Divya Kandala is a fictional British journalist featured in the Far Cry 4 promotional website divyakandala.com, wherein she authored an internet blog titled Divya's Travel Blog. She traveled to Kyrat and personally met with Citizens of Kyrat, members of the Golden Path, and eventually Pagan Min.
As a freelance journalist with a history of writing on the subject of Kyrat from outside the country, in 2014 she was hired by a then-unnamed Western magazine to write them an article about Kyrat based on interviews and observations within the country. Divya Kandala created a standalone travel blog wherein she posted updates about her trip to Kyrat and travels within the small war-torn kingdom.
She began her trip on 16 Oct. 2014 by flying from the UK to an undisclosed city in India, where she met with a hired "Fixer" by the name of Raj who helps her cross the border into Kyrat from India on 21 Oct. via 2 buses (Raj travels with her through the mountain road border crossing). In the days between arriving in India and crossing into Kyrat, she begins to read over printed-out translated (the translation was done by a friend of hers back home) pages of Yuma Lau's journal from the First Kyrati Civil War to acquire detailed information about the hierarchy/history of Pagan Min's kingdom. However, she leaves these papers at the second bus station before boarding the second bus for fear of extra scrutiny at the border crossing the bus will pass through.
After disembarking in Kyrat, She settles into an empty rental home (Divya's Hideout) Raj found for her in Shanath and interviews some of the locals there, namely a woman named Pavitra, who lives with her husband in a nearby house. While in Shanath she learnt more about the chain of command in the Golden Path, with conversations often covering the Golden Path's leaders, Sabal and Amita, and their differing views and influences. She also learns of the Shanath Arena, run by Noore. On 24 Oct. Raj gifted Divya with a revolver to keep for the rest of her stay in Kyrat and then accompanied her to a nighttime show at the Arena. After visiting the Arena, Divya was deeply disgusted by the blood sport and wrote about it the next day on her now quickly growing blog.
On 27 Oct. she travels with Raj to Utkarsh, Kyrat's "model city", where a few days later they witness a man run through the streets tearing down propaganda posters while being chased by Royal Guards who catch up by shooting the man's legs, after which they brutally beat him unconscious and take the man away. Divya then leaves Utkarsh sometime between 31 Oct. and 2 Nov., returning to her temporary home in Shanath. On the morning of 3 Nov. she has tea at Pavitra's house, where they talk more about the Golden Path, with Pavitra revealing she was formerly involved with the resistance group and telling Divya where she could interview active members of the Golden Path only after warning her against associating with them in any way due to the dangerous repercussions Divya could face from Pagan's men. From 4 Nov. to 6 Nov. Divya meets with the Golden Path and learns more about the group, publishing a brief history of the Golden Path and an interview with a Golden Path member that reveals more about Sabal and Amita on her blog.
On the evening of 7 Nov. she returns to her temporary home in Shanath and discovers it broken into, with her notes/photos/personal electronics stolen but expensive things and gun left behind, and Pavitra not answering her door. Divya soon made arrangements with Raj to be picked up later that night, but an hour before the scheduled pick-up time Royal Army enter the house and arrest her, taking her to the Royal Palace where she is held in a windowless cell until the afternoon of 9 Nov. when she is interrogated for 4 hours before being taken upstairs and "released" to an ornate guest room where all her luggage and belongings have been placed alongside a note from Pagan Min inviting her to do an interview over dinner, which Pagan hopes will "clear up some misconceptions". During that weekend the blog was made inaccessible (both in the fictional world of the blog and IRL), instead displaying a "page unavailable in your country" screen indicating the Kyrati Government was responsible, having somehow gained access to the website.[1]
The interview over dinner took place on 11 Nov. and lasted for three hours. The recounted parts of this interview primarily cover subjects like the nature of the Golden Path, Pagan Min's leadership, policies, and view of modern Kyrat, the man Divya saw in Utkarsh, and why the Shanath Arena exists. Divya recorded most of the conversation on her phone with Pagan Min's consent, until nearing the end of the conversation when Pagan opens her phone using her passcode and stops the recording, going "off the record" to "give [her] context" after Divya brung up Mohan Ghale and stated she read Yuma's Journals to get context about the past. Over the next two days following the dinner, Divya composed a condensed chronological retelling of the conversation that she posted in two parts on the blog; whatever context Pagan told her is never really posted about.[2][3] On 14 Nov. Divya wakes to a room service breakfast and her suitcase packed by the room's door, with her passport on top holding a plane ticket tucked inside. Divya walks with a soldier who helps her to the front entrance of the palace, where Divya and Pagan have a brief chat and say farewell. She then enters a waiting truck that takes her to the Kyrat-India border, where she transfers to a waiting car that takes her to a nearby airport from which she flies to the Delhi Airport. There she posts the final blog post and then boards a plane to London Heathrow Airport, arriving the next day. Her trip to Kyrat having concluded, Divya posts no further to the blog but continues to reply to comments on it till around mid-2015.[4]
In January 2016 she was hired to document the progress of an archeological dig site in Central Europe positioned along the Danube River whose purpose was to unearth artifacts of an ancient Mesolithic civilization located there. By this time she has already published her full article on Pagan Min in the previously-unnamed magazine, revealed to be a fictional magazine called Weekly Read, and Pagan Min has through one way or another abdicated rulership of Kyrat.[5]
Link to website: The live website is now defunct. An archive version is still available at this link.
See also[]
- "A word from your dig director" - Far Cry Primal promotional material in which she features.
References[]
- ↑ "Safe.". Divya’s Travel Blog. 10 Nov. 2014. Archived from the original on 18 Feb. 2016. Retrieved 4 Sep. 2022.
- ↑ "Conversation with the King: Part One". Divya’s Travel Blog. 12 Nov. 2014. Archived from the original on 18 Feb. 2016. Retrieved 4 Sep. 2022.
- ↑ "Conversation with the King: Part Two". Divya’s Travel Blog. 13 Nov. 2014. Archived from the original on 18 Feb. 2016. Retrieved 4 Sep. 2022.
- ↑ "Departures.". Divya’s Travel Blog. 14 Nov. 2014. Archived from the original on 18 Feb. 2016. Retrieved 4 Sep. 2022.
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20160321203104/http://far-cry.ubisoft.com:80/primal/en-CA/community/archaeology-hub/164-235179-16/ru-RU