Eden, move over for the Garden of Assam

Shila Desai
May 14
2 min read

Playing Lady and Lord of an Assam tea estate

Tucked away in northeast India, Assam teems with wide open spaces, silk weaving, tea plantations, and lush wildlife reserves. One thing it doesn't teem with: tourists. Wonderful! That is exactly why we keep returning to this special part of India.

Prior to the pandemic, my husband and I explored Assam for seven days before a group tour. We visited the home of the rare one-horned rhino, stayed in a luxurious tea planter’s bungalow, and experienced the 900-year-old traditions at Guwahati’s Kamakhya Devi Temple. Sualkuchi’s sericulture, producing the world’s finest Muga and Eri silks, was a highlight. However, it was Majuli, a riverine island in the Brahmaputra, that captivated us.

Majuli is the world’s largest inhabited riverine island, surrounded by the Brahmaputra. It has a distinct cultural heritage rooted in the 16th-century saint-scholar Sankaradeva's reform of Hinduism, promoting monotheism and compassion over ritualised casteism. His legacy endures in fourteen satras (university-monasteries), each dedicated to arts like mask-making, music, weaving, literature, and dance to honor Lord Krishna. These satras preserve traditions passed down through generations of monks.

Our foray into Majuli was bookended by a memorable ride on a ferry with no guardrails and an impromptu top deck casino. Watch it here!

Each morning, we left our bamboo cottage homestay to explore Majuli's cultural riches (photos)

Early mornings in Majuli rang with children's greetings on their way to school.

Bamboo cottage breakfasts were cooked the old fashioned way on a woodfire.

Fired up with a heary breakfast, we visited the drama-satra Semaguri with head Hemchandra Goswami, who shared his lifelong dedication to crafting masks for dramas that celebrate Krishna. These raas-leela occur in October, aligning with Diwali.

An afternoon with the semi-nomadic Mishing tribe, named because the British, trying to study their way of life, often found them "missing" due to their relocation caused by the unpredictable flooding of the Brahmaputra plain. Weaving is integral to their daily life; each woman creates enough to meet her family's needs or for bartering.

On our way back from Majuli, we tracked one-horned rhino in Kaziranga National Park - a wildlife conservation success story.