NAGALAND: FIRST IMPRESSIONS
Not many people have Nagaland on their bucket list. Uncomfortable roads, poor transport system and a lot of corruption are a few factors which contribute to it. Added to it the stories of still active insurgency, Nagaland although an extremely beautiful hill state doesn’t manage to have a lot of tourism going on except for the Hornbill festival in December every year where the entire culture of Nagaland is beautifully portrayed. But, my case is slightly different. Affinity towards the culture of the entire Northeast, plus a desire to visit not to tourist frequented places made Nagaland a definite must go. So, when I got time and saved some money, I immediately planned a trip to the beautiful hilly state with my girlfriend.
Since this was my second trip towards the hills of the Northeast, I was more confident and familiar with the system than the previous time. We booked a flight to Guwahati and from there we took a train to Dimapur aptly named: The “Nagaland Express”. This trip was never meant to be pleasurable as we reaffirmed many times. The “Nagaland Express” was in a pathetic condition, and we had to do some extra efforts to get our compartment cleaned! Anyhow, we reached Dimapur on time at 0530, which to my surprise looked like 0730 because of the sunshine. We had to get our Inner Line Permits (ILP) from the DC office in Dimapur and for that, we had to stay there until lunchtime at least.
Dimapur is the commercial hub and the biggest city of Nagaland and it is in pathetic condition. The roads are broken, the drains overflow and people are filled in the streets. The entire city looks at least 15 years behind Delhi or Mumbai. We got out ILP from the DC office at mid-noon not before paying a bribe for visiting their state! So, with the ILP in hand, we were well equipped to visit the capital of Nagaland: Kohima. Kohima has a special place in my heart. Having read about the Naga tribes during my childhood, and a curiosity to see their capital city made me really excited. The heartland of the Angami Nagas, located on top of the hills, Kohima is really a beautiful city. We took a yellow “zonal taxi” from Dimapur to Kohima. The road has been under construction for eternity, and almost the entire route was dusty and broken. With dust flying everywhere, I wondered whether we were in the lush green hills of Nagaland or the deserts of Rajasthan. Anyhow, after 4 hours of chewing dust we reached Kohima in the evening. I felt a sense of accomplishment because I had planned to visit Kohima at least 7 years ago! The hotel was booked online and without any difficulty, we managed to get a good night's sleep. Before that, we took a stroll at around 1900 but sadly everything was closed, a typical occurrence in the northeast.
The second day of the trip was reserved for Kohima. We started off in the morning by visiting the Commonwealth war cemetery, set up and maintained by the commonwealth graves commission, an arm of the British govt. It’s a beautiful place built in the memory of the commonwealth soldiers, most of them being Indians who died defending the city from the Japanese siege during world war II. From there, we visited the state museum and got a lot of information about Nagaland. We had lunch immediately after that, and despite what people suspect, dog meat was not on the menu at all. Although I’ve heard the Naga people relish dog meat, I observed that it’s not as easily available as chicken, mutton, or pork in Kohima at least. Then we went to the Mao market to see how the markets function here. It is a huge, south Asian kind of market, more like Jakarta or Bangkok than New Delhi or Mumbai with almost every kind of thing available. From food items to clothes to live animals and weapons, everything can be found in the smelly, cramped shops. We ended our day with a coffee in a very nice-looking cafe situated in the heart of Kohima.
The next day, we had to visit the Mereima village to meet a friend who had invited us to her village. But before that, we also visited the Mereima campus of Nagaland University situated nearby. Neiphre Viluo, an extremely hospitable, beautiful girl met us on the way from Dimapur to Kohima and was very impressed on knowing that we were visiting her state! She was explaining a lot of things on the way and told us about the Angami tribes which inhabit the places in and around Kohima.
We went to her village, and she showed us in such a nice and calm way that it made our visit to her place unforgettable. Never during our meeting with her, we felt that we were in a land 2500km away from home. She took us to the oldest house in the village, which was more than 100 years old. Later, we went to her sister’s house where we played with her little son. Finally, she took us to her home and treated us to very nicely made tea. We had a lot of discussion over tea and I felt one of the purposes for which I travel, knowing people from different cultures and look for similarities was fulfilled. We bid her goodbye and left for Wokha.
We had no fixed plans to visit Wokha. It turned out that on leaving Kohima in the afternoon, we could reach only as far as Wokha by evening so we were forced to stay for a night in Wokha. It is an ordinary town with not much activity, and we stayed in a govt managed guest house. The place is famous all over Nagaland for organic fruits and on tasting a few fruits bought from there, we could understand why it is. The next morning we left for Mokokchung. We could find 2 seats in a taxi with a little difficulty as the traffic is scarce in that part of the country.
The road from Wokha to Mokokchung was surprisingly good and once we entered Mokokchung district, it got even better. Now the road signs were visible and the vehicle was moving at a good speed. This journey was the most enjoyable we undertook in Nagaland. So, I expected Mokokchung to be slightly better than the places we visited, and it proved true to my expectations. On reaching Mokokchung, we immediately went for lunch, and there I found a big shopping center. Nothing like that was visible in Kohima. Mokokchung is a big city and it is the headquarters of the Ao tribe. It is a calm and clean town. Surprisingly, a lot of people from Bihar live and work there. I could communicate with them in my language, a surprise indeed. One boy offered my cookies for free because of that! We stayed at the circuit house (Yes, it is accessible for common people there) and it was comfortable indeed. That day we took a walk around the city and it was really pleasurable. We had to leave the next evening so I casually inquired about the taxi and I was surprised or rather shocked!
From Mokokchung we had to go to Mariani to take a train to Guwahati. But sadly from Mokokchung, only 2 taxis ply on that route and for the next day, both were already booked. I canceled the train in hurry and my worries were multiplied when we came to know that on the following day no taxis will be going because of Sunday! This was totally unheard of. I was shocked, confused, and frustrated. The only option for us now was to take an overnight bus to Dimapur (that stinky city) and then carry on to Guwahati. We booked two seats on that bus and it meant we had to tweak the plans a bit.
The next day we visited Longkhum Village. As we were scheduled to take a bus to Dimapur at night, this was our last day in the hills of Nagaland. So we went to Longkhum village. The place is so quiet and clean that it took us by surprise. Nobody was surprised by us visiting there though and continued with their work. The villages in our part are anything but clean hence this was a bit out of the world for me. We took a walk around the village, went to the top, talked with a local boy, and totally absorbed ourselves in this beautiful place. It is said that once you visit Longkhum, you leave your heart there and you have to visit again to take it back!
We returned from Longkhum in the afternoon, went for lunch in that same shopping complex again, and for a final time went through the streets of Mokokchung. Then we returned to our rooms and started packing. We had to take a bus to Dimapur in the evening. The bus started at 1730 sharp and we bid goodbye to Mokokchung. The bus trip was comfortable, the only thing was that the road to Mariani was so narrow that two vehicles could not pass at the same time. We reached Dimapur in the morning at 0530 again and it was raining hard. We had booked a retiring room at Dimapur and it was really shabby, understandably so. Nothing in Dimapur impressed us. But we had to spend an entire day in that room on top of the railway station. The train to Guwahati: “Rajdhani express” was scheduled for 0230. Finally, we boarded the train and comfortably reached Guwahati in the morning on time.
At 0730 we were at Kamakhya, which meant the temple visit could be easily completed on this trip. It was drizzling. I felt like the light drizzle welcomed us to the town. I love the drizzle especially in that part of the country where we can see so much greenery. Even when I’m here, a drizzle immediately transfers my mind to the banks of mighty Brahmaputra in Guwahati. So, welcomed by drizzle we went to the Nilachal hills to visit the Kamakhya temple. It is a highly revered temple and visiting it was definitely a very nice idea to end the trip. My mother wanted me to visit that temple last time as well. So this time I had to go. The visit was completed within an hour and I took a walk around the temple compound. The temple doesn’t have a very glorious past, with stories of human sacrifices so prominent. Although now human sacrifices don’t take place at all, goats and pigeons are sacrificed on a regular basis there to please the mother goddess.
After the temple, we had to rush to the airport as Lakshitha had a flight at 1130. Mine was scheduled for 1630 which meant I had to sit for 5 hours in that airport. At 1930 I landed in Delhi and went to my home immediately as I was tired. The next day I took a bus to Nainital and by evening I was in my room recounting the memories.
The entire week passed so quickly and we were enriched with one more experience of the Northeastern states of India. The tagline that the North East is a “paradise unexplored” seems to resonate with me and I wonder if more and more people start visiting that “paradise” will it remain such! The drawbacks of uncontrolled tourism are so evident in Uttarakhand, where I live at the moment and I pray that the hills of the Northeast don’t go the way this place is going.
Through this trip to Nagaland, I saw a lot of things about the Naga society, which I had read only in books, shed a lot of misconceptions about the Naga people. They are hospitable, kind, and never shy away from a smile. Although the Hornbill festival is a perfect medium to observe and understand all the tribes of Nagaland in one place, I believe by traveling inside the state, we saw for ourselves how the land was. We were exposed to various communities, talked to a few people, heard their stories, and overall felt pretty overwhelmed by the plurality of the people inhabiting this part of my beautiful country.
As a souvenir, I got myself a traditional Ao naga jacket, which is extremely beautiful and keeps me reminding of the wonderful time I spent in Nagaland.
