Right at the entrance of Sikkim’s Tsomgo Lake, there’s a stairway leading down towards the local market that sells all kinds of winter wear, ‘mountain’ food (the usual Momos, Maggie, tea and coffee), and most importantly, the tourists can rent plastic snow boots from here. The sellers here are no other than the residents of the place, as the greater part of the population’s income comes from tourism. As we were going down the stairs, my mother kept instructing us to walk carefully, what with all the snow! With tight cautious steps, we get down, and right there at the market entrance, two little kids are running around and playing in the slippery snow as though it were a grassy playground! While the travelers held their children tightly, these kids were let loose to their own devices while their mothers catered to the tourists.

How different is life up there in the lap of Himalayas!

Not the usual worries we have, but neither the usual comforts. To stay in a hilly region in winters is an adventure for us, but for them, it’s home. Our childhood is spent rolling in the mud, collecting pebbles whereas theirs is spent among the snow collecting snowballs; we used to get lost in a world inside our heads, but what about these kids who wake up to the sight of the Himalayas, a world that is as good as our world of imagination?