My first hike in Saiha

This post talks of one of the more invigorating weeks of my life during my initial days in this amazing land, one full year and few weeks ago!

I had recently moved on to Saiha in Mizoram to be a part of a team that would set up Samrakshan’s third field base in this southern most district of north east India. It had been a month of initial activities ranging from purchasing stationary to meeting the executive members of the Mara Autonomous District Council and now I had to move to the field (somehow I still am uncomfortable using the term!). So we set off, me and my colleague, for about a week.

We moved to Tuipang on a Saturday and on reaching met the Block Development Officer; primarily to seek sanction to put up the night in the state guest house. Wondering if I would meet him on a drizzling Saturday evening I was surprised to see the entire staff working on a holiday. Electricity then used to visit Tuipang only during weekends! The Block Development Officer then wished us for the journey saying that people in the region were very cooperative but not the weather as it currently stood. At the guest house, later that evening, I wondered what people’s perception to opposition to dams and other development activities in the region by people staying in urban India would be if this was state at the block headquarters. The hot and wonderful potatoes in the evening meal were cooked by a person who came from Nepal, had worked at Vijaynagar in Arunachal Pradesh and very proudly talked of a Nepali ghetto within the district.

We moved on early next morning. A three hour walk which seemed much longer brought us to Lalveng where seeing me puffing and perspiring a family offered tea. During the chat accompanying tea on knowing our interest in forests they told us of people from Myanmar coming to collect orchids from around their village. Discussion then ventured to work done by World Vision, an international non government organization, in their village undertaking diverse activities like construction of public water points, facilitation of self help groups and distribution of school books. On knowing about us they asked us how our presence would be of benefit to them. Thanking them we moved on further towards Ahmypi with me wondering how to have people actively participate in conservation education and awareness without their getting tangible benefits! Conservation education and awareness was what we were planning to initiate our efforts at Mizoram with.

Walking on, desperately seeking hot tea, we came to the Power House. This is a dam on Tuipang river that generates power in middle of this Eden. The power is initially transmitted to neighbouring district of Lawngtlai from where it is distributed to Saiha besides Lawngtlai. In case of emergency it also lights up the state capital, Aizwal. Having steaming tea with the people present there made me feel a proud Indian. Here I was, a Gujarati with a Mara colleague having tea made by a Mizo in the house of a Jharkhandi while the company that made the Power House and this tea providing house was from Orissa. In course of the tea powered chat they told us of having seen deers and bears around the Power House especially in the season that the amla trees bear fruits. Talk on bears reminded me that we had to reach Ahmypi before sunset and we resumed our walk. Wandering again on environment education my thoughts dwelled on the possibility of linking protection of the forests around of Tuipang river to the people that they get electricity! Then staring at the amazing shades of green surrounding me I smiled at my own thought and moved on. Finally when we reached Ahmypi I was so exhausted I could not have run even if I was chased by a bear. An hour or more later over an amazing curry of fresh pumpkin leaves we discussed the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act - the daily wage rate offered, trainings the people concerned received, people’s interactions with the Block Development Office that administered the Act and the work done with the local village committee.

Next day I was awaken by the chill and drumming of rain on the roof. The rains tired off, roof retreated to a sloppy silence and we put on our bags to move towards Khopai. We came across parakeets, jungle fowls, forktails and leeches! The team spirit the leeches demonstrated in sucking my blood reminded me of the wild dogs attacking a deer in cohesion in one of Sekhar’s films. After the blood, the bath. It was an experience, a tired body letting itself go into the chill Tipa river to the most beautiful of surroundings, making one sing aloud. Reaching Khopai putting our bags we went for a walk around the village. After being impressed with the dustbins in positive blue lining the road that went around the village in a U we sat down to talking with people.

We started conversing about Hoolock gibbons with a group of elderly men. According to them while Hoolock gibbons had decreased significantly in numbers people still used to hunt them! One of them added that they used to be easy to hunt as their call is very loud and during specific times of the day. Also they stick to specific areas and have single mates. If a hunter shoots an adult Hoolock gibbon then the mate calls out in agony and follows suit. I remembered reading Kashmira’s article the week before – their loud calls, their being monogamous and territorial – all now being put across in a fashion that to me was unconventional. His friend listed the manner in which the lesser ape then used to be utilized - when it occured in abundance. The arm of a dead Hoolock gibbon was used to lessen agony of women during child birth by placing it over her abdomen and that its blood was considered good for curing ailments like blood pressure and malaria. The Phayres leaf monkey too was regularly put to use in those days! Its brain was given to a child having abnormal growth while its blood was good for curing tuberculosis. Just when I was feeling that I had had my awareness lessons for the day one of them asked if he could catch these animals and help them produce babies. I smiled initially, my mouth full of beetelnut, but when I realized he was talking about captive breeding and to what end I gulped the beetelnut down and with starry eyes asked for water!

We stayed over at Khopai as we were invited to the annual celebrations of the local youth club. The function began with a prayer and a beautiful folk dance by youth attired in traditional clothes which was followed by a series of speeches. By the time the third speech ended I had an idea of when to smile and clap. Then came the games. There was a relay race where students raced teachers, young girls pulled over the rope in tug of war with elder men, few boys unsuccessfully tried climbing the pole dripping with oil and the final two participants at musical chair went on and on for long. I simultaneously flew back in time to those wonder years with friends when life was simple, beautiful and fun. In the evening we met the village council president who had just returned from a meeting in the neighbouring village. This was for protecting the forests alongside the Tuipang and Tuisi rivers and attended by representatives from select villages and forest departments from Indian and Myanmar sides. A meeting on similar lines had also been organized during the previous year.

Next day we left for Vahai reaching in around six hours. Enroute we stopped to see a group of Orange bellied himalayan squirrels rushing up and down a huge tree. In my three years in South Garo Hills in Meghalaya I could not recall coming across such huge trees in community owned lands. Also while silently sitting and watching the squirrels I felt glad that we did not carry the camera, binoculars and GPS with us then for rather than admiring nature we would have been fiddling with the blessed equipments. At Vahai we stayed with an accomplished hunter, as the 17 trophies on the walls of his house suggested. Memories of the survey we had undertaken earlier at Meghalaya flashed in my mind and I asked him to tell us of the species in the forests nearby that he believed had increased and decreased the most in numbers. He told me that earlier he was aware of only three animals being protected by law, meaning those he could not hunt; Asian elephant, One horned rhino and Royal bengal tiger but of late through interactions with various people he got to know of the list being pretty long.

The next day we walked down the slope to Phura. While Vahai and Khopai are eighty five to hundred years old Phura is young at twenty five. A pilot project on rice cultivation was initiated and people from surrounding villages slowly moved around to settle at Phura. I moved around the place and my meager knowledge on rice cultivation did not prevent me from supping few cups of tea at the Phura market where I ended up soaking the ambience for a couple of hours. Byline of the movie Matrix fits Phura market place to the T. Unfortunately it cannot be explained one has to experience it.

After a good long sleep at the forest rest house we set out for Palak lake on the following day. Palak is Mizoram’s largest lake and recognized as an Important Bird Area. I had seen pictures of the lake but being there on the spot left me mesmerized. This same feeling I had when I first saw the Nandadevi peak in Uttrakhand and the Balpakram gorge in Meghalaya. Walking around I saw a Great hornbill and dung of the only elephant in the landscape. There used to be five till some years back intruding in crop fields and demolishing toilets. Crop fields, of the permanent nature, are about two decades old and toilets one decade while Asian elephants who have been here for ages are considered intruders! This may be another vanishing population of the mega species! Sitting down to have a meal at the hut constructed near the lake by the fisheries department some years ago I wandered if some places should just be left alone, left as they are, bereft of conservation and livelihood projects. Majority of these projects are unfortunately ill conceived or cannot match the complicity that nature offers. Back at the forest rest house I was told that government officers come over to hunt birds at Palak. I wondered if we will have to begin our efforts with them!

The next day we walk to Maisa from where we took a pick up for Saiha. The first 40 kms taking 8 hours. After reaching Saiha finally when I talked to my colleague waiting at the office I realized these days will stay with me for long.

Thanking all the people for wonderful stays in their villages with mustard curry and the energy infusing cups of tea!

The lines above document our interactions with people during our trip and not the stand of the organization.