Tale from the hills

Two beautiful years of childhood were spent in heavenly verdant lap of the Himalayas. Almora, to be precise. My family and I, together bit by wanderlust, spent a considerable time exploring the virgin territories of this amazing landscape. Tehri, Garh Mukteshwar, Pithoragarh, Uttarkashi, Chamoli et al.

I have quite naturally, some wonderful young memories of my time spent there. One such place I visited deserves a mention here called Munshiari. If I recollect correctly, it was a picnic of some sort on large green patch on a plateau. Overlooking this plateau was a large pointed snow-capped mountain, which to me, resembled a cone of ‘Rita’ ice cream. In between these two was a deep ominous valley. I still remember the place because the peak seemed to be so close that I felt that I could reach out my five year old hands and touch the snow on the peak. Quite unbelievable.

It is therefore with much eagerness that I picked up a book called The Man-eaters of Kumaon by Jim Corbett.

The book is a collection of the adventures of this great man, taking place at various locations I mentioned above. It immediately took me back in time and brought back some wonderful memories. Any experience, which does that to me, is something I will cherish forever. But it is not merely my own childhood experiences, which compel me to write about this book. This collection of stories is truly a fantastic read.

Corbett relates one adventure after another with the big cat. You can almost smell the jungle, hear the rustling of leaves under the soft paws of a tiger and see the naked face of terror upon staring into a leopard’s eye in the wild. The setting is so realistic, the fear raw and the atmosphere taut.

At no point does Corbett come across as a fearless hunter going after the tigers. He is mostly scared stiff and shows reverence for these magnificent animals. His fear and adventures are so frightfully real that it puts to shame all the contrived thrillers and artificial situations we come across in the works of Sheldon, Archer and Follet etc.

Corbett brings alive, with his simplistic and humble style, the lives of the ordinary men folk, the land and the beasts. I can bet anyone who reads the Champawat man-eater alone in the wee hours of night would jump at the slightest creak of the door.