Daramsala and Kashmir

Srinagar old city. A place with lots of old fashion charm, the massive presence of the Indian army and goodhearted but bitter-sweet locals who take every opportunity to tell us confused foreigners that: "We want freedom, that's what we want!"


The local people are masters of their ovens. They make delicious bagel-like tandoori bread with sesame seed and all kinds of biscuits and cakes.


There are beautiful old mosques in Srinagar city. This is one of them. ....Muslim fitness with devotion.


The weather changes by the minute around here. Now the big clouds are creeping up on us.


This is a small mountain-village of Aru and the local bus that comes ones a day and goes back the next day. But for the winter these villages get cut off from the rest of the world by the snow for months at a time.


Some local mountain boys. These people speak Urdu and a local language called Kashmiri that is a mix of Hindi, Urdu and Arabic.


The country side of Kashmir is out of a fable-book. Mainly high pastures and snow-capped mountains. There are plenty of madly running rivers fed by melting glaciers to keep the foliage as green as it can get.


Two good local merchants...


"If your mosque wants to play the loudest muezzin call, be our client."


Kashmir is the land of splendid garments made of local silk, pashmina, wool and other delicate fabrics.


The local architecture is large houses mainly made of wood and bare red-brick.


Welcome to Kashmir, according to the Indian government; the northest state of India, according to the local Muslim communities; autonomous territory, forcefully occupied by the Indian Army since 1948.


Smiling Tosca Pontillo


Smiling Gabrielle Stassi


Lots of sheep and goats. The tender hair growing from the cheek and the bottom-neck part of the local goats is called Pashmina. Apparently the finest quality of wool on the market. Depending on what is the pashmina percentage in let's say a Kashmir shawl, it's value goes up tremendously.


But at least we did it with style. This is how it looks when you sit on your rucksack and slide down a mighty glacier (well.. practically mainly on your ice-soaked butt)


Sometimes the Himalaya can be real deceiving. Peaks that look real close, can be pretty damn' fare. After about 3800m being short on time and equipment, we had to turn back.





We took a three day hike, setting out to conquer the first range of the Himalayas. The peak I am looking at on the second morning was the final target at 4200m.

This is from our balcony. Step-aunty is creating some crop-circles in the yard.

Buddhist temple interior.


Well not only His Excellency, but the whole Tibetan government in exile is harbored here in a village called Meclaudeganj.





So after Sikh-land Punjab, we found ourselves back up at the foothills of the majestic Hymalaya. The town is called Daramsala, one of the local unique features is the Dalai Lama as a permanent resident since the 50's.

A visit at my Sikh brother's...

Some of the turbans are enormous. This is a baptized Sikh. They by law allowed to carry weapons on themselves. And so they do. Some just small knifes, but some of them are walking around with huge swords and two-three meter long spears. Of course all these is representative, to protect the weak and oppressed.

People are queuing to see the holy book.

"We are from New York, U.S.A." It is a dream of every Sikh on the world to come to the Golden temple at least ones in their life.

Taking a rest.

The temple compound also gives free or cheap accommodation to the pilgrims. If you get a room, you lucky. If not, you can still sleep in the courtyard of the hotel. Like so.

On a busy weekend approximately fifty thousand people eat in the eatery, the meals are being portioned out by "waiters" running up and down the lines of people with big buckets of food. They do so with such speed, that when they splash the dal on your plate, parts of it can even end up on your shoulder.

But thank god there are plenty of people ready to help out for a few hours to peel, cut and chop.

The kitchen looks like a medieval food factory with immense proportions.

One of the major features of the Sikh temples is the "people's kitchen". It is open 24/7, operated largely by voluntaries and the food is free.

This is a chapati- machine.

Afternoon chit-chat...

The lake surrounding the golden temple is considered to be holy, so a good dip in the water is highly recommended by the followers.

Sikh man allways wear a turban, and never ever cut their hair.

This is the golden temple, the holiest place of the sikh religion in Amritsar, Punjab. Inside the temple they keep (and continuously recite) the holy book of the Sikh religion that was born in the sixteen hundreds and is based on the brotherhood of all mankind.

I need some hot stuff...

As the final conclusion, the skin of the Rajastan desert people may look like dried beef-jerky, but if you take the time to look deeper under the coarse skin there is a soft and ever so open heart.

Ram-Ram :-)

What gives rajastani food that lethal kick?!

The streets of Jaisalmer are full of life at the evenings.

The vehicles parking in front of the house. And a black goat that must be feeling a bit inferior.

The local tourist industry tries real hard to capture the heart (wallet) of the foreign visitors:-

Until the beginning of the last century Jaisalmer was home to several big families that possessed immense amounts of wealth mainly due to the bloom of international opium trade. This photo shows the facade of a family palace of one of these clans. The intricate stonework is done on send-stone which is used mainly throughout the whole city. Sand-stone gives out a golden glow when gets wet after the rain. This is where Jaisalmer got it's nickname; "the golden city".

A proud grandfather.

The only tree in eyesight.

It looks lonely, but when you get close, it harbors all forms of life. And the camels give the leaves a neat trim on the bottom.

Most of the times I find it real difficult to observe local life as it is, because as soon as we appear, this is what happens.

But if you do work up the guts to go out into the desert, you find treasures in the small villages.

These are three gems here.

Dashing trough the west-Rajastan desert on a small moped around noon time (42-45 C) is a very safe thing to do, 'cause the roads are practically deserted. The locals know it better. They thought we are insane.

We've found this nice old Baba up the hill. He is the first Baba I met that does not smoke. But he did make a splendid chai for us.

I just have learneth that the camel keeps his water supplies in and around his knees. Than it makes me wonder what is in the hump?! Maybe his knee-caps?

A high-tech moment of an old couple.

Two gypsy girls in Jaisalmer. They did everything they could to sell us this little doll that can be flipped upside-down so it changes from Prince into princess.

This is a holy lake (whatever is left of it since it hasn't rained here over 3 years) in Jaisalmer, this hot-hot desert city just off the Pakistan border.

N/c

This is the mighty-big fort of Jodhpur. It has immense proportions and amazing send stone buildings.

Jodhpur is called the Blue City since back in the days the old city was highly populated by Brahmin families and theirs is the only cast that can paint their houses blue.

In the tiny streets of the old city there are thousands of these small little shops, selling just about everything. At the hot afternoons they have a real meditative vibe.

 After Pushkar we headed west towards the Pakistan border. Our first stop was Jodpur, this large and happening desert city with an eighteenth century charm. This is a young tailor. His age at the workplace doesn't raise too many eyebrows. This is India.