Featured Story: Hodal in Hodal
Welcome to Hodal.
Having forever found my Slovak surname clunky, I was more than a little surprised to discover that it was also the moniker of two towns in the world.
One Hodal is in Norway. The other is in India.
In 2008, I visited both. The Indian Hodal is a dusty town split in half by the two-laned highway that unites Delhi with Agra, home of the Taj Mahal. One side is devoted to agriculture and weaving, where small tipis burn wood fires and cow pats dot the green grasses and wheat fields. The other side is an industrial town where most of the people live, and where I happened to cause a head-on collision between two young motorcyclists. They’d never seen a blonde woman before.
One month later, I found myself traipsing through two feet of snow to visit my second alma ‘nomus’, Norway’s alpine hamlet of Hodal. It consists primarily of one crescent street, a dirt road then covered in crunchy white ice, which curved through pine trees and red and grey wooden farmhouses and stretched from a creekbed to a small chapel, where it finally rested at a small collection of guesthouses, popular during the summer, when the winter ice melts into a large lake. Hodal – also called ‘Hodalen’ in Norway, or ‘the valley of Ho’, which no one could explain – is just an hour from Roros, Norway’s oldest city and a gastronomical and visual behemoth. Dusk was beginning to appear on Hodal’s horizon when the only seeming inhabitants appeared out of nowhere, two octegenarians in what looked like Olympic space outfits, cross-country skiing on their way to the next town’s supermarket. “Hei!” they called out over the snow. “Hey!” I called back. “I’m a Hodal!” My cry echoed into the mountains and disappeared with the swooshing of their skis.
Marvelous! Another “who knew?” — and good for you for not only tracking it, but visiting to boot! Bet your Grand-dad loved it….
PS VERY glad to see your site… Well Done!
Hi. I’m writing a story that takes place in India and in the course of researching came upon your ‘Hodal in Hodal’ entry. Since you were there (in Hodal) recently I thought you might be able to help me out a bit. I need to find any distinctive landmark (in Hodal, or down the road in Mathura, or any town along that stretch of National Highway 2 running from New Delhi to Agra) that is located near to or just off that highway. I came across mentions of something called Dabchik (?) and a temple, Tygi Baba Mandir, both in Hodal. Any of these ring familiar? If you can enlighten me about either of these two structures (send photos!?) or if there are other landmarks (temples and such…) you know of that hover close to Hwy 2 around Hodal–or any cities in that general vicinity–I’d greatly appreciate your input. The older the landmark the better–they have to date back to at least 1982, per the dictates of the story. Thanks.
Dirk
November 11, 2012
Hi Dirk,
Thanks for your message. I’d say the best landmark in Hodal is the Hanuman temple, Tygi Baba Mandir. If you look at my slideshow you’ll see pix of monkeys and a temple — that’s the same temple. Dabchik is a ‘tourist resort’ but when I stayed there I was the only international tourist…it’s a sort of run-down hotel with a Shining feel to it. Totally worth a visit if you’re headed there. Hodal itself is split in two by the highway — there’s a village on one side with adobe homes and women tilling fields and on the other side, a proper town with a cinema and schools and fire station. I’m not sure how old that temple is (ie if it dates to 1982 or not), but if you have any other questions, please get in touch. Oh and there’s an amazing temple to Shiva in Mathura — you should check that out — where Lord Krishna was said to be born. The temple has various parts to it, including a generator-run marionnette section with Krishna ‘reenacting’ various stages of his life and a cave with sort of life-size gods in various states of action. I would of course love ‘Hodal’ to be in your story for namesake alone, so please do keep me apprised of what happens!
Thanks,
Kate
Thanks, Kate, for your expansive reply–I’ll look further into Tygi Baba Mandir. Beyond the Hodal entry I browsed your site a bit and came upon entries on Beijing, Yangshuo and Guilin, China–places I have visited. Your writing took me back to those visits and reanimated some old, cherished memories…thanks. I enjoy your writing.