As shared in my earlier post of Day 3, I had a high fever on 29th and therefore made some changes to my travel plan. As I was not sure if I will be alright by the next morning, I wanted to keep it easy for me with no hectic travel or activities during that day. I canceled the plan to go to Gulmarg/Sonmarg, and rather went to Doodh Pathri. Another activity in my mind was to do birding if I can find a bird sanctuary or wetland nearby, but that didn’t materialize.
Doodhpathri is ~50 km from Srinagar. I am generally a road person and look forward to the paths than the destinations. The road to Doodhpathri had soulful views and it filled my heart with richness. The first half an hour was while getting out of Srinagar spent talking to the driver who is always ready to share gyan on every topic possible.
I asked him if they say Kashmir is Jannat. Do you think so and if yes, why? To which he replied that first and foremost is our culture. You’ll not find this culture anywhere. Here people live in brotherhood, they help each other. ‘log sukh dukh baant te hain. Ye nahi ki sath wale ke ghar mein kya ho raha hai kisi ko pata hi nahi’.
Secondly, the weather in Kashmir is the best. Na zyada sardi padti hai na garmi, I corrected him on this that ‘sardi to itni padti hai’. The hazir jawab Muzzafar said “Thand ka to ilaaj hai, garmi mein kya karoge, sardi mein to garam kapde pahan sakte hain”. I was not convinced with this jawab as I think for the poor it’s vice-versa. Also, I was thinking of those whose only means of livelihood is farm-grown crops or vegetables, etc as when it snows, no crops will be growing. How will they manage then? To which he replied that ‘yahan sab ke ghar mein 6 mahine ka ration rehta hai, gareeb ho ameer ho. Kabhi dhara 144 laga diya, kabhi 370 tod diya, kabhi flood aa gaya, yahan sab log apne ghar pe itna ration rakhte hain ki 6 mahine ghar pe reh ke kha saken. Yahan crime rate zero hai. Delhi ki tarah nahi. Yahan har koi har kisi se lift maang sakta hai, aur deta bhi hai. Ye nahi ki Delhi ki tarah Taxi mein bhi koi jaye to bharosa nahi pahunchega bhi kee nahi. Yahan log aksar apne kaam se pehle doosron ka kaam kar dete hain. Main khud kitni baar apne ghar se apne kaam ke liye nikla, kisi aur ne apna koi kaam bataya to pehle wo kiya aur kayi baar apna kaam kiye bina hi ghar aa gya’.
For that second my thoughts took me to that saakhi of Guru Nanak Dev ji doing sacha sauda.
I said this culture is there in Punjab also. Even I am quite sure that in villages of every state, this culture of brotherhood is there. But for sure it is changing now even in villages but still where city and western culture hasn’t reached that much, this culture is surviving. To which my talkative driver said yes in Srinagar you may see this culture missing a bit but still, it exists majorly. Except for a few families who have followed in the footsteps of the western world. He quoted a very interesting statement by Dr Allama Iqbal “Maghrib ki taraf mat jao, doob jaoge” Maghrib wo jagah hoti hai jahan sooraj doobta hai which is West. Means don’t follow the west, doob jaoge. So he concluded that other than corruption, Kashmir has got the best of everything. He said with the proud feeling that only Kashmir has got 3-4 airports, no other state has more than one airport.
From what I have seen of Kashmir in the last few days, I see people are hardworking and polite. Common people look resilient, perhaps times have given them this strength. We all have the hidden power to overcome all the adversities which we get to know only when we face them and put into that situation. Life has its way to come out victorious whatever the circumstances. It’s the nature of life, to keep flowing irrespective. But I also see the explosion of feelings, the anger that keeps building up when accustomed to a stepmotherly behavior. That is there and normal for any human to feel and express.
Ok. Back to our journey to Doodhpathri. As we were about to exit Srinagar, I saw Kremshore Badgam written on the signboards and asked Muzzafar where we were. He told me that we are just at the backside of Srinagar airport. I said but I have seen Badgam is written somewhere. He told me yes Srinagar is in Badgam district only (I didn’t know this before).
After crossing Srinagar, all the way through Doodhpathri was beautiful and soulful with trees laden with yellow leaves to die for. There were trees of Willowood on the sides of the roads. Muzzafar told me that the wood of these trees is used to make cricket bats. We stopped on the way for tea/kahwa. I had Kahwa and makki di roti tawa fried with butter. Though this is a common food in villages of Punjab to seko Makki di behi roti on tawa and have with butter. As I love this staple food anyways, I enjoyed it thoroughly sitting on a chatai facing deodar trees. A family was cutting the logs of wood and loading them onto a truck. They were beautiful people, all of them. Men and women cut the wood in turns and worked with each other equally. The women were very pretty as we know of the Kashmirans. I clicked a few photographs of them working though they all were shy but welcoming and talking to me passing smiles.
After reaching the destination, I was trying to not buy into any of the ponywala’s proposals to take to points on the pony. But one young boy tagged along irrespective of me telling him that he is wasting his time as I am not going to go to any of the points on the pony. But he did not leave me alone and finally, I said he can be a guide but I will go walking. He walked a little further with me and said first we will see Khilan marg, though there were no flowers at all when we reached the spot. His friends/ partners came behind us with a pony. I was feeling so bad that he would have been wasting time in the hope that he’ll convince me to hire the pony and I gave in before his spirit. But remembering my experience of the previous day, the steep downhill on the pony, I just paid him some money and came back. I was not sure for whom to feel bad about – myself who couldn’t go see the points because I didn’t dare to sit on the pony again or that boy who tagged along with me irrespective of my clear No in the hope that I might change my mind. I came sadly from there and he was sad too as he couldn’t buy in customer’s confidence. I wish I could keep his faith in his skill. I sat on the pony at his insistence but he was not able to control its speed and I was already scared. So this combination failed us.
As I was going back to the car, Muzzafar met me on the way and he asked me to wait for some time as it was his time for Namaz.
To spend time, I started talking to the only person selling keychains there. His name was Gulzar. He was writing names or text on a grain of rice. While talking to him I got a couple of keychains made. He told me that he can write 52 alphabets on one grain of rice and it took three days for him to learn this art. After writing the text on rice, it is put in oil which doesn’t let it decompose. Gulzar asked me as everyone in Kashmir asks where am I from? When I told him Punjab, he replied that every year he along with his fellows goes to Goraya in Punjab in winters and sells woolens in the nearby villages. After taking the keyrings, we started back for Srinagar. On the way, I saw a gazebo which one of my friends had sent a picture of. I saw there were a few people already. I asked my driver to stop there as I wanted to check the view from there. As soon as I reached there, the family there befriended me in no time, no time means no time. They were a Kashmiri family who had brought a family guest to the hill station. I asked the girl to click a photograph for me, in the meantime, her mother/mother-in-law gave me a cup of tea. I couldn’t say no to the homemade tea. She also shared cake rusk and cookies with me. I left the spot feeling warm inside out.
Muzzafer stopped the car again at the same stop where we had stopped in the morning. He had his tea and got makki Rotis packed for home also. As we reached Srinagar, there was still time and I asked him to take me to Shalimar Baag which we had missed earlier. I took the ticket and rushed quickly inside Shalimar Baag. Unlike other gardens, it was not maintained well, however, Chinar trees threw their spell over me. The fallen leaves were welcoming. As I was walking towards the other end of the garden, I saw two kids and their mommy playing and clicking photographs together. As I approached them, I got a photograph of myself clicked by mommy. In the meantime daughter caught hold of my camera and looking at her confidence and the way she was holding the camera, I guided her to click and she clicked a good photograph for me with her little hands. Rest if the pictures couldn’t decide the subject and had to rest in peace (we deleted them). Her mommy seemed quite an artist, she asked me to keep the chinar leaf in front of my face before she clicked my photograph and she chose which of the fallen leaves can be used to make an artistic photograph.
As the sun was about to set and I had to check in the houseboat, I quickly took a round and came back.
After reaching Gate No 13 at Dal lake, my luggage was handed over to the Shikarawala. I was very happy that I was in the Shikara and going to stay in the houseboat. But my happiness and excitement were short-lived. While talking to Shikarewale bhaiya, I got to know that I was the only one who will be staying in the houseboat. On asking him about if not a guest, who all are there in the family of boat owners who will be there. He said None. The boat was already in the middle of the lake and my heart was pounding with fear.
I called the organizer of my trip, my driver but they both gave a cold ear to my apprehension saying it was safe and never checked again if I was feeling alright. That’s the flip side of being independent and trusting sometimes that people think that you’ll manage and manage what you do but there are always those moments when we feel weak. I felt like drowning in the lake with fear but after reaching the houseboat, I felt comfortable as there were other houseboats connected. I took a hot bath, cooled myself down, started counting my blessings, and felt better.
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