MANIPUR DIARIES

 

2020 has come, maybe not with a bang as a lot of me may have hoped, but the world goes on and as such I have decided to record my past travels for all to see.

I was solo travelling in Northeast India in December and was loving my experiences; even though the infrastructural difficulties meant a lot of time was spent in moving from one place to another. When the clock neared noon, I put a limit of 1 pm in my own mind. The 1 pm limit meant if I couldn’t find a ride for Imphal; then I would just head back to find a homestay near Kohima and try afresh the next day.

Upon reaching Imphal, my plan for the day was to visit Ima Market and go for local Sightseeing. However, my friends had informed me that, there was a Loktak Festival going on there and I was very lucky to be here on this day so he suggested me to visit Loktak Lake instead and if possible, to take part in the local festival. I really felt this would really be something unique experience for me. As I personally believe, one can really get to know a lot about local culture if one could take part in their Marriage and/or Festival.

Then, without wasting much time I started for Loktak Lake. Loktak Lake, being the largest freshwater lake of North East India is the most popular tourist place of Manipur. It also houses the world’s one and only floating National Park named, Keibul Lamjao National Park. The drive through the districts of Bishnupur and Moirang was amazing. It took me around one and a half hour to reach Loktak Lake View Point.

Frankly speaking, the view point didn’t impressed me much. Definitely the lake was beautiful but wish I could do something more. While on my way to Loktak, I noticed various army personnel deployed at every corner of the city which raised my suspicions about the same. I spotted a local there at Loktak, who seemed to be friendly. Upon approaching him, and chit-chatting for some time I came to know that due to conflict amongst various tribes, Manipur has been imposed with Armed Forces Act. From my personal experience, I noticed, the less you talk about these things is better, as there are lots of cultural sentiments involved here. However, for tourists there’s no such threat at all.

I being mostly interested in hills, upon enquiring, I came to know that except few of them, it’s mostly impossible to visit those surrounding hills, as those being the house of various tribal groups. The main reason behind visiting Loktak today was the Loktak Festival which occurs once in a year. But unfortunately, I couldn’t notice any festival going on there. Finally, the same person came to my rescue and informed me that, I need to travel a bit towards the village, named Thanga for the same. He assured me that it’d be safe and nothing to worry about.

Finally, I caught a cab back to our hotel and reached by around 6 PM in the evening. After taking some rest, finally I choose to hit the street. I noticed lot of Army personnels deployed throughout the city for safety of people. It was more like a Street Food Festival there with various stalls selling some lip smacking items.

I did try out some of them until we were full!! It was a fun filled evening I’d say. I was really glad to have experienced something like this on our last night at Manipur.

Finally, I returned back to our hotel and hit the bed after packing up the luggages.