What Is It Like To Get Stuck In A Disaster?

I always embody a ‘why not’ attitude. I will typically say yes before I say no, especially to travel. Traveling fulfills this thirst to push my boundaries, take risks and try new things. But this time, things didn't go as planned, but when I came out of it, I was nothing but grateful for the days I was stranded in the valley of Himachal Pradesh, which was shut due to swollen rivers and extremely heavy rains. What I experienced then was unreal, not enticed by fear but, gratefulness.?

Some people dream of getting stranded in the hills. For me, it really happened. I traveled to the upper Tirthan Valley for a weekend getaway in July 2023. I thought I'd be there for a quick vacation, but days turned into a week, followed by no electricity, no network, just me, my fellow 20-something travelers, and the beautiful locals of Himachal Pradesh.

Spoiler alert: While I was in the valley, my life was nothing like Tom Hanks in?Cast Away?or any other girl who leaves the world to escape into the mountains and I wasn't just chilling out, but losing my hopes most of the time when there was no way out, but in the end, it was beautiful.

Tirhtan Valley is no stranger to me, in fact, a favorite place to get peace of mind and regain my sanity. I visited that place last year in July, but this time, some other things were planned for me.?So much so, that I didn't sleep for the night when the river levels were rising constantly and I came to know that this disastrous episode is happening after 30 years. I kept my eyes open the whole night navigating ways to get out of the place, SAFELY, in the absence of any network.

Why Tirthan?

I work at an IT company in Noida as a full-time corporate girlie, but with that little time I get over the weekends, I hop on to the hills with a community travel group. Usually, I'm accompanied by a few experienced people in the travel industry, but this time I was alone with a group of 15 people.?(God, what did I do to experience that alone?) ;)

On the day second of our weekend-turned-week-long vacation, we went trekking towards a holy lake, the 10 km long trek starts with Jalori Pass, at 10,800ft above sea level. It was raining the whole time, so, we carried our raincoats, our umbrellas and drenched our feet with Dettol and Sanitizers to prevent leeches (That shit hurts, trust me).?

Heavy rainfall throughout the trek seemed normal to me because of the season, and it even made the trail pretty, filled with monsoon mist.?

But, as we came back to the valley, I noticed something unusual, the river started swelling, and I started feeling heavy in my heart as if something bad is going to happen. It was still raining heavily, even in the valley. After we had our dinner, the resort managers, who also happens to be the locals of the valley, warned me about the rising level of the river.?

Now, I have been to that place more than 5 times in the past 2 years and I've seen it in almost every season, AND, mind you, I never saw the river going to this extent in the past. So, I took the warning very casually. Also, we were heading back to Delhi the next evening, so, I stayed chill.?

It was around 2 am in the morning when I was informed about the rising water levels. Around 4 am, we were suggested to shift to another property.?

By 5 am, we shifted the property where I was staying to a separate property of 10 minutes of walking distance.?

No connection, No electricity, No way out??

When this whammy began, we lost connections for Jio, India's most promised network carrier, and after a day, we lost all the connections, and electricity. It was just us, and the locals in the valley, Stuck, Stranded, and Lively. I changed 5 stays, alone, during this time, with my bags on my shoulders, my drenched shoes in my hands, and an umbrella to cover myself from heavy rain, I roamed in the valley, with fear and question in some deep corner of my subconscious mind of ever getting back to Delhi!!?

By the time we lost our connections, there was news across the country about landslides, roads being broken, properties and cars being washed away, (some properties went down broken in a river in front of my eyes. The place where I had lunch in the afternoon was in the diving in the river by the evening.) It was unpleasant, but pleasant simultaneously, a mixed feeling that I can't even express.?

Fearful or faithful?

On the one hand, I had the responsibility of 15 people and myself, keeping everyone safe and taking them back home, safely. And, on the other, I was happy when locals started having meaningful conversations, we started visiting their homes and had the most honest conversations of our lives. Within a few days, the whole valley knew me, we were drinking together, cooking together, laughing together, away from our work, our family, or any other distraction. The valley in monsoon is as pretty as it could get, but there was a constant battle of dealing with enjoying the paradise and the constant reminder that it is somewhere you can’t leave.

During that time, I also learned a lot about myself and about humanity in general.?I asked my property manager, whom I call Bhaiji, about the gas cylinder situation, knowing the supplies are cut and we were going to stay there for a few more days. He assured me of serving us good food and was ready to go an extra mile to help us reach back safely. There were times when I walked more than 20kms in a day just to learn about the road connectivity situation outside the valley

Stuck, really?

Certainly, the idea of being stuck in paradise is certainly appealing—but I think in reality, no one wants to be “stuck” anywhere. You could put someone in their favorite place in the world and as long as they are “stuck” there, I don’t think they’d enjoy it. No one likes to be limited and told they can’t do something, and I think that takes away a lot of the charm of enjoying and being in the moment.

What is Home?

For me, it was not seeing my life in Tirthan as being stuck, but rather accepting it as my temporary home. This took me some time before I really accepted I might be here for some time. Before then, I was constantly in eager anticipation and hope of being able to return to Delhi and my life there. Once I had accepted the reality of waiting for things to get better, things were a lot easier and everything changed. The river was calmer, and the sunsets were more incredible, the people I met started to mean much more to me. I really started to live life again, instead of having my own life on pause and missing what I used to have.

The Lesson?

Before this episode happened, I used to think my time was so precious I would count down my minutes and never give myself a spare second. Now if I miss a day or two of work, ...well, that’s just life.

You can’t plan ahead too much, and you just have to let life happen.?Life is funny, just like that, everything happens for a reason, even when you can't see a reason happening straight away.

So, Chill out. Slow down. And enjoy.