amassed . The few fellows still alive are in their 80s and 90s and hard to find .
The roads in the north eastern states are as panoramic as they are wrecked . The ravages of monsoonal rains eat up the thinly laid tarmac leaving potholes the size of ponds prone to filling with slurry clay after rains . To add to that , we had fires engulfing parts of the roads . Slash and burn fires , a method used by locals in Nagaland to clear mountain slopes for cultivation . Following the success of neighbouring Assam ’ s tea plantations , Nagaland is clearing virgin slopes for planting tea .
One day , after many hours riding on dirt tracks , we encountered thick smoke on the road from fires down below the escarpment . Despite low visibility , exploding bamboo sounding like automatic weapons firing at close range and raining live embers , we had to push on . Going back was not an option . Not enough hours of daylight left . So , we charged through the smoke in a war-like scenario hoping for the best . When we finally emerged from the inferno , we were covered in ashes from head to toe and had to wipe live embers from our shoulders .
But that is not all . Through sunny patches of the most verdant mountainsides , encounters with armed men were not unusual . They mostly carried homemade rifles to hunt , they said . But there have been kidnappings in the area for ransom as this state has a history of separatism . They don ’ t consider themselves Indian or Burmese . They are their own people . There were , until not long ago , militant cells in need of money to support their cause . We didn ' t have any trouble at all and in fact stopped and posed for group pictures with some of them .
In total opposition to this dangerous scenario was a stay in
TRAVERSE 122