Roads to Mussoorie Read online

  Roads to Mussoorie

  By the same author:

  Angry River

  A Little Night Music

  A Long Walk for Bina

  Hanuman to the Rescue

  Ghost Stories from the Raj

  Strange Men, Strange Places

  The India I Love

  Tales and Legends from India

  The Blue Umbrella

  Ruskin Bond's Children's Omnibus

  The Ruskin Bond Omnibus-I

  The Ruskin Bond Omnibus-II

  The Ruskin Bond Omnibus-Ill

  Rupa Book of Great Animal Stories

  The Rupa Book of True Tales of Mystery and Adventure

  The Rupa Book of Ruskin Bond's Himalayan Tales

  The Rupa Book of Great Suspense Stories

  The Rupa Laughter Omnibus

  The Rupa Book of Scary Stories

  The Rupa Book of Haunted Houses

  The Rupa Book of Travellers' Tales

  The Rupa Book of Great Crime Stories

  The Rupa Book of Nightmare Tales

  The Rupa Book of Shikar Stories

  The Rupa Book of Love Stories

  The Rupa Book of Wicked Stories

  The Rupa Book of Heartwarming Stories

  The Rupa Book of Thrills and Spills

  Roads to Mussoorie

  Ruskin Bond

  First published in 2005 by

  Rupa Publications India Pvt. Ltd.

  7/16, Ansari Road, Daryaganj

  New Delhi 110002

  Sales centres:

  Allahabad Bengaluru Chennai

  Hyderabad Jaipur Kathmandu

  Kolkata Mumbai

  Copyright © Ruskin Bond 2005

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to any actual person, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This digital edition published in 2012

  e-ISBN:

  All rights reserved.

  This e-book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated, without the publisher’s prior consent, in any form or cover other than that in which it is published. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic, mechanical, print reproduction, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. Any unauthorized distribution of this e-book may be considered a direct infringement of copyright and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  From Bangalore to old Vellore

  From Puri to Mussoorie

  From Chandigarh to every ghar

  New Delhi to Siliguri

  From Chennai's shores to Mumbai's doors

  From Kolkata to Kochi

  From north to south and east to west

  Those gentle people are the best

  Who love their books and spend their leisure

  In reading both for worth and pleasure.

  To these good readers, young and old,

  I pay respects as hands I fold,

  And dedicate these words I pen—

  And dare to hope they'll pay for them!

  R.B.

  Composed at Shamli, on my way to Mussoorie

  Contents

  Introduction: Backward

  Breakfast Time

  On the Delhi Road

  Cold Beer at Chutmalpur

  The Kipling Road

  At the End of the Road

  Sacred Shrines Along the Way

  Trees by My Window

  'Let's Go to the Pictures!'

  Some Hill-Station Ghosts

  The Year of the Kissing and Other Good Times

  Running for Cover

  Party Time in Mussoorie

  Forward!

  Backward

  Instead of a Foreword I'm writing a Backward, because that's the kind of person I've always been.... Very backward. I write by hand instead of on a computer. I listen to the radio instead of watching television. I don't know how to operate a cellphone, if that's what it's still called. Sometimes I read books upside-down, just for the hell of it. If I have to read a modern novel, I will read the last chapter first; usually that's enough. Sometimes I walk backwards. And in this book I take a backward look at people I've known, and interesting and funny things that have happened to me on the way up to the hills or down from the hills.

  In fact, I urge my readers to start this book with the last chapter and then, if they haven't thrown their hands up in despair, to work their way forwards to the beginning.

  For over forty years I've been living in this rather raffish hill-station, and when people ask me why, I usually say 'I forgot to go away.'

  That's only partly true. I have had good times here, and bad, and the good times have predominated. There's something to be said for a place if you've been happy there, and it's nice to be able to record some of the events and people that made for fun and happy living.

  I have written about my writing life and family life in The India I Love and other books. The stories, anecdotes and reminiscences in this book deal with the lighter side of life in the hill-station, with the emphasis on my own escapades and misadventures. Over the years, Mussoorie has changed a little, but not too much. I have changed too, but not too much. And I think I'm a better person for having spent half my life up here.

  Like Mussoorie, I'm quite accessible. You can find me up at Sisters Bazaar (walking backwards), or at the Cambridge Book Depot (reading backwards), or climbing backwards over Ganesh Saili's gate to avoid the attentions of his high-spirited Labrador. You are unlikely to find me at my residence. I am seldom there. I have a secret working-place, at a haunted house on the Tehri road, and you can only find it if you keep driving in reverse. But you must look backwards too, or you might just go off the edge of the road.

  I shall sign off with the upside-down name given to me by the lady who'd had one gin too many—

  'Bunskin Rond'

  Ledur (the village behind Landour)

  ONE

  Breakfast Time

  I like a good sausage, I do;

  It's a dish for the chosen and few.

  Oh, for sausage and mash,

  And of mustard a dash

  And an egg nicely fried—maybe two?

  At breakfast or lunch, or at dinner,

  The sausage is always a winner;

  If you want a good spread

  Go for sausage on bread,

  And forget all your vows to be slimmer.

  'In Praise of the Sausage'

  (Written for Victor and Maya Banerjee,

  who excel at making sausage breakfasts)

  There is something to be said for breakfast.

  If you take an early morning walk down Landour Bazaar, you might be fortunate enough to see a very large cow standing in the foyer of a hotel, munching on a succulent cabbage or cauliflower. The owner of the hotel has a soft spot for this particular cow, and invites it in for breakfast every morning. Having had its fill, the cow—very well-behaved—backs out of the shop and makes way for paying customers.

  I am not one of them. I prefer to have my breakfast at home—a fried egg, two or three buttered toasts, a bit of bacon if I'm lucky, otherwise some fish pickle from the south, followed by a cup of strong coffee—and I'm a happy man and can take the rest of the day in my stride.

  I don't think I have ever written a good story without a good breakfast. There are of course, writers who do not eat before noon. Both they and their prose have a lean and hungry look. Dickens was good at describing breakfasts and dinners— especially Christmas repast
s—and many of his most rounded characters were good-natured people who were fond of their food and drink—Mr Pickwick, the Cheeryble brothers, Mr Weller senior, Captain Cuttle—as opposed to the half-starved characters in the works of some other Victorian writers. And remember, Dickens had an impoverished childhood. So I took it as a compliment when a little girl came up to me the other day and said, 'Sir, you're Mr Pickwick!'

  As a young man, I had a lean and hungry look. After all, I was often hungry. Now, if I look like Pickwick, I take it as an achievement.

  And all those breakfasts had something to do with it.

  It's not only cows and early-to-rise writers who enjoy a good breakfast. Last summer, Colonel Solomon was out taking his pet Labrador for an early morning walk near Lal Tibba when a leopard sprang out of a thicket, seized the dog and made off with it down the hillside. The dog did not even have time to yelp. Nor did the Colonel. Suffering from shock, he left Landour the next day and has yet to return.

  Another leopard—this time at the other end of Mussoorie— entered the Savoy hotel at dawn, and finding nothing in the kitchen except chicken's feathers, moved on to the billiard-room and there vented its frustration on the cloth of the billiard-table, clawing it to shreds. The leopard was seen in various parts of the hotel before it made off in the direction of the Ladies' Block.

  Just a hungry leopard in search of a meal. But three days later, Nandu Jauhar, the owner of the Savoy, found himself short of a lady housekeeper. Had she eloped with the laundryman, or had she become a good breakfast for the leopard? We do not know till this day.

  English breakfasts, unlike continental breakfasts, are best enjoyed in India where you don't have to rush off to catch a bus or a train or get to your office in time. You can linger over your scrambled egg and marmalade on toast. What would breakfast be without some honey or marmalade? You can have an excellent English breakfast at the India International Centre, where I have spent many pleasant reflective mornings... And a super breakfast at the Raj Mahal Hotel in Jaipur. But some hotels give very inferior breakfasts, and I am afraid that certain Mussoorie establishments are great offenders, specializing in singed omelettes and burnt toasts.

  Many people are under the erroneous impression that the days of the British Raj were synonymous with huge meals and unlimited food and drink. This may have been the case in the days of the East India Company, but was far from being so during the last decade of British rule. Those final years coincided with World War II, when food-rationing was in force. At my boarding school in Shimla, omelettes were made from powdered eggs, and the contents of the occasional sausage were very mysterious—so much so, that we called our sausages 'sweet mysteries of life!' after a popular Nelson Eddy song.

  Things were not much better at home. Just porridge (no eggs!) bread and jam (no butter!), and tea with ghur instead of refined sugar. The ghur was, of course, much healthier than sugar.

  Breakfasts are better now, at least for those who can afford them. The jam is better than it used to be. So is the bread. And I can enjoy a fried egg, or even two, without feeling guilty about it. But good omelettes are still hard to come by. They shouldn't be made in a hurried or slapdash manner. Some thought has to go into an omelette. And a little love too. It's like writing a book—done much better with some feeling!

  TWO

  On the Delhi Road

  Road travel can involve delays and mishaps, but it also provides you with the freedom to stop where you like and do as you like. I have never found it boring. The seven-hour drive from Mussoorie to Delhi can become a little tiring towards the end, but as I do not drive myself, I can sit back and enjoy everything that the journey has to offer.

  I have been to Delhi five times in the last six months— something of a record for me—and on every occasion I have travelled by road. I like looking at the countryside, the passing scene, the people along the road, and this is something I don't see any more from trains; those thick windows of frosted glass effectively cut me off from the world outside.

  On my last trip we had to leave the main highway because of a disturbance near Meerut. Instead we had to drive through about a dozen villages in the prosperous sugarcane belt that dominates this area. It was a wonderful contrast, leaving the main road with its cafes, petrol pumps, factories and management institutes and entering the rural hinterland where very little had changed in a hundred years. Women worked in the fields, old men smoked hookahs in their courtyards, and a few children were playing guli-danda instead of cricket! It brought home to me the reality of India—urban life and rural life are still poles apart.

  These journeys are seldom without incident. I was sipping a coffee at a wayside restaurant, when a foreign woman walked in, and asked the waiter if they had 'à la carte' . Roadside stops seldom provide menus, nor do they go in for French, but our waiter wanted to be helpful, so he led the tourist outside and showed her the way to the public toilet. As she did not return to the restaurant, I have no idea if she eventually found à la carte.

  My driver on a recent trip assured me that he knew Delhi very well and could get me to any destination. I told him I'd been booked into a big hotel near the airport, and gave him the name. Not to worry, he told me, and drove confidently towards Palam. There he got confused, and after taking several unfamiliar turnings, drove straight into a large piggery situated behind the airport. We were surrounded by some fifty or sixty pigs and an equal number of children from the mohalla. One boy even asked me if I wanted to purchase a pig. I do like a bit of bacon now and then, but unlike Lord Emsworth I do not have any ambition to breed prize pigs, so I had to decline. After some arguments over right of way, we were allowed to proceed and finally made it to the hotel.

  Occasionally I have shared a taxi with another passenger, but after one or two disconcerting experiences I have taken to travelling alone or with a friend.

  The last time I shared a taxi with someone, I was pleased to find that my fellow passenger, a large gentleman with a fierce moustache, had bought one of my books, which was lying on the seat between us.

  I thought I'd be friendly and so, to break the ice, I remarked 'I see you have one of my books with you,' glancing modestly at the paperback on the seat.

  'What do you mean, your book?' he bridled, giving me a dirty look. 'I just bought this book at the news agency!'

  'No, no,' I stammered, 'I don't mean it's mine, I mean it's my book—er, that is, I happened to write it!'

  'Oh, so now you're claiming to be the author!' He looked at me as though I was a fraud of the worst kind. 'What is your real profession, may I ask?'

  'I'm just a typist,' I said, and made no further attempt to make friends.

  Indeed, I am very careful about trumpeting my literary or other achievements, as I am frequently misunderstood.

  Recently, at a book reading in New Delhi, a little girl asked me how many books I'd written.

  'Oh, about sixty or seventy,' I said quite truthfully.

  At which another child piped up: 'Why can't you be a little modest about it?'

  Sometimes you just can't win.

  My author's ego received a salutary beating when on one of my earlier trips, I stopped at a small book-stall and looked around, hoping (like any other author) to spot one of my books. Finally, I found one, under a pile of books by Deepak Chopra, Khushwant Singh, William Dalrymple and other luminaries. I slipped it out from the bottom of the pile and surreptitiously placed it on top.

  Unfortunately the bookseller had seen me do this.

  He picked up the offending volume and returned it to the bottom of the pile, saying 'No demand for this book, sir'.

  I wasn't going to tell him I was the author. But just to prove him wrong, I bought the poor neglected thing.

  'This is a collector's item,' I told him.

  'Ah,' he said, 'At last I meet a collector.'

  ★

  The number of interesting people I meet on the road is matched only by the number of interesting drivers who have carried me back
and forth in their chariots of fire.

  The last to do so, the driver of a Qualis, must have had ambitions to be an air pilot. He used the road as a runway and was constantly on the verge of taking off. Pedestrians, cyclists, and drivers of smaller vehicles scattered to left and right, often hurling abuse at my charioteer, who seemed immune to the most colourful invectives. Trucks did not give way but he simply swerved around them, adopting a zigzag approach to the task of getting from Delhi to Dehradun in the shortest possible time.

  'There's no hurry,' I told him more than once, but his English was limited and he told me later that he thought I was saying 'Please hurry!'

  Well, he hurried and he harried until at a railway-crossing where we were forced to stop, an irate scooterist came abreast and threatened to turn the driver over to the police. A long and heated argument followed, and it appeared that there would soon be a punch-up, when the crossing-gate suddenly opened and the Qualis flew forward, leaving the fuming scooterist far behind.

  As I do not drive myself, I am normally the ideal person to have in the front seat; I repose complete confidence in the man behind the wheel. And sitting up front, I see more of the road and the passing scene.

  One of Mussoorie's better drivers is Sardar Manmohan Singh who drives his own taxi. He is also a keen wildlife enthusiast. It always amazes me how he is able to drive through the Siwaliks, on a winding hill road, and still be able to keep his eye open for denizens of the surrounding forest.

  'See that cheetal!' he will exclaim, or 'What a fine sambhar!' or 'Just look at that elephant!'

  All this at high speed. And before I've had time to get more than a fleeting glimpse of one of these creatures, we are well past them.