March 1999, a village on the outskirts of Leh. A golden morning glow embraces the freezing land stirring it to life. Above, a trail of wispy cirrus clouds is strung across a cold blue sky.

Looking out from a small, one-room mud-brick canteen at the back of an OCR, a deeply sunburnt Gilik, exclaims: Aaaa, Nanu aa giya …, (then, pursing his lips and raising his eyebrows) smart dress pehna hai Nunu aaj toh!

Jorgias: Nunu chai peeyega?

Nanu: Haan (vigorously nodding her head and smiling broadly; she had been waiting for the question).

Gilik (pulling a half-broken wooden stool across the beaten earth floor for the nearly three-year-year-old to sit): Tashi, Nunu ko ek matthi do badhiya chai ke saath.

Sonam (laughing): Nunu, Zombay kaise chalta hai?

A wave of laughter reverberates through the mud-brick, smoky room recalling yesterday’s performance.

Nunu smiling, readily performs – the shuffling, bent Zombay walk.

A Tsunami of mirth bursts out of the canteen door and fills the office corridor, Sonam doubles up laughing on the canteen floor, the somber Tashi is forced into a crinkly-eyed smile; Zombay’s smile closes his eyes and his sunbaked creased face is a dark brown version of the craggy mountains of the Ladakh range.

Chetan from admin comes out running, and Nunu is requested for a repeat performance. She is the happy mascot for the unit.

After the merry tea ceremony is over, Angdu and Jorgias, together: Nunu, aaj gaadi Chalaeyga?

Nanu, vigorously nods her head and hurriedly clambers down the high stool. They set out together towards an old olive Jonga, parked between two one-tonners in the MT shed. The old army jonga rarely moves these days, but in its youth was a master of the mountain roads.

Jorgias: Aaj kidhar chalne ka Nunu?

Nanu: Turtuk.

Nanu navigates the treacherous Leh – Khardungla road with utmost concentration, her cheeks starting to glow like the late summer blush on Ladakhi apricots.

Jorgias laughs and exclaims: Nunu itna steering ghumayega toh gaadi gaddhe mein jaayega!

Nanu, a bit gentler with the steering following the reprimand, tentatively: theek hai?

Jorgias, driver, mechanic, knower of vehicles par excellence, guitarist all rolled into one, laughing: Haan.

Called to duty, they deposit Nunu under a tall eucalyptus growing next to a sandy courtyard, she sits on a surface covered with large pebbles from the Indus to carry on her daily explorations.

Joined by a curious Magpie in her shiny formals, she is soon engrossed in digging out cold sand with a stick; side-by-side piling the pebbles from the Indus bank on top of one another, God knows thinking of what all (maybe inspired by the chortens lining the Leh-Thiksey road), till Almas from the neighbouring house is back from school and calls her to play: Aaooo Nanu, khelney chalein? And, she trudges off holding Almas’s hand. She returns home late in the evening, having had lunch with her friend.

June 1999, a squishy-clumpy-grass meadow on a gentle slope with a thin strip of winding road cutting through it to Shambhala (a mythical kingdom of peace and tranquility in Buddhist lore):

A war rages further north in the higher reaches of Kargil. All the drivers, staff pre-occupied like never before – travelling to Kargil, Dras, Batalik, Diskit, Turtuk, …; the bustling office nearly empty; so, evenings Nanu goes on long, meandering walks towards the Shambhala hotel about a kilometer away.

Phoolchand: Nanu, udhar paani mein nahin jaana, joota-moja geela ho jayega.

Ma, trying to distract her from wading further into the little stream just before the Shambhala hotel, pointing to the sheep in the meadows: look at the sheep there.

Nanu: yes, Ma, turning around; then quickly back to picking pebbles from the stream and storing them in her red jacket pocket ignoring all talk from the grownups.

Ma: It is getting dark and cold, time to return home beti.

Nanu, seizing an opening: Can we go to the Jam-jam (German) bakery and get a pastry? Their large chocolate pastry with a large jam-drop on top are the town’s hot favourite.

Another day, pouring over patrol patterns across the LAC, a little hand pats a knee, Nanu (imploring but confident): toffee.

Going out with her in the small sandy courtyard: Sukhdev, issko toffee dila dena.

Vermaji: sir, ye badmaash ho gaee hai, kal Sodhi ko kah rahi thi, ‘sodhi yaar, toffee nikaal’. 

A year later, summer of 2020:

Time to say goodbyes … everyone is there Gilik, Jorgias, Angdus, Sonam and Tashi, Chetan and Mr. Wangchuk, Norbu, so are Almas and her elder sister and mother, and the guards, and many more friends, blurry-eyed she sees them waving, Jigmet is wiping his eyes with his soiled sleeves. Nanu sits in the cavernous Ambassador, and waves.

When she returns twenty years later with her look-alike younger sister, almost all are there; they host a party in a large hall where they play their orchestra. Zombay’s spirit hangs around, so do a few other kindred souls. Again, overwhelmed in the land of the Buddha.

***