During an idle time of paging through the family photo albums recently, it occurred to me to be amazed all over again at all the traveling my brother and I got to do as missionary kids. So I thought I'd do a little photo series--probably mostly for the sole entertainment of my brother and me--reviewing some of our adventures.First stop on this little reminiscence: Kashmir, up in the northwestern highlands of India, a region split between Indian, Pakistani and Chinese rule.
Nowadays the state department strongly recommends that Americans not travel to Srinagar, the capital of the Indian-controlled region of Kashmir. Too much terrorist activity in the region. Back around 1970, though, we had no sense of danger as we visited the beautiful town by Lake Dal. We visited shops and I bought a papier mache box decorated with little pink roses, a box I still have. We stayed on one of the Victorian-era houseboats on Lake Dal, and took day trips into town, into the mountains, or via gondola to some of the beautiful gardens of the region.
I recall that as my mom was snapping pictures of us smelling snapdragons (Do snapdragons smell? I don't recall), just out of the picture being taken was a whole situation going on. There was a film crew filming a "love scene" in the gardens for a Bollywood production. I was quite intrigued, watching the couple do their melodramatic flirty thing.
As I mentioned, the way to travel on Lake Dal is via shikara (gondola). Each one is equipped with a bed where you lie like royalty under the curtained canopy as the rowers behind you put forth the effort to get you to wherever you wanted to go. You can tell I was quite pleased with the arrangement.
In fact, I was quite happy to sit for any length of time up in the front or on persian carpets and pretend I was a queen being ferried to her palace on the other side of the lake.
My brother, on the other hand, got bored. As you can see, the canopy made a good monkey swing. And in this picture with his tongue hanging out, he's rather reminiscent of Hanuman, the Hindu monkey god. I love this picture of my brother, particularly followed by this next one.
Eventually he'd had enough of the boring, easy life. He hopped over the back of the bed and joined the rowers for some real action, his blond hair gleaming in the sunshine. Much better!
I grew up in a little baptist church with a big missionary budget and am so glad to have found your blog through Jayne's. Perhaps you were one of the families that we prayed for and read letters from.
ReplyDeleteLove the story and photos - makes me wonder if you'd stayed at one of my in-laws houseboats.
ReplyDeleteI don't see anywhere that the US discourages travel to Srinagar these days, and in fact that part of Kashmir is quite peaceful now.
Kim, thanks for coming by and leaving a note! I don't recall the name of the houseboat, but if it was there around 1970, we could well have stayed there.
ReplyDeleteThe state department warning about travel to Srinagar is here: http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1139.html. The quote I read there is this: "The Department of State strongly recommends that U.S. citizens avoid travel to the state of Jammu & Kashmir, with the exception of visits to the eastern Ladakh region and its capital, Leh. A number of terrorist groups operate in the state, targeting security forces that are present throughout the region, particularly along the Line of Control (LOC) separating Indian and Pakistani-controlled Kashmir, and those stationed in the primary tourist destinations in the Kashmir Valley: Srinagar, Gulmarg, and Pahalgam"