Into the jungle

Yesterday I walked into the Garbhanga Forest, a jungle nearly the size of Guwahati and home to the fifteen hostel students at Parijat. The “road” to the village was nearly impassable by car, with muddy ruts at least a foot deep in places. It is JUNGLE, home to wild elephants and in more isolated places tigers and leopards as well. Two German environmental interns and their asshole Indian coworker came with us. I spent most of the trek up talking with Henrick, a bright 18 year old almost as tall as myself, about India and politics and the EU. It was great to relate stories of India to another person who also found them novel – most Indians are pretty unimpressed with our Western impressions of their country. To entertain a different part of my brain it was also interesting to hear about a German opinion of EU economics.

When we got to the village, Garbhanga Ulubari, the first thing we saw was the Parijat satellite school – small, well constructed but without any children. There is only one teacher and it’s very difficult to convince the students to come to school. Uttam and I and the three others brainstormed way to improve the village, from volunteer guest houses to solar-powered lamps and Uttam again tried to convince me to write a book about the Karbi people, the tribe of his family and of Garbhanga, which would make me “famous like Oprah Winfrey.” I’m interested to return to the village with Sankar or Nabakanta in February or March to help teach and get a better idea of what Parijat can do.

The village was idyllic. Golden rice fields snaked around the valley floor while the hills were scattered with houses that overlooked the paddies like lake-view estates. The fields were backed up to dense jungle with picturesque streams running through and each was dotted with villager cutting and transporting rice, cows eating the stalks left after harvest and ringing their bells peacefully, and thousands of bundles of rice, each tied together at the stalks and fanning out like a lather brush. The villagers also grew oranges, grapefruit, star fruit, pineapple, betel nut, and papaya on their properties. The village is 17 km on foot or by motorcycle to Lokhra, the nearest modern town and the isolation gives it a whimsical quality. Of course it is also the cause of many problems. There is no electricity or running water. There is an understaffed government school through class 4 and Uttam’s school through class 8 but both struggle to educate the students. The nearest healthcare is in Guwahati. (The government built a modern-looking medical building but it is currently abandoned.) Their only substantial means of income is at the Lokhra market where, again, they have to carry their goods 17 km. Sankar and Nabakanta each speak good English as their fourth language and will likely attend university, but both said they wanted to live in their villages again after school. I think they will do more good here than anyone from the outside could.

The walk home started at 2:45 and Hendrick and I ran out of things to talk about so time passed more slowly. The sun set at 3:45 and by 5 we were walking in the jungle at NIGHT. We got out around 5:30 and returned to Parijat by 6:45 having walked at least 35 km. I have wanted to see Garbhanga since before I got to India and it was even better than I had hoped for.