I'm Back!!!

For all those faithful readers not already aware, I am writing to say I am back from my trip! Sorry for the worry as it has been so long since I've written but my mobile is now reconnected and I am open for communication!!!

Ladakh Living

OK, so the last time I wrote I explained how much I love Leh, focusing on food, shopping and the awesome views of the surrounding Himilayas.

Yup, still the same.

I decided I needed to do other things because if someone said that yogurt had more culture than me they would be right.....I hate it when I'm not right.

So Clauds and I have been having a great time with Carlos, a 56 year old Colombian who loves to laugh and travel. Works perfectly for us! We all travelled together at 6am one morning (DEATH!!) to go and see morning puja at Thiksay monastry. There were about 40 monks, mainly very old or very young, and we were able to witness them giving their morning offering. This was done through song silence, prayer and butter tea with sampa (tasty, a kind of ground grain that you mix into your tea).

Then it was onto appreciating the natural wonders within Ladakh. We travelled over the third highest pass in the world, (about 5200m) to reach I think the second highest lake in the world, Pangong. This lake is 25% in Ladakh and 75% in China. We had the good fortune to borrow tents and so we camped away from anything or anyone on a hill overlooking the lake. We chatted around a fire and looked up at the full moon.

STUN-NING I tell you. Who knew I would be so into nature?

We also camped at another Lake, Tso Moriri. Just as beautiful, just as fun. But my favourite place so far has been Dha Hanu. I heard whispers about this place back in Srinigar and I was dying to check out if the rumours were true. Carlos, Clauds and I hopped on a bus and travelled seven hours to this fabled place of Aryian Villages that nestled next to the Indus river a mere 20km from the Pakistani border. We had to get permits to be there as this area has only recently been opened up to tourists, and you can tell. Unspoiled nature with none of the usual tourist trappings. We were told to stay at Bema as this was the main place to stay to visit the surrounding areas. So I got off the bus and all I saw was one resturant in something the size of a garage.....and it was closed. "We're screwed" was the first thought in my head. We managed to find somewhere to stay and thank God for that because there was nowhere that we found in the surrounding 100km to eat, so our guest house was our resturant and our shelter from the natural elements. God it was beautiful though. We would go walking for hours and see mountains change colour in the setting sun, the river turning from a bright gold to a smouldering silver. I have never been one to be overwhelmed by nature but there was nothing else that I could do except be awed by it.

We stumbled across a village where we greeted by beautiful children with light honey skin and blue eyes, sandy hair and big smiles. So we finally meet the Arians I had heard so much about. They took us into the heart of their village and gave us chai and chang, (a light alcoholic drink made from fermented barley), and we entertained them with the novelty of our ipods. The next day we wanted to go right into the mountains to see the secluded villages. When we were stopped at a military check point we were informed that our permits did not allow us to go there. This was a tragedy for me. The whole reason I had come this far was because I wanted to ask a local if the rumours I had heard were true. Do German women come all the way her to have pure bred Arian babies?? How could this man in uniform deny me this answer? I don't know how it happened, really I dont, but we had a three person military escort through the several checkpoints and were waved on our way up into the mountains. We were through! We drove up into some of the most beautiful scenary I have ever seen. Lush green valleys between striking are orange mountains. Women with their local dress and flowers in their hair tending to the crops waved us in. It was like something out of a fairytale. We climbed into the village and were greeted with a friendly 'Hello'. It was the local school teacher and he welcomed us into his school of fourteen kids ranging from 2 years to twelve. They all spoke English fluently, as well as Hindi, also whatever their local language was, and a smattering or Urdu and God knows what else. I couldn't believe I was able to converse so easily with a community that to my primitive mind seemed to step straight out of a history book.

These people live in the most amazing location and live to most simple and happy of lives. I came away feeling strangely humbled by the whole thing. I was so distracted by my experience that I almost forgot to ask our local driver my all consuming question. So when we were sitting in his house and having chai I pounced.

"So I have a question and my intention is not to be rude but it is too fascinating for me not to ask it".

He looks at me politely and with some patience, but says nothing. I surge ahead....

"I heard a rumour that German women come here to 'be' the with local men so that they can have pure Arian race babies. True or False?"

He considers the question for a minute or two while I work on my sweat patches and imagine being chased out of the village by men and women brandishing farming implements.

"I remember two years back two German women came here. They were in their late thirties and they wanted to have children. We found out later they both were pregnant". This was a round about way of saying they did the nasty with some locals. SO IT WAS TRUE!!! I was ecstatic that in this modern world something that is such a myth in my mind was a reality. It's like finding out there is no Easter Bunny, but in reverse! He went on to explain that the culture is still reserved so they don't talk about it but it goes on. Women come, they make arrangments, sweaty actions take place and hey presto! Your very own Arian baby.

This world is fascinating

xoxo
Sim

I'm Alive

For all my loved ones who are freaking out I write to say I am alive and very very happy, so stop working on those stomach ulcers!!

Really, an update of all my adventures will be coming soon but as I have said many many times over the last three weeks I have stepped into the Bermuda Triangle here.

I'm dashing off so I won't write a big update now but I can't wait to share about camping at lakes in the Himalayas at altitudes of 5000m and my knowledge of where women come from all around the world to breed pure Aryan babies with men in remote mountain villages (no shit!!!)

Tantalizing, no?!

Sorry for the lack of photos but Leh doesn't allow any uploading and the connection here is cronically slow.

xoxo
Sim

Lazy in Leh

Back home when I was looking at the map of India I noticed that right up in the north there was a place called Ladakh. I instantly decided to go there, the irony being that I decided to go because it is the name of one of my favourite brands of clothing. You can laugh, but I'll have the last one cause it is brilliant here!

Clauds and I hired a jeep and enjoyed the comfort of having the whole thing to ourselves for the 13 hour journey. Our last atempt at a shared jeep was the two of us jammed in the front next to the driver. My knees pushed against the dashboard and every time the driver changed gears, (and you can imagine how often that was climbing steep hills) I was slammed in the thigh and developed a nice oval bruise. So we went to the other extreme of having a car where we stretched out and slept. The drive through was amazing, (but of course) and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Our hotel owner from Srinigar said it was like going to the moon, he was right. Kashmir is beautiful and green, Ladakh is striking and bare. There was a point driving high into the hills where it became so cold that it started to snow, we were right on top of the mountains and I had to get out to register with the army men. I came back looking like a human snowman. This country man, I sweat my body weight down south but I freeze my tatas off in the north.

I made an arse of myself talking to Claudia the next day, "You know, we were so high up in the mountains and it was so bloody cold it was like crossing the Himalayas!"
She looks at me for a moment, "It was the Himalayas" she says blandly.

That's what you get for using a clothing brand as your travelling compass.

Anyway we arrived in Leh, the main place in the Ladakh area, and I experienced two things that I have not experinced for quite some time. The need to shop and the need to eat. OK wait, anyone who knows me knows that the latter is a lie, I always want to eat. But the food here is bloody good, the coffee, the cakes and a whole host of Tibeten cuisine such as momos (dumplings). It is a nice change from Indian food, I do still love it but there is so much butter and grease in their meals that it was time for a break. I celebrated by having four meals on the first day, then it was onto shopping!

In one of the first junk shops that we stepped into we ran into Matt, an American with a wicked sense of humour and a passion for movies and TV. Poor Clauds spent the first night listening patiently and Matt and I spent hours throwing quotes back and forth to each other. It wasn't until the end of the night that we looked around and realised that we had scared all the other patrons away. Then this brilliant man showed us to what became our Mecca, a resturant that shows movies on a big screen as you sit around a fire eating, drinking and looking up to the mountains and an obscene amount of stars. I have to say that this is what I did for four days, eat, drink and be merry. I also spend a large amount of time sitting in the cafe called Booklovers eating cake and tea, laughing with the owner. But the big draw card is that he has the whole collection of Tintin comics!!!

So after four fun days with Matt we had to say adios as he scooted off to Delhi, Clauds and I realised that we have done nothing cultural in Leh at all. This was quickly remedied by climbing the mountain to see Leh Palace, Gompa and castle. The altitude nearly killed us, every 20 seconds we had to stop for two minutes to catch our breath. We had to constantly remind ourselves that it was the altitude and not the fact that we were fatties eating cake for the last five days that caused us to be so out of breath. Unbeknownst to us it was Sunday and everything was closed, Murphys Law. As we were making our way up to the castle Claudia and I laughed about the OH&S issues of this climb, one slip could send you sliding down the mountain. As we were laughing I stopped short as I realised I was face to face with a sheer rock that made it impossible to continue. As I looked back to Claudi with a bewildered look on my face I noticed that we had missed the hidden stairs that would lead us to the castle and instead followed the path of what I can only presume was a goat looking for a place to do its business. The climb down was a little tense, wouldn't you be tense if you had to backtrack down a non-existant path in Pumas that were cool but with no grip whatsoever?? Well at least we savoured the view, which was spectacular.

Now we are off to climb another hill to a Stupa, all this pain and exertion in the name of culture! It seems that Claud has picked up where Dave has left off, whenever we have to do excercise (which I never am too keen on) Clauds exclaims in her upbeat voice, "Well, at least it's good excercise!"

I waut till she looks away before I give her my death stare.

xoxo
Sim

The most beautiful place on earth

Is Pahalgam, Kashmir. I'm not kidding, it is spectacular. Clauds and I, along with a very entertaining American called Jayson, arrived after a two or so hour jeep ride through mountains and checked into a perfect guest house. The rooms were basic and clean and the staff were very friendly, but what made it was the backyard. We stepped out into bright sunshine where everything was a brilliant green and RIGHT THERE was a river racing past. We crossed a little bridge to an island to take tea, I always feel very civilised and grown up when I do this, though I have no right to be! I sat and looked up at the mountains towering over us with their peaks tipped with snow. It was picturesque and I felt instantly at peace and ectasticaly happy at the same time.

We strolled around all afternoon to say 'Howdy Ho' to the neighbours, but being that Kashmir is predominantly Muslim we quickly switched to 'Asalam-u-alikum'. They instantly love you for it and think it's kind of sweet, similar to a child learning to say good morning to adults. Pahalgam is a small town that is a tourist destination for Indians, not so much for International tourists. I think we saw one other anglo when we were there, so it makes sense that we are quite the novelty. Stares are much more frequent and marked with a genuine curiosity, but the second you chuck out a 'Asalam-u-alikum' they crack the fattest smile and launch into the questions they were dying to ask you. "Where are you from?...what is your good name? Who are you travelling with? No men? Only girls? What is your profession? How much do you earn? Australia, oh yes...RICKY PONTING!!" The last always gets me because I have to own up to being a very unpatriotic Australian becuase I do not follow or care about cricket. It's like taking a nap but with people interrupting you every six minutes or so to applause someone for running four metres. I made the mistake of telling one boy, ONE BOY, that I didn't know much about cricket. This 13 year old went on for 20 minutes telling me the batting average of every Australian team member, where they were born and what his opinion was on all of them. It drew a crowd...by then end of the conversation I was joined by his Father, his uncle, his two brothers, three cousins and his Mum, passionately throwing their two cents into the conversation. All of them took the oppurtnity to tell me EVERYTHING that I have ever ignored or avoided knowing about cricket, and I couldn't stop laughing the whole time.

The next day was the best day of my life. Clauds and I woke up early and sought out a pony man to take us riding into the mountains. I have been wanting to ride a horse for years now and never got around to it. I was so excited to slip my foot into the stirrup and swing myself up into the saddle, everything I ever learned about horses came flooding back to me and I found it effortless and downright brilliant to be riding again. First things first, big SNAPS for Clauds. She has ridden a horse only once in her life...in year six....for twenty minutes....and someone walked the horse up and down the road. I reassured her the night before that these were sturdy looking ponies and would be an easy ride. So up she goes...and within two minutes we are cantering. God bless her, her stirrups were too short, there was no thorough instructions before mounting and we are on the main road made of asphalt which would bloody hurt to land on. But she kept her whmpers inaudiable and clung on for dear life. She has forever earned my respect for that. After fixing her stirrups and reducing her pulse rate we trekked through the mountains and it was like stepping into a fairytale. Tall trees, running brooks, nomad families herding their goats while pack horses carry all their wordly goods with their children perched on top. The views were constantly stunning. On the way back Clauds encouraged me to canter ahead while she stayed with the safety of the pony man at a pleasant walking pace.

Let us change perspective for a moment. Be any resident of Pahalgam, a farmer, a nomad, or one of the friendly militia that are ever present in the town. You look up to see a foreign girl with aviator sunnies, hair streaking out behind her, cantering like a mad thing down the main road, which is complete with buses, jeeps and the multitude of pedestrians...and she is laughing maniacally all the way. Strange no?

I can confidantly say that I had every pair of eyes on me as I passed. But I was enjoying myself so much because I love horse riding, and I loved the reckless feeling of streaking down a road....that just happened to be the hub of all Pahalgam.

That afternoon I walked like I had an invisable balloon between my legs, so I set myself on my little island in the back yard. I took tea and read a wonderful book under the dappled light of a tree. That night the three of us sat outside and watched a lightning show, as many as 84 bolts in one minute, dramatically lighting up the night sky.

A good day, no?


Photos:

1) Our backyard

2) Clauds and I stopped on a hill top called 'Little Switzerland' that was strikingly stunning. Green fields, then green trees, then mountains, then snow tops. Stun-ning.

3) Overlooking Kashmir Valley

4) Preparing saffron milk - our favourtie drink to chase away the cold!

5) Had to show you the extent of the pot growth out here, it's like this all along the roads

Love those pictures

1. Ancient and beautiful Elephanta Island

2 & 3. A certain family member (DOM!) suggested I still looked like I had a hair of healthy locks. I do, but I felt the need to show just how much hair I am losing. It's a little disturbing and kind of gross but these are two pictures of what I lost after washing my hair two days ago.

4. Mughal gardens in Srinigar

5. Me looking pretty in front of a mosque in Srinigar, (possibly a permanant game plan if my hair loss continues..)

Also...

A couple of things I forgot to mention in my last blog. When we were driving through the mountains we cleverly drove over a large rock that kicked up underneath the jeep and punctured a leak in the petrol tank. So we all bail out in a hurry before the fumes made us nauseous or it caught fire and burned us alive. As we were waiting I lazily looked at the surrounding foliage when suddenly my eyes narrowd.

"Is that marijuana?" I thought to myself. I crawl over and sure enough it is, growing wild throughout the mountains. Thinking this is a funny stroke of luck I take a photo of the little shrubbery. Proud of my find I straighten up, then I realise the entire freakin mountain is covered in it. There is so much of it growing wild here that locals were hanging their laundry over it to dry. Phenominal I tell you!

Anyway we are called back to the jeep and we are off. Ignorance is bliss because I found out later that they stopped the leak by rubbing soap over the gash, or something like that. It didn't stop our driver from smoking cigarettes the whole way up though.

Then we got to watch the beautiful ballet of baksheesh, (bribe). We were in a jeep meant for 7 people but it had 8. When we reached the checkpoint which was the border for Jammu and Kashmir a seamless sequence of events happened.

1) A passanger jumped out the back of the jeep and walked across the border, which was being guarded by several men with very big and scary guns

2) We are pulled over by the military and the driver exchanges a few choice words with the officer

3) The driver pulls out 50Rs and hands it over, in return he is given a couple of pieces of paper

4) The 8th passenger jumps back in and we drive off

5) We look at the papers expecting to see permits or some such thing, instead it is tickets to the annual policemans ball

I love this country, I really do.

xoxo
Sim