DARJEELING - THE HOME OF HIMALAYAN AMBITIONS

Just another visit and yet I call it home. Home of Himalayan ambitions. Home to stubborn ambitions that doggedly resurface time and again. Obsessive, and welcoming. That strange corner of the Himalayas where the psychological gear truly shifts. Where the Kangchenjunga looms above, in formidable proportions. Rising every morning through the dark skies, bathed by a mere orange streak, that panoramically hits only those sacred peaks first, as if to lay down the true hierarchy of nature. Tourists tongues have rolled out the name of this view point 'Tiger Hill' through the years.

Brightly painted monasteries that hang down the mountainside like pendants in a necklace in the chain of mountain civilization. Monks with a freshness to be rivaled by only mountain grass in the monsoons.

Tea gardens, that heady British brew, for which Indian gratitude, at least to mind, is well in order. Yet there is nothing more pleasant than the chinky eyes and pretty faces, the cultural charm of Darj. Add to that the British churches and great educational institutions, cheese from Sikkim, confectionery from Keventer's or Glenary, the hotels and cottages with their sloping roofs and wooden floors. Couple that with Landrovers ( of the 50s ! ), music that mixes both Nepalese and Hindi within the strumming of the guitar. Noodles and thupkas for the noses. All this and more lets Darj take over all five senses.

There is that funny something about the place. The ambience, believe it or not, is full with healthy bodies and minds. It resounds with mountaineering legends. And tales of peaks. Some isolated references to even the Yeti ! Orchids, with more than 600 varieties. Rhododendrons, magnolias and primulas, snow leopards and the quaint and cuddly Panda. The yak as the beast of burden at the higher altitudes and its cousins - the Dzo or the Orang at lower climes. Glaciers, seracs and moraines and then just what is expected. One of the worlds most reputed mountaineering institutes - Himalayan Mountaineering Institute ( HMI ). Among the faculty today, are five Everesters ! Dorje Lhatoo a recepient of the Tenzing Norgay Award for contribution to mountaineering, Nawang Gombu, the present Director of the Institute, also the first man in the world to have scaled Everest twice, a worthy successor to Tenzing Norgay, the former Director of HMI. And of course many many sherpas who have left their footprints on the snows of Kangchenjunga, Everest and other eight thousanders.

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