small accounts of great adventures

Darjeeling is a place I never knew existed. I only knew the name as it was carried on countless packets of tea—to sound exotic, or so I thought.

At first taste, Darjeeling tea doesn’t conjure the foreign like its name would suggest. Neither does it entrance upon first sip the way the citrus punch of regal Earl Grey would. Instead, this unassuming brew is comfort in a cup. It leaves sweetness on the tongue and a soft floral aroma wafting under the nose.

On the train one day, I very much needed a cup or two. I had caught a glimpse of myself on the glass window two hours past twilight with the smell of the office still clinging to my clothes. There was dullness in my stance, several dark circles under my eyes. My fatigued expression matched the once bright-blue floor of the coach I had ridden in. I wanted to get home, to forget that I had seen myself like this. After all, it was a week before my 25th birthday and my weariness made me look much older than I was.

Unemployment is an abyss I feared but dove into. Listening to no other voice but my own, I often had to stretch my capacity to hear the tiny sound I made. At the heart of this wretched place lay a small pocket of possibility but getting there meant risking success and stability without any guarantees.

So I did.

It took me two thousand two hundred seventy one miles west of Manila to discover that Darjeeling was indeed a place. I arrived on a Friday and was met by a heavy downpour that quickly matched the storm brewing inside me.

What was I doing here, of all places? Did I really have to go so far to unlock the mystery of an unusual name?

I spent my first night in a damp room, lying under a thick woolen blanket of yak fur. Above me, the wooden walls were surrounded by images of Tibetan Buddhas rendered in varying colors, each a universe unto itself. I slept soundly in the presence of my sentinels. The next day, I awoke to the sound of chanting and rose quietly, tiptoeing toward the wrong door. Suddenly I was in the sitting room of the main house where a kind man that I hadn’t seen the night before settled down to pour me morning coffee. I later discovered that he was no less than the great grandnephew of Tenzing Norgay.

I had traveled many miles for an audience of mountains and the elusive meaning of a word. When finally the Himalayas were in view, I wept in awe at the truth of greater heights, climbed down the hill and settled for what I had come for to begin with: a cup of Darjeeling tea.