Mountain views

I was twelve when I went to the hills for the first time. It filled me with great curiosity, the sight of the higher mountains arising darke...

I was twelve when I went to the hills for the first time. It filled me with great curiosity, the sight of the higher mountains arising darker in the background. The train had duly deported us to Kathgodam railway station, at the foothills of the Himalaya. From there the mountains appeared all-powerful and I was drawn to them like a magnet.

But my parents had other plans. As we boarded a bus for Almora, I was made to sit in the middle seat8212;between my parents8212;because father was worried that I would lean out of the window and injure myself. As the bus proceeded, the mountains enfolded us in their grasp. Father kept a constant check on me. I found his concern very constraining and to this day I hold this against him.

Some years later, when I had entered the adulthood, I got an opportunity to visit Dehra Dun, where my straitjacket of a father was posted. One day he actually allowed me to visit Mussoorie on the condition that a subordinate of his would accompany me. Fortunately, father8217;s subordinate was a good-humoured person quite unlike the pater familias. We enjoyed ourselves thoroughly for hours up in the hills.

Some years late, after getting a job, I resolved to revisit Dehra Dun and environs alone. Travelling without father8217;s numerous constraints was a joyous experience. It was drizzling when I reached my hotel. A little way down from my room was a market which had a bookshop. It caught my attention. I made a point to visit it and took out some books from the shelves. My collection of books so impressed the shopkeeper that he urged me to meet Ruskin Bond, Mussoorie8217;s writer-in-residence. Not only did he provide me with Bond8217;s address, he allowed me to use his telephone and fix an appointment with the writer in Mussoorie. Ruskin Bond agreed to meet me the next day.

The next morning I boarded a bus for the Queen of the Hills. The dense trees had rendered the road as dark as a tunnel. After reaching Mussoorie, I was directed towards an arduous winding pathway that led out of the main town and before long I was climbing the steep road for Landour, where Ruskin Bond lived.

To this day, that walk to the writer8217;s home comes back to me like a fresh breeze. The walk was laborious exercise, all right, but so very rewarding. As I sat on a parapet along the road to catch my breath, the awe-inspiring sight of the town and its environs 8212; houses stacked above houses against the towering mountains, with every windowpane flashing in the sunlight 8212; was something that has haunted me since.

If father had only known how magnifying is the touch of the mountains on an ordinary life!