Children, lessons, and laughter in the cold the quiet courage of teachers who stay. Prologue After Ice, a Door Opens “A river can teach you to walk; a village can teach you why.” I arrived in Padum with the Chadar still in my bones those careful days on the frozen Zanskar, the daily grammar of ice (tap, trust, tiptoe), the…
A kitchen-table immersion: roasting kernels for oil, braiding wool tassels, learning the stories behind floral headgear, and sharing salt tea while elders map seasons in proverb. The lane into the courtyard was hardly a lane at all more a remembered path between a wall that had kept its stones together through six stories and a willow that had learned to…
A people-first walk through Dah–Hanu’s orchards, kitchens, and classrooms past the mirage of “pure blood,” toward the lived textures of Brokpa/Dard life. The first time I saw the word ARYAN painted on a roadside sign, the Indus was the color of hammered pewter and the wind had the blunt honesty only a high valley can carry. The sign was cheerful…
From a “two-day hop” to a pilgrimage of passes fuel, faces, and the long way home The Map That Laughed Back “We drew a clean line to Leh; the mountains answered with paragraphs.” It began at a table in Padum, the enamel chipped, the tea a little smoky, the afternoon bright as a certainty we hadn’t yet earned. Two days,…
The monastery festival meets a biker’s misadventure – revs mixing with rituals. A Festival at the End of a Spanner “Some mornings you tune a carburetor and end up tuning your expectations.” Two nights after the long crawl from Kargyak to Padum, I woke to the small arithmetic of a town getting ready: women loosening apricot stones in courtyards; a…
A test of patience, luck, and small kindnesses at every mechanic’s fire Prologue Chance, Maps, and the Smell of Petrol “Some rides begin with a route; the good ones begin with a reunion.” Late June, 2016. I was back in Leh making the sort of lists that don’t end spares, bungee cords, biscuits, tyre irons when the door chime of…
Walking (and slipping) across history – the fragile beauty of the frozen river route. After the Finish Line, Before the Freeze “Some journeys start where the applause ends when the body is finally quiet enough to hear a river make ice.” The September sun of 2014 still lived in my legs. I had run the Ladakh Marathon in a city…
A coast-hugging day on foot: sunrise at Nai Harn, tide-pool dawdles at Ao Sane, windmill lookout lull, and a slow glide into Promthep Cape’s gold hour. Summer 2024, and my passport was a smudge of airports: Thailand first, then Bali, then Malaysia later; a solo itinerary written in pencil and sweat. I had come to the south end of Phuket…
The under-construction frontier road and what it means to ride through uncertainty. The Map That Refused to Sit Still “Some roads are not taken; they are taken apart and re-made under you stone by stone, rumor by rumor.” Manali, early summer 2016: a town of wool caps and soft promises, engines idling under rain-dark eaves, and travelers comparing altitudes the…
Threads of mountain wind turned into warmth. Morning in Leh is a careful sound. Not the alarm clock kind, but the quiet arithmetic of altitude adding itself to breath: a longer inhale, a more deliberate exhale, prayer flags clicking a soft grammar as if the wind were reading out loud. The bazaar wakes in segments kettles clearing their throats, a…
