours. All these sitting in the valley of flowers, I tell you it was pure bliss (Now, tell me would you prefer eating your dinner or sit witness the unceasing beauty of nature?)

You can guess what megh was trying to do !

Roti!

Yashashree, my naani, couldn’t stop raving, she would frequently murmur that she was in love with this place and I would nod with a sly smile on my face. Knowing her, it was damn cute, she would tell me how this trip meant a lot as a break from her tedious work, she was all smiles one could sense it. By the way, Megh found a dead buffalo skull somewhere around and yes, he took it to Pune. How cool is that?

These people.

As the clock ticked past 21:30 Hours we were forced into our tents by our camp leader but who were we to sleep? Just we assured ourselves that the camp staff were asleep we turned on our incognito mode and sneaked in some people late night we weren’t supposed and then continued our ‘blah blah blah’ session. It was around 23:00Hours when Anjali Megh and me were sitting and talking, going through the sequence of events, how we made it to the trek after cooking up stories to parents etc. (Anjali was supposed to be interning in some city but she was with us somewhere in the mountains of blissful Himalayas! Isn’t she awesome? Badi fraud ladki hai bhai). It was cold, really cold and she forgot her jacket and I had to make the sacrifice such that we didn’t want to wake up any of the camp staff. But, truth be told it was amazing to feel so cold, to shiver, talking to your friends cracking the worse of PJs under the starry sky where you felt the stars were so close to your very eyes.

       

    

My Akku!Angel

Megh was scared as he argued that the cow sitting nearby was sliding towards us due to the slope of the mountain (that argument did give me cancer! The cow never moved an inch) and sometimes he direct the torch light at a cow’s ass (he’s a person of some special interests, huh, after all he’s my brother right?) then at an instance a cow dropped her dung making ‘pochak’ sound pretty loud that both these idiots hugged me in fear (Megh and Anjali, for one last time I am telling you both I didn’t get scared!) and then we started discussing about it! Maybe, I didn’t care for my jacket in spite of the cold because I didn’t want to break the flow of our unhinged conversations, allowing every moment to segue into the next. However odd it was, it definitely felt nice.

We had a party at Sethan, looking at the amazing view of the peaks far but beautiful as it could get and god yes it was a crazy party. Everyone in his or her own tune, and yes finally we did have some sexy chicken curry, it is always nice to treat yourself after having reached the peak of the trek. I had to do the organizing part either I am good at it or it is the only thing I can ever do. You should have seen Aksharat’s reaction when I successfully got permission from the camp leader who was understanding enough, Aksharat gave me a tight hug with a big smile! Ha that happiness!

crazy naani!

It was nice to see vyoma aka our yo-mama try chicken for the first time, welcome to the club girl! Adithya, the naagin, started his tamashas, just like everyone did, when they got into their zones as time passed by. But, boy he always stands out of the rest. I really wonder how possibly he could be so? ‘You are insane’ is the least compliment you can ever give him. He sprained his leg in the very first acclamation walk, it definitely had me worried. Hats off to the bloke, he trekked the next five days in such pain. When he was about to leave, he told me, “Keep my hat with you bro!”, that moment made me emotional, I do not become so easily. Ha all 7 odd days we kept swearing at each other in funny veins and then he does this. Chutiya.

As the clock passed the 21:30Hours mark the camp leader hushed us into our respective rooms. At the base camp, Tilgan, Saruto we slept in tents but Sethan we were provided rooms. I really hated it, I missed my tent I assume so did most of my friends. Then, it hit us this was the last night we all would spend together. Around 23:00Hours we used our torches to flash at the girls’ rooms, we actually flashed at the camp leader’s room assuming that it was the girls’ room thank goodness he didn’t wake up. It was another nice evening to walk and talk as you experienced serenity, why would you want to sleep? Our bodies were definitely tired but our minds were not it wanted more and more of fun. And yes we had ragging sessions which I probably shouldn’t elaborate.

I woke up around 05:30Hours after having fallen asleep around 02:30Hours, my body was sore and my legs were even so. I could hear Amruth uncle having conversation with someone, and he suddenly talks something about me and starts to press my legs in succession as I slept on my chest. It startled me and told him it was not so necessary but he was sweet and kind that he insisted he would do so. It was such a relief having hurt my little finger (yes, that little bastard) and knee after having a bad fall and on top of that I was wearing bad shoes. He treated me again this time with early morning mint tea and it was amazing, darn I should have had one more. After all our chores, our last trek to Prini started.

We explored a cave!

My lovely naani.

We all reached Prini in numerous pocket groups everyone battered by the long walk and in a couple of hours some had to leave. It was definitely poor planning by them especially Divyansh, Adithya, Anudeep and Lokesh wish I could have punctured their faces. I was hoping it would be great to spend one more day at the base camp. As we reached base camp I think the happiest person was Prasanth bhaiya, haha why wouldn't they be? Prashant, after 4 days, got proper signals to talk to his fiancé and the romance continued way past midnight. The only hard time I had was when I was with the Marathi group, they would talk in Marathi and I wouldn’t understand a thing! How selfish people moreover listening to people talk in Marathi felt as if each were scolding each other in some foul words, pretty weird. Anyways, Jai Maharashtra (I have to be politically correct, right?)

Anu and Heman himanshu! Faggots

Naagin's hat

my water bottle after 16 day trip

  Anushka totally nailed it! Pretty

 

 The trek ended and so everyone had to leave. Being the group leaders me and Megh we always were last but for me, having to see everyone leave and being the last person to leave did not invoke any good feeling. It was pretty hard than I expected. Actually I never expected any of these. It made me stress on my own philosophy, ‘Enjoy while it lasts!’ I think I did justice to it. Just as I said before we did the dirtiest of things and the cheapest of thrills together, I don’t think we judged each other. Few of us, broke almost all the rules, did things we weren’t supposed to and looking back, Ruhani said to me yesterday, “ How boring it would have been had we didn’t do all those things. When some asks me about my trek all I can remember is the cheap dramas we all together”.

 

Did you think I forgot to mention about the locals? They are such gems with such great humbleness within. The kids are so cute that it would not be wrong to call them angels from heaven, the little smile and little laughs and also their rosy cheeks. I met an old woman who was over 90 years of age, although she refused a photo, you should have seen her. Even that such old age she walked briskly albeit she stooped as she walked along. How healthy she would have been as a young person? The girls too were so pretty, stunning natural beauties. Everyone would speak with a sense of care for you, tell you things you didn't know which, give you tips for trekking.

You could easily sense the connection you would get from most of these people and boy, it would be a crime not to mention about their trekking capabilities. The distance you would cover in 2 hours or so, they would easily do it in an hour. I hope god blesses me with the strength and humility of these 'paharis'.


Just to summarize, throughout the trek I got more hugs than handshakes.
Written on 10th July, 2016. Incidentally it was our last day at the camp a month back.