Indier.se

Wow just realized its been almost a month ago since i wrote anything here…amazing! I’ve been to buissy working on Shans webpage (www.indianinstrumentmaker.com) and getting things setup there that i’ve forgot about my own stuff =) Anyway i’ll try to fill you in on the latest news.

After 15 days in Laxman Jhula i left for Banjar, my hometown in the mountains where i have a indian family =) The trip there was quite funky i must say! To Chandigarh with three israeli friends on the train and then rikshaw to the busstand. My friends took the buss down to Dharamsalah and i took my own to Aut. Trip was quite good on the local buss, not as last year when i went from Delhi to Aut, this buss was almost the same but more comfertable =) The bussdriver though is another story.
Since im foreginer i got a seat in the front (when i bought the ticket) and ofcourse im the only tourist on that buss. After 3-4 hours on it they stoped to pick up one guy (another buss driver i thought) and after a while they changed seats. Now the old bussdriver sits on the left and starts to smoke. He calls me ower, im thinking he wants me to see more of the landscape so i go in front to sit with him. He passes a ciggarette and even though i shouldnt be smoking i take a zip. What i’ve forgoten is that the locals never roll joints in rizla paper but in ciggarettes or beedies. I then realize he’s called me up there just to share a joint. So this one goes back and forth a few times and im set and enjoying the view. Sitting there for a while and he starts to make a new one, i rise polite and try to move back to my seat.
He says please stay and points at the joint hes rolling, well oke, i’ll stick here for a while until its rolled and then go back…no no…he passes it along again. What the hell, one more zip then he smokes it all himself. Tells me i can go back to my seat thats now been taken by a indian but the bussdriver sorts him out =) 30-40 mins on the road and we stop for dinner. Im out smoking a beedie and watching around, i see the bussdriver (Sundil) and hes calling me. I get to the table and im invited to sit down and so i do. With hard english or mostly body language i understand that he wants to give me a drink. Sure why not, alcohol i like =) So we get one peg each and then some food arrives, some really nice mutton soup. And one more drink and more soup, one more drink and more soup.

Enjoying all this with all the locals smiling and laughing he brings out another joint =) Well im all done now, kindly say no and passing it to the waitor. Two joints and probably half a bottle of some local spirit is gone in 40 minutes. We hop back up on the buss and to my surprise the new driver we had picked up has left us. On the driving wheel was Sundil thats now all stoned up and boozed…well-o-well-o-well i think. Remembering back to what he had said to me before all the joints (we had a small chat before it) that this was his government duty, to drive this buss everyday back and forth to manali and aut. After taking some comfort in that i sit back and try to enjoy the crazy ride! We had a few turnpoints where the breaks hit in hard (and belive me this busses are something else, fast and furious =) some locals walked to the front and started talking. But that didnt affect our driver, luckily i get off 1h after that stop so i didnt get to be on the whole ride…but i bet it was a bumpy one =)

I get to Aut around 11pm, my friend Kamlesh has rented a jeep with driver to come and pick me up since there is no busses to go anywhere. We are having a good laugh about seeing eachother again and me telling him this story. In the end all you can do is laugh, since probably most of the drivers up here are doing the same just that we dont get to see it. And its not like you have an option to get off and take another buss, your stick to it =) The comfort you can have is that this person probably have been doing the same ritual for 30+ years and that they know their ways around the curves. Eventually it might even be up to god to bless the buss =)

So staying a few days in Sojah (the upper house from Banjar) we are invited to go to Ani, a little smaler village past the highest top (Jalori Pass) and down again. Spend 5 days there with a shit load of flies everywhere, dogs barking at 4am in the morning and food thats cooked very strange. Even though the chicken was big and “ecological” they dont really know what to do with the meat. Anyway we had 4 nights of drinking local wine and whiskey, walking 8km down the himalayas to the big town…twice in two days. My knees are still hurting from this experience but damn the view was so amazing! I’ll try to resize some pictures and upload them today.

I was going to Dharamsalah today but since we got some really bad weather up here now with rain and thunder still going on at 7am and 10am i decided to stay for another day. Hopefully i can leave tomorrow withouth a hustle on the road.
All in all im doing great, some stomake pain but not at all as last year. Semes i’ve addapted a bit to the bacterias out there. Drinking local water (not that there is an alternative) but the water is damn fine. A new pipe has been made to the house and the water comes spot on from a spring out of the mountain, so its relativly safe. They’ve also managed to build a indian style toilet out on the back and fixed the roof on the kitchen. Good to see that things are happening here, maybe next year this will be a full-on guesthouse with visitors all the time.

So thats it for now, see if i get some time to update the pictures, otherwise i’ll do something from Dharamsalah.
Take care and always with Love!