Where This Road Is Taking Me

Snow Leopard Expeditions - India

It all started with an insult. A decade ago, on a mountain relatively smaller and easier. Any mountain cannot be underestimated, but I did at that point of time. I ignored that I was under-prepared, overconfident and a kind of a ridiculous arrogant fellow. I gave up badly, totally, and it was that which became the start of my life. You know when life is completely screwed up, a new opportunity will rise from the ashes. I am lucky to have found it, and it was a deliberate choice that I will never make the same mistake again. Those were the days where I encountered these words: apex predator, conservation and sustainable ecosystem.

There was inspiration, there was failure, there was suffering, followed by four months of sleepless nights until the guilt slowly lost its power when I reached Kala Patthar. The introspection, the so-called gutsy decisions, I can say foolish decisions, another four and a half years passed. The second time, six months before covid, the mountain of gods tested me again. I was able to reach 5,053 meters. I was not in good shape of course, but I was committed. Natural causes, human causes, avalanche causes, and I myself am a cause. The mountain kicked my ass and sent me home. That is where it started. Initially it was the same old sleepless nights and overconfidence for sure. Blows upon blows. Ignorance and suffering. I knew that I don’t know what I don’t know.

In all these mistakes I made, I am sure about one thing. The blessings of the mountain were there with me. The mountain of gods and the Goddess mother of the world have punished me, but only to transform, not to suffer. Besides, all this time, I was sincere. Truly. Because good things take time, and shattered dreams slowly began to take shape, and in time the results proved promising.

Life. Life is nothing but training to survive that one mistake, and training keeps you finding the better version of yourself. It continued until the summit fever ambition was found and fulfilled. The expectation was a successful future. That was an interesting interpretation. But actually that was a dead end. In fact most successes lead to a dead end. That was the first step in real life. I understood the strength of a mere common man when he actually pushes the limits, and beyond that, what things can be achieved. I went misstep there too, because of the expectations. Life moved on, troubles, more troubles, more insults. These are the tests and examinations of life, conducted only for me by those well wishers. And I am okay to bear that pain, happily, with all heart because one thing is certain. I am sincere at least.

The story I tell today is not new and everyone already knew it much before my realisation. However, what is truth? Truth is a reality, which is not the truth until it is experienced personally as truth. This is my story. The truth I have realised and the truth I have experienced. And I name it the imperfect story. That is the definition of beauty I understood, which is imperfection. Symmetry looks good, but with a little imperfection the looks will be stunning. Which in my opinion is the exact definition of beauty.

I am pretty inspired by people working with the International Snow Leopard Trust (ISLT) and Panthera, those organisations working in India. So why can I not do some of this work? Maybe in the future, not today. I don’t want to commit to anything now. The noble idea is to use it to generate some standpoint here and slowly take it forward to raise funds, camera traps and conservation later. But for now it will be a standard Snow Leopard sighting expedition and Himalayan wildlife sightings. It is the beginning.

The words are fancy. Explorer, mountaineer, conservationist. These are just fancy words and I too dreamt of sticking one of these designated words before my name. Now if you ask me, no. I just want to be a nobody doing the work I intend to do and finish the job before the final day. Every corner of the earth is mapped now. GPS killed the explorer. I am not sure of the other designated professions anymore. I really don’t care about those fancy words. I am more proud to be an assistant to Mr. Rahul in this upcoming expedition, learning more about conservation and digging deep into the subject, to do a squirrel’s contribution for a greater cause.

Project Elusive Animal

The Snow Leopard expeditions I wish to undertake, I will keep in the imperfect section of my website, because over a period of time the ecosystem lost its perfection. The imperfect perfection, which is the cycle of the food chain, will disrupt not just the carnivorous system but the herbivorous and eventually the human systems. For an ecosystem to run perfectly, we need that imperfect way of the cycle. And then comes the sustainable part.

This I understood after my encounter with a man. An acquaintance in the early days, later turned into lifelong teacher-student relationship above that serious friendship. And that was the beginning of the idea of the Snow Leopard expedition. The idea was sown a decade ago and materialised and documented in 2026.

Mr. Rahul

Mr. Rahul is, in the simplest words I can find, the encyclopaedia of the Indian Himalaya. He was the expedition leader on that mountain a decade ago. The same mountain where the seeds for this article were quietly sown without either of us knowing it. Two decades in the Himalaya, founder of Mystic Himalayan Trails, and one of the few people I have met who treats conservation not as a cause to talk about but as work to actually do. He actively volunteers with the Spiti Valley Snow Leopard Project, run jointly by the Nature Conservation Foundation India (NCF) and the International Snow Leopard Trust (ISLT). I am his student. I don’t say that lightly.

We are living in the most vulnerable of ecosystems and the food chain is on the verge of collapse, and humanity is about to hit an unbreakable dead end. Life goes on whether we preserve nature or not, but living at the cost of an apocalypse is not decent, right. The kind of development we are racing into, in this world of artificial intelligence, nothing good will happen until humans understand what “prevention is better than cure” actually means. I found it there, at the toes of the mountain of gods. And so is the beginning of this journey. I don’t know where this road is taking me. I don’t know yet. The action of this moment is more important and is absolutely necessary.