Sunday 18 May 2008

Wake up and feed the Mithun

The time at bomdo village started off on different notes. first of all, i was glad to meet the inspection bungalow caretaker dungé yalik in the village the only person i knew well before i set in alone to the village. Met his beautiful kids, and dungé himself will figure later in the commentary.
Well, for starters i slept well and the day started with feeding the home-mithun that dungé and in laws own. The last time she came home for salt, dungé doesn’t even remember, so it must be a long back. This lady is beautiful and didn’t take her seconds to get acquainted with me then she ate salt from my hands, take a look...
Then the day took off and i visited old fallows close to the village. The good thing with Adi cultivation sites is that every place has a name. I felt really good when i saw a fallow about 50 years old needed for my study and then there’s a small sequence in a one-year fallow called kanyong you would like to see.
When we reached the place, the mithuns came closer, one by one; they all thought we had salt. Finally we were surrounded by five of them! Before that we had seen a non-venomous snake; a kukri.







The evening was full of conversations with the village leader (head-gaam), second-in-command (gaam-buda) and others, with a tinge of the local rice beer of course.
The next day i planned a long trip with a local boy who ensured at least ten times if my legs can make the trip he has in plan for me and the timing we leave. As far as i saw he was convinced I can’t wake up at 4 in the morning and walk the rest of the day.

The day started at 425 and we left to go to fallows and forest adjoining the villages at about 5. Clouds figured we were having a field day and pitched in. So by 6 it was pouring and we decided to give a break for some time considering the fact that i was carrying expensive equipment. We reach a temporary house called poyup built in the jhum field of gaambuda and he welcomed us. Here, while i stayed a couple of hours i realised how hard people work for the rice they eat all year. In comparison with people like us walking to the nearest grocery store, haggling over the price and bringing home a bag, these guys literally slog their arse out. I took a video of the people planting rice seeds after the biggest chunk of work for the year; clearing the forest that is. Whats impressive is that theres a tune to planting “ho ohh ho ohh ho ohh” which supposedly help in not tiring them.



Then, we walked to some more fallows and got to a 50-m waterfall which was even more beautiful than the stream i visited the earlier day and i took a dip again, its beautiful and full of life, take a look…


Further ahead we saw a red-headed trogon (my first time) and a small chick in a nest, I couldn’t figure which species.



Then i got back to the village, before i forget i gotto tell you i met a Telugu guy in Bomdo village, only about 5000 km out of place. When i saw him i was really excited and i shouted to him, "telugaa meeroo" which means are u Telugu and he nodded and coolly said that he would meet me later in the day. He looked at me as if i was a leaf that fell on him while he worked and few seconds later got again busy in his work which was to build a canal in Bomdo.

The next day i packed out of bomdo to reach back Ramsing village and then in the evening after couple of rice wine glasses, decided to type this!






The lows and highs - the ebbs and tides - the fall and rise

The water during a high tide on a beach gushes in loudly and surprises me with how high it rises. It moves in slowly but reaches out far in ...