the secret of hope
itinerant life, kindness-cruelty, hope, driving through India, poetry, stories of perseverance, wild medicine, Sikkim countryside
Dear Reader,
Thank you for joining me. I hope the week has started well for you.
We are in Himachal now, and in the lack of good houses and hosts we could resonate with have been moving frequently.
This is what I have to say about the past fifteen days or so,
The biggest test on the road sometimes is that when you don't dress as a married woman, one look at you and your partner and people think you are a couple who has come from as far as Karnataka (our car number plate tells so) just to stay in their hotel. (I talk about the difficulties of finding hotels in India as a couple in the travelogue series on our journey from Sikkim to Himachal. I’ve shared two of the narratives today. But for those who don’t have the context, many geographies of India and their cultures don’t appreciate unmarried couples to live in one room. Only marriage would sanction their togetherness.)
The hotels want to ensure their hotel would be safe. Some directly ask about your relationship, and others go around and scrutinize you in ways you get uncomfortable. Your smiles that you were proud of now you don't want to give out freely because people think you're being nice to get a room.
The second biggest problem is trying to normalise to others' sense of cleanliness. Recently for a really filthy toilet in a monastery room the person managing told me “This is clean, madam.” One said we can't wash blankets every day so they are all used. Just declaration, no solution to the problem.
Another host hadn't shut her rooms even though her cleaning help left for two months but asked her kitchen staff to clean. Result: filthy rooms and expensive tariffs. By filthy I don't mean dust but cockroaches in bed, mosquitoes and moss in water jugs, and every surface buried in grime.
At some places, we get clean drinking water, and at others, when we show up with bottles they look at you as if you asked for their kidney. Amongst everything, being a couple — without family or children — is the biggest judgement you face. As if two together you aren't a family.
Everyone's culture varies and understanding others' and explaining ours takes effort. Not everywhere is the same though. You meet with unprecedented kindness, too. Some don't question you at all. And those are the places you visit again and again. They're home of the homeless.
But, still, you get tested on the road, so much and so many times often you think you cannot do more, try more, travel more, hope more.
But you do. And that shows you really want to. Your continuity also underlines the streaks of light in between all the dark, and that the universe always guides you.
You are never alone. But first you shoulder a hard day on a bumpy barren road melting under the glowering sun, and only then the tree-lined shadowed boulevards rich with roses and rhubarbs take you in their lap. Now you can rest.
Recently I read this beautiful poem and it is perfect to be shared here right now,
Hope by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer
Hope has holes
in its pockets.
It leaves little
crumb trails
so that we,
when anxious,
can follow it.
Hope’s secret:
it doesn’t know
the destination —
it knows only
that all roads
begin with one
foot in front
of the other.
Hope is all we have.
Do you live on hope, too?
For this week’s letter,
Some of my writing,
quotes I love,
things to read,
things to watch,
and
travel tips.
Articles From the Week
The 500-km Drive Through Bihar: Corn Harvests, Marriage Certificate at Hotels, and Truck Slogans [Episode 2]
The long drive through Bihar was a test of our unrelenting spirit but the journey had its fun and lessons. This narrative is the second in the series of travel essays on our 2000-km Sikkim to Himachal road trip.
Read the travelogue now. Or Pocket it for later.
Arriving in UP at Midnight: An Eerie Expressway, A Suspicious Hotel Attendant, and a Missing Wheel-Cover [Episode 3]
One night when my partner and I arrived in my home state Uttar Pradesh by driving through Bihar, I was unnerved on the eerily empty highway. But those were just joys of being in UP.
This is the third story in the series of travel essays on our 2000-km Sikkim to Himachal road trip.
The rest of the stories to follow this week.
Read the travel memoir now. Or Pocket it for later.
Quotes I Love
“The death of childhood is the beginning of poetry.”
Andrei Tarkovsky
“I did not mind his prayers, though he chose the place nearest the fire to say them in, and caused us all great inconvenience: what I resented was the assumption that holiness is a virtue that other people should be glad to pay for, instead of being a private affair between yourself and you.”
Freya Stark
“It behoves a man who wants to see wonders sometimes to go out of his way.”
The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, c.1350
“David has a problem, he feels pain being alone but can’t stand most people. How the fuck do you solve that?”
David Wojnarowicz, as noted from The Lonely City by Olivia Laing
“The only way to get somewhere is to not give up.”
Yours Truly
What I’ve Been Reading
I’ve been reading short stories, books, articles, and so much more. I can’t possibly list all what I have read in the past week so I’m putting down the things I found most relevant and worthwhile.
Beautiful reads from the week,
Memoirs and Essays:
A father bringing up his daughter alone (by Stuart Horwitz) and facing the judgment of the world who thinks fathers can’t do it right
In truth, we were glad there were two of us, for the massive amount of work a kid is. I just wanted the credit I was due.
Little House in the Redwoods by Sherry Shahan — a memoir of a drunkard father, the innocent trying-to-keep-it-together efforts of a child, and the world that relentlessly goes on.
“The door to our room bangs open and I hear Daddy swear and stumble down the stairs. Clothes rustle and I stop breathing. Is he in the closet? Then something else. Whooshing. Pee? No. Yes. That’s it. He’s peeing in the closet. I smell it!”
“It must be morning because the room is triangles of bright light. My brother is still asleep, tangled in his bedspread. Daddy has gone. I go straight to the bathroom to practice my nothing’s wrong face in the mirror, but can’t get it right.”
Call Me Master by Kate Sheridan — How painful to read and how painful it must have been, yet, so many of us continue in toxic and abusive relationships.
“Let’s get pizza then,” he said. But the charade of acting like a happy family, in front of other, real happy families made me want to cry.
Wild Medicine by Rachel Bunting — Struggling with her sicknesses, Rachel finds the medicine in the wild — literally. What a story of pain, survival, and triumph!
But if this is immutable, this idea that my body is no longer what it was, then so is my determination to keep hold of what I can. If I am required to recognize new losses as this disease progresses, then I will continue to look for ways to hold on to the things I can, to keep loving the things I have always loved.
In the literary world,
In an interview, the popular non-fiction writer Mary Karr discusses the faults of memory, the challenges of writing about loved ones and the pain of deleting pages because "there was something untrue about them." — This piece is highly relevant for both writers and readers who wonder why non-fiction is such a crowd-puller these days.
I mean, I think as fiction has become more hyper-intellectual or dystopic or unreal, I think people hungry for the real - for real, lived experience - have been forced to migrate to memoir.
Joan Didion Answers the Proust Questionnaire by the Marginalian
“Misery is feeling estranged from people I love. Misery is also not working. The two seem to go together.”
In personal growth,
Joan Didion on Learning Not to Mistake Self-Righteousness for Morality by the Marginalian
It is all right only so long as we recognize that the end may or may not be expedient, may or may not be a good idea, but in any case has nothing to do with “morality.”
What I’ve Been Watching/Listening
that’s worth mentioning
I saw Mrs. Chatterjee vs Norway in fast-forward and was flabbergasted by the idiocracy and the cruelty of the world. It’s not only a movie about the extent to which injustice can penetrate a human’s life, crossing all boundaries, but also about how crushed from all sides, a human can still will, choose her reaction, and act according to it. It is a story of strength, perseverance, and love.
And for all my Wanderlusters
As promised, sharing photographs from my exploration of the Sikkim countryside.
a countryhome
the bamboo fence and the mountains beyond
intrusive roses
a promising path
my companion, just the one of them
here are they both
mossy trees and mossy shadows
hidden stairs through the steep Eastern Himalayan mountains
how many live in such a little space
rolling tea hills in Sikkim, go as far back as the English rule
Contrasts, both essential and both can live in harmony
Thank you for reading.
I hope you have a great week ahead. Hope you can be happy with your work, sleep well, and eat lot of fruits!
Let me know what you think about this letter. Press reply.
Yours,
Priyanka
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