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May 30, 2003
Solar eclipse; all down to the shoemakers Tommorrow sees a rare "annular eclipse" of the sun, although it is a little unclear how visible it will be in this part of the world. The peak place to view is somewhere off the Icelandic coast, so it doesn't look good.
However, we were told an interesting story about eclipses and what local people believed until recent times:
God is the highest and the shoemakers caste the lowest. The shoemakers wanted to put one over on God and show that they too have some power, so they travelled to the Sun and placed over it the skin of a cow ( the shoemakers caste used to be allowed to skin dead cows in India) hiding the sun and turning the sky black. The people began crying and wailing and begging God to bring back the light. To get the attention of God to help them, they blew horns, banged drums and let off fireworks. God heard and said to the shoemakers "my children are crying because of what you have done, take off the cowskin and go home". The shoemakers heard that their own children were also crying, felt sorry and took the cow skin and returned home, ending the eclipse.
In some local villages, apparently people still bang drums and fire shotguns during an eclipse.
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Missing Israeli The Israeli missing on the hills above Dunghri still hasnt been located, in spite of the arrival of a professional search and rescue team from Israel. As it is now 3 weeks since he disappeared, there must be little or no hope of finding him alive. Theories abound, and some local people are casting suspicion on his Turkish girlfriend, although without any evidence.
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Manali's tourist crisisManali's tourist season still hasnt picked up, and there are a lot of long faces among the cafe and guest house owners who must be haemorraging money by now. The number of tourists has gone up and down since the "start" of the season at the end of April, but overall numbers remain extremely low. It almost seems like a self fulfilling prophecy; people arrive, stay a day or two, then hear that there are lots of people in Kasol and Daramshala, then they too leave for those places to find the great party that they would be missing out on by staying.
Kasol, by all accounts, is packed out, with scarcely a room to be had. This is usually Israeli season in Manali, so most of those in Kasol will be Israelis, who in any case tend to stick together in large groups.
Various suggestions have been put forward for why there are so few; favourite is probably the number of casual police raids in Manali from cops looking for backhanders. Or that Manali is now just too overdeveloped. This one is quite possible, although Manali's downfall was a sharp one. In the 10 years I've been coming here the place has changed beyond recognition. In 1993 there were about 6 restaurants, 4 small and 2 big, and prices were very low for eating. 2003 and there must be 50 restaurants and prices in most are equivalent to the best restaurants in the main town, but without the quality.
The place certainly has too much concrete, with anyone who has 50 square meters of land putting up a concrete block as a guesthouse. Or a shop. The number of concrete shop units here far outstrips the need, and this year many are lying empty. The traders have seen the writing on the wall and gone elsewhere, put off by the ludicrous rents demanded by greedy landlords who follow the "prices always go up" school of property rental with no thought to what the market will bear. A 3 M x 3 M shop could cost a Kashmiri trader 30,000 rs for the season; one close to the temple 3 times that. Its a lot of money to recoup on sales.
So Manali stands a real chance of becomng a tourist ghost town, wiped out by lack of planning, regulation and forethought. As tourism grew, more people moved to cash in to the point that the place no longer had the serenity that brought people here in the first place. The tourists must bear some of the blame; encouraging the growth and then abandoning the place when it got too much. Whoever said tourists were ethical? If nothing is done to salvage the mess, there will be a lot of empty concrete boxes.
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May 14, 2003
Hail to the Chief
In India the importance of a politician (or VVIP for VERY very important person) is not measured by the stature of his politics, but in the size of his security entourage. Even if you did not know who, you would have known that manali was expecting an extremely important person from the sheer numbers of Police in the town.
So yesterday Mr AB Vajpayee arrived for his regular annual holiday break in Prini, next to Manali. We were coming back by bus from Mandi, 115km to the south, and the road covering the 40km from Bhuntar to Vajpayee's "second home" of Prini was almost lined with shoulder to shoulder cops, all side roads had barriers across them, and Bhuntar airport looked like a military camp. The fact the road was mobbed with cops is a little surprising given that the "Pradhan Mantriji" did not go by car, but flew by chopper to Prini from Bhuntar. On his arrival at the Bahang heliport, he was "felicitated" by an endless stream of local and State officials from the new State chief Minister, down to the head of the Village of Prini.
For the next week of his "restful" stay, his house will be besieged by petitioners seeking attention to their problems. The cops will inevitably be heavy handed with some, and cops apart, a coupleof hundred people will be a permanent feature of the Prini road for the next week, hoping for a chat or even a glimpse of the Big Boss.
For all the disruption to the life of the area brought by the visit, Vajpayee is well liked in the area. His association goes back over twenty years and many of the local village politicians know him personally from the days before he ran the country, and having priveledged access to the Prime Minestrial ear has advantages.. His increased influence has brought many benefits in development of infrastructure that would be denied to other places.
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And another bad apple harvest
To add to what would appear to be a disastrous tourist season, the local apple crop in Manali promises to be bad for the 3rd year running. The trees were full of blossoms in mid April, and the prospects were looking good. But the weather at this time of year is capricious, and a sudden cold snap characterized by a cloudy day followed by a cold, clear night can destroy many of the delicate blossoms. This is what happened, and in addition, a few violent hailstorms and strong wind damaged many of the leaves, and even pulled down trees. A few days later the tiny stalks that hold the fruit began dying and falling off, maybe up to fifty percent in all. 3 weeks later, they are still coming loose.
Rabet went to the Orchards today to spray the trees, and reports that the crop will be worse than last year, but better than the year before, which puts the total harvest at about 15-20 percent of the potential of a good year.
15km down the valley and 250metres lower, where conditions are less prone to cold, the growers are predicting a bumper harvest; scant consolation to the Apple growers of Manali and the surrounding villages.
The weather here is unpredictable at this time of year, but the overall pattern of the last 10 years suggests a distinct shift in the weather.
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Another missing tourist
A report in the Indian daily Hindustan Times edition of 10th May (article dated 9th may headline "Israeli youth missing for 3 days in Manali") reported an Israeli citizen (named as "Duady", 25 years old) as missing for 3 days after going walking in the hills around Dungri in the North Indian town of Manali, Himachal Pradesh, India with his Turkish girlfriend (named as Godge Ataman). While walking, he had apparently fallen and fractured a leg, and was unable to continue walking back. They apparently spent the night on the hill and the girlfriend went back for help, but when returning with 3 workers from the hotel, she couldnt locate the place she had left Duady.
It is now about a week since he went missing and still there has been no trace of him found in the hills. The search group has expanded to include local police, some other Israeli tourists, plus members over the local mountain institute. Today a notice has been posted in the Internet cafes, informing that the Israeli embassy has now sent people to join the search.
Yesterday, one of the Israelis involved in the search reputedly had a slanging match with the Turkish girl over her "stupidity" in not finding her way back to the spot.
The numbers of police involved in the search was probably hampered early on by the arrival of the Indian Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, for his annual summer break in Manali. The police in the town are almost solely devoted to providing for his security.
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