The Night I Slept under a Tree

“Have you ever come across a situation when you felt yourself too vulnerable at the mercy of Mother Nature?” 

Today, I am going to share with you all the “scary” night I slept under a Tree!!   

I am going to walk you through: How I landed in the situation? How I dealt with the situation?

It was in the month of February 2009, I was assigned a task to visit a remote place in Mid Western part of our country. The objective of my task was to supervise and monitor a district wide social program. My destination was a small town called Gamgadi in Mugu district. To reach the destination, I had only two options. The first option was to take a flight from Nepalgunj or Surkhet to Gamgadi or a nearest district Jumla. The second option, the hardest one, was to walk all the way from Surkhet to Gamgadi, Mugu. I chose the second option – to take a flight. After many uncertainties due to rough weather, I could fly to the nearest town call Jumla.

Once I landed in Jumla airport, I immediately headed uphill for Gamgadhi , Mugu, which would take to me 2 complete days. Since it was already late afternoon, I had to speed up my pace. Sky was clear with no sign of clouds. My only concern was that I needed to cross the hill before 5:30 pm. The hill stood towering at an altitude of 3000 m. The uphill ascend was tough – natural cardiac exercise. My target for night halt was Village A. The locals assured me that I can reach the village before night.  At around 5:45 pm, I reached the peak and refilled myself with biscuit. 

After minutes of rest, I walked through the dense jungle. It was dead silent. Now, I could even hear my own breathing and heart beat!! Suddenly, I could feel gush of cold wind and trees began to sway breaking the monotony. Somewhere I got an uneasy gut feeling – what if? After half an hour, I was still in the jungle walking and begin to hear crickets - slowly raising their voice. My god, the visibility was slowly vanishing in front of me. My heart started to beat a bit faster. I prayed, I could meet somebody or even an animal from the nearest village. Sadly, I met nobody. Suddenly, it was pitch black and from nowhere, the whole of jungle was covered in evening fog. Now I was in a mess. No GPS, no mobile tower, no people or animal around!! 

Fortunately, I had a torch but I could not see feet away because the visibility was very poor. I came in an open field. I shouted here and there, hoping someone will hear me. I stayed still, hoping somewhere in the distance I could hear people’s voice or animals. I was also hoped; I could see light in the distance and follow there. I failed and I was loitering here & there for almost one hour. Now I was convinced, I am lost in the wilderness and. I looked at my watch – it was already 9 pm.  I knew, wild bears are rampant and on top of this, there are cliffs nearby. Anyhow, I needed to survive this one night!! I decided to stay under a tree hoping to get cover the whole night.  Sadly, it started to shower lightly. I became wet and fortunately, I had a plastic cover. I used to it along with all the clothes for some warmth. Till 1 am, I could not sleep because the place was getting slippery.

Finally, the only help that I got was at 1:15 am; a lonely horse was came from nowhere and stood beside me the rest of the night. I was so delighted and stayed still for a cover waiting for morning to come.  When the morning welcomed me, I was the happiest person, I survived!!

For me, the lonely horse was the God, no one else!!

ABC

03 August, 2014