Acknowledgments

Projects like this do not happen in a vacuum. I had support and assistance from numerous people and organizations throughout the process. It began as a follow-up to a January 2019, “Exploring Urban Sustainability through India’s Cities” fellowship for community college and minority serving institution faculty that was awarded by the Council of American Overseas Research Centers (CAORC) in partnership with the American Institute of Indian Studies (AIIS). Through the AIIS, in the fall of 2019, I was invited to apply for an open-ended follow-up fellowship of my own design to return to India to conduct research under the umbrella of digital humanities. I received notice of my award for this follow up in April of 2020, from Dr. Elise Auerbach at AIIS, however, at the time the world was hindered by the COVID-19 pandemic. Finally, in 2022, the globe began to open once again for international travel, and I was able to follow through on my proposal.

I must also thank George Mathew, Chair of the Institute of Social Sciences in New Delhi. Though we have never met, he and his institute sponsored my Indian research visa.

On a walk to explore the Yamuna River watershed I happened across Shivam Gangan. In fact, I was walking through his front yard in Barkot, Uttarakhand looking for a trail when he asked what I was doing. As it turned out, Shivam, the 19-year-old son of the newly appointed Barkot Forest Head Ranger, Jagmohan Singh Gangari, was helpful in translating for his father about the problems faced in managing the Barkot Forest. Shivam was my first formal interview and he and his father hosted me for dinner that night.

While I have travelled to remote locations in many places, I had never travelled in rural India, and I found deciphering a means of getting from place A to B somewhat difficult with no skill in Hindi or local transportation experience. For example, in Barkot, Uttarakhand, the jeep taxi to Mussoorie picks up curbside at 6 am, 50 m from the hotel in which I was staying. However, there was absolutely no indication that was the case; it was genuine local knowledge. By pure happenstance I ended up at Hotel Parash Palace in Barkot, part way to my Yamunotri destination. Hotel owner/manager Paras Rawat was instrumental in assisting me with how to find the correct jeep taxi, registering me with Uttarakhand Tourism Development Board for access to Yamunotri, as well as making me comfortable in his hotel and even extending my phone SIM card (my credit card would not work). Likewise, his brother, Dr. Pranshul Rawat who I never met face-to-face, used his connections to secure a room for me in the Himachali Dharmshala Hotel in Janki Chatti where I was embedded, if you will, with the ghoda and doli walas.

In Janki Chatti most helpful were brothers Vikash and Aanash Nautiyal. I arrived in an overloaded jeep taxi and was expelled into a mob of pilgrims, mules, walas, and vendors all choking on diesel exhaust fumes and mule dung. In a state of total disorientation, I was tasked with finding the hotel (it is not something one finds on Google maps and street names are non-existent). An English speaking yatri from my jeep asked around for me and pointed me in the direction of uphill. He said it is near the bridge. I walked up the road and found the automobile bridge to Kharsali. I asked around there and was almost recruited by two other hoteliers to stay in their hotels. Finally, I was directed to a pedestrian bridge even further up the hill. Mind you I was carrying an overweight backpack burdened by camera gear. Fuzzy headed from being on the verge of motion sickness from two hours on the hairpin-to-hairpin curved road from Barkot, with a driver who had to pass anything in front of him, (and at an elevation of 2,500+ m (8,300 ft)), I trudged up a steep footpath and wandered my way to the pedestrian bridge. As I was walking against the stream of hundreds of pilgrims, their mules, and their porters/guides; the roar of so many people talking, mule bells jangling, and muleteers yelling at their beasts; me sweating across my brow from the burden of the backpack combined with the overwhelming cultural shock, I thought I heard “Walker.” I brushed it off as hearing things because who would know my name up there? But I heard it again. “Walker,” and a young guy came running out of a rough restaurant-looking concrete building. “Are you Walker?” Relieved, I said “yes.” It was Aakash. Dr. Rawat had called his brother Vikash who then called Aakash, to arrange for my stay. I felt a wash of relief as he took my backpack and guided me to a room. Atul Rana got me situated in my room and showed me around a bit. At one point five guys were standing around this curiosity of an American researcher asking what I was doing there—a bit of a novelty I was. Shiwa Nautiyal offered me chai and I talked with Aakash about getting up to Saptrishi Kund, the lake at the bottom of the Champasar Glacier that is the origin of the Yamuna River. In my online research prior to this trip, I found the lake to be between 7 to 9 km (4.3 to 5.6 mi) from Janki Chatti at an elevation of 3,293 m (~10,800 ft). Doable if I took my time. However, Aakash, and later Vikash, confirmed that it was actually more like 14 km (8.7 mi) beyond Yamunotri for a total of 19 km (11.8 mi) one way at an elevation of 4,451 m (14,504 ft). That would have been a solid 38 km (23.6 mi) roundtrip trek at an elevation I knew would be me taking two steps then having to catch my breath for five minutes, two steps, five minutes… I know this because last year I climbed to the highest point in New Mexico, Wheeler Peak at 4,013 m (13,167 ft), without the weight of camera equipment, and it was two steps, breathe for five minutes… I live in the Texas lowlands at 200 m (660 ft) elevation totally unaccustomed to elevation and I knew I could not keep up with a 20-something guide.

Despite the reality check and need for a change in plan, Vikash, Aakash, and Shiwa took exceptionally good care of me during my stay in Janki Chatti. Shiwa kept me well fed and Vikash tolerated my multitude of questions about what to him must have certainly been mundane, day-to-day things like, “did you just buy milk from that guy?” (The guy being a man who poured two liters of milk from a dirty 20-liter gas can looking jug into a bottle…turned out to be local, fresh milk for tea). Likewise, Vikash was eager to get me out and show me around. He offered to take me back up to Yamunotri and show me around, but I was little interested in retracing my steps up to the ashram along a hyper-crowded, mule-dung laden trail. I did take him up though on an offer to tour Kharsali and the multiple temples there, with entry to the Shani Dev and Yamunotri temples. I also happened to run into Aakash in Kharsali one day and he detoured from his task at hand to show me around.

During my time in Janki Chatti I was “kidnapped” by Mr. Chandan Singh as I was setting out to explore beyond Kharsali. I say “kidnapped” because the elderly man insisted on me walking back to the village with him for chai. I attempted to politely decline but he would not take no for an answer, so he took my hand and turned me around and towed me to his front porch where his family and extended family materialized while I drank a small cup of sugar with some tea in it. I also took tea with a retired man by the name of Kuldreep on my first day in Janki Chatti. “Hello, where are you from?” Although he lived in Janki Chatti six months of the year and in Delhi for the winter months, I was never able to find him again during my stay.

On my return trek I was introduced to a cultural event that was both disturbing and overwhelming. The event, a one day “Fish Mela” on the Aglad River, a tributary of the Yamuna River, was disturbing because they poison the river with powdered timeru and proceed to net all of the fish from the several kilometers of the river. Overwhelming because well over 10,000 men from villages around Uttarakhand show up for the event.

Others who helped me out include Michelle Pelletier, an American expat ESL teacher living in Sainji. She showed me invaluable skill of hitchhiking along the Mussoorie road so I could get into Kempty to buy groceries—an otherwise 6 km (3.7 mi) one-way walk. Sanyukta Sharma and her husband, AirBnB hosts, gave me some hiking tips for the Banglo Ki Kandi area and I ended up having the opportunity to visit the Tibetan refugee community where the Dalai Lama was first exiled. And for just one day I shared a kitchen with a social anthropology professor and India expert Dr. Thomas Chambers. He clued me in to a variety of ways to expand my case study write up about the socio-economic network of guides along the Yamunotri trail.

There were numerous shopkeepers, taxi drivers (Satish, Raja Rainbow, and others), and Ibis Hotel reception folks who took great care of me too, but many of whom I never got their names. While they may have just been doing their jobs, to me they went out of their way to help.

Finally, I would like to thank my wife, Dr. Jeannette Jones, who tolerates my off-the-beaten path treks, seemingly without worry most of the time, whilst she planned her own adventures, caught up with friends, and helped my son work through the tedium of foreign visa paperwork to coordinate his first international adventure to study in Ireland. She was also my editor on this project.

Without everyone’s support I would never have been able to make this fellowship a success. Thank you.