After
a rather
tiring day of air travel, I manage to get a good night’s
sleep and
find myself refreshingly
fresh and fully woken up
around
5 AM
itself in the morning.
I slide the
curtains provided on
the solitary window in my
hotel room slightly
and
have a look
outside. It is surprising to
see that at
such an early hour, the
dawn has already broken through the darkness
of the night.
I realise
though, that
my watch,
showing Indian standard time,
is
actually slow
by at least
an hour, when compared with
the local time at
Shillong.
The sun rises in Shillong
about
an hour earlier,
compared to
my home town Pune, because it
is
situated
so much
in
the
east. With local time and
Indian standard time
differing so much, there are
anomalies such as sunrise at 5.30 AM and sun setting at 4.30 PM. What
is really
needed is
to have an eastern Indian standard time, something similar to what they have in the
US, where east and west
coasts have different standard times. But with the
bureaucratic set up of mind
of the federal Government in Delhi, who cares if
people living in some far
away parts of country, face practical difficulties such as schools
and offices closing well past sunset.
I get
ready and after a sumptuous breakfast,
get out in the warm late
morning sun. The weather is
crisp cool, extremely
pleasant and
reminds me of the winter weather in my home town Pune. The hotel
courtyard is nicely designed with number of flowering shrubs and
orchids having been planted all around. Some of the shrubs are
blooming and the camera enthusiasts from our group get clicking. Soon
it is the time
to move on our first day's
sight seeing.
Shillong,
the capital of Meghalaya
state of India, is
a charming city
with a population that touches just about one hundred and fifty
thousand. This city,
located amongst the "Khasi" hills of Meghalaya, with an
average altitude of about 5000 feet, is more like a hill station,
with almost all the major roads laid along steep climbs and slopes. I
am much reminded of the downtown area of San Francisco city.
The city appears quite clean
and well maintained. I can see wicker baskets placed on steel frames
mounted on the footpaths for garbage collection. The city appears to
have a large vehicle population though, as we encounter traffic jams
almost on every street corner. A military cantonment is located right
in the middle of the city and one needs to crisscross it all the time
while travelling within the city. I am reminded of having read
somewhere that Shillong
is called Scotland of the
east, because of its rolling hills. Since, I have never been to
Scotland I can not vouch for it, but I like
it
nevertheless.
Our
first destination is what is known as "Shillong
peak," a misnomer
really. It is just the top of a
small hillock having an
altitude of 6500 feet. The road,
leaving the main city, starts
climbing up almost
immediately after,and the
scenario undergoes a
sudden change. I can see lush
green foliage at many places with pine and other connifers
in abundance
with their needle like
leaves.I do not see any cones on the trees as yet. In fact this
entire hillock appears covered with lush green foliage. More than
half of the Shillong
peak hillock is occupied by
the Indian air force with their Eastern Air Command headquarters
built on one side. A huge radar antenna looms on the top of the hill.
The tourists still can go to the top of the hillock and see the
views but only towards northern direction. It is nevertheless a
wonderful drive up and I enjoy every mile of it. On one of the sharp
bends, a tree is in full bloom with pinkish white flowers. From the
distance, it appears as striking as a blossoming
Cherry tree. We are stopped
at an entry gate and the drivers are needed to get their names
registered with air force authorities. We move on, with even thicker
and bigger pine groves, appearing on road sides. We take a sharp bend
and finally arrive at the parking ground on the top.
The
authorities have built two observation towers that look towards north
with winding staircases. I climb to the top of one of them and have a
panoramic view of the
Shillong
city. Far beyond the city and
towards northwest, I see a huge reservoir of water, gleaming and
shining in late morning sun. The waters are of a huge lake, that
supplies water to Shillong
and is called "Bada
Pani"
or huge water. I am not much impressed with the view from the
observation tower though, which I feel is quite ordinary. What is far
more interesting is a cluster of 9 or 10 shops on hilltop selling
curios, souvenirs and
odd ethanic things
like hats, caps, scarves and shawls.
Everyone
in the group, crowds around the shops. One of the shops lets on hire,
tribal traditional Khasi clothing, worn by Khasi men and womenfolk.
Soon we have
15 or so, ladies from our group, dressed in long black skirts, red
blouses and a bright yellow cloth draped around with beaded strings
worn around their necks. One of our energetic young male member also
dresses himself in a
male tribal dress consisting of a red dhoti, black short coat and a
brightly coloured red turban complete with a sword and a shield. It
is an interesting sight, photo opportunity and great fun for
everyone. Rest of us get busy in clicking the
snaps. I buy for myself a hat
and then spend rest of the time looking for odd stuff displayed in
the shops. We are served freshly cut pineapple pieces, which taste
quite nice and go well with the upbeat mood of the group.
We
move on to our next destination for the day; the elephant falls,
which are located roughly about 8 or 10 Km from the "Shillong
peak."
There is nothing even
remotely elephantine about the fall, which is just a large impresive
waterfall with water falling in three short steps. The name was given
to it by the Britishers,
because they imagined that a rock near the falls resembled an
elephant. However this elephant shaped rock was destroyed in an
earthquake in 1897 and now only the name remains. The original
"Khasi" tribal name for the falls perhaps describes it
correctly as a three step fall. Our flotilla of cars stops at a
parking lot near top of the falls. From here it is a climb down to
the bottom and then climbing all the way up.
At the
first glance, elephant falls look like a manicured city garden; well
cut steps in the rock on a side of the falls,
tubular steel railings for
support, while climbing and going down. They even have a small bridge
across the falls, to approach the side steps that have been cut on
the other side of the fall. The water falls in three steps in a
disciplined fashion on a well defined course controlled by concrete
walls on sides. Just about a month back, I had visited some natural
waterfalls at “Thoseghar”
near my home town. Compared
to those falls, elephant falls look like a domesticated animal; no
hint of raging, wild behaviour, There is no wilderness at all here.
Nevertheless,
I walk down all the way to the bottom. From here the falls look
fairly impressive.
There
are a few souvenir
shops here too, on the side of
the
parking lot near the top of
the falls. Ladies from our group, again get themselves engrossed in
shopping. After climbing back, I sip some nicely brewed
hot "masala" tea
served by a local woman and relax for a while.
Finally, it’s the time to
move on again.
Our
next stop, 70
Km away, is at "Sohra"
town; commonly known as "Cherrapunji."
It is one of the wettest places on the surface of earth. In
preparation, I have been carrying a raincoat with me
just in case the downpour
starts during the visit. We take state highway 5 leading to the
south. The road appears to be in moderately good conditions, however
I keep seeing scores of
landsides on both sides of the road with huge, yellowish brown
tinged, large sized boulders strewn around with heaps of clay of
similar hue.
I feel
confused about the landslide theory as how can there be so many of
them on a short patch of road. Then I see some of the trucks ferrying
on the road. They all carry either sand, gravel or cut and
chiselled stone bricks. It is
obvious that quarrying is being done here on a huge scale probably
to feed the construction
activity in the area. Seeing the colour of the boulders and the
gravel, I get a feeling that they are probably
limestones
or sandstones. However a lady
in our group, who is a geologist, confirms that the stones are
actually of a special variety of granite known to geologists as
Gneiss.
According
to wikipedia,
Gneiss is a
common and widely distributed type of rock
formed by high-grade regional
metamorphic processes
from pre-existing formations that were originally either igneous or
sedimentary rocks. It
is often foliated (composed
of layers of sheet-like
planar structures).
So much so for the Geology, what is important to me is that these are
granites. Soon the landscape changes with the lush foliage of pine
and conifers all disappearing as we reach the
plateau, on which "Sohra"
town is located. The land is all barren now with just a few shrubs
growing that too at some spots only. The plateau however is not flat
or a tableland. There are series of small hillocks, almost of
half-round shape, around. I was expecting plenty of vegetation,
considering the fact that this place gets an average rainfall that is
in the vicinity of 10000 mm every year. However surprisingly the
landscape is devoid of any big trees. All that I can see around are
some shrubs and grass that is yellowing. This perhaps is due to fact
that rainfall in the months of November to January is minimal here.
There is no chance of rain today also. This means that we would miss
to experience the famed “Cherrapunji” showers.
The
cars stop near an impressive building that houses the "Ramkrishna
Mission School."
This school was founded in
1924 by Swami Prabhanandji
of
Ramkrishna
order, who was inspired by
the prophetic message of SwamiVivekananda.
We are here however not to visit the school, but to visit a small
anthropological museum that consists of just two large rooms on the
first floor. I climb the stairs overlooking the courtyard of the
school and a giant statue of Swami Vivekananda. The museum hosts a
fairly large number of exhibits that concern the tribal people of
Meghalaya; the Khasi, the
Garo
and the
Jaintia
tribes. Their traditional
clothes, the gadgets and appliances manufactured by them mainly from
bamboo and used by them for catching fish,
smoking tobacco leaves,
playing music are all nicely displayed along with lots of
anthropological information. Models of typical tribal houses and
villages of these three tribes also find a place. I however find that
it is virtually impossible to remember much of what I am seeinghere,
because photography is prohibited for unknown reasons and can only
mention my general observations. I see number of old ladies selling
Cinnamon pieces and bay leafs found in the forests in
the valleys outside of the
school buildings for tourists like us.
We
continue with our southward journey till we reach almost the end of
the plateau ending into
a deep valley with almost vertically cut rock faces. In fact, this
kind of geographical situation is the basic reason for "Cherrapunji"
to get all that world beating rainfall. The monsoon clouds from the
Bay of Bengal, fly unhindered over the plains of Bangladesh, before
they hit the Khasi hills. The rains push the clouds up to the height
of more than 4000 feet through the deep valleys on the "cherrapunji
plateau" and cause
extreme rainfall here. I
find that the phenomenon exactly similar to what happens on Western
Ghat
mountains in Western India.
There
is a small restaurant near the cliff face and we have hot lunch here,
which turns out to be quite enjoyable in the given setting. Just
ahead of us is one of the major attractions of "Cherrapunji;"
The Nohkalikal
falls. After lunch, I walk to
the edge of the cliff, where nice observation galleries have been
built. I see in front of me a deep valley, almost semi-circular in
shape, the
bare cliff faces cut off in
straight vertical lines and are devoid of any vegetation. Near the
top of the cliffs, on the lower side and everywhere else,
there is plenty of thick
green foliage. Around the middle point of the semi-circular cliff
top, a huge stream of water suddenly bursts out of the foliage and
falls hopelessly down to a height of 1115 feet and crashes in a pond
at the bottom, creating a cloud of mist. This water plunge is tallest
in India and fourth tallest in the world. I stand near the cliff
face, totally mesmerized by the fury and anguish of the falling
water. It is wilderness at it's best. Local tribes associate with the
fall, a gory tale of a young woman, who had jumped off the falls and
has given her name to the fall.
There
is another observation point at a lower level with paved steps. The
view from here is even better. I take few snaps and reluctantly
realise that its now the time to move on. I am back to the parking
ground and we motor further in southern direction still keeping to
the plateau. We are actually going along a circuitous route along the
edge of the plateau. Our driver tells me about another water fall on
way called "Seven sisters fall," but adds that there is no
water there in the fall. From there we
start moving northwards and
enter a densly wooded area known as Ecological park, signalling that
the "Sohra
plateau" has perhaps
ended. The road is also known as "Sohra-Shella
road."
The cars stop
near a vista point with a slightly rusted board on display, which
describes the place as "Kho
Ramhah
or Mow Trop." As I stand
on the age of the cliff, directly in front of me is a natural wonder;
a monolith rock formation approximately 200 feet high that resembles
a huge upturned conical wicker basket used by Khasi people. It is a
sight worth seeing no doubt, but what interests me more is what I see
lying beyond the rock and ahead almost stretched to the horizon.
Roughly
a thousand feet below, the hills end abruptly and a vast stretch of
flatland with scores of lakes, small and big, and all interspaces
filled with wetland marshes and lush green paddy
fields stretches to the
horizon. This is the Sylhet province of Bangladesh and seems to
contain every possible shade of green. I can see the Indian border
fence about 30 or 40 Km away
as a sharp black line through
my binoculars from this height. It was in this area, where Indian
Army's first heliborne
troops had attacked between
7th and 15th December 1971, against the Pakistani defences during
Bangladesh liberation war. The scenario before me is
so spell binding that I have
to be reminded that we need to move on.
We
continue our southwards journey and soon reach the last bit of
today's sightseeing plan; The
Mawsmai
cave.
To venture into unknown dark
world of a cave is not exactly my piece of cake, but I have seen at
least one of them earlier. I can recollect a visit to Luray Caverns
in the state of Virginia in US, where weird shapes formed by dripping
water containing Stalagmites and Stalactites surround you. The
Mawsmai
cave is a typical example of
this type but
is of very short length;just 150 meters. Our cars stop at a huge
parking ground and we climb a short flight of steps lost in dark
dense foliage, to face the mouth of the cave.
The cave has a spacious
opening and is well lit with electric lights and I can see the weird
rock shapes hanging from the ceiling and formed on the wall. I am in
two minds, whether to proceed, because of the severe foot pain and a
general constrain on my left
leg movement, because of
a flat foot problem that has developed since last several weeks. I
enter the cave and proceed for about 20 or 25 feet inside the cave.
But the cave is now squeezed
into a small neck. The cave also haapens to be a one way road and in
the middle region, there are
places, where you've to bend and squeeze yourself out. Considering
the state of my left leg, I become
accutely
aware that probably I may not
be able to make it as at number of places the cave bottom is quite
slippery. I finally give
up and return back the same way I had entered. It is no doubt a
disappointment but there really was no chance of my completing the
journey through just of 150 meters.
Its
dusk already and a hot cup of tea welcomes me at the point from where
I had started for the cave. We start back for
Shillong
and reach there right at
dinner time. Somewhere on the way, the rain catches with us with a
blinding fury. There was no rain at Cherrapunji, where I was
expecting it. I keep wondering about the vagaries of nature. However, back at the hotel, It is the time for a warm dinner and bedtime as the night had
already turned chilly.
( To
be continued)
12th
November 2014
