Homealone – Story of a Lonely Woman

Even after two years, it’s still stuck in my mind… it’s about a woman who stays alone in a mountain wrapped small village near Thangu Valley, North Sikkim in her own home attached with a shop where she sells tea, coffee, biscuits, and cooked noodles and hard drinks like whisky, ram, etc.

Almost two years back, April 2017, I was traveling to Gurudongmar Lake, Sikkim and we, my car driver and I halted for tea and noodles in her shop twice – while going to and coming back from Gurudongmar Lake… it’s somewhere near Thangu Valley on Gurudongmar road, I can’t remember the exact location now, I wish I noted it down or I geo-tagged it.

In April 2017, in the entire Sikkim hard drinks were banned, but I was surprised to see it was available openly in her shop. One reason, it’s very far away from the North Sikkim’s major populations, and over there it was too cold, altitude close to 13000 feet. Being China border very close by, I saw many military camps, bunkers and there was hardly any or a few civilian homes. I think except tourists and army people, no one goes to her shop, there are none actually.

While having noodles and tea, we had a talk with her. I expressed my views on her home, it was neatly decorated as you can see in the pictures and I took a few photos of her room. When I asked her how long she is staying there in that place, she told me it’s about two years and I asked if she was born and brought up there or not, most probably she said she is from Pelling, West Sikkim. She cracked jokes with me when I was taking pictures of her home – she was saying that I can invite her to decorate my own kitchen in Kolkata, she can do it for free of cost and many other things.

When I asked her how long she is staying there in that place, she told me it’s about two years…

My driver was very curious about her and he was pushing me to ask about her personal life, like if she is married or not, where is her husband, why is she staying alone in this place, why isn’t she going back to the mainland, etc. They know each other for a very long time as he drops by there with tourists on a regular basis, even though at that point in time, he didn’t know much about her. He had a lot of interest to know about her personal life, and it’s obvious too; he had very good respect for her courage, staying there all her along for two years is not an easy thing at all.

The environment is not supportive, it’s terrific cold, there are hardly any people to talk to, almost no transport except a few tourist cars and army trucks. It’s still wondering how she manages her home, shop and everything all her alone for such a long time, I think she stays there now as well. If I am fortunate to go there again, I wish I can meet her again. I have noted her name and phone number in my phone’s contact book, I promised her that I will pass her photographs over WhatsApp, but not sure I couldn’t find that afterward, just lost it somehow and I feel bad about it.