A guest post by Sugandha Das on what its like to live and manage Mary Budden Estate.
Conventionally, an office space has a work station, soft board walls, a technological buzz, gently creaking chairs with roller wheels and neatly dressed men and women. My office is an ancient desk, covered in a paisley patterned table cloth with a kaleidoscope and a feather covered pen stand cushioning my laptop in the middle. My view is of an immense and dense oak and rhododendron forest with layers of mountain tops upto the horizon where sheer green meets sheer blue, against the backdrop of soaring Himalayan griffins and leaf munching langoors. And a mountain dog who huffs and puffs at my side, demanding hourly cookies.
I live inside Binsar Wildlife Sanctuary, a protected forest of 47 square kilometers, tucked away in a remote part of the Kumaon Himalayas in Uttrakhand. Peter Hopkirk, a British journalist and author of some of the most iconic books on the Himalayas, once said, that the best view of the Himalayan snow caps is from “Jhandi” peak in Binsar. I have to agree with him. It is not merely the view that this place offers, it is also the quietude, the purity and the silence of the forest, as you gaze upon a 180 degree showcase of the biggest wonder of the world—the Himalayas.
Mary Budden Estate, is a 150 year old estate located deep inside Binsar sanctuary. It has been run as a boutique homestay since 2011 and boasts of being best hidden because it advertises with no sign boards. As soon as one thinks of a homestay, one is compelled to think of a “local” experience, and something cheap, meant for backpackers.
Mary Budden Estate, Delhi based photographer and writer Serena Chopra’s labour of love surpasses convention and staple hospitality at every step. Each room has character, each dish from the kitchen is a mix of tales and cuisines collected and shared over years and places, each person here has a story.
I have been living at the estate for the past 2 years now. City life with its mania of ambition and noise became too much for me and in December 2013, I decided to move away. A lot of people I know have termed my decision akin to a sabbatical or the lack of ambition, perhaps even a “hippie” phase. It saddens me to think that to move closer to nature must be a phase and not a general and welcome tendency; to embrace living over existing must be thought “weird”.
In my world here, there is no place for fashion, for trends, for beer nights or expensive cars. In my world here, there are only warm smiles shared over bonfires, tedious treks undertaken to sigh at the beauty of sights never seen, clothes mended and worn over and over again till they become souvenirs of a time spent with the forest, with a rock, with a tree, perhaps even gazing spellbound and afraid, at a leopard.
Mary Budden Estate, luckily enough, becomes home to guests who understand that Nature surpasses all; who strive to seek healthier lifestyles not through gym classes but through the trails of the forest, who would rather be able to rattle off names of 250 species of birds that reside here than as many numbers of brands of shoes.
Typically, a day at Mary Budden Estate, begins with a hot cuppa in the wide, long patios, in the warmth of a shawl on a comfy day bed, as you watch the million colours of the sky explode to welcome the day’s sunrise. Breakfasts are lovingly put together from the large kitchen garden and our very own in-house baker whose breads and cookies will put city ovens to shame! Food is taken seriously here and long hikes are rewarded with warm “bukhari” (iron fireplaces) fires and gorgeous meals.
A staff of 9 village men assists me at Mary Budden Estate. All of these men are local villagers who have been trained and taught at the estate, for housekeeping and service. What is special about these shy Kumaoni men is their wide smile, and a “yes ma’am” or “yes sir” to every demand. They only ask you to respect the silence of their forests in return. Noise is not something we forest dwellers seek or entertain. In fact, visits to the neighbouring town of Almora are thankfully accepted as day visits only. City noise isn’t for us, and we, certainly aren’t made for it.
In the waning winter and oncoming spring from January to March, we are eager hosts of blooming rhododendron flowers. A bright red carpets the forest trails while hillsides seem to be blazing in the brightness of a colour we only learnt to associate with violence in history books—red. Here, red is happy, red is beautiful, red is cheerful, red blends with the green of the trees, the blue of the sky, the brown of the mountains, the white of the snow peaks and makes you marvel at how Nature, over the millenniums, has always inspired awe and wonder.
Mary Budden Estate recently also launched a village home stay called Dalar, located 8 kms from the estate. This two room mud bungalow is an artist’s haven. Located in the small village of Dalar, which houses only 10 families, the village house is covered in passion flower vines, surrounded by lemon, orange and fig trees and the distant sounds of village life—children, dogs, cattle and the occasional “thak thak” of an axe on wood.
While Mary Budden Estate offers a generous peak into the old British life and the experience of a cabin in the woods, Dalar takes you into the life of the locals through the years, in remote mountain villages.
Clearly, city life lacks something. Because the smiles I have seen on the faces here are only surpassed by the brightness of the sun and the blueness of the sky in the Kumaon Himalayas I now call home. I would urge everyone to experience this, make this a part of their life, atleast once a year. The mountains after all, are always, always calling out. All you need to do is take off those earphones and listen. Listen and run into the forest, into what has moulded us to be who we are today. Believe me, the experience is not disappointing. It is only wondrous and eye-opening and if you listen long enough, it will take you beyond moments of selfies and social media. It will take you home.
About Sugandha Das-
Sugandha Das is a Binsar based slam poet. She manages Mary Budden Estate in the Kumaon Himalayas and comes down for monthly slam poetry shows in New Delhi with her group, Mildly Offensive Content. Sugandha also runs her own stand up comedy and slam poetry show called PocketRockets, in New Delhi. Her first loves are the mountains and poetry. A St Stephen’s graduate, Sugandha studied Sociology and then worked variously as an editor, a mountain guide and a social media manager, before settling at Mary Budden Estate, which has been her home for the past 2 years. She also blogs at www.namelessverses.blogspot.in
