Layers of green : banboo, banana, ferns and fern trees, cactus, local lemons called “kaji nemu” in Assam and “kagoji lebu” in Bangaldesh ( as told to me by Rani Singh & Purna Pratiti Saha via Instagram! )
Layers of brown : reddish soil, black soil, no roads but muddy slush, big red ants.
Bamboo is used EVERYWHERE for literally everything. I saw tall bamboo but not very fat bamboo. A Japanese friend of mine who I’d met in LA, recently sent me a photo of fat FAT bamboo from Japan and I told her I hadn’t seen anything like that in real life. To which she responded that even she knew India has bamboo! I told her I was heading to bamboo countryside soon but I doubted I’d see anything that fat and sadly, I was right. Boo.
Arunachal Pradesh is not heavily populated and I hope it stays that way – the only way its resources are going to be used without plunder.
This drive was the worst! But I guess a bit of it was compensated by the “hellos” with some really HOT Indian Army officers who were on the road to and from from this and that. Shared a couple of meals along the road with some of these hotties. Yummy.
Got to Likabali and vodka with local lime was on the agenda. Fabulous.
Likbali is in Assam and the town is right next to another called Silpather. These are plains probably formed by the Brahmaputra river hundreds of thousands of years ago. Vast expanses of super rich soil where rice is grown and after crossing the river, there’s LOTS of tea gardens.
The temperature has gone us drastically as we’ve travelled down from Menchukha. Likbali was HOT and humid and we got into our rooms and the first thing we all asked for was the air conditioner power switch.
This was Day 13.
