Kashmir-Delhi-Agra trip - Day 3

Day 3 – 1-Feb-2010

Every morning I loved to wake up to the loud chirps of the birds around the hospital. And (once every two days) to the relieving thought that I needn’t bathe that day! :D I hate bathing on holidays. In Kashmir, a bath every two or three days sufficed :D. Added to these pleasures was the blanketing silence. And the cold. And the snuggling into all the warm woolens. I cannot describe the deep calm joy that gave me!
So the plan for day three was to drive around Anantnag. In Bangalore we had planned to visit Sonmarg on day three. But the place was closed due to heavy snowfall. So off we went on our Tavera, first to Achabal – Mughal Gardens. The name is self explanatory. The pictures would’ve given you the idea. Green captivates my senses. The sound of trickling water was also quite new to my ears. I would’ve loved to laze on the grass with a yummy book to read, to ponder, and to take a small nap :P

But alas! The mood of the travelers was quite the contrary. I had a headache – courtesy the early morning outdoor photography without a cap covering my head. My fellow-women mumbled about feeling low and mildly depressed. I too began to believe that I too was depressed. Reason? Not sure… the cold maybe, or affected female hormones or (in my case) home sickness. Fayaaz’s songs were adding fuel to the fire. Man! Melancholic men and women, howling and sobbing about their departed lovers!

The next destination was Kokernag, where we believed was where the river Jhelum originated. We first lunched at the gardens. Walked around. At one end we observed a thin stream that appeared to originate there. My! Such a tiny stream gave rise to the Jhelum?! Where did the water come from? Must be from those micro bubbles we could see towards the center of a puddle. Anyway… we moved on, wondering about the mysteries of nature.

A couple of Kashmiri women who were cleaning fish drew us into conversation. As was the norm, they invited us to tea at their home . We preferred to take snaps with their kids; there was an apple amongst them! The poor kid was struggling between his desire to pose and mingle with us and his mooku-chali (running nose).

Then back in the Tavera, we moved towards Verinag. By now we girls were a little restless. L warned that if the songs continued, it was very likely that we three would commit suicide that evening. We conveyed this to Fayaaz who promptly came to our rescue, like a chivalrous knight in shining armour that he was, by switching off the songs :D.
Verinag had some mildly warm sunlight. Traces of snow from a previous snowfall were melting. And at the gardens we received enlightenment from the locals :P. *This* place was the source of the Jhelum river! And how our imaginations had taken a walk in Kokernag!
The source spring was beautiful! The highlight of the day! The water had a rare deep blue hue. It was transparent and had several fish in it. The spring was 54 feet (or was it meters?) deep, having 3 levels of 18 units each. It was surrounded by a low wall, quite well architectured and had a couple of Shiva Lingams. Wonder how they came there.

On the way back home, we made a couple of halts. First for a break at a chai shop to drink noon chai (salt tea). That’s where we met a person called something-something-something-Bhat. Bhat it seems is a Kashmiri caste. He was a totally talkative guy. It seems the noon chai helped to energize. It was ok-ok. I liked kahwah which is a sweetish tea with almonds etc. The chai uncle refused to accept money, but then we convinced him to. Bhat invited us to return to Kashmir again, that we could stay at his place, that he considered us like his sisters and requested us to talk good about Kashmir and its people. Not all of us are militants he said. That touched me. But S told me later that he also said something like – we’re all Indians – and his countenance suddenly changed.
I somehow find it tough to believe that all the courtesy and kindness that we received by random Kashmiris wasn’t true. That it was all tourism based. That behind those smiles, they didn’t really like us.
Anyway the next stop was at a cloth store. The guy made about Rs.3000 worth business :). I bought myself a sozni work salwar set for Rs.380 which I thought was a great bargain. I wasn’t very fascinated with the Ari work salwars. Unlike me the others had siblings etc to shop for. I suppose an advantage of being an only child and having non-demanding friends. Disadvantage? Sigh!
That night had something in store for us. We went down to the hospital. And we met half-a-dozen newborns! The women were all excited to see us. They even wanted us to name the babies! Hehe no such risk-taking ever!