McLeod Ganj and Dharmasala

This blog is going to be a long one because this weekend trip to McLeod Ganj was just amazing. I have decided that it is by far my favorite place in India and maybe one of my favorite places in the world. So get a cup of chai and hopefully my entry will give some better insight into this wonderful weekend set in a wonderful place!

I went with two of my good friends, Evan and Dana, to Dharmasala and McLeod Ganj. These two towns are located in the mountainous state of Himachal Pradesh in north-western India. The region is known for it stunning Himalayan vistas, severe arid-mountain landscapes, and its unique Indo-Tibetan culture. McLeod Ganj is also the ‘temporary’ home of the Dali Lama while he is in exile and thus these two towns have become the Tibetan exile and refugee center in India. The towns are more Tibetan communities than Indian at this point.

We arrived via sleeper bus. However, the name of such a vehicle betrays its true nature. While one may be able to lay down, the bus hardly has the capacity to give a restful nights sleep. The roads in India, especially in the northern states and mountainous regions, are notoriously bad. It was not uncommon to be thrown up into the air as we hit a bump just as one is about to fall asleep. I think I got maybe 2-4 hours of sleep.

Nonetheless, the journey was worth it. Arriving in the morning, we got off the bus and were engulfed in the crisp, clean, and slightly brisk mountain air. It was wonderful. While Delhi has finally started to cool down, being in the mountains made it truly feel like winter. The subtle dirt and alpine scent permeated the town and it made me feel incredibly alive.

We were able to see the Dali Lama speak. He gives teachings at the monastery every so often when he is in town and not around the world traveling. It was a fascinating sight. Monks dressed in robes crowded the upper terrace of the monastery. Old men and women occasionally got up with their palms touching and lifted them first to the sky, then to the direction of the Dali Lama (even if they could not see him except on a TV screen), and then bowed face down to the ground. Young Tibetan families were out in droves to come hear his teachings and young kids would play in the courtyard. Weird, long or dreadlock- haired foreigners would also be sitting cross legged trying for their own attempt at spiritual enlightenment, even though, honestly, it seemed like many were trying just too hard to ever reach a place of Buddhist bliss. While I listened to the Dali Lama teach on Buddhism, I must say that I was more interested in watching all these people then actually listening to the teachings.

Besides, my mind was on the evening to come…

You see, last Friday was Diwali (if you would like you can look at an earlier blog to learn a little more about it, see “Fireworks”). Evan and I had stockpiled a huge mass of fireworks from Delhi and then lugged them here where we would celebrate Diwali with a definite “BOOM!” Evan and I, like a five year-old on Christmas Eve, were gitty with anticipation as it slowly became night. We had already lit a few earlier during the day just because we were that excited. We even bought more fireworks at the local bizarre because, well, can one really have too many fireworks for Diwali?

After anxiously waiting for dark, the festivities began. It was great! Children in California have been deprived the joy of fireworks for too long! We went and joined with the hotel owners who were Hindu (as opposed to Tibetan Buddhists, it is a Hindu holiday) and light one after the next. There were bombs which exploded with a flash and an ear deafening “BOOM!” There were cones that lit from the top and then erupted a 20-foot fountain of sparks into the air. Here were tops that lit and spun while sparks flew out of the sides up it. There were singular rockets that shot up into the air and exploded. But what we were most excited about were the box sets…

The owners and us went to the roof were we brought our most expensive (and largest!) fireworks. We had two box sets that would collectively fire 80 rockets into the sky and put on a mini-show for us over the course of a few minutes. It was phenomenal. The box sets were amazing. They were like a professional show and I am not kidding! It was as good as some professional shows I have seen in the States. Rocket after rocket flew into the sky. Some sparkled, some were just big booms, some were multi-colored. They even had finales where 10-15 rockets were sent into the air. It was truly amazing. When it was done, the kids from around the neighborhood, and indeed around the entire valley (the town is perched on a crescent-shaped slope so everyone could see all the fireworks going on in the town) cheered with enthusiasm and approval when the show was done. I could have been one of the kids. I was just as entranced and looked up at the sky in a kind of half-bewildered wonder.

Diwali was great. The valley was filled with the sounds of explosions for the rest of the night. When we finally decided to call it quits after 3 hours of our own fireworks, we went to a bar to get a drink. The streets seemed like a war zone with fire-crackers, spinning tops, and so on. I mean you really had to watch your step. And all of this in a town that was a majority Tibetan Buddhist! I can only imagine what Delhi must have been like.

The next day, we hiked around the hills a bit but we mainly just cat-napped the day away. It was wonderfully relaxing. We wandered the bazaar where red-clad Tibetan monks mingled with store keepers and food vendors sold delicious steamed momos for 25 cents. We explored hole-in-the-wall restaurants and had great hot tea. It was relatively quite, no honking, no overly-aggressive vendors, just lots of smiling. It didn’t feel like the India I have known and come to love. It was just… peaceful.

The final day we went back to the monastery to see what it was like without the Dali Lama there. It was wonderful. Perched on a hill, it had amazing Himalayan views and a wonderfully peaceful feeling. In the cobble-stone courtyard, kids played tag, and monks talked on a bench under the trees which were just losing their last leaves. Candles were lit for prayers and the sight of hundreds of candles was truly beautiful. It was delightful.

We continued to wander around and walked into the valley a little. Pink blossoms were blooming on trees over a stepped farm on the side of the mountain. Prayer flags were strewn across the pine trees and flapped in the wind. The town buildings with their sheer building faces overlooked this crescent valley. The weather was just right, a slight chill to take the heat off of any hike in the hills. As the sun set and we watched the light shine through the blossoming trees onto a harvested farm, we could see the red garb of monks in the distance on the winding road. We felt like we had found a little piece of paradise.

But I think one of the best parts of the trip was the company. Evan and Dana are wonderful people to travel with because they are open for adventures and love to talk about anything and everything. They can be deep and intellectual at times with insightful observations on India, our experience, life, etc. Or they can be sentimental and poignant; over the course of one dinner we just shared stories about our families and good childhood memories. But they can also be total goofs where we play with our food or end up talking about how our boogers here in India are always black (Pollution? Dirt? The world will never know…). We went to a Korean restaurant two nights in a row. I think some of my best memories of India will be with them in that restaurant, laughing until our sides hurt at one moment and then consoling each other the next moment by the fire of the restaurant because we all thought it felt like Christmas time and felt that slight pang of homesickness.

Overall, it was an excellent weekend. Diwali was blast (literally!) but the rest of the weekend was like a rest for my soul. It was like a fairytale. In those mountains, where the horrors of Chinese occupation and Tibetan exile are ever present, where Tibetan culture is challenged by Bollywood films and Chinese pop songs, where despite the beauty of the mountains it is still not their homeland of Tibet, the idea and community of Tibet seemed to thrive nonetheless. It seemed like a utopian community, but a melancholy one. There seemed to be a deep sense of tradition, of prayer, and of compassion. But there also seemed the pain of a deep longing to return to Tibet. It made me want to travel to Tibet and see what kind of land would create such a kind of people. Why is it that an entire community here could be so kind and gentle? How could an entire people be so good? But then again, after enjoying the company of Evan and Dana, it also makes me think that maybe such ‘goodness’ in people is ever-present, it just takes a weekend in the hills, some fireworks, maybe a few pots of hot tea, and some good conversation.