Books and reading

I did not read anything apart from itinerary related items online before our trip. At the airport on our way from Kolkata to Bagdogra I found The Secret Diary of Kasturba in the bookshop, however I did not buy it as I was trying to travel light.
I could not find a bookshop when we flew out of the international terminal in Kolkata and it was not available in the Toowoomba library, however I found it as an ebook on Amazon and bought it.
It is a novel, as Ghandi's wife was illiterate, but it gave another perspective on his life after reading his book and another a couple of years back. Judging by the list of references in the back, it was quire well researched and very readable. Knowing something of Ghandi and his search for 'the truth' a term which does not seem to be a good translation, I feel that this helps in trying to understand and appreciate India.
In the past I also read a book by Naipaul and another by a Kolkata journalist on the divisions in India and what has occurred in the past.
Kolkata itself has had a tumultuous past, despite being a very recent city founded at the end of the 17th century by the East India Company.

I picked up a book to read while staying at The Barfung Retreat at Ravangla in Sikkim.
Nine Lives by William Dalrymple, a Scot living near Delhi is subtitled In search of the sacred in modern India. It is a series of stories he has gathered in his travels which illustrate the diversity and acceptance of people within India and has reference to some ideas we have picked up from our Indian philosophy studies and experiences on this trip. I was able to borrow it from Toowoomba library and will continue to read books by him.

While reading these books I was googling Kalimpong and the Odlings as we had visited Crookety, their home where Dr Graham died. I felt that the Steels had probably been there, although it now seems unlikely as it was built about 1940 and sold in 1947. I did however come across a wonderful website A Journey through Western Tibet 1938 with Journals of two young Americans, Vanderhoef and Cummings who stayed with the Odlings at their previous house Glen Rilli in Kalimpong at the same time as Sheena's sister Elizabeth. Their accounts and photos of their trek were most enjoyable reading and added to the bits we picked up from Alister regarding Tibetan buddhism while visiting monasteries in Sikkim.

I returned Nine Lives and came home from the library with Calcutta by Simon Winchester which I chanced upon while looking for books on Japan. Another collection of short stories which are particularly suited to the hot weather and life indoors with the tennis on TV. Again it is well written and gave interesting impressions of the city of palaces, although perhaps a bit out of date and Bristish oriented.

At the same time as these books, I have endeavoured to read Stories from the Punjab, a collection of folk stories by Flora Annie Steel and published in 1894. I bought many years ago in Innisfail. It is illustrated by the father of Rudyard Kipling.

At Barfung, Liz was reading Sikkim Requiem for a Himalayan Kingdom, which she recommended so I ordered it online when we got back. It has sat while I worked my way through India, but again it ties in with my previous reading.
I  have found it interesting to read, but not very pertinent to our trip although I will look forward to finishing it before we return to Sikkim. I hope we can go to Gangtok and North Sikkim with Alister some time and to the Tibetan border.

Home again

We landed in Singapore at 4.45 am and said goodbye to Liz and Mike, then had 2 hours before our flight to Brisbane. It was an almost empty flight and we had a pair of seats by the window. I was able to lie across seats in the middle for a couple of hours.
The flight arrived in Brisbane at 5pm and Emily collected us. A quick trip back to Yeronga through the tunnels and coffee at her place, then we hopped in the Impreza and were back in Toowoomba around 7.30 to drop Denise, then home past the tasteless excessive Christmas lights of some houses.
After the long last day of the trip, it was good to have good flights home.

Dimapur-Kolkata-Singapore

The Resort hosted an outdoor wedding with very loud music until well after midnight so we started our last day with less than ideal rest.
It was nice to meet Dick for the early morning walk around the resort which was beside a broad river bed, a fancy mansion and a large anthurium nursery.
We drove to the Kachari ruins which were interesting.

Almost next door was a large market and we spent some time wandering among the food items.

We were at Dimapur airport in good time as Alister and the drivers were going back to Guwahati where he would take the train back to Siliguri for his next tour - again to West Sikkim.
Fortunately we got seats by the window in the departure lounge although there was little happening as planes were delayed. After a while they provided us with water and snacks and we eventually got on our plane a couple of hours late.
We were further delayed once we got to Kolkata airport as the luggage was very slow to emerge and came in separate times. Dick's bag, identical to mine, did not appear until about an hour later. Then we had to find our tour guide to take us to the hotel. We did not have time to go to lunch as planned, in fact, once we got to the hotel, we only had about an hour to shower and freshen up before we headed back to the airport where we managed to buy a snack before the plane boarded.

Khonoma to Dimapur

I had a nice morning walk along a lower road towards Dick's homestay, although I ran out of time to get all the way.
After breakfast we had a wonderful walk around the village, stopping at Dick's homestay for tea before going down to the ricefields, then walking up them before climbing back to the village for lunch.
After lunch we headed off to Dimapur. Another long slow drive.
We were tired when we got to the Niathu Resort which consisted of two storey chalets. It was nicely done and we were glad to relax with a cup of tea in our room. Unfortunately I did not work out the hot water switch and had to wash my hair in cold water which left me quite cold.

Khonoma

After a chilly night in our tents, conveniently sited at the end of a gully which contained a frozen stream, we had a short wander along the ice covered water in the valley before heading out with the prospect of a late lunch back at our homestay if someone could alert Ketho on their mobile.
We quickly warmed up as we climbed out in the sunshine and were glad to get to the tunnel through the vegetation then up to the forest.