Having reached our destination, we walk quickly to our hotel, and drop on the carpeted wooden benches laid along the walls.
Blood, that was warmed up by all the exertion, is now cooling.
The room keys are handed out; we are to walk a few steps to our room and drop our bags
That short walk in the well protected indoors seems harder than the kilometers we just finished in the moorlands.
For our blood is cooling now.
As the evening sets, it becomes colder still.
All of us gather around the Tandoor at the centre of the dining hall.
We sit inches away from it, and thrust our hands forward at the flames with a vengeance and soak in all the heat they give.
And when the heat starts cloying our hands, our faces, we move back.
And then it’s the turn of the cold to tease our back, our ears and we move a little forward.
It’s perfect now. I wish we had a Tandoor in every room for the night.
They bring in kerosene and yak dung, feeding the Tandoor from time to time.
My friend is stoking the fire.
There is a kerosene tin full of yak dung at our feet. No more.
As the evening makes way for the night, the fire is becoming weak. And it’s getting cold.
Friend tosses more yak dung into the Tandoor. There isn’t much left.
We still have 2 or 3 hours to go before bedtime.
It’s cold.
We have two options. To make the fire stronger. Or to make it last longer. Intensity or Longevity.
Although all of us know it is important to choose the second option, we can’t resist the first.
For we are by nature, capitalists. Short sighted.
We have no thought for tomorrow.
We are consumerists who want more and more now, this moment. We will consume all resources.
We measure our prosperity in terms of GDP. And rush towards extinction, instead of walking slowly towards it.
Warmth is not enough for us. We want heat. We will borrow all the fire from tomorrow, squeeze the last spark and sizzle today.
When the cold comes, we shall see.
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