darjeeling unlimited

 

At the beginning of November I packed up my bag once again, wished my Delhi life farewell once again, promised to return to Women and Children’s (my first home in India) with tear glossed eyes, closed out business with my upper class host family, and eagerly jumped on board the train that would carry me into the next block in my India journey.

The Raj Dhani departs New Delhi railroad station 2:00 PM, rolls across the western spoke of this kite shaped subcontinent through barren, dusty fields supporting meager villages, showing the countryside's secrets that roads barrel through. For 20 hours travel is constant, slow, and easy. By the time the train pulls into New Jailpaiguri station, the body has acclimated, the mind processed the change and all together, self is ready to de-board into something new. Trains are kind traveling, closer to human pace.

Another station to navigate. Find the front. Exit. Look past the hustlers awaiting you at the bottom of the stairs. A jeep is what you need. Identify a secret guide, someone that may be going to the same place as you and looks authoritative. Mine, a female monk. Female features, 1/2 inch hair evenly growing out of a rounded skull and a bodice warmed by Buddha’s sacred colors summed to striking grace and ease. My thought was people don't take advantage of what looks religious, it is like spitting on God. Trailing closely behind my chosen guide, I found my way through the aggressive voices, mothers with a baby in one arm and the other tugging at my sleeve begging for money, into the front seat of a Darjeeling bound jeep (military style, no Cherokee). Snug between my guide and the driver, I enjoyed the first class view up the mountainside, my sweat converting to chills as we exited the lowlands and, cruised around the striped rice fields, into the famous tea fields that conquered the region's name with a prized product.

Small houses line the road. Mountain cabins in pastel. Sea foam green wood panels. Marigold plants in black garbage bags resting on white railings. Glass windows swung open, inviting crisp air to sweep in and out. Thin men and women walk up and down the inclines, their backs weighted by towering baskets of greenery hanging on a strip of canvas that lies across the hairline. Their calves barely exist. Sweat sits softly on their foreheads. One slow step. Then another. Making it into town.  Just like yesterday. Just like tomorrow.

Our jeep lines up with the rest at the entrance to the tourist town. All the vehicles swell in together, the magic of a bottleneck. In the middle of town, we stop. Everyone dismounts. Up a steep hill with all my belongings on my back to Hotel Long Island, to Bidhya, the face behind the phone voice, to the navigator for my next month.

Step after step. I wonder - should I have supported the local economy and paid the middle-aged women who offered to be my porter? Would this be easier if the weight of my bag was lying across my hairline? Would it feel like a reverse headstand? Around the road's bend. Up the final flight. Short of breath, I walk into the hotels restaurant/kitchen/library/reception area to find Bidhya, who promptly offers me some water and a cup of tea.  

I spend the next two nights in a cozy bedroom with a mountain view taking the deepest breathes I've treated myself to in ages. I've escaped the pollution. I've escaped the city chaos. By 8:15PM I collapsed under two levels of wool, zipped into down. Clear headed, no interest in Indian literature or American lyrics. Lost in the warm, soft, pillowy thoughts and chocolate chip cookies. A half stack completed, I close my eyes, drifting off to the other place, the one my subconscious controls for me, until the sun rays pull me out, reminding me that there is a world outside of my head.  

  

Those first couple Darjeeling days I had lunch with Amit (my Indian friend from the jeep ride into town), walked the tight bazaar paths hunting the shawl/blanket that would act as my partner - my shield on cold lonely nights, and tried not to prepare too much, because I knew I could not construct an accurate image of days spent teaching in a village school and living in as part of a local household.  

 

The ride to Peshok is down out of the high altitude clouds into an eternity of hills carpeted in evenly spaced tea bushes and a tropical montane ecosystem, equipped with bright pink hibiscus and flourishing ferns. An hour and a half into the ride, abruptly, Bidhya asks the driver to stop. We hop down from the jeep and stroll into her family's house, into the next month of my life.