DAY 208 - Orpington, England

Well, It's good to be home. In general...

 

We had a few nervous hours at Delhi airport. We knew there might be travel problems on the drive from the hotel as the fog was so thick we couldn't see more than ten metres ahead of us. True enough, planes were being delayed and cancelled while we sat waiting to hear about our own flight. Fortunately, BA seemed not to be suffering and our flight touched down in London only an hour or so late. The Air France passengers weren't so lucky and spent the night in a hotel. The Jet Airways passengers got the budget treatment of a cup of coffee and the departure lounge floor. 

 

If that wasn't exciting enough, a couple of hours after arriving home a pipe burst in the attic creating a rather surreal waterfall through the landing and hallway. I'll spare you the details of the hassle i've had so far with the insurers, the drying specialists, the builders and the loss adjusters (who i can only assume don't like each other given their unwillingness to talk to each other). Suffice to say, the woodwork's cracking, the ceilings are staining and that lot can't make up their mind who's doing what, when.

 

Rather than sit around the house doing nothing, i've been catching up with friends and family for the last three weeks. An unfortunate side effect has been a big increase in calories, just when i was congratulating myself on the 6kg (1st) i'd lost while away (if you want to lose weight, spent a week in Tibet). All the cravings i had whilst away, namely cheese, bitter and (rice-free) lasagna, have now, i can confidently say, been sated.

 

We had a short break in St Ives, Cornwall last week which was very pleasant. Yes, it rained and wasn't very warm, but there's something rather fantastic about wandering around the muddy British coast in such conditions. The beer down there is the best in Britain but the food was shockingly overpriced. We stopped off at Cheddar on the way home and bought six months worth of cheese having eaten one months worth in the tasting room.

 

We've got a couple of weeks now before we head off on possibly the best bit of the trip - Antarctica. If anyone fancies a pint before then, let me know. I need to get three months worth of bitter down in two weeks...

 

Rich.

DAY 184 - Delhi, India

I'm in the hotel room waiting to get a taxi to the airport for the 0330 flight to Heathrow. I'm soooo ready for home.

 

We only had two nights in Amritsar, so as soon as our train arrived (six hours late, sharing a compartment with some gentlemen with the worst and most unsubtle flatulence), we headed to the Pakistan border. We went to witness the elaborate and jingoistic closing the border ceremony. A bunch of overstressed soldiers from either side waggle and strut around like they're from Monty Python's Ministry of Funny Walks. A bloke with a microphone whips up the audience into a nationalistic fervor ("Hindooostan! Hindooooostan!") as the border gates are slammed shut with such determination they immediately bounce back open.

The next day we headed to the Golden Temple and a definite highlight of the trip. Up to this point India had struggled to provide the goods, but this place was somewhere special. The atmosphere when we walked through the gates was noticeably calmer and more pleasant that in the chaos outside. No-one wanted to sell you anything, no-one wanted to rip you off in a rickshaw, no-one wanted your money, people were friendly without overdoing it and I smiled for the first time since arriving in India. Nice chanting too. I was happy to take my shoes and socks off here, unlike at some of the other places we visited where the floor was less well tended, the water dirty and the local stray dogs had moved in to do a bit of redecorating, if you know what i mean.

Wednesday we got the "express" train to Delhi (two hours late); our last stop on Leg 3. We checked into an ok hotel in Paraganj, the local backpacker district. The last time I was here I stayed in squalor, and I certainly wasn't going to repeat that. This place has hot water and a window. Exciting, eh? There's plenty to do here which is just as well, as we had five and a half days to fill. It was New Year's Eve, but beer was hard to get hold of at a reasonable price, and we didn't really feel like a night on the town anyway, so we had an early night.

New Year's Day we did the old city with the Gandhi museum and Red Fort. Friday we had a wander around 'new' Delhi; the bit the British built (OK, designed - I suspect the Indians actually built it). A lot of roads were closed for security reasons which made finding our way around difficult and frustrating.

Saturday we hired a car to take us to Agra. Given how unreliable the trains had been, we dared not use them although it would have been a lot cheaper. The Taj Mahal was as beautiful as ever but the fog made taking pictures pretty difficult and the swarms of people kept getting in the way. We were made to pay 38 times what the locals paid to get in. For that price we should have had the place to ourselves instead of a poxy free bottle of water. After that we visited Agra Fort. Our driver spent the day chewing betel nut, spitting it out the window and sleeping. He didn't say much until we were almost back in Delhi when he started the most transparent sob story I've ever heard. He might have borrowed it from Bohemian Rhapsody ("I'm just a poor boy from a poor family", etc). When that didn't work he tried to charge us 1,000Rs (£14) for the aircon, which had been switched off all day because it was so cold. He didn't get a tip.

For the last two days we've wandered the streets of Delhi looking at tombs. Dan bought a brass Ganesh.

I'm over India. The infrastructure is decrepit and unreliable. The hotels are overpriced and squalid. Trains are late, smelly and overcrowded (and that's just first class) and the driving is downright suicidal. You get hassled all day, every day by people who only speak to you because they want your cash. People appear, to me at least, to only be interested in themselves and what's in it for them. This is not a holiday, it's an endurance test.

 

Ok, it's not as bad as all that. The food is generally great although a bit frustrating for a carnivore like me, and it's a very interesting place to visit, but I'll be glad to be home.

See you soon.