Close to the DM Office was the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute (HMI). It’s located in a zoo. I wanted to visit the HMI since my American friend, Steve, recommended it.
When I reached the entrance to the zoo, there was a long queue. I saw a QR code on the wall, which was a way of buying tickets online. I bought a ticket and was inside quickly, bypassing the queue.
Some famous mountaineers were students and/or trainers at the HMI. The institute has equipment from various expeditions. This includes equipment used by Tenzing Norgay who in 1953, with Edmund Hilary, was the first to climb Mount Everest. Norgay was cremated at the HMI. There is a statue of him near the cremation site.
A curious item in the museum was a telescope, which was a gift from Adolf Hitler.
Thereafter, I walked around the zoo. The zoo, like many zoos nowadays, focused on conservation. For example, there was a breeding programme for the red pandas. Some animals are released back into the wild.
There were plenty of signs asking people to be silent and not tease the animals. These were all ignored. The guards didn’t try to enforce the request.
The last time I went to a zoo was when I previously came to India. I wrote about the mixed feelings I had.
I’d never seen red pandas before. I didn’t even know they existed. They were shy but seemed content chomping away.
I returned to my homestay and joined Steve for dinner. He’d already been to the zoo and summarised it well. It’s not the best zoo for animals nor the worst. The animals had space to move around.
Every day, we’d had different dishes for dinner. Today was no different. One of my favourite dishes was the fermented spinach — a new dish for me. The home-cooked food has been delicious.
