Manaan Kar Ray reflects on four decades with the Himalayas in a spoken-word tribute to his solo trip through Leh-Ladakh. He uses turquoise lakes, prayer wheels, and towering peaks to explore courage, fear, and what it means to travel alone versus with others.
Himalayas, you speak to me. You always have. For over 40 years, you have been my magnet, drawing me over to your slopes again and again. I went as a child, in my teens, in my 20s, 30s, 40s, and I'm pretty certain I'll keep going back. So, I've travelled many a road, trekked many a path. Some as a family, some as a couple, some with friends, some with parents, some with siblings. But lately, just on my own. Travelling together or solo, exploring the Eastern ranges or Western, each travel has its own memories, own messages that your mountains echo. But none were as unique as the messages from the contrasting terrains of Layladakh. Whether it be the aridity of your lands or the lands' interplay with water, each message, each thought, each feeling was novel. The tranquility of your lakes, the turbulence of your streams, The confluence of rivers, the divergence of valleys, the paradoxes are intimate and immense. You have even got a stream that snakes through sand dunes. Whether it be the mystique of the mountains or those of the monasteries, in the magical land of Leh Ladakh, every dawn Every morning brought new vistas. Every dusk, new memories. Switchback after switchback exposes the many ups and downs of life. Some peaks are distant, some are right in your face. Some of your land seems dead, but then the road and the river takes one to an oasis of habitation. To all this and much more, Leh Ladakh This is my tribute to all the secrets of life that you have helped me discover in this short sojourn. Dawn or dusk, noon or night, your peaks are forever reaching for the stars, coaxing me to do the same. You say reach within and you can reach out for the heavens too. You remind me that you are real. The mountains in my path, though, exist only in my mind. They can be overcome. Take the first step, you say, and then go the extra yard, the extra mile. What is the first step for a journey of a thousand miles? Is it to accept the fear in one's heart? Is that what courage is? Is it to accept the twists and turns of life? Does it involve embracing the finite failings of the road? Is that the road to discover infinite hope? A journey on your roads brings one closer to these secrets. Sometimes the destination remains elusive, but the roads say it over and over again. Mountains of the mind can be traversed, can be transcended. Hang in there. There may be high passes. It may be the road well traveled or the path off the beaten track. You too can reach out for the stars, but you have to begin your journey, begin your travels. Leh Ladakh, your arid abode, is close to heaven, literally and figuratively. But your heaven is a paradox. When I was in it, you brought me down to earth. The eternal enormity of your mountains and lakes reminds me of my chronological insignificance, brings perspective to my existence. Hey, you have even brought the moon to earth. You show me your moonland and say, even I have needed to change. This was once a glacial lake. Now, this alpine aridity is a lunar landscape. But your changes are tectonic. I'm just a speck on planet Earth's timeline. You, on the other hand, have been here for eternity and will be here forevermore. You will adapt to movements in the Earth's crust, create lunar paradoxes. That are technically badlands and support no growth, but the beauty of Moon and Earth is beyond compare. I am just a mere mortal. My challenges, my achievements, my contributions, my aspirations all seem so trivial in your omnipresence. When I was rotating the prayer wheels, I was close to heaven. But down to earth. Leh Ladakh, you are a paradox like no other. To my thoughts about my trivial existence, you responded with your sky. Our sky, you said. Your dreamscapes show me that despite our difference in size and time, we share the same sky. The same sky to fly, to soar above, to journey beyond our daily troubles. Our sky can be as small or as large as we want it to be. Paint the sky over the mountains in your mind, you say. And then you point me to the prayer flags. As the wind whistles through those prayer flags, it picks up the prayers of the locals. You ask me, what color are my prayers? What color is your sky? Are you blue, green, or gray? What color do you want it to be? You point me to your lakes and the ever-changing shades of the reflected sky of the icy cold waters. You tell me that whatever is in your sky will color your life's lake. A large mountain in your mind will cast a large shadow, but as the sun journeys from the eastern horizon to the west, the clouds will drift And the shadows will evolve. Your lakes remind me that whatever be the color now, it is bound to change. What I feel may be a reflection or a shadow of the mountains in my mind, but the shades of blue in life are ever-changing. New mountains, new lakes and valleys, and new journeys towards new horizons. You leave me with many unanswered questions. After an eternity, you are still growing. How do I follow in your footsteps of eternal growth? Am I alone in life's quest, or am I with others? Each of your snowy peaks stands alone, but as the Himalayas, you stand together. In a divided world, is it better to be solitary and take solace in standing by one's values? And just let the others be? Or do we attempt to stand together, to unite like the peaks in your range, and redefine the future of humanity? Am I defined by who I am within, or who I am with, or both? Many of these questions stay on my mind as I bid you goodbye. In a world full of illusions where segregated heavens are constructed by religion, language, race, color, what does it take to keep it real? You asked me to come back for more answers. I'm assuming more questions to keep coming back. You gently remind me that the divided heaven in our mind is a human myth, but nature's bounty— the mountains, the lakes, the valleys, the roads— are real. These roads will take one close to heaven, but down to earth. Close to heaven, down to earth.
