"Point of Departure": Feminist Locations and the Politics of Travel in India

Author(s): Ravina Aggarwal

Source: Feminist Studies , Autumn, 2000, Vol. 26, No. 3, Points of Departure: India and
the South Asian Diaspora (Autumn, 2000), pp. 535-562
Published by: Feminist Studies, Inc.

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3178637

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 "POINT OF DEPARTURE":
FEMINIST LOCATIONS AND THE POLITICS
OF TRAVEL IN INDIA

RAVINA AGGARWAL

This article is based on a travel story entitled "Points of Departur

set in a locus far away from the villages and bazaars of the
dakh region of northern India which I have looked upon as a
of my "fieldwork" over the last decade. The events in this na
tive take shape in the departure lobby of the airport in
Delhi, another kind of bazaar perhaps, where products are tra
ported, knowledge is traded, and landscapes and peoples beco
commodities and are consumed. It might be said that airports
domains of hybridity and transience, intersecting junctions w
hosts and guests, tourists and traders, exiled refugees and eth
raphers encounter each other. In the reconstructed account
follows, I incorporate several episodes revolving around the in
action between passengers and airport bureaucrats as they aw
the announcement of a second flight to Leh (the capital tow
Ladakh), a day after the first one has been canceled. I examine
contested meanings of "field" and "genre" in anthropology a
provide a feminist reading of the different lenses with whi
Himalayan culture is imagined and represented.

THE MAKING OF ANTHROPOLOGICAL FIELDS

Critics such as James Clifford have alleged that fieldwo

hallmark of anthropological methodology, has tended to
localized dwelling over movement, that ethnographi
derived their authority by highlighting the conditions
course of "being there," rather than travel-"getting the
field, as Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson describe it, can
"a clearing whose deceptive transparency obscures the c
Feminist Studies 26, no. 3 (fall 2000). @ 2000 by Feminist Studies, Inc.
535

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 536 Ravina Aggarwal

processes that go into con

termined setting for th
had its genesis in Europ
cism, and colonialism, at
ize freedom, and the con
civilized, enlightened, a
tion and fieldwork subs
ter tropes of anthropol
lived, a place where the
damental truth of hum
tancing the self from ho
fellow Europeans and o
of subjectivity, but truth
the neutral eye of the t
ethnography was to be
travelogues and other for
tional. The ethnographe
my, was to be a specialist
The first opposition to
"science of travel" come
tion and objectivity. Th
argues, is achieved at th
places and ideologies w
forced by anthropologi
rationale which fails to
gy have also been affect
Laurent Dubois asserts that "there can be no travel outside the
historical and cultural relationships that arise out of colonial his-
tories; the places toward which one goes, seeking escape, have
already been written upon."6
The second objection is that ethnography has been traditionally
constructed as an enterprise unilaterally mapping the odyssey of
the Western ethnographer in marginal places. Fieldwork, writes
Kamala Visweswaran, propagates a discourse of difference and
distance, reproducing the colonial roots and authoritative stance
of anthropology. She urges anthropologists to choose the concept
of "homework" instead to avoid a kind of ethnic tourism and take
seriously the business of living in other cultures.7 The separation
of "field" and "home" becomes more complicated when we con-
sider the multiple positions that academics themselves identify

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Ravina Aggarwal 537

with and the "refraction

those observing with th
Mary John asks "For o
which I might translate
nists like myself often
gist and "informant,"
founded, blurred, trans
Drawing from feminis
tivity to the "politics of
cation, labor, agency, a
the flux and flow of tr
remarked: "Charter flig
Himalayan trekking pa
as pleasure.""' My stor
between field and home
reverse" as Mary John h
field site. By describing
by disprivileging what J
by examining my own
and global identificatio
mies between "self' and
frozen in time and spac
tope of the modem," is
rents, the locations and
process of culture makin
a mere textual device or
engaged with the exper
account of ethnographic
ing individuals or lame
with inefficient bureau
years of residence in th
stand the micropolitics
Working within the fram
ated and accountable wr
universalizing tendency
es to recognize that des
worlds, there are signific

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 538 Ravina Aggarwal

TRAVEL, TOURISM, AND REPRESENTATIONS

OF LADAKH

Ladakh is the largest and northernmost district of India,

altitude region located at a politically significant juncture
state of Jammu and Kashmir, bordering Pakistan to the w
Chinese-occupied Tibet to the east. The major religions of t
are Buddhism and Islam. Tourist brochures advertise Ladakh as
"the rooftop of the world" with the airport in Leh located at a
remarkable height of 11,800 feet and the Leh-Nubra route over
the Khardong pass claiming to be the highest motorable road on
the globe.
When Ladakh opened up for exploration during the nineteenth
century and a new wave of print capitalism, hungry for tales of
the far and exotic, swept across Europe, narratives of hunting
exploits and mountain conquests, and pictorial depictions of the
landscape abounded.12 Travel literature was greatly influenced by
colonial interests. Impelled by scientific, economic, and ecclesias-
tic movements in Europe, census records, economic statistics,
maps, and land surveys were deployed for documenting the area.
Missionary writings were aimed at salvaging Ladakhi souls from
the dark constraints of Buddhist ignorance. It was only during the
mid-nineteenth century, with the intensification of British geo-
political interests in India, that the Himalayas began to be visual-
ized as a spiritual utopia, contends Peter Bishop.13 The inaccessi-
bility of Tibet to Westerners had immense allure, and travelers
such as Alexandra David-Neel, Thomas Manning, and Sarat
Chandra Das disguised themselves as pilgrims and devotees to
cross the border from India into Tibet, often using Ladakh as a
way in.14 With the closure of the Tibetan border after the Chinese
occupation in 1959 and with the expansion of tourism-related
infrastructure in postcolonial India, Ladakh has come to assume
the status of a sacred realm of authentic Buddhism. In contempo-
rary Western academic and travel literature, Ladakh has been var-
iously designated as "Indian Tibet," "Western Tibet," or "Little
Tibet," represented as a surviving remnant of the glories and mys-
tic secrets of an unsalvageable Tibet even though it had been an
autonomous polity for centuries until the nineteenth century
when it was annexed by the Dogras and then incorporated into
the Indian nation upon independence in 1947 as part of the state
of Jammu and Kashmir. Buddhist Ladakhis recognize the Dalai

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 Ravina Aggarwal 539

Lama as their religious

their cultural affinity wi
as Tibetan, politically or
There is a preference in
secluded haven, remove
rationalization forwarded
ed in India but its cultur
Ladakh or tourist brochures make mention of the fact that almost
one-half of its population practices Islam. To quote the words of
one eminent scholar, "Ladakh comprises the last remaining area
of the world in which the original Tibetan religious culture
remains untouched either by communism as in Tibet proper or by
the modernization to which refugees in India and Nepal are gen-
erally exposed." John Crook's article goes on to prophesy that "the
tourist, however poorly informed, visits Ladakh for its authentici-
ty. If that is lost the nature of tourism itself will change."15
Most visitors to Ladakh carry with them the romantic notion of
an idyllic land, eclipsed from time and space. The portrayals of
Himalayan culture have glossed over contemporary political real-
ities, tending to dwell in wistful moments of paradise lost. Indian
travelers, officials, and academics have also contributed to this
process of partial representation. In Indian literature, the Hima-
layas are delineated as a sacred site, the abode of hermits for spir-
itual enhancement or as an impenetrable, sturdy, and protective
frontier against invaders. There are songs that bear testimony to
the heroic patriotism of those who shed their blood for the liberty
of their motherland, defending the "wounded" Himalayas in the
wars with Pakistan and China. As Agehananda Bharati main-
tains, "the Himalayas tend to be ascriptive rather than actual
mountains" to most Indians except to those who live there."16 On
the other hand, as Bharati has shown, people of the Himalayas
are depicted as backward mountain folk with strange body habits
and stranger marriage relations. Ladakh is characterized as a
primitive wilderness at the fringes of the Indian subcontinent that
must be modernized and brought within the folds of a progres-
sive and developing state.
The mountains, of course, are not infinite texts of wisdom,
frozen in eternity. There are roads linking Ladakh to Srinagar and
Himachal Pradesh. The opening of the highway connecting La-
dakh to Srinagar in 1976, and the operation of Indian Airlines

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 540 Ravina Aggarwal

flights for civilian pur

for national and international visitors and also for numerous
migrants, students, tourists, and entrepreneurs from Ladakh
Tourism is fast emerging as the largest income-generating indu
try of the region after the military and governmental administra-
tive sectors. Tourists have been permitted into the district sin
1974. Government records show that there were a total of 17, 9
tourists during the year 1995, out of which 12,391 were foreig
and 5, 594 were domestic tourists. This is a notable figure wh
we consider that the total population for the Leh sector durin
that period was 43,952 and the regional figures totaled 89,474.17
Tourists to Ladakh can primarily be classified into cultur
enthusiasts, religious devotees, trekkers, members of mou
taineering expeditions, and package tourists who come to exper
ence assorted samples of the landscape and cultural heritag
More and more amenities are being provided to accommoda
travelers. Houses in Leh have been expanded as guest house
and several restaurants have been opened in the last decad
Most of the monasteries, now accessible by road, have shifted
their annual festival to the summer months to attract visitors. The
increasing reliance on tourism is indicated by the anxious declara-
tions of safety expressed by the tourism ministry which claimed
that Leh had not been affected by the raging border tension
between India and Pakistan in the Ladakhi district of Kargil and
that more tourists had visited Leh in 1999 than the corresponding
months in the previous year.18 Tourism was optimistically envi-
sioned as the solution for rehabilitating Kargil and compensating
it for the loss of lives, the destruction of property, and displace-
ment of entire villages after the war with Pakistan in 1999.
Mohammad Ashraf, the director-general of tourism of the state of
Jammu and Kashmir, announced that the state would do every-
thing to promote tourism by capitalizing on the international
publicity that the war had generated. Addressing a BBC corre-
spondent, he declared that Kargil "has mountains, it has rivers ...
it has glaciers, it has everything you name in adventure."19
The threat of military aggression looms large in Ladakh which
has been the frontier battlefield for three of India's wars with
Pakistan (in 1948, 1965, and 1971) and one with China (in 1961-
62). Consequently, among those who travel to its heights are large
battalions of soldiers and other defense personnel stationed at

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 Ravina Aggarwal 541

posts, such as the Siach

perilous. The Indian arm
dakh and the Leh-Srinag
The travel industry re
other parts of India for
Kashmir valley has limi
ing a lacuna that has no
over the Rohtang pass
lanches and negative we
dence on the airlines has increased and reservations have to be
made months in advance especially since the tourist season is so
short. Any disturbances in the carefully planned schedules can
cause considerable chaos as was evident in the media reports
from the summer of 1999 when the Sindhu Darshan group of
nationalist pilgrims, who had gone to Ladakh to celebrate the
Indus River as part of their Hindu heritage, were marooned at the
Leh airport. High-altitude conditions make loads subject to
weather and air pressure. Thus, there are substantial regulations
on the number of passengers and luggage allowances.20
The influx of national and international tourists has created a
demand for travel agencies and consumer shops. The main
bazaar teems with products of all sorts sold by merchants from
Ladakh and other parts of India and by retailers of Kashmiri and
Tibetan descent. The business of trading, whether salt, wool, or
other goods, was primarily a male task in precolonized Tibet. For
several Tibetan women rehabilitated in India diasporic conditions
following the colonization of their nation by China, have necessi-
tated an occupational shift from farming in their earlier years to a
life of marketing and selling later in life-particularly jewelry, sou-
venirs, and antiques for tourists but also shoes and other con-
sumer goods for the local modem sector which are all transported
by road and air across great distances.21
Nowadays, Ladakhis too travel abroad as cultural ambassadors
and to major Indian cities for purposes of education and com-
merce. It is not surprising then that in this period of major cultur-
al reformulation, they are not content to be passive objects of
global representations. Some of their formulations of other soci-
eties are idealized and essentialized too, both subverting and
challenging stereotypical cultural distinctions at times but also
reproducing and ratifying dominant categories at others. Tourists

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 542 Ravina Aggarwal

are labeled as skor-yang

mgo-gser-po (yellowh
Modem short stories lam
comment on the compl
and relationships.22 Joke
everyday discourse, and
debated. Some of these debates and constructs are what I have
tried to depict in the following narrative.

POINT OF DEPARTURE

"Excess baggage, ma'am," said the man at the counter as I

maged through my bag for my tattered airline ticket. "Tw
dred and fifty rupees for ten kilos overweight."
"Women!" exclaimed the bearded Britisher with the Leica
over his right shoulder, eyeing my oversized American To
and Kesang's eighteen boxes of merchandise disdainfully.
I glared at him and looked back at the counter man. "Bu
person yesterday didn't have any objections. Can't you mak
concessions?"
"Rules are rules! He should have noticed. Anyway I'm excusing
five kilos. Just you pay the money there. Then only we can issue a
new boarding card!"
As soon as my luggage had been cleared, I helped Kesang load
her boxes on to the weighing scale, both of us staggering under
their weight. Thankfully, she had already paid for the cargo.
The bearded English man behind us was sighing in exaspera-
tion. I could see an assortment of antibiotic, anti-high-altitude
sickness, and antidiarrhea pills, and a half-empty bottle of Mr. Pik
mineral water protruding from his open handbag. There were
three tote bags at his feet. He probably had as much stuff as I did.
A kissing couple stood at the end of the line. American tourists
with matching his-and-her olive green T-shirts (his read Tintin in
Tibet and hers had a Yakety yak yak logo with Nepal mono-
grammed under it). They had only one battered fluorescent ruck-
sack and two rolls of dusty sleeping bags between them.
Trekkers, I gauged. I thought of the gifts I bore in my new navy
suitcase and all the books I would bring back to the United States.
Always excess baggage!
"Some of these people are so light," Kesang said, "Why charge

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 Ravina Aggarwal 543

us for our stuff? They sho

Just as we lifted the las
announced. We were to r
luggage, and proceed to
comfortable.
Kesang and I had bumped into each other the day before, both
struggling to get in line, me dragging my suitcase, she lugging
her boxes. We had exchanged knowing smiles. A few minutes
later, I had run into her again. She had been sitting on the tomato
red, vinyl seats, dark circles under her eyes from awakening so
early, wearing a pink outfit and a pink, plastic flower in her hair.
Her face looked very familiar and yet I had not been able to place
her. Because of the strangeness of the location itself, perhaps.
"What's in your cartons?" I had asked.
"Only the latest shoes." She had grinned back at me, pointing to
a box in her hand luggage that was covered with pictures of a
famous cricket star and a blonde girl in a bikini riding an alliga-
tor. "Rush service for the Hemis festival in June. The Miss India
brand fashions are really popular with the girls. Their heels are at
least two inches higher than last year. And for the boys, there are
the neon light-ups and Status Keds."
Kesang had told me that she was born in Mongud in South
India in a Tibetan refugee settlement. As a supplier of shoes, she
accepted orders on consignment, purchasing shoes from factories
in Delhi, and moving from place to place to sell them. She was
affiliated with two stores in Leh and distributed large quantities
of shoes to them. The sales had to be large enough to cover the
cost of her travels and leave her with a means of livelihood. She
didn't seem to be faring too badly.
She had asked me my name and the business I was in. I was
struggling to find an adequate word for anthropology in Tibetan
or Hindi, when Hassan had come up to us.
"She writes guide books for outsiders visiting Ladakh," he had
said. "Isn't that what you do?"

This was the second day that we had all been thrown together
after our flight to Leh, the capital town of Ladakh in North India,
scheduled for the day before, had been canceled due to "bad
weather." The additional plane that had been provided for strand-

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 544 Ravina Aggarwal

ed passengers was an A
the foreign tour group
travelers, sleepy-eyed f
ture lobby of New Delh
were supposed to board
day, a hopping flight to
two holdups on account
authorities claimed. We
spired in the control ro
was building up, but de
each other.
"I saw it in my dream
land today either," serm
Sky Dancer after the bo
had overheard her talk
wisdom contained in Indian and Tibetan texts earlier and had
classified her as a dharma junkie even though the book she w
clutching was on my list of biographies and novels that I nev
seemed to find the time to read. The Sky Dancer told us that
her dream she had seen a buzzard circle around its carnage an
then turn back. Gliding over the mountains, it had come close t
white Tibetan monastery with prayer flags fluttering in the w
only to disappear amidst a sea of clouds. She interpreted this
an omen about our canceled journey.
"It's a Kashmiri conspiracy to keep the innocent Ladakhi peop
subjugated." The English man proffered this information with
extremely disgruntled expression. He had been deserted by th
other members of LADS (an NGO that aimed to save the Hima
layas from intruding modernity, devastating tourism, and th
"mind-set that had corrupted other Indians"). They had board
the earlier flight while he was stuck in the toilet with the run
(did I mention that the latest LADS project was a film campai
to educate the Ladakhis on health matters?). To add to that, h
had been forced to stand in the Economy queue with no one t
serve him at the Business class booth. "There was this Kashmiri
bloke yesterday trying to sell us some motor-boat trip in Srinagar.
He wanted one hundred dollars for it. Bloody ridiculous!"
"We won't be able to leave until the energy quadrants sort
themselves out," announced the Sky Dancer dramatically, deter-
mined that the obstacles on her path to Ultimate Salvation would

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 Ravina Aggarwal 545

not be attributed to mer

gies had signaled to her t
Her seat number was 11A
the syllable count of her
her what the A stood for.
"We have ten days of vacation time left," whimpered the forlorn
Americans, desperately flipping through the pages of their Lonely
Planet. Their two days in India had been confined to the airport's
waiting lounge. They began inquiring about the bus from Manali.
"No need for that yet," stated the NGO Guru, "it's probably just
the B thing again."
"Bureaucracy?"
"Bakshish!" he proclaimed smugly.
"One way or another, we've got to go. I have a shoot that can't
wait." An advertising executive from Bombay, this restless speaker
had quizzed me earlier about locations and terrains in Ladakh, flat
and wide, that might be suitable for a massive sweater campaign
that had been assigned to her production unit. "Modi-Luft is going
to Srinagar at noon and they are very willing to assist us- these
Indian Airlines people are really going to have it. Let this new
Archana Airways come-we've heard they even have foreign
pilots-they'll be sorry for the poor service then. Now they're
kings-occupying this terminal all by themselves while all the
other agencies are lumped together at Terminal B. Just to harass
the passengers."
"Oh, like privatization is going to solve all the problems," mut-
tered the woman in the saffron silk sari, an environmental activist
and journalist from New Delhi who was writing a feature article
on organic textile dyes. "Look at Damania Airways. All of them
will go bankrupt in no time. This liberalization-shliberalization
does nothing for the common commuters. More inefficiency,
more inequality, more foreign dependence. That's all."
The government engineer from the Rural Regional Planning
division nodded his head in agreement. He had obtained his tick-
et from the VIP quota and was quite palsy with the airport offi-
cials. We looked to him for the scoop. "The pilots are on some
kind of Go-Slow," he divulged, patting his belly and smiling
importantly. "Nobody wants to risk this sector. This route is one
of the most difficult in the world. Unfortunately, the Airbus got
Captain Tufan."

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 546 Ravina Aggarwal

At his last sentence, o

hours much had been
a.k.a. Kala Nag, Black S
Leh in a record time of f
Himalayas come hell o
some, stubborn, it was said. We had counted on his antics to
deliver us from the endless wait. Envy swelled in our souls.
"Well, they haven't quite canceled it, have they?" I remarked
without conviction.
This was hardly a new scenario for me. When I had first flown
to Leh in 1989, there had been only two scheduled flights per
week from the Indian capital of New Delhi. Flying to Leh was
such a daily activity now that it was hard to remember that the
runway in Leh, designed by the incredible Ladakhi engineer,
Sonam Norbu, had only been laid out in 1962. And it wasn't until
1979 that Indian Airlines had brought in the first airborne visitors.
Elders in Ladakh would often relate stories to me about the feel-
ings of wonder and dread they had experienced at sighting their
first airship, reminiscing about the manner in which they had
once used honorific speech when talking about planes. Although
the frequency of the operations had increased drastically in the
recent years, whether we would actually take off or not was a
question that was always up in the air. Delays were so customary
that I was ashamed I hadn't learned to deal with them more calm-
ly. My summers were carefully rationed between Ladakh and my
parents' home in Bombay. I detested the endless airport wait in
Delhi wholeheartedly.

When breakfast was announced, Kesang and I walked over to

summon Hassan, who worked for a company called Shangri-la
tours. We met up with Hassan at last as he sat sprawled on the
floor in a corner, chatting with Dechen, college student and
daughter of a prominent Ladakhi politician, who lived in the
Ladakh Buddha Vihara in New Delhi.
"In Leh, we've got connections. There, it's our rule," Hassan said.
"It's useless to argue with this computer here." He hadn't even got-
ten a confirmed ticket and couldn't be bothered to get a wait-list
number. "As long as the Group has gone. They got on the Airbus.
I'll rest for a few days." He yawned and stretched his legs out, as if
he were a consummate airport dweller.

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 Ravina Aggarwal 547

"But my holidays will j

all the good seats," argu
"Come on, don't be so s
tourists!" Hassan held o
up. We took the stairs to
"Where do you think t
Hassan taught us a syste
from some of his Tibe
They're all meat. Chic
they're chicken. Then
Americans. Israelis are c
rare but expensive.
"I bet you five rupees t
"Ten that he's Chicken,
"Ten that he's Germa
"What do you say?" He
money!"
I handed him my tenner and wondered if I should guess
Belgian or Swiss. Seeing his impatient look, I hurriedly conjec-
tured "Israeli."
"Beef? Yeah right. Throw your money away. He's European,
can't you tell? Do you see any Enfields here or anybody bargain-
ing for the airfare?"
"I've met several Israelis who don't do that. Anyway, how
should I know? You're the tourist specialist, not me."
"But you've BEEN THERE," he protested.
"Weren't you just there?" Dechen added.
"Where? In Europe? For a conference on Ladakh in Bonn. You
wouldn't believe how strange they thought I was at Frankfurt. I
was interrogated for the longest time." More quizzical looks from
them.
"So who's going to ask?"
"Not me," said Dechen.
"Count me out," Kesang shook her head. "I don't understand
their language anyway."
When I too shook my head, Hassan walked across, landed at
the man's table, and pulled up a chair.
"He's so bold," gasped Kesang.
"Wie gehts es Ihnen?" Hassan asked the man. Silence. He'd
slipped at last, we thought.

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 548 Ravina Aggarwal

"Wie gehts es Ihnen?" h

The man brightened u
Hassan translated for
Ladakh? A native! That's remarkable!"
Not content with winning the nationality quiz, Hassan took his
time heading back. He was smooth. He proceeded to ask the
German if he was headed for Leh and then bummed a cigarette
from him.
"He's too much," exclaimed Dechen.
Hassan sauntered back to our table with his cigarette and held
out his hand. We slapped the money on to his open palm. The
German looked extremely puzzled.
"It's a native custom, Herr Confused, figure it out," I mumbled
uncharitably.
"Now the next question," Hassan continued, "is that one over
there a man or a woman?"
"Time to back out for me," I said. "I'm not playing any more
games."
Hassan and Dechen decided to go downstairs to check on the
status of the flight.
"By the way," I couldn't resist asking, as they made their way to
the exit, "what's the code for Indian tourists?"
"Dog meat," answered Hassan. "I'm joking, I'm joking. Don't get
mad."

After eating, Kesang and I returned to the waiting area. She took
an inventory of her boxes and I mailed a postcard to my husband.
I told her of the airport fiasco that had taken place during my
wedding. The groom had almost missed the wedding when his
flight from New York to Bombay on Delta had been canceled.
They had initially refused any compensation or guarantee of
alternative accommodation.
"But I've heard that things are so efficient there. Everyone forms
neat lines, computers make work so simple, and there is no cor-
ruption like here."
"Maybe that's what they would like us to believe, but I've lost
count of the number of times my luggage has arrived late and
flights have been delayed. No one even complains."
Kesang laughed out loud. "Not like the ra-lug here."24

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Ravina Aggarwal 549

All of a sudden, her t

strange, isn't it? Here you
way to Leh. You will go b
back to Mongud. Still, we
She paused and looked
people, you can do business
That is how we women thi
I tried to come up with
band, what shall I say? M
sober. Women have to be
do it ourselves. The fami
So I do business. I sell sh
fore, when we see some
them and gossip about th
about so freely and in wh
when we do it ourselves,
must go through. We have
A swarm of social work
heading for the "Ladies"
"As I grow older, I know
what I've learned throu
these routes. Never mind
quality. Those who wea
line of work is straight-w
not have to bow my head
All this she said, squatti
while I hunched over my
as the drone of indisti
arrivals, departures, and
"So gather your belongi
ernment engineer walke
1982 been canceled. I hear
Prospective passengers,
gather around.
"The manager said that t
lodging after cancellation
corn yesterday, they ha
our chances for tomorrow
"I'm afraid that's not so
had been through anothe

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 550 Ravina Aggarwal

to get themselves wait-l

cautionary measure, but
can styled block-bookin
and reserved them for
take had resulted in the
and 14 for this morning
were notified that onl
access the program; the
before their case could be considered.
I was sympathetic. Both of them had been so eager and yet
mellow, it was hard not to like them. I shared with them a wait-
list-trauma-story of my own from another flight. I had a sore
throat and Delhi's humid summer and pollution weren't helping.
I was coughing desperately and almost collapsing from bronchi-
tis, but my ailments had no effect on the Duty Manager. "Every-
one has their own problems," he had admonished me. "Ladakh is
bad for respiratory problems anyway. You should stay in Delhi."
"We should do what the Brazilian traveler did." Drew, the
LADS fellow, displayed a humorous side for the first time. "They
say that he was the true Boddhisatva of Tourists. The Enlightened
One. He had done it all. Seen Emptiness and found Meaning. He
found himself in a similar predicament in Srinagar, in a jumble of
cancellations, bookings, and the rest. Nobody was paying the
slightest attention to him, so, finally, he squeezed his head
through the window of the reservation counter and stuck his fin-
ger down his throat, threatening to vomit on the new computer.
"I'll puke all over your machine," he warned. The staff was com-
pletely confounded and called security. The guards came and
tried to pin him down, but he threatened to toss his cookies on
their uniforms, alternatively thrusting his index finger down his
throat and wagging the saliva-filled thing at them. They had
never heard of this situation before and had no idea what to do
with him. Nobody wanted to touch him. They gave him free
accommodation and even confirmed him for the evening flight
that day. The Srinagar taxi drivers were so impressed that they
offered him a free ride into town.
A few yards away, at the Customer Services counter, a loud
altercation was taking place. We hurried to the spot.
"What can I do?" the Duty Manager was protesting. He ap-
peared to be genuinely distressed. "Change the weather? You

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 Ravina Aggarwal 551

don't understand. Each

that's the union agreemen
should I produce them fr
"What about tomorrow?
tent.

"That is entirely up to th
"Come on, what is this s
"Yes, bring him out."
"Let's all go in and get h
nalist from Delhi, wave
anticipating a march. "W
will do it again, Mr. Du
granted for all and an add
The Sky Dancer reminde
violence.
"But haven't you heard of civil disobedience?" mumbled Drew.
Eventually, we decided to do something and recruited all the
willing bodies, marching past the bewildered airport workers,
charging into offices, yelling "Indian Airlines, hai, hai! Indian
Airlines, shame, shame!" with the advertising woman leading the
way, and the Sky Dancer chanting "Aum peace, peace, peace."
Routine business came to a halt for a few seconds as people
thronged around to watch, the bystanders adding critical mass to
our movement.

The Duty Manager implored us to wait while he sorted out

problem with the Superior. "Some women are causing a
commotion," we heard him say. That got us yelling again.
The Superior finally emerged from his lair. "You please wa
in the departure area. This section is for personnel only."
"We will go nowhere-only to Leh."
"That is not possible. We have no way to send you."
"We understand that but how come you sent the tour gr
earlier?" challenged Drew. "Why should they get prefer
What about other travelers? We made our reservations two
months in advance."
"And how come all the Indians got left behind? Otherwise the
Leh flight always looks like an international one. How many dol-
lars did they pay you? We are under the Dollar Raj, aren't we?"
"The British have gone but they've left their puppets behind."
"I didn't know Indian women were so forthright," commented

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 552 Ravina Aggarwal

a foreign tourist from th

The Sky Dancer was sti
The Superior tried to ta
tack some of us, he direc
"Who are you accusing,
lars? Do you have any p
Ladakh region is to us?
out!"
"Who is he telling to get
"See how he's treating
joined hands with us and
ing with the "Indian Air
"The government spend
diers on the Siachen gla
that district with any c
"He's singling me out b
tended Dechen. "He th
him my passport."
After much consulting
the office and told tha
for lodging and for the a
"Passive resistance actu
bemused.
We all smiled at each other, exalted in our brief moment of soli-
darity, animatedly discussing our success in outmaneuvering the
system, exchanging life stories and addresses, promising to visit
each other in the future or at least meet up in Leh for a celebrato-
ry meal.
One airport officer who had been patiently listening to our
plight throughout volunteered to issue the hotel coupons to us.
He began handing out the passes for the Unicorn.
"We're not going to stay at the Unicorn. It's no place for decent
people," objected Seema, the ad exec. "Last night, an army couple
were given some double bedroom with a very strangely posi-
tioned bed. While his wife was reclining, the husband got up to
take a shower when he noticed that there was a connecting door
and a peep-hole located directly to get a view of the bed. And
there was a man watching them. He pulled open the door and the
man darted off."
"The pervert!"

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 Ravina Aggarwal 553

"The entire staff was in

ring leader. It was he who
refuse to step into that ho
The officer turned red
coupons for the Emperor
hotel. I looked around f
room with me. She had s
but had said little. I saw
she was.
"She's just going to remain here. I'll stay with her. Accommo-
dation is only for those from out of town. They'll tell us to go to
Majnu-ka-tila or Ladakh Buddha Vihara or some place like that if
we ask."
"But Dechen has a room," I argued.
"Staying here will mean a better chance for tomorrow," he rea-
soned. "Kesang probably has a deal with the manager about let-
ting her cargo go for reduced rates."
"But they're paying the cab fare. We can lug the cargo."
"It's not the same for us. You come once in a year. Our business
depends on these people. And then think of all these cardboard
boxes littering the lobby of that fancy hotel. What will people
think?"
Kesang came by and took my hand. "You go ahead. The hotel
bus is waiting," she said, squatting on the ground beside Hassan
and her boxes. "As for me, excuse me, please. For this load that I
carry is very heavy indeed."

TRAVELLING GENRES AND FEMINIST INTERVENTIONS

The management of "baggage" with which the narrative

unfolds and ends is a recurring and significant motif in t
ry of Himalayan travel writing too. During the colonial p
system of obligatory porterage known as begar was
upon the residents of Ladakh whereupon they had to
labor and pack animals for visitors and offical missions.25
ogues from this time typically highlighted the heroism of E
an travelers as they captured and tamed the insurmo
Himalayas. Despite this emphasis on individual discovery
ever, images of porters and support staff figure promin
the form of complaints about their unreliability and stu

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554 Ravina Aggarwal

through comments abo

portrayals are also prev
occupied an ambivalent
a patriarchal colonial leg
of lesser education and r
a "double- bind situatio
their texts were constr
legitimacy and truth va
adventure-hero forms.2
Bullock Workman, cour
difficult glaciers in Lad
her voyages were "for t
ascended to altitudes ab
so."28 Yet her self-aggr
stantly offset by her f
who she describes as slo
mountain routes. A sim
writings of the English
light of the hazards of h
precipices, avalanches, r
ditions, and pass-poison
and companions that Is
son who had to allay th
so that no doubts would
her 'spider-legged horse
Not surprisingly, Servan
by a Ladakhi writer, is
accomplished porter, Gh
the assertions of his em
selfless service, and cu
various expeditions he
ized.31 Porters are still
Sherry Ortner has show
treks to base camp hav
and baggage carriers for
For anthropologists tra
gage has made furtive
of ethnographies as in
Pritchard's arrival episo
supplies with much rel

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Ravina Aggarwal 555

missal of travel memoi

original discovery by d
tails such as "the exact n
is Levi-Strauss whose f
approximates a travelog
announces in the openin
the story of my exped
presses for Levi-Straus
nity where all human jo
ism. As an anthropologi
he too is a conspirator
natural habitats but is
because he understands t
Anthropology is salvaged
abstract science and the
Modernist anthropology
its struggle for objecti
voice of the ethnograp
into a style that was pl
plinary priorities reser
dotes or for seasoned an
genres much like "thos
in the airport, which on
get to walk through."3
the transformation and
the orchestration of the
rative component in t
tures.36 But even as ethn
discursive practices rev
ing, as Clifford Geer
strated.37 Examining t
levied against Florinda
Yanomamo, Pratt sugge
been generated by the
cence as a captive or cas
in a culture without th
changes, or the stigma
baggage and my occasio
ple versus some of the
and longing for such a r

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 556 Ravina Aggarwal

Besides travelogues, the

undermine ethnography's
fiction. From the early ye
color like Zora Neale Hur
nonical distinctions betw
fictional prose to redress
nant groups.38 The femi
graphic truth has divulg
have experimented with
experiences and to ruptu
have obscured women's histories and voices. One of the most
dramatic illustrations of experimental writing is Laura Bohan-
non's ethnographic novel, A Return to Laughter, which is now re-
garded as a precursor to the confessional and reflexive narratives
that are accepted forms of ethnographic writing.39 It was consid-
ered so risque in 1954 that the writer concealed her identity be-
hind the pseudonym Elenore Smith Bowen. By exposing the
daily trials and tribulations of adjusting to fieldwork among the
Tiv in Nigeria, the text allows a glimpse into the distant objectifi-
cation and authoritarianism of the anthropological gaze so remi-
niscent of colonial travel narratives. We learn that Bohannon's
research was aided by servants she christened Sunday and
Monday who looked after her luggage, brought her coffee, and
laid out her clothes. Still, it is her use of this self-reflective form
that brings the author to admit to the limitations of the scientific
process; she aligns its objectivist principles with prejudice and
questions the right of Western society to pass moral judgement
on other cultures.
Since the mid-eighties, the postmodem turn in anthropology has
facilitated the publication of several anthologies and texts which
examine the literary motifs underlying ethnographic composition
and use anthropological tools to interpret literary texts. Through
novels, short stories, and playwriting, contemporary anthropolo-
gists such as Kirin Narayan and Dorinne Kondo have investigated
the political and cultural practices of the fieldsite known as the
American academy.40 Others, such as Karen McCarthy Brown,
have juxtaposed fiction with ethnography to point to the vagaries
of history, investigating the manner in which the flux and shad-
ows of memories traced through female lines reflect individual
and cultural transformations through fields that range from

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Ravina Aggarwal 557

Africa and the Caribbean

lyn.41 These contextuali
tions are significant both
interventions that work
scientific study of culture
Even as experimental wa
the frontiers of anthropol
are significant differenc
that "to do away with a
and fiction would entail
Narayan, disparities in
process, and representa
between ethnography an
er, to stress the connect
reveling in the fantasy th
exchange. Homework, aft
I, thrown together in on
words of an English m
bound by a moment of c
our travels. Yet, we also
ries that distinguish us a
us in moments of crisis
argued, the nomadic stat
into that of laboring ref
ginalized classes."
Located at the confluenc
tion, my story can serve
set of issues about fieldw
cultural representation t
events in the tale are fas
my travels on this route
transpired after a cancel
1994. I have conflated a s
ticipated in and conversa
tional, but fictional in a
into relief established an
allows for them to be re
monographs are genera
regions. Conversely, I re
tween virtual strangers w

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 558 Ravina Aggarwal

similar predicament to t
lective action will be the
transit lounge of the ai
the "non-places of supe
destination is both a reali
sage is the rite.
As the social transactions in the narrative are not founded on
long-term relationships, misunderstandings and stereotypes
abound. If the characters appear one-dimensional at times, it
reflects short-term impressions that people make of each other.
"In almost any ethnography," writes Pratt, "dull-looking figures
called 'mere travelers' or 'casual observers' show up from time to
time, only to have their superficial perceptions either corrected or
corroborated by the serious scientist."46 But by situating the ethno-
grapher's voice as one among many others, I place the anthropo-
logical subject within a global network of travelers with the pur-
pose of exposing prejudices rather than perpetuating them. Al-
though authorship can lead to appropriation of voices, I have not
attempted to conceal the biases of the narrator which are partly
influenced by my own ambiguous spheres of identification as an
Indian national living in the United States, as a member of a dom-
inant Indian metropolis traveling to a marginalized area, as an
anthropologist observer who is a traveler nevertheless. The finale
is not a neat point of cultural entry, where the traumas of inter-
personal understanding fade into the background, but a recogni-
tion of discrepancy and diverse location.
The metaphor of baggage is a shifting one, signifying the traces
of other locations that accompany the anthropologist, but it also
opens a potential for a sustained exchange with cultures we study.
Kamala Visweswaran's, Fictions of Feminist Ethnography, for exam-
ple, ends with the image of a trunk packed with saris left behind
in her grandmother's house, a symbol of the memories and rela-
tionships that enfold her to which she will return again and
again. The anthropologist's heavy bags in my story may also be
read as portents of gifts that would be traded, information that
would be shared, paths that would entwine in the future.
Clifford's suggestion that ethnography incorporates sites of
knowledge production, such as modes of transport, capital cities,
and university settings, enables it to move away from travel as
mere legitimation of authority to an ongoing process which is

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 Ravina Aggarwal 559

founded on the negotia

knowledge and power. A
ethnographers recogniz
travel genres in order t
hegemonic challenges to
ness of the ways in w
influence this asserts o
can reconceptualize ou
knowledge and with th
course of our journeys.

NOTES

I am grateful to the Ladakhi and Tibetan business women who have generously told m
about their lives and to the staff of Indian Airlines in Leh and Delhi who have made the
uncertainties of travel more bearable. Earlier drafts of this article were presented at and
benefited from comments at the 24th Annual Conference on South Asia held 20-22
October 1995, at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, the Women's Studies Tea at
Smith College, and the Postdoctoral Fellows' seminar, "The Future of Fact," at the
Annenberg School of Communication, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1996-97. I thank
Abdul Ghani Sheikh, Mick Khoo, and Julia Thompson for sharing airport anecdotes
with me; and Michael Herzfeld, Michael Jackson, and Martha Kendall for encouraging
my interest in narrative anthropology. Suggestions offered by Monisha Ahmed, Agha
Shahid Ali, Frederique Apffel-Marglin, Robbie Barnett, Debbora Battaglia, Piya
Chatterjee, Leyla Ezdinli, Kai Friese, Inderpal Grewal, Giles Khan, Nicole Mailman,
Kirin Narayan, Susan van Dyne, Kamala Visweswaran, and Christopher Wheeler were
very valuable.

1. James Clifford, "Traveling Cultures," in Cultural Studies, ed. Lawrence Grossberg,

Cary Nelson, and Paula A. Treichler (New York: Routledge, 1992), 96-116; and Clifford
Geertz, Works and Lives: The Anthropologist As Author (Stanford: Stanford University
Press, 1988).
2. Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson, "Discipline and Practice: The 'Field' as Site,
Method, and Location in Anthropology," in Anthropological Locations: Boundaries and
Grounds of a Field Science, ed. Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1997), 5.
3. This argument has been laid out in Inderpal Grewal's Home and Harem: Nation,
Gender, Empire, and the Cultures of Travel (Durham: Duke University Press, 1996), a
provocative text that links travel with colonialism, masculinity, and class distinctions.
Mary Louise Pratt's Imperial Eyes (New York: Routledge, 1992) also posits powerfully
the relationship between travel and empire in the context of Africa and Latin America.
4. Clifford Geertz has provided an evocative analysis on the history of this split regard-
ing ethnography. Frederick Errington and Deborah Gewertz's article, "Tourism and
Anthropology in a Post-Modem World" (Oceania 60, no. 1 [1989]: 37-54) offers insightful
comparisons between tourists and anthropologists and the work/play dichotomy.
5. Anjun Appadurai, "Introduction: Place and Voice in Anthropological Theory,"
Cultural Anthropology 3, no. 1 (1988): 16-20.

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 560 Ravina Aggarwal

6. Laurent Dubois, "'Man's Dar

Women Writing Culture, ed. Rut
California Press, 1995), 317.
7. Caren Kaplan has theorized th
of global sisterhood in her Ques
(Durham: Duke University Pr
Boundaries" (The Body Shop's
1995): 45-66, where she connect
Shop with mass consumption an
8. These ideas are laid out in K
ogist?" American Anthropologist
at Home: American Represent
Centuries," Cultural Anthropolo
Fictions of Feminist Ethnography
9. Mary John, "Postcolonial Fem
and Native Informants," Inscripti
10. Visweswaran, 113.
11. See Cynthia Enloe, Bananas, Beaches, and Bases: Making Feminist Sense of International
Politics (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), 20. She writes that the freedom
to travel has not been equitable or accessible for large masses of women. In the past,
women traveled in disguise, donning male attire to prevent obstacles. Male fantasies of
pursuing travel and adventure outside the confines of the home were considerably
fueled by education and literature, even in boyhood. In recent times, the commodifica-
tion of exotica and sexuality through tourism and other forms of travel has simultane-
ously been accompanied by the deterritorialization and marginalization of the same cul-
tures that are marketed as landscapes of flight and freedom.
12. Travelogues on hunting include Arthur Brinckman, The Rifle in Kashmir (London:
Smith, Elder, 1862); Henry Zouch Darrah, Sport in the Highlands of Kashmir (London:
Rowland Ward, 1898); F.E. Adair, A Summer in High Asia (London: W. Thacker, 1899);
and Theodore Roosevelt and Kermit Roosevelt, East of the Sun, and West of the Moon
(New York: Blue Ribbon Books, 1926). C.G. Bruce's Twenty Years in the Himalayas
(London: Edwin Arnold, 1910) is an account of his mountaineering venture; and Arthur
McCormick's An Artist in the Himalayas (London: Unwin, 1895); Nicolas Roerich's Altai-
Himalaya: A Travel Diary (New York: Frederick Stokes Co., 1929); and Marco Pallis's
Peaks and Lamas (London: Cassell & Co., 1939) are memoirs by artists who traveled in
Ladakh.
13. Peter Bishop, The Myth of Shangri-La: Tibet, Travel Writing, and the Western Creation of
Sacred Landscape (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989).
14. The French traveler Alexandra David-Neel, studied Buddhism extensively and mas-
queraded as a pilgrim-mendicant, crossing perilous terrains and combating threats of
exposure, to become the first woman to enter Lhasa in Tibet. In her classic travelogue,
My Journey to Lhasa (New Delhi: Times Books International, 1991, originally published
in 1927), David-Neel writes (9): "Many travelers had been stopped on their way to
Lhasa and accepted failure. I would not. I had taken the challenge by my oath on the
'iron bridge' and was now ready to show what a woman can do."
15. John Crook, "Social Change in Indian Tibet," Social Science Information 19, no. 1
(1980): 139-66.
16. Agehananda Bharati, "Actual and Ideal Himalayas: Hindu Views of the Moun-
tains," in Himalayan Anthropology: The Indo-Tibetan Interface, ed. James Fisher (The
Hague: Mouton, 1978), 77-82. For an interesting account of the portrayal of Tibetans as
naturally eco-conscious, see Toni Huber's "Green Tibetans: A Brief Social History," in
Tibetan Culture in the Diaspora, ed. Frank Korom (Vienna, Austria: Verlag Der Oster-
reichischen Akademie Der Wissenschaften Wien, 1997), 103-19.

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 Ravina Aggarwal 561

17. Records were obtained from t

by the District Statistics and Eval
Jammu and Kashmir Planning De
18. "Leh not affected due to Kargil
19. Mohammad Ashraf, quoted in
20. Prem Singh Jina's Tourism i
1994), 665-66, contains additional
ating problems associated with La
21. I have written about exile, tou
and the Marketplace in Ladakh," A
1995): 33-38.
22. Abdul Ghani Sheikh, Do Raha (Jammu and Kashmir Cultural Academy, 1993).
23. Keith Dowman, Sky Dancer: The Secret Life and Songs of the Lady Yeshe Tsogyel
(Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1984).
24. This is a Ladakhi term meaning "sheep and goats" used with humor sometimes by
travel agents to describe tourists in tour groups.
25. See Nicky Grist, "The Use of Obligatory Labour for Porterage in Pre-Independence
Ladakh," in Tibetan Studies: Proceedings of the Sixth Seminar of the International Association
for Tibetan Studies, Fagernes 1992, vol. 1, ed. Per Kvaerne (Oslo: Institute for Comparative
Research in Human Culture, 1994), 264-74, which outlines the manner in which the
colonial Dogra and British governments extracted labor from common Ladakhi house-
holds.
26. Good discussions of the paradoxical politics of identification of Western women
travelers can be found in Sara Mills's Discourses of Difference: An Analysis of Women's
Travel Writing and Colonialism (London: Routledge, 1991); and Indira Ghose's Women
Colonial Travellers in India: The Power of the Female Gaze (Delhi: Oxford University Press,
1998).
27. An insightful reading of this issue is provided by Mills in her analyses of the allega-
tions that Alexandra David-Neel fabricated her visit to Lhasa.
28. Fanny Bullock Workman, In the Ice World of Himalaya: Among the Peaks and Passes of
Ladakh, Nubra, Suru, and Baltistan (New York: Cassell & Co., 1900), 182.
29. Isabella Bishop Bird, Among the Tibetans (New York: Fleming H. Revell Co., 1894),
72.

30. Ghulam Rassul Gaewan, Servants of the Sahibs (Cambridge: W. Heffer & Sons, 1923).
31. Another autobiography by a Ladakhi caravaneer is Abdul Wahid Radhu's Caravane
Tibetaine (Paris: Fayard, 1981). For further details on the subject, see Abdul Ghani
Sheikh's "Some Well-Known Adventurers of Ladakh," in Recent Research on Ladakh 6, ed.
Henry Osmaston and Nawang Tshering (Bristol: Bristol University, 1997), 231-38. A
good analysis of Ladakhi autobiographical writing can be found in Martijn van Beek's
"Worlds Apart: Autobiographies of Two Ladakhi Caravaneers Compared," Focaal 32
(1998): 51-69.
32. Sherry Ortner, Life and Death on Mt. Everest: Sherpas and Himalayan Mountaineering
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999).
33. Edward Evans-Pritchard, The Nuer: A Description of the Modes of Livelihood and
Political Institutions of a Nilotic People (1940; New York: Oxford University Press, 1969),
10.

34. Claude Levi-Strauss, Tristes Tropiques (New York: Pocket Books, 1955), 4, 3.
35. Laurent Dubois, quoted in "Introduction: Out of Exile," in Women Writing Culture,
ed. Ruth Behar and Deborah Gordon (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), 21.
36. But James Buzard, author of The Beaten Track: European Tourism, Literature, and the
Ways to "Culture," 1800-1918 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993), proposes that modern
guidebooks too adopted the appearance of scientific exactitude to gain legitimacy, pre-
senting information in a standardized and straightfoward style rather than an impres-

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 562 Ravina Aggarwal

sionistic or personal one.

37. Mary Louise Pratt, "Fieldwo
and Poetics of Ethnography, 27-50.
38. See Visweswaran; Behar and
for Cultures, Writing against the
39. Elenore Smith Bowen, Retur
40. Kirin Narayan, Love, Star
Dorinne Kondo, "Theater, Wom
Women Writing Culture, 49-64.
41. Karen McCarthy Brown, A
California Press, 1991).
42. Kirin Narayan, "Ethnograph
Humanism Quarterly 24, no. 2 (19
43. Toni Huber ("Why Can't W
Gender, Ritual, and Space at Tsa-
pilgrimages were major forms o
although spiritual travel was pe
was coded by gender, and mou
women. Female pilgrims were n
the famous Dag-pa Shel-ri ("Pu
and oral explanations provided e
breached these spatial limits, l
inherent in their bodies. Their
nating the beneficial energies
Tibetan women, mostly from hi
of literature by writing life stor
bear testimony to the trauma
Daughter of Tibet (London: W
Turquoise Roof (Ithaca: Snow Lio
44. In Translated Woman: Cross
Press, 1993), Ruth Behar uses th
the life story of a Mexican mer
recorded, materialized, and cons
of her class and race.
45. Marc Auge, Non-Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity, trans. John
Howe (London: Verso, 1992). I choose to read Auge's description of "non-places" as sites
which appear so obscure and geared toward individualized experience that they con-
ceal the fact that they are located within historical memory and national boundaries.
46. Pratt.

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