Hello friend,

All I feel able to write about is longing. In particular, the longing for connection. I think about writing every single day, wanting to reach a hand out to you, to invite you a little into my world. It’d be nice to have a little conversation. But I have been struggling to put my experiences to words - they become ash before leaving my mouth.

For the entirety of the time I spent in the Himalayas, I found it easier to connect with trees than I did other humans. Save for a couple of delightful souls, I was attuned to the more-than-human world: I took long, long walks, cried in the arms / branches of deodar, repeatedly visited the same unattended mandir so I could greet the dogs who napped there and the deities who watch over them.

Now, I’ve been back in Chennai for 4 days, and some of that feels very far away. What’s still with me is the sense of slowness, the disorientation of being away from home, and of course, the longing.

Of course, you may have seen me in this state long before I left for India. This whole year, so far, has been a sort of fever trip. It’s just that while I’m traveling, there are fewer escape routes. More than any particular friend, location, or routine, I am my most consistent companion. But that’s why I set up the whole thing, isn’t it?

Last week I took my dad’s ashes to a place in the Himalayas that had a lot of resonance for him: the Chopta Valley. Firsthand, I got to experience both the beauty of the mountains and the onslaught of modernity on a region that, ten years ago, appealed to me.

Modernity cannot be “escaped” simply by going to a quieter place. But I tried, following roads I had taken before.

In these days, I traveled very simply, taking local transit, squeezing into share jeeps, being told where to sit and where to go, eating whatever food appeared in front of me, constantly befuddled by communication because I appear as though I speak fluent Hindi and the reality is… I don’t.

I would wake up not knowing where I was going to sleep that night, and walk for hours, hitchhike, “be taken” somewhere and then rest. Eventually, I found a quiet place near a waterfall that’s associated with a sage, did a terrifying climb which included a little crawl space, and respectfully let my dad’s ashes go.

And then I sat at the waterfall and cried for an hour.

I wasn’t just crying because of the release of my dad, though the ritual was powerful. I was crying to see the mountains being cut into so that bigger and bigger cars could reach pilgrimage sites. I was crying on behalf of the local trees that are being crowded out by the colonial regime’s policy to forbid pahadi people from managing their own forests in favor of the resource-draining, profit-producing Chir Pine.

There are entire hills and mountains taken over by these invasive species. As a new friend of mine put it, this “government failure” happened over two centuries ago yet here I am, today, feeling devastated over it.

Everything is connected. I am hearing of folks living in India who are deeply impacted by what some are calling “AI Psychosis,” the phenomenon where technology leaders overestimate the short-term financial upside of using AI and fire many of their people prematurely.

So many here have made their entire careers downstream of the bay area tech industry. Careers that are feeling less and less stable, while people work ever-intensifying shifts with no end in sight.

What’s more, Indian corporations (and the government) are taking over forests and displacing the communities living on them to build data centers for American companies.

Then, of course, there’s the weather. In the same week we are seeing hail come down and then the hottest temperatures on record, and then hail again. People, especially elders, are dying in the heat. And the forest cover that might provide natural cooling is being cut down across the subcontinent.

Just like in the US, all of this is tied to social and material inequality: the neighborhoods that still have tree cover are colonial and upper caste. And in India, forced occupation, one of the structures that enforces the immutability of caste, is still practiced, albeit more invisibly. That means that the person who handles your toilet refuse, who is required to work outside, who is more likely to die in a heatwave is much more likely to come from a dalit background.

We must be willing to speak about these things, even if we aren’t as precise in our knowledge as we’d like to be. I’m still learning, but this is what I’m witnessing, and it’s taken me a month to find a way to put it to words.

Everything is connected. I sit at the waterfall and feel all of this as despair. I walk the same routes I did ten years ago, hoping to feel some of the sense of wonder, adventure, and connection I did back then. But I am filled with grief and I can’t relate to the happy-go-lucky attitude of international backpackers finding themselves on the shore of the Ganga.

The good thing is, the river herself hasn’t changed. She is still the same powerful, erotic being of creation and destruction that provided my first experience of ecological awakening 15 years ago. Just like back then, she reminds me that there is no substitute for humility and surrender. Get quiet, she coos, there is more if only you let yourself see it.

I am more quiet than usual, in search of something that I won’t find by going to “the right place.” I am already in the right place, and I will be for the entirety of my trip and beyond. The journey goes deeper inward - it’s just harder to write a postcard from there.

Still, here in the city, I miss the trees. I open my eyes to concrete and my ears to incessant honking. There is, thankfully, still birdsong here in Chennai, but I miss the trees. I would like to be back amongst them, sometime, though I know that they’re still here with me, cheering me on as I continue to delve down this path. Just like you.

The longing persists, and it does soothe an ache to be able to write about it. I wonder, what is your heart singing for these days? I’d like to listen with you, together.

Faithfully yours,
Rishi