The Silk Route Opens Up

A PASSing thought

With Nathula Pass opening up, its Hindi-Cheeni bhai-bhai time again. The old Silk Route disentangles leaving us in a SILKtuation where all ROUTEna manana is over and trade is expected to flourish.

It is much to my delight when physical boundaries diminish and the hope that the stronger boundaries that we guard so protectively in our minds will someday diminish too, strengthens. Just a couple of months back I was there! Yes, right there basking in the glory of seeing China on the other side of the barbed wire, going blue in the -5 degrees (or so we were informed) chill, gleefully gazing at Chinese snow and freaking out about being right on the border. We were surrounded by snow through most of the way to Nathula around mid-April but the photograph in the newspaper today was almost unrecognizable. Not a speck of snow!!!! I’m just so glad I went when I did, for as a resident of the urban grey, my tryst with white purity is limited. Here are the two photographs for comparison.