Where?...to a nearby ravine (छिनकुआँ, in Gethia itself) that is presently popular for its feline inhabitants that show up now and then, though doing no harm. Last such sighting was just yesterday evening (as the village folks claim). I thought to give it a try late tonight.
We - me and baby brother - set away by 2245, with nothing but a torch at hands. We were there by 2300. The ravine isn't too wide, but in length it extends across the entire mountain, either side of the road. With neither of us having experience about the cattle track that led into it, I found it better if we just sat on one side of the road and wait in anticipation of something. The ravine forces the road to bend inwards sharply, cutting it out of sight from much of the village. There are no houses here, so we were to peace, and dark.
My intention was to listen for the jungle noises - sound gives more information than a single focused beam of light on such occasions. With time and increasing focus, the sounds came by our ears louder and more sustained: sweet serenade of an owl whistling away far atop the mountain, shrill cries of crickets and cicadas from all directions that soon merged with the ambient noise, occasional rustle of the smaller animals or insects, trucks moving up the ribbon-like hill roads. That formed much of the rush. There was a moment of scuffle as something moved in the bushes below, but that turned out only a civet (which, too, only Shiv could manage to locate). We walked back, me feeling like being inside a planetarium - darkness all around with a dazzling nightsky overhead.
The British colonists in 1900s would've called such an outing in search of wildlife as a 'ghoom' (coming from Hindi word घूमना/ghoomna that means roaming about). But theirs were different: they pushed deeper into the forests; they mostly did so during the daytime, or if during the nights then it'd be atop a tree (मचान); either had a support crew at their heels or would come well prepared.
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