Tag: river

Sunset at Sangam

We’re in November! The year is fast ending. Now where did this year go? For those who know me, it’s been one heck of a roller coaster the past couple of years. And given all that’s going on right now, it would be madness to even think about participating in, what the blogosphere calls, the Nanos. So I’m not thinking about it. I’m jumping right in. If I can manage it, hurrah! And if I can’t, well, that’s okay too.

How about you? Are you going to blog every single day in the month of November? Are you planning to write a novel? Are you crazy enough to do both?! Let me know 🙂

I had previous written about our experience on the boat ride towards Sangam and the jolly boatman who thought we were out to steal his job! This is a picture of the boat on which we sailed. We reached Sangam—the confluence of the holy rivers Ganga, Yamuna and Saraswati—at Sunset, and it was breathtakingly beautiful!

Sunset at Sangam, Prayag (modern Allahabad)

Picture taken with Moto G3, edited with Befunky. Click/tap to view my Flickr Photostream

It appears that I have several photos with curves in them ;). That makes this boat my third post for the weekly photo challenge! Check out my previous responses Lamps in the sun and On the road: Gangtok to Darjeeling

This is post #1 in this year’s NaBloPoMo, or as Ra calls it Nano Poblano

NaBloPoMo = National Blog Posting Month = Thirty straight days of blogging

Tags Allahabad, boat, golden sunset, India, NaBloPoMo, photo, river, Sangam, sunset, travel, water

Stories

The nauka

“Do you want to make a boat?” There was a hint of concern in the man’s voice – he seemed to have mistaken our behaviour as a threat to his livelihood.

Up until then, the nawik was quite cheerful. He encouraged us to feed the birds. Another man on another boat sailed by, selling goodies to be fed to the birds. “Don’t worry about polluting the river – the birds will swoop down before it soils the water”, he said, gently steering the boat across the remarkably clean Ganges. The Magh Mela had ended only a fortnight ago, and the temporary docks were still up – being taken down one nail, one plank at a time.

Seeing our keenness to photograph everything around us, and the special attention his boat was getting, he was at first amused, and then a little worried.

We couldn’t help laugh a little and reassured him that we were just fascinated and enjoyed getting up close to the many textures in front of us. We had no intention of making a boat.

Somewhat reassured, he returned to his usual cheery self and continued to row gently. “The other nawiks were interested in showing their muscle and speed at rowing. What’s the point? Why rush? I enjoy myself. Don’t you? You’ve clearly come from far just to see the Sangam*. You would want to spend more time, won’t you?”

We nodded our approval of his thoughts. He offered if we’d like to try our hand at rowing. Of course! He taught us to row and the technique for steering. We both took one oar each and rowed for a while. “I’ll take a picture of you two! You would want to keep this memory.”

We taught him how to use the phone camera and continued to row. He was a good teacher. And rowing was actually fun! After a while he took back the oars. It was, of course, his job!

We soaked in the glow of the golden sun as it began diving into the river and once docked at the ghat, we paid our nauka a tip for the memorable trip.

Here’s one of the many close-up pictures of our nawik’s prized possession – his nauka

Captain hook? One of the metal loops along the edge of the boat.

To see what details other bloggers around the world are clicking, zoom in to this week’s Photo Challenge

Glossary

Nauka: boat
Nawik: boatman
*Sangam: the confluence of three rivers at Allahabad: the Ganges, Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati

Tags Allahabad, boat, DPchallenge, river, travel

Poetry

Transition

From established comforts
To starting anew

From being a part of one family,
To belonging to two

From the yearly hop between two cities
To a traveling spree

From figuring out two cultures
To switching between three!

From the spoilt n lazy brat
To greater responsibility

From an individual
To managing a team and a family

The image featured above is of “Lovers Meet” – the confluence of the rivers Teesta and Rangeet. The viewpoint is located somewhere between Darjeeling and Gangtok.