They say a picture is worth a thousand words: I literally gave it a try!
I was returning from Mawphlang, a small hamlet perched in the Khasi Hills of Meghalaya. Meghalaya is a north-eastern state in India that means ‘the abode of the clouds. This incident happened in 2017 when I saw visiting this beautiful state for the first time. I saw an alluring and borderline surrealistic sight. It was an exceedingly beautiful sunset over the city of Shillong. Unfortunately, my camera’s battery had enough of activity and had called it a day. Me, on the other hand, still had loads of energy and excitement to devour anything that nature had to offer. I just took the scenery in, through my eyes’ lens into my neural memory. Nevertheless, memory fades fast and I don’t have anything remotely like the photographic memory. Therefore I captured it in my mind and later typed it out on my laptop, once I reached my hotel. This is my humble attempt of preserving the shot, not in pixels but in ~1000 words.
Mawphlang is a small village in the Indian state of Meghalaya, and this village known for its sacred grove. These sacred groves or ‘Law Kyntang’ or ‘ Law Lyngdoh’ are areas of forest land that were demarcated to be used only for holy rituals and kept untouched upon. People are allowed inside it but you can’t take anything outside. Not even fallen fruits, though you may eat it there. So right after finishing our trip, with vivid images of this beautiful place, still in mind, we started off for Shillong. Descending towards the main city, we found a clearing from which we saw a glimpse of city lights. It was not exposed in the first instance due to the trees, but eventually, there was a spot from which we could see things clearly.
Thick clouds are common over the capital of Meghalaya, but it was an uncommon day for Shillong. Since we had arrived at this city, we had witnessed negligible rains and we had been quite lucky in that sense. The weather was extremely pleasant with a cool breeze trying to soothe the leaves getting parched in highly unlikely bright sun. The window of the cab was open earlier and we could feel the cool breeze which was soothing us too, though not gently as by that time, it had turned somewhat uncomfortably cold. Nevertheless, there was a girl sitting between me and the window, she was a stranger and we had not shared a single word till then. So, when I saw the city lights, I was elated. I looked around as far as my eyes could see. This part of the city that I could see had a lesser concentration of homes, they were not as bunched together as a normal city but well spaced out, which was unique in itself. The lights nowadays are mostly CFLs and LEDs so they were mostly white and had the piercing sparkle of these sharp lights. I somehow find the incandescent bulbs more soothing and gentle. They are also warm and welcoming than the white and lack a sense of character.
Through the city crevices, I could see, thin long patterns of lights settled peacefully where they were not perturbed by the moving air. It was glowing in the soft, dying light of twilight. Somewhere near the horizon, one could see them mingling with the sky, be one could never be sure, where that point would be located. The whole sky was diffused in the washing of dark navy blue. This color is the same that we see right after sunset when the sky is heavy with rain-bearing clouds. As the eyes wandered across the clouds, they would come across the small clearing in the sky where one could see a magnificent display of hues. It was like an eye in the sky. The top layer of this clearing was brightest, in the shade of purple. This gave way to a layer of red streaks that glowed like the eyes of a wild cat. It was getting its energy from the sun. The sun had set an hour back but thanks to the refraction of the sky, it was still diffusing its rays into this part of the earth. I could instantly imagine what it would feel like from a flight flying above the layer of clouds, with passengers staring awestruck outside the window. The next instant I was back into the cab and saw this girl staring at the sky too, just like me. Without any consideration, I spurted out a ‘wow’, half lost on the horizon. My friend was looking in another direction and I gestured him to look to the left into the valley.
Two birds flew across the sky, breaking the stillness that was there in the scenery. They must have been tired after a long day of wandering, just like us. In fact even more tired than us as they would have had to spend energy to fetch food for themselves. We crossed a tree that was just below the level of the road, it was there that the group of birds settled on to. My eyes wandered back at the canvas that was there, still there, right across us in its unchanged display of lights and colors. I wanted desperately to stop the cab and get down and take a picture but I knew I could not. It was at this instant when I decided to capture it as vividly as possible in my eyes. Just at that moment, an idea struck me. It would be even better if I could try to express that picture in words so that I could share it with people and they would also enjoy at least a slice of the beautiful scenery. Right then I decided to write a thousand words description of that moment to see if that image was really thousand words or not. These sights are the moments when we travel and these very moments make the journey memorable.
There was another part of the sky that did not shout out loud for any attention. It was the darker, almost black layer of the clouds that were below those bright streaks. Unassumingly they were there, unconcerned for anyone’s attention or display of what their true colors were. Maybe, they just wanted to be unseen, who knows. Looking at this scene in its entirety, I could also see what we miss in our lives, living in large cities where we don’t have time for these pleasures. People wake up after the sunrise and probably catch a fleeting glimpse of the sunset from their cubicle if lucky.
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