Blind woman rowing a Shikara in Dal Lake, Srinagar, Kashmir
Limited edition prints of this image are for sale. Ordering info is given at the end of the post. Click on the image for a larger view.
I had driven to Kashmir during April (a great time to be there) and could but help falling in love with the Dal Lake in Srinagar. I went on multiple Shikara (local boats as seen in this image) rides at all times of the day. In this case, I was out visiting the floating vegetable market at the crack of dawn and had stopped for tea at one of the floating shops in the lake. And then I saw this old woman rowing towards me – as she got closer I realised she was nearly blind. And then the shot happened as she crossed me: a perfect play of light with colourful reflections of house boats in the background. Few shots have given me as much professional satisfaction as this.
Continue reading if you want to order this print
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Need to touch and feel snow – not just see. After all I am in the Himalayas. So off to Gulmarg it was. An eventful day – here is why:
* Conned by shop renting gumboots for the snow – paid Rs. 75 against official rate of Rs. 45.
* At Tangmarg, 12 kms before Gulmarg, I was told to get off to register my name with the police – only to be told later Indians don’t need to. But it gave some guides an opportunity to insist I need their services. [continue reading…]
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The early morning vegetable market on the Dal Lake in Srinagar, Kashmir, India
Aaarrrrrghh! Its 4:30 am and the alarm is not giving up. If only I had not booked a Shikara for 5:00 am! But get up I had to – after all I am a travel writer out to cover the daily vegetable market in the Dal Lake. But once in the boat, was I glad for it. [continue reading…]
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Crusing in a Shikara in the Dal Lake in Srinagar, Kashmir
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The best time to go boating in the Dal Lake is in the evening. Start about half an hour before the sun starts setting behind the peaks. This will give you enough light to look around and for any shopping. What shopping? Before you realize it, ‘shikara shops’ will float up close to you – selling silver jewelry, fine Pashmina shawls, paper mache gifts, dry fruits and more. Sceptical? Why not? Anything targeted solely at tourists is taken with a pinch of salt. Check out the floating market too – these are shops standing in the water selling everything from handicrafts to household supplies. Even hot tea and local breads. But don’t spend too much time here. Lest you miss the magic. [continue reading…]
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The Hazratbal Mosque in Srinagar, Kashmir
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The day turned out to be one marked for visiting some holy spots – and what a revelation they were.
Hazratbal
The first thing to strike me about Hazratbal: it has a dome and a single minaret – not a common architectural feature. It is the most sacred of Muslim shrines in Kashmir Valley – for it houses a single hair of the Prophet Mohammed brought a thousand years ago from Medina. It is publicly displayed only on special occasions. Could not help noticing hundreds just sitting around on its lawns – including two young veiled women whose eyes seemed to be following my camera and me all over. Still wondering how they would have reacted had I gone up to them to strike a conversation – would give anything to see what they looked like. Will never know. [continue reading…]
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The Pari Mahal in Srinagar, Kashmir
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The day was dedicated to exploring historical Srinagar – or at least as much as I could cover in a day. What will it take for the city to take a pause from impressing me? Show-off city! [continue reading…]
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The Tulip Garden in Srinagar, Kashmir
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Want to see tulips? Here are two possible options:
1. Keukenhof Flower Gardens near Amsterdam in Holland: Over 7 million bulbs planted, best viewed for two spring months starting end-May.
2. Tulip Garden in Srinagar: Smaller by comparison, best viewed for 2 weeks starting end-March. With a breathtaking view of Himalayan peaks around and the Dal Lake below. Surrounded by gardens developed by the Mughal emperors many centuries ago. [continue reading…]
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The ancient temples at Kiramchi near Udhampur in the state of Jammu and Kashmir
If I ‘discovered’ the ancient temples at Kiramchi, it was only because I was told they exist. Not that anyone – including the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) – knows much about these. For anyone with even a passing interest in ancient structures, this site is a must-see. They are a work of art. And hats off to ASI for maintaining the surrounding gardens so well. [continue reading…]
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A sign on the Jammu - Srinagar highway in Kashmir
“If there is a heaven on Earth, it is here, it is here, it is here,” uttered Mughal Emperor Jahangir when he first set his eyes upon Kashmir in the 17th century A.D. There have been no dearth of expressions to describe the most prolific of all Himalayan regions since then. The state’s highways abound with signs reading Kashmir is the ‘Fruit Bowl of the Country,’ ‘A Flower Bed’ and ‘The Crown of India.’ Pity some vested interests have made this crown one of ‘bloody thorns’ – but that is another matter altogether. [continue reading…]
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Is it possible to cover the entire span of the Himalayas from Kashmir to Arunachal Pradesh as one unbroken journey by road? Yes, it is. And I am setting out to show how it can be done, starting January 29, 2010. And I will drive for approximately 120 days.
Billed to be a trip never done before (certainly not in recorded memory), the journey will stretch from the western border of the Indian Himalayas in Kashmir to the eastern end in Arunachal Pradesh. It will also go through Ladakh, Lahaul Spiti, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan, West Bengal, Assam, Nagaland and Manipur.
The journey has been made possible with sponsorships from TripAdvisor.in and Yatra.com. Keen to know more about the trip? Click here…
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The longest and most interesting dance at the Hemis Festival depicts the eight forms of Padmasambhava, or Guru Rinpoche, who is credited with establishing Buddhism as the religion of the people of Tibet and Ladakh in the eight century A.D.
[Click on any image for a larger view] [continue reading…]
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By the ninth century A.D., the rise of Buddhism at the expense of the Bon religion prompted the Bon King of Tibet, Langdarma, to prosecute Buddhists; monks were forced to shed their robes while they saw their monasteries being dismantled. In frustration, a powerful monk Palji Dorge came dancing dressed in a wide brimmed black hat, high boots and silk brocade costumes and assassinated the king with an arrow in Lhasa.
[Click on any image for a larger view] [continue reading…]
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I am sure I have been present at monasteries around lunch time, but only at Karsha monastery did I hear a conch being blown informing all the resident lamas, about 120 in all, it was time for the meals.
The 11th century monastery was built by Buddhist master Zanskar Lotsawa Phakpa Sherab who introduced Buddhism to this valley. Its thirty building, constructed in a cascade style along a hill face, have come up over the centuries and not all at one go. He was followed by other masters like Tungpa gyaltsa Pa, Thapuwa Dhamcheu Gyaltsen and Dupkhang Guelek Gyatso who established Karsha a major scholastic centre of Buddhist studies. [continue reading…]
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All through the summers, dozens of women take up spots on the pavements of the main bazaar of Leh to sell vegetables. One look at these and you will be surprised how fresh and healthy the vegetables look. Where do they get such high quality supplies in a high altitude desert like Ladakh?
Surprise!! They grow these themselves. In nearby villages. Without making an effort, these vegetables are better than the ones with the fanciest organic markings all over the world. Reason? Fertiliser use is very low. And the fields are usually used for only one crop a year, giving the soil plenty of time to get its nutrients back. Tough to grow anything when temperatures go 30 degrees below zero, right? [continue reading…]
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When a seven year old lama cries for his family, how do the senior lamas handle it? They give him a sweet to pacify him. If that does not work, a little whack behind the ear certainly does.
[Click on the images for a larger view]
Jigmet and the other lamas, all in their late teens to the early twenties, at the Hemis monastery were laughing when they gave me this answer. However, I got a more philosophical answer from His Holiness, the XII Gyalwang Drukpa, who believes in taking a long term view of what is good for the person. And knowing that the bonds of love are stronger than any iron chains. [continue reading…]
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What would you think when a girl in the third grade says she wants to be a cop when she grows up? And this sounds interestingly ambitious when this girl lives in the small town of Padum in the Zanskar valley in Ladakh, a full day’s drive away from the nearest urban settlement of Kargil. That’s Zarina for you (with the yellow headscarf in the picture).
I got chatting with her while walking around Padum on a July 2008 evening. She was coming back from the mosque (she is Muslim) after offering evening prayers, and going back home with a group of three other girls, all of the same age group. Actually she started the conversation with a “Hello” and a big smile. Both her smile and ability to address a stranger like this were charming in themselves. My reply of a “Hello” was followed with a “How are you” from her. After saying “I am fine,” I decided to pursue the conversation in English and asked the name of her school. And suddenly she was embarrassed and could not reply; maybe her vocabulary did not cover my words, or my accent was the problem, or she just decided to feel shy suddenly. [continue reading…]
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Many Buddhist monasteries in the Ladakh and Tibetan regions have a tradition of annual festivals, going back hundreds of years. They are usually dance spectacles with colourful costumes and masks adorned by the lamas (monks) for the occasion. Solemn ceremonies in their own way, it borders on the amusing when you see them practicing leading up to the big day. Like I was witness to at the Phiyang Monastery near Leh in July 2008 a few days before their festival.
For one, it was an opportunity to see the lamas let their guard down away from public eye and behave just like lesser mortals; they were practising in an area usually not open to outsiders. Before I witnessed these sessions, the image of a lama came across as someone who smiled but did not laugh, one who spoke but did not talk too much and one who always seemed a bit serious about everything. [continue reading…]
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A sign seen at a Muslim village from Zanskar to Kargil in Ladakh
A major concern of the Buddhist Ladakhis is the population increase by Muslims in Ladakh, where the latter are in a minority, as part of a plan to disrupt the existing demographic patterns. If true, the consequences could be socio-economic as well as political in nature. This worrying aspect came to my attention when locals in Ladakh told me what I have written here.
And for those indulging in such practices, the law helps them too: in India, polygamy for Muslims is allowed but not for other communities. As a result, large Muslim families are not a surprise with each wife bearing more than a couple of children. The Buddhists feel Muslims are spreading their influence in the mostly Buddhist areas of Ladakh by consciously having many more children – some men have been said to father over 20 – and buying property. The Buddhists believe the money to buy such property and support large families comes from the rich benefactors in the Middle East. [continue reading…]
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One of the surprises in Ladakh was the sight of workers at road building projects all the way from the states of Bihar and Jharkhand in the northern plains of India. Workers from these two states are known to be migratory in nature, going across to all parts of the country in search of employment. But coming to the cold, high altitude desert region is another thing.
All across the Indian Himalayas, it is common to see road construction activity going on; these include new roads, repair and expansion of existing ones and building of tunnels. Often contracted to private companies, they tend to get the cheapest labour to work for them to keep costs down. Hence the reliance on these migratory workers. [continue reading…]
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The Indus river evokes memories of history lessons from school as one of the earliest human civilizations came up along its banks in the plains of the Indian subcontinent. Captured here are some images of the river near Leh in Ladakh at different times of the evening, including the moment when the moon was rising above it.
Click here to view the full set on Flickr. The images of the streams were taken in the forested area along its banks. You may email me should you want to order any prints, or visit the Kunzum Gallery to see more prints to order.
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