Lifting the veil,
I woke up into my afterlife,
as I walked through the small door –
to the light, I knew,
he/she — the Almighty will be there.
I scripted the questions in my mind,
“Are you a christian/hindu/muslim/jew/jain/parsi/……..”
Across the doorsill,
I expected the Almighty — 
whose power no foe can withstand,
I imagined the Hindu God — 
reincarnating his followers,
Jesus grouping his disciples
to heaven and hell,
and a whole lot of Gods
under the Prussian blue roof — 
busy themselves tallying –
their people’s worksheets.
To my superastonishment,
as I entered:
a light wind blew wind chimes,
gently kissed my cheeks,
and swept my hair.
I saw nothing but a pot,
a pot of elixir of life.
I sat there, helped myself
serving a cup of elixir,
for each sip, a thousand memories rushed,
I cried, I laughed,
I felt guilty, I felt satisfied,
I was sad, I was happy.
And now it’s time,
at the other end,
a big wooden door,
with a giant iron latch,
“lift the latch and step out”
the sound was from within,
that moment, the bliss, I know
the world behind,
I was latched in for a reason,
They are parallels,
with no points of intersection,
and that is how it works,
a lot of parallel worlds,
a lot of parallel universes,
each of them, two doors away,
and the passage through is — 
Death — an illusion.

My university life was moving to and fro from hostel to hospital and hospital to hostel, like a suspended pendulum and that is when I entered a student exchange program to feed the novelty-seeking monster in me. I flew down to the land of nomads — The Republic of Kazakhstan, 9th largest country in the world, landlocked in the heart of Eurasia, historically inhabited by Turkic tribes to Arabs to late in the13th century by Genghis Khan’s Mongolian Empire and at last by the Soviet Union as Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic till 1991. I walked into the ancestral home of 131 ethnic groups.

Its 2 am in the morning, a light wind blew, gently kissed my cheeks, swept my hair, my hands wide opened hugging the whole mass of air around me. I’m breathing freedom on the rooftop of the tallest (41 floors) building of Astana city — ‘Northern Lights’. In front of me, the whole city glowing bright, city lights flowing in and out. Astana is a planned city, carefully crafted and exposed to the world with the utmost architectural skills. A toy city with skyscrapers, symmetric buildings, perfect roads, tent-shaped shopping mall (Khan Shatyr) and right in front of me the illuminated ‘Bayterek tower’. She was a tall giant today morning when I was walking through the streets, now she is an elegant lady in her fine beauty, okay…so this is now looking at the same thing in a different angle of vision gives an entirely different perspective. I turned back to see my global friends — 3 Chinese, 3 Kazakhs, a Czech and a Romanian — I could see a potential ‘Parea’ (a group of friends who regularly gather together to share their experiences about life, their philosophies, values, and ideas.) Most of them with a lit cigarette and a Czech beer, storytellers, all of them. It’s just another splendid night for them, but for me, who is from a conservative Kerala Christian family of India, where cows are safe at any hour of the day but girls are not, this is too much to ask for, back there at home. I sat there humming the Russian folk song I heard in the evening, at the banks of Ishim River. An Indian girl’s tale of traveling alone, traveling abroad, first time on board, moving out of her comfort zone, connecting globally, and finding meaning in life and meaning of life, the thought is fascinating indeed.

I stepped out to the extremely low built platform of Almaty railway station, after 18 hours of a tiring though interesting train journey through the grasslands, from the flawless Astana city to the cultural hub and the biggest cosmopolitan city of KZ. Almaty is original, more real, she has asymmetric buildings protruding at the corners of her streets. Street dwellers playing ‘dombra’ (a Kazakh string instrument), street vendors selling ‘khlep’ (KZ bread), fresh berries and peaches, under the shades — around the Pedestrian Street. I saw wrinkled hands selling their oldest memories, their best antiques — medals, compasses, and jewelry from USSR time, I bought a historically relevant (that’s what she claims) ring from one of the oldest lady vendors for 2000 tenge. That evening I looked up to the blue sky this close to me, up to the golden domes of Zenkov Cathedral and Central Mosque, up to the snow-crested mountains of Zailiski Ala-Tau mountain range and looked down to see the illuminated hustle and bustle of the city from the cable cars of Kok Tobe hill.

I woke up into a fresh morning, opening the wooden framed glass doors of my balcony to feel the chilled breeze on my face and I stared at the mountains far away. Looking at them I took an epic decision, I who take rikshaws from my hostel to university, decided to go on a 7 hour day hike up to the ‘Manshuk Mametova Lake’ (3450m above the sea level). I along with my ‘Parea’ started by 8 am, we took a Poptuka (Russian for a hitched car), for 700 tenge and reached Medeu- our starting point.
Literally, this is my first ever mountaineering, with no prior learning, no proper climbing shoes or no other preparations except some baby foods, bananas, and water bottles. I started with immense enthusiasm and as time passed by, tarred road devolved to mud roads, mud roads to the rocky dirt track and here I’m with no more roads ahead. The trail is so far so good, the picturesque valley of ‘Malaya Almatinka’ and the white water gushing through her veins, guarded by magnificent mountains around, altogether gave me an ‘Aha feeling’. By 2 in the afternoon I’m all done, heavily tired, increased palpitations and leg tremors, moreover extremely depressed of the fact that I’m halfway and going back is not an option anymore. My co-climbers made themselves heard clear “shake a leg you girl, we gotta be there by 5 if not…descending will be a herculean task” (haha as if ascending is not one — yeah that was a self-talk). I tried hard, pushed myself, but the steep climb, the trail to Alpingrad — holy….. I can’t do this, I really can’t, but I also don’t want to burden my friends and ruin the hike for them. So I asked them to carry on without me and promised to join them at the lake. I sat there for some time, made some travel diary entry, regained my normality and continued trekking. It was getting dark, the place was deserted and somehow scary, with the whistling of the wind, running clouds and just mountain tops around and nothing else.

“Oh, My God… where am I? What is this place — a dead end? Where are they? Where is the lake? Okay calm down Evlin, take a deep breathe” No I can’t do this, it’s not working, I screamed out loud: Adma….Alexy….Yoyo…Eve….my sound echoed, fused into vibrating thin air column around, no response, no one around. The cell phone is of no use for past 4 hours. I’m scared and sure am losing my mind. Maybe they are on the other side, but it’s just snow, should I give it a try, yes I should. Alright, first leg; ok fair enough there you go girl second leg…PLOP! What! am I going to get stuck here? Am I that unfortunate? My sympathetic nervous system functions shot. Tears rolled down my cheeks, lump in my throat, I gave up, and I’m going to die here. My cognitions started processing all the English movies I have had seen. People getting stuck in deserted islands/forests/mountains etc. followed by a pathetic death, later years after someone on their voyage would find the skeletons (Hello, dear reader I know what you are thinking but I’m super emotional right now and no logic would come to my mind). But Chuck Noland from Cast Away survived on raw fish for 4 years, that’s a hope, forget it I don’t have any raw fish here. “Stop thinking Evlin please stop”. No, I can’t, there suddenly appeared a large screen in front of me, my life reel loaded — Achan (father), Amma (mother), sister, love, studies, profession, endless dreams, and unmarked footprints. I felt nothing but numb, I simply stared at the nothingness and saw my angel –smoking, walking towards me. A Kazakh laborer working on his excavator, on his descends; he gave me this look, which according to me is “how stupid is this girl” I reciprocated to my rescuer with a puppy face, he pulled me with his left hand, while the right one was still busy with a cigarette. ‘Oh! Is he this strong or is it that easy”? I think I have some extraordinary non-verbal communication skill because he completely got that I got lost. He dragged me down the hill, Oh! Oh! There… the lake, a glimpse of the turquoise green heroine — Manshuk, the moraine lake (cold and lifeless like the current me) and the glacier feeding her. A 200m down the trail, I found my folks going nuts and that moment I don’t know how to thank him, I hugged him tight and took a selfie (yup I didn’t forget to do that).

Maybe my decision to go on the hike was stupid. I could have died that day ….but hey life is like that, very unpredictable sometimes, you can never be completely prepared and I’m OK with that…in fact, that’s the best part. It makes me want to live every moment like it could be my last. If I have a chance I would do it again; definitely with a little more preparation. This experience gave me hope in humanity, it made me realize that there are so many beautiful people and beautiful places out there; all you got to do is get out there and push yourself to take chances. Getting lost I found myself!