Why do we reflect back into the past? Why do we write about journeys completed long back? Is it to share our experience or is it a homegrown remedy for ourselves for this unnamed, unexplainable ailment that revolves around boredom? I would say it is a bit of both!
I had always been a travel-sleeper. You might find it tough to relate, but that’s how I enjoy my travels the most. Among all forms of travel, there’s something about aeroplanes that instantly puts me to sleep. I always envy the people who are eager for the window seats, the ones with unlimited energy to shoot photos and videos throughout the journey. As for me, I preferred the aisle seat and a quiet nap. Starting our journey at 2 in the morning from Bangalore, I was sure I would sleep all my way, however to my surprise, I fell asleep even before the plane took off. I again had a nap at the Hyderabad airport while we were waiting for our connection flight. One of the biggest advantages when you are travelling with Bhavish is that you never have to worry about missing flight announcements or boarding calls, Bhavish was always ‘a man with a plan’. For the ten of us this was our first long journey after getting sucked into the corporate world. Though we had the usual weekend getaways in and around Bangalore they were all followed by a ‘Monday’, with more work and newer deadlines. However not this Monday, this Monday we would be away from the reach of our mangers, thousands of kilometres away from hustle of the city hiding behind the mighty Himalayas in the beautiful city of Tawang. While I enjoyed my nap, dreaming about this promised day, Yohann had joined us (Yohann was working at Hyderabad during that time and was to join us from there) and immediately started hunting for places to have food. Mathew, meanwhile was busy in the washroom. No journey is complete without someone falling sick. Mathew Shaji did the honours this time with a classic case of “Thootu” (‘thootu’ is colloquial for diarrhoea in Malayalam).
From Hyderabad, we soon took off to Guwahati, and no I didn’t sleep this time, I had deep conversations with Geogy and read a little of ‘Shantaram’ by Gregory David Roberts (the book deserves a post of its own). Upon reaching Guwahati, the final member of our trip, Krishnan joined us (Krishnan was working in Noida during that time) and the pack was complete. Our tour coordinator also met us at the airport, showed us our traveller and introduced us to our driver, Dileep. And so the journey through the Northeast began. We travelled through the rural side of Assam that day, the scenery was picturesque, small houses overlooking smaller ponds on both sides of the road and a lush green landscape with distant mountains in the background. My sleep during the ride was minimal, though my friends would disagree. We were surprised when the sky got dark by 4 o clock. It took us some time to relate the fact that we were so far east of the IST longitude. We crossed an army check post around 7:00 PM and got our permits stamped to enter the territories of Arunachal Pradesh. We soon came to a halt at our allotted hotel in a small town called Bakulpong not far from the Assam-Arunachal border. By now we started feeling the cold creeping in through our light clothes. We were happy to find warm chapatis and two bowls full of chicken curry waiting for us in the dining hall. The taste of chappathis drastically increases with fall in temperature. At 18 degrees, the stage was set for a delicious treat.
Dinner was followed by hot lime tea served in tiny glasses. As we sat in the hall, slowly sipping our tea, Nived made a clever reflection of how we had bed coffee at Bangalore, breakfast in Hyderabad, lunch in Guwahati and dinner in Arunachal. While Bhavish was quickly noting down Nived’s wise words for his upcoming status, my thoughts were lost on how I might have taken naps in four different states on the same day, I wondered if I was that pathetic and then relived myself when I realised that Mathew probably took a shit in four different states.
Read.Reflect.Repeat 