May 2014 – Page 2 – My Favourite Things

Ferns, mosses, lichens, fungi…

Posted on May 7, 2014July 14, 2015 by sudhagee

My trip to Himachal in September last year was a trip of many firsts — the first time I saw the mighty Himalayas, the first time my under-graduate and post-graduate classes on Himalayan Geology came alive, the first time I saw apples on trees, the first time I tasted a yellow plum, the first time I saw the confluence of two rivers … and so much more. It was also a trip where an old interest in the plant life around me got rekindled.

It started of slowly enough with the magnificent trees in the region grabbing my attention: the pines, the deodars, the fruit trees. Then it was the flowering shrubs that my attention shifted to, especially the wild rose plant that I thought was a pomegranate plant ! Go ahead and laugh. You have my permission 😛 Wild Rose, Himachal Pradesh, Fagu, Travel, Himalayan Plants Soon words like bryophytes, pteridophytes, angiosperms, gymnosperms, mycota… were floating around my head, dredged up from some corner of my brain, courtesy college-level Botany. And slowly, with each passing day, other plants came into focus, especially the non-flowering variety of ferns, mosses, lichens and fungi. (Strictly speaking fungi are not plants, but since they were considered to be part of the Plant Kingdom in the recent past, I have included them here.) And before I knew it, I was traversing the fascinating world of ferns, mosses, lichens, fungi… and then some more. Continue reading “Ferns, mosses, lichens, fungi…” →

Charming Chail Palace

Posted on May 5, 2014 by sudhagee

Chail (pronounced as Chaa-il) was the last destination of my Himachal trip. Our group stayed at the Chail Palace, the former residence of Bhupinder Singh, the former Maharaja of Patiala, and now part of the HPTDC group of hotels. The Chail Palace has an interesting history. It was built in 1891 after Maharaja Bhupinder Singh got expelled from Shimla. The brief story goes something like this:

Apparently the Maharaja was having a good thing going with a top ranking British official’s daughter/wife. (the accounts differ whether it was the daughter or the wife). As a result of this indiscretion, the Maharaja was expelled from Shimla. Furious, the Maharaja decided to ‘cock a snook’ at the British and build a grand palace at a location that would be visible from and higher in altitude than Shimla.

That location was Chail, a tiny village in the Shivalik Hills and across the valley from Shimla. How this particular location was picked is another interesting story and that was narrated to us by Jagat, a waiter at the hotel.

Chail, Chail Palace, Himachal Pradesh, Travel Continue reading “Charming Chail Palace” →

The Sacred Spaces of Devbhoomi

Posted on May 2, 2014January 16, 2015 by sudhagee

I first came across the term “Devbhoomi” on the day I flew to Chandigarh to begin my Himachal Trip. The airline’s in-flight magazine had an article titled “10 things to do in Devbhoomi”. Now, I detest anything that talks about top 10 or 5 or 21 or any number for that matter, for they never make sense to me. I almost always skip such articles in question.

But the name Devbhoomi, which means land of the gods, intrigued me and I read on. The article wasn’t particularly good or the “10 things to do” even half-way interesting for me. But the article did reveal one interesting fact: Devbhoomi is how the local Himachalis referred to their state, their land. Though this established that ‘Devbhoomi” was not a marketing gimmick like another Indian state’s claim of being “God’s own country”, I remained a little sceptical.

Over the 10 days that I spent travelling in Himachal Pradesh, I tried to understand why the locals referred to their land as Devbhoomi. Each day there brought in new insights through visits to sacred sites, listening to narrations of folk tales and legends of sacred spaces from the locals, and experiencing nature in its elemental form. Every glimpse, every experience of a sacred space was an appreciation of the tangible and intangible meaning of Devbhoomi.

This post is an attempt to put together all those experiences and I invite you to join me in this journey. Let us begin this journey in Devbhoomi with roadside shrines.