The village by the river – Bomdo

Today is the day I will start writing in detail about the village Bomdo in Upper Siang District, Arunachal, by the river Siang, called Tsangpo in Tibet. What inspires me to write I am unsure but seeing the Google Earth image of my PhD research site was an initial trigger.

Circled above are two important places in the village, the one on the left is my home for a big part of the next six months and in the coming years; the Inspection Bungalow of the Forest Department, built over a graveyard! To the right is the Naamghar or Bango, the community hall for local meetings and feasts. In the next few posts I will write stories from this village, since I will be spending a considerable amount of time here. You may see earlier articles in which Bomdo is mentioned too, but here I start documenting anecdotes from the village. Interesting things happen all the time; someone brings a hunted barking deer one day, another day a wild pig, the local booze parties in which the rice beer flows like the Siang, and well the lazy evening firewood-gossip and chat! I hope you enjoy reading them, because I am certainly going to enjoy writing them!