By Nabamita Mitra
The trip to Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh was the result of days of deliberations and series of altercations with my friend, who had come to Shillong from Delhi. Finally, on July 16 we left for our destination, almost unprepared for the trip.In our haste, we completely forgot about getting the inner line permit papers and decided to get it from Tezpur, from where we were to take a tourist Sumo to Tawang. Between Tezpur and Tawang, it was an eventful time.Time in this passage is divided on the basis of its flow and will have its ebbs and tides. The anecdotes, which can be stringed together into a travelogue, will focus more on the trying times and the hurdles and hassles of the journey. This negativity in narration of the road to Tawang is not only to overcome the monotony of praises by awe-struck tourists but also to highlight the appalling picture behind a façade.
Tezpur travails
Tezpur was our transit point. Passenger cars to Tawang are available every morning. The plan was to reach Tezpur by noon and take a car to Tawang. However, the first mistake, albeit unknowingly, which we made was taking a bus to Tezpur from Guwahati via Nagaon. It takes not less than five hours, unless the conductor and the driver feel too lonely to run with 5-6 passengers and decide to delay departure time by 45 minutes, in taking that detour. Later, we came to know about the route through bypass. It takes less than three hours on a lucky day.The bus conductor asked us to get down in Nagaon and showed another bus. On enquiring he said there were not enough passengers to Tezpur. Our travail had already begun, again without us being aware of it. By the time we reached Tezpur it was already 12 and we were hungry.After picking up munchies we took an auto (we were told by the food joint owner that the fare to the bus stand was Rs 10 and so we expected a short journey). But the path seemed never-ending and when we realised that we were going in the wrong direction it was too late.After an argument, we left in a huff for another ride, this time a gentleman who dropped us at the bus stop at a cost of Rs 100 (this was despite us sharing the ride with at last five other passengers).However, the ordeal took an hour of our precious time and we had already missed the car. That meant that we had to spend the night in a nearby hotel. The man at the counter, who had helped us with the inner line permit papers, promised comfortable accommodation and asked a “colleague” to show us the way to ‘XYZ hotel’.There is no end to deception in this mortal world and that we learnt so well on our trip.The hotel, though looked decent from outside, turned out a damp squib inside. With broken toilet flush and clogged drain in the bathroom, used towels and stained bed sheets, the young manager, a Bengali from Assam, was shameless to smile and quote Rs 1,200 a night.After threatening to call up an imaginary friend in Tezpur and walking out of the hotel, we settled for Rs 600, a new towel (which they had to buy from the nearby market) and a starched bed sheet.As the sultry summer and the day’s hassles took a toll on us, we melted in the bed immediately after taking bath. The next day was to start early.
Tawang, finally
We were told at the counter that the shared vehicle would pick us up at 5am. So both my friend and I were ready. When we got into the Sumo, there were only two passengers, the mother-son were from Bomdila. The vehicle took us back to the bus stop where it waited for 45 minutes for passengers. When asked, the driver nonchalantly answered it was the regular practice and we should learn to be patient.By the time we started for Tawang, it was 7am. The journey was 12-hour long and we would be left with no time to go around the town after reaching Tawang. But the road trip through the snaky broken roads of Arunachal (till then we had no idea what nightmare awaited us) looked promising despite the fact that two of us managed seats at the back of the Sumo. A young army jawan, who later told us that he was from Himachal Pradesh and would go beyond Tawang, smirked at me and said, “Brace for a hard journey.”The Kameng river started following us from Bhalukpong, the border locality where papers were checked and formalities done to ensure there were no illegal migrants.The journey till Tippi in West Kameng was pleasant. Once the vehicle crossed Tippi, where we had stopped for refreshment, the real hurdle started. The road (if we could call it that) was broken beyond repair though JCBs and workers were busy fixing it. The car had to stop several times to make way for vehicles coming from the opposite direction. Later, a tourist car driver told us that the road remains perpetually broken and despite the Border Roads Organisation’s eight-year struggle, no solution could be reached.We overcame the fatigue and muscle cramps at 6th Mile with a sumptuous meal of roti/rice, vegetables and chicken. The spicy chutney was a booster and we were ready for another roller-coaster ride.It was a joyride for more than an hour and the road smoothened as the car neared Sela. The Sela Pass is located between Tawang and West Kameng districts and one of the highest points in the region. The vehicle stopped again for another round of refreshment. The Sela Lake reflecting the Tibetan flags of multiple colours was serene and mysterious. Clouds slithered down the mountain slopes to settle atop the lake making it look even more enigmatic.After a break of 30 minutes, the vehicle and its passengers were ready to continue the journey but only for a few minutes. A senior army official was travelling with his family in a car followed by a convoy. The pace of the vehicles was sluggish owing to the mucky and broken road but as the traffic halted, a state police man came up to us with an apologetic smile and informed that the army official’s wife wanted to take photographs. Since the road was broad enough for one vehicle, there was nothing we could do but wait.The dilapidated road continued till we reached Tawang. It got worse in places where there were landslips a few days ago following incessant rain. It was surprising how, despite the advanced technology at hand, the BRO had failed to provide tough roads in almost a decade. This is despite the fact that Tawang is a popular tourist site.No wonder the bad roads had prompted locals to come up with imaginative one-liners written on rusty signboards. While one said ‘Safety on road is safe tea at home’ as a warning against drunken driving and speeding, another read ‘Check your nerves on my curves’ as a pointer to hairpin curves.By the time we reached Tawang, we had exceeded the 12-hour threshold and it was almost 9.30pm. Our two co-passengers, both army jawans, turned out to be real gentlemen who not only found us a room to stay but helped us get dinner at a Bengali restaurant (Bengalis from Tezpur are in large number in the town and Bengali food corners are dominating). By 9.30 pm all shops, barring the liquor counter, were closed in Tawang. It was July 17.
Disheartened
Tawang, till that day, was a utopia hidden behind the mountains and clouds. It would have remained so had not the traitor daylight revealed the changing face of the sleepy town that stirs up only by the gongs of the monastery bell. The town that still plays with our imagination has met the same fate led by greed and development. Ugly concrete structures mushrooming on mountains, heaps of bricks and cement on the roadside, the air carrying dust and construction particles and too many tourist vehicles can dishearten any first-time visitor. The Buddha’s life size statue in meditation and the monastery are the only attractions in the rapidly urbanising Tawang. We started from Tawang on the same afternoon. On our way back, the driver showed us a five-star hotel under construction. It was the chief minister’s project and a coveted one. In a few years, Tawang will have ‘luxury’ on offer.The whole trip back, my friend and I continued sulking about the onslaught of capitalism and fatal politics. The road back was the same old wreckage so we hardly paid any attention except at a point after Sela where tyres started skidding because of excessive muck.As the vehicle stopped in front of Padma Momos, a dimly lit eatery run by a Nepalese woman, around 7pm we decided to stop fretting over changing times. Steaming chicken momos came on a platter with a pinch of a mix of indigenous spices and soup. The food made up for the broken roads and the Tawang we did not imagine. We thanked the driver for the stop.As the car bumped forward, we felt the urge to take a nap. The momos were filling and made us stretch joyfully. It was another four hours before we reached Bhalukpong. Without delay we cosied up on the seats, bidding goodbye to Tawang and promising to return to witness the transformation.