Chapter
9
Nye-mae-el
It was a
nice little hotel, managed by a girl of our age and her little brother studying
in class 5. They too stayed in the same building; basically it was a house
extended into a hotel – the ground floor rented, the first floor occupied by
the family and the top one OYOed. They provided us home-made food as well, for
dinner – roti, dal and omlettee.
After
settling down in our rooms, we took bath and embraced the beds. We ordered
burgers for our late lunch; Khan and Mahesh had been half way into their sleep
when the food arrived. We woke up for dinner at around 8, ate and went back to
sleep. We had to make up for a night’s sleep that we had sacrificed on the
road.
******
Out of Curiosity…
On 22nd
May, 1975, Sikkim became India’s 22nd state; before that it was an independent
mountain kingdom. Sikkim is a landlocked state bordered by Nepal on the west,
Tibet in the north and north-east, Bhutan in the east and West Bengal in the
south. The Lepcha people, the original inhabitants of Sikkim, call it
Nye-mae-el, meaning ‘paradise’. It is India’s first organic state (practicing
organic farming).
******
We woke
up late the next day. The bikes had to be lubed and we spent around half an
hour on that. We had poori, sabji and chai for breakfast – home-made. We left
the place at around 10:30 AM. As we were loading our bags onto the bikes,
Thorappan told me that deedi had
wanted to take a photo with my bike. She had particularly liked my bike, it
seems. Now that was an honour, especially after the embarrassment in Kolkata (Chapter 5: The Comedy of Errors). During the rest
of the loading, half my vision and the whole of my heart looked out for deedi, who unfortunately didn’t turn up.
We were
all excited about our soon-to-begin meeting with the mountains. The initial few
kilometers of road from Siliguri, passed through a stretch of lush green forest.
And then suddenly I saw a mountain range at a distance in front of me. I was
very excited and caught up with Mahesh to tell him that it was probably our
first sight of the mighty Himalayas. We weren’t very sure about it though.
The lush green forest route in Siliguri…
We
filled our tanks to the brim, in the next village, which was around 40
kilometers from Siliguri. We were on National Highway 10, the one that
connected Siliguri to Gangtok. Segments of the road were under construction and
this lead to traffic blocks once in a while. The Teesta river meandered
alongside the road and it was a treat to our eyes. There were many bridges on
the way and we crossed the river many-a-times on those bridges.
Teesta
river meandering along NH10…
The
roads were narrow in some places; at times it was covered by gravel and rocks
due to landslides. The monsoons were performing their annual rituals. Besides
the mini buses run by both the West Bengal and Sikkim governments, that plied
between Siliguri and Gangtok, there were plenty of jeeps that connected
different cities. Some of them had the board ‘Darjeeling’ and our hearts longed
that we had enough days and a bigger plan for covering the ‘Queen of Hills’ as
well. But no, Darjeeling will have to wait for a blog of its own. The 'SK' registered taxis, mostly Altos and Wagon Rs, interested us for the initial few
kilometers from Siliguri. I hadn’t seen vehicles registered in Sikkim before that
in my lifetime. After around 70 kilometers from Siliguri, we reached the
gateway to Sikkim – Rangpo. The ‘Welcome to Sikkim’ board did give us the very
same excitement and sense of satisfaction as that of the ‘Welcome to the City
of Joy’ one; we didn’t wish for a similar roller-coaster ride though (Chapter 7: A Roller-Coaster Ride).
NH 10…
A
tunnel enroute Gangtok...
After a
while, we stopped for tea and late lunch. It had drizzled along the way and we
were already starting to feel the chillness of the height. We had soupy maggi
and momos at the road side shop. Curious school kids gathered around our bikes.
From where we sat and slurped maggi, we could see a two-storeyed house made out
of wood and bamboo. A man sat on the balcony and took drags from his pipe.
Mahesh envied the man’s state of peace and wished he too could live like that. I
mulled over the possible hardships that this particular man could be facing in
his life and how we in a matter of a few minutes had presumed that he was
leading a peaceful life.
Bridges,
bridges and more bridges…
Tough
roads…
We
booked rooms in Gangtok via Gobibo. Thorappan and Mahesh were particular about
getting a room with a view. We continued our ride and soon entered the city of
Gangtok. There was heavy traffic in the city and the ascending road made it
even more difficult for us. My hands started aching due to prolonged engagement
with the clutch and front brake levers. But what fascinated us was the
discipline of the vehicles on the road – no overtaking and no honking, they
just waited patiently in the traffic, one behind the other. Now that was indeed
some ‘peace’ in life for the people of this city, if only they knew how
horrible it was down in the plains.
"Welcome to Sikkim"
“Will be
there soon…”
We
reached the hotel at around 6:30 PM. It was a premium hotel with good
facilities; luckily we had got it at a cheap price on Gobibo. The rooms didn’t
have ACs or fans – of course, all one would wish for in this place were room
heaters. We unloaded our luggage and went out again to get some quick service
for our vehicles. Khan had noted a few service centers on the way, which he was
quite sure were just a few kilometers from the hotel. After descending for about
15 kilometers, we inferred that Khan had hallucinated. Meanwhile, Thorappan had
gone to meet Mr. John, our agent in Gangtok, who would get us the required
permits and passes. After failing to find the service centers, we returned back to
meet Thorappan and John. We lost each other on the way, but did re-join at the
location shared by John. After collecting the permits, we headed back to the
hotel. We had dinner on the way – chowmein and pork dry fry. The ride after
dinner was fiery – the cold air pierced our skin. It must have been 9:30 PM or
so, but the roads were empty. We inferred that Sikkim slept early. We hurried
back to the hotel to earn a few extra hours of sleep, for we had the Nathu La
and the Old Silk Route awaiting us the next day. Unfortunately, one of us
wasn’t ready for the adventure.
(to be continued…)
Entering
Gangtok …
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