Snapshots in sepia: Parts III and IV

III

Pasighat is Arunachal's oldest town, established by the British in 1911, and is the headquarter of the East Siang district. It serves as a gateway to the rest of the state and it is from here that we were to board the shared jeep that would take us to our next destination -- Yinkiong, a town some 200 km from Pasighat.

A local transport strike forced us to stay in Pasighat for an extra day that I duly spent hiking through lush hill tracts and watching women in their colourful wraparounds and parasols go about their day's business.

On a day washed out by spells of moderate-to-heavy rains and made inactive by the bandh, these minor distractions provided the much-needed relief.

IV

My jaw dropped when I saw the driver of our jeep, a boy barely out of his teens. From my erstwhile trips to northern Himalayas, I was used to seeing hatta katta Punjabis/Jats behind the wheel, negotiating hairpin bends on difficult mountain terrains, and, hence was least expecting an adolescent to drive the jeep. Very soon, however, as we set out on our journey, all my doubts were put to rest; I realised we were in safe hands.

We were a motley bunch travelling to Yinkiong, all eight others in the group of ten were either officers in some government department or traders travelling on work. We, the only two "outsiders", were hence of immense interest to them. They just couldn't believe that anyone could come to Yinkyong just for a pleasure trip. All kinds of tales were traded as our co-passengers wished us luck and safety for our trip that, as we eventually came to know, happened to coincide with the election season in Arunachal.

By then my morale had touched rock bottom. The driving force that kept me going was the spectacular landscape and also the thought that we were now at the point of no return, and the only wise act would be to just move forward and cross bridges as they came. And bridges we surely did cross!

The monsoon season is not a good time to visit this part of the country, even if you love the rains.

There are chances of being held up due to mudslides or the hanging bridges being washed away by the rains. Sometimes it might be too risky just to travel in such weather. The brighter side is that you get to see the mighty Siang, that skirts the Pasighat-Yinkiong road, in all its elements and are able to freeze plenty of Kodak moments. "Beautiful" would be an understatement while describing this route, "mesmerising" would near-about qualify it.

Power supply in Arunachal is sporadic at best and non-existent at worst, which is an irony since Arunachal has the potential of being one of the largest hydel-power-producing states in India. Most places, if they are not too remote like Tuting, receive power for only a few hours in the evening. When we reached Yinkiong, the sleepy hill town was settling down to another evening of darkness and rain. Desolation was creeping in and for a moment I found myself asking, "What am I doing here?" Just then, the bright blue signboard of SBI Yinkyong came into view. Somehow in the remoteness of the situation that ubiquitous sign seem strangely re-assuring, making me feel that I was in "known territory".