The history to this madness!
There's always some history behind any kind of madness, and there is, behind this too. It felt important to communicate why I gave up a lucrative corporate job and a good life in the Capital city to move lock, stock and two smoking dogs to Nathuakhan. Really the story of how Khanabadosh came to be.
"This began many decades ago, when as a child, I would be packed off to Srinagar to my great-grandparents home for the summer break every year. Each night, and as a reward for finishing the dreaded ' Holiday Homework' for the day, I was read to by my great-grandmother, Mama, as we all called her. Her animated face and old wrinkly hands would create a dance of shadows on the wall, encouraged gently by the soft light from the Shankracharya Temple above that floated in through huge windows."
"She told stories of valour and friendship, love and spiritualism, wealth and magic, struggles and religions. The beautiful part of her story telling was, that her stories were from all over and not limited to Kashmir. With them, my young mind wandered the battlegrounds of Ancient India, sat by the mighty rivers of the East, shivered in the cold snow bound mountains of the North, danced in the magnificient temples of the South. I travelled through those stories, like a gypsy, like a Khanabadosh, awestruck and falling in love with something new every evening! In retrospect, some of my best lessons came from them."
"I have craved ever since, to go back into the comforting arms of those stories, to learn some more from them. What I really wanted to do, was to bring out that gypsy again, to make her travel to new lands, live in different homes, wake up to different sunrises…and tell those stories. To do this, I chose Nathuakhan, in beautiful Uttarakhand as my third home. The endeavour will be for this home to absorb the local colours, aromas, tastes, stories and culture of Uttarakhand and then move on in 3 years, to a new environment, a different place. Just like a gypsy."
"And this is how Khanabadosh, the travelling Homestay, came to be."
Why it matters
This story is the soul of Khanabadosh — it explains the move from a comfortable city life to a mindful, slow, mountain home.
The promise
Absorb local colours, aromas and stories; then carry the home onward like a true traveller — just like a Khanabadosh.