Namaste

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Hi all

Welcome to chaotic Kolkata. Very beautiful in places, but a bit mad.

You will be pleased to know I made it here in one piece.

I was a little late contacting people to let them know I was safe and sound as none of the three phones I wanted to take to India worked unfortunately. I tried to buy one today but most places were closed with it being a Sunday, so I'm going to try again tomorrow at a large phone shop and get a local pay as you go phone.

I wasn't too nervous until about ten minutes before setting off for the airport, when the nerves began to hit me hard, but then again I always have hated waiting for things. At Kings Cross the Hare Krishna's were out in force, so I thought maybe I'd got to India a little early! Thanks again to Hung and Ron for seeing me off at the airport, and especially to Ron by providing the entertainment by emptying a bottle of tomato sauce down his trousers.

The flight passed by really quickly. Thanks to Air India for keeping me in free food and drink on the way to Delhi. Everyone was really friendly on the plane, and I got chatting to a couple of blokes who were on the way to Punjab followed by Thailand. I was impressed with how swanky Delhi airport was, and it was just a short wait before my flight to Kolkata.

The less said about Kolkata Airport the better really, but on the flight from Delhi I got talking to the person next to me - Bob, a native Kolkatan who has spent the last two years working as an investment banker in Canary Wharf. Bob has kindly offered to show me round the city, so I'll get that sorted and give him a call once I get a new phone.

I arrived at Kolkata airport and it was literally in at the deep end. As soon as I got through immigration and booked a pre-paid taxi I was swarmed by independent taxi drivers, but they weren't too bad once I told them I had already booked a pre-paid taxi, and one of them even directed me towards the correct rank.

I joined the rank, where my designated driver seemed to change about six times, and then as far as I would see, some random punter was turfed out of a cab for unknown reasons and I was shoe horned in!

The Kolkata roads are mad! No two ways about that. No rules at all for driving, it's definitely survival of the fittest, with the car horn being the weapon of choice. The horn basically means "Coming Through", and most drivers use it every five seconds! Surely not by coincidence most cars are also full of bumps and dents!

I saw everything in the thirty minute drive to the hotel, street stalls, shanty towns, beggars, busses with cattle pen windows and people hanging out of the doors, broken down vehicles, random cows, goats, and dogs wading down the busy highway. None of the streets seemed to have any names either and were much more run down than I'd expected.

The air polution was like nothing I had ever seen or smelled before, but every now and then the smell of the food from the roadside stalls was delicious and the smell of polution temporarily dissapeared.

The taxi driver was great, I was going to tip him 10Rs for his trouble but by the time we got to the hotel I offered him 100Rs. I was wondering if he would be expecting a tip, but since he made a point of telling me he neither worked for the company, nor owned the car I took that as a hint. That was ok though, glad he got me there to Hotel Oriental alive.

It was dark already at 5pm, and the hotel was that well hidden I had to ask someone on the street where it the entrance was. He insisted on showing me all the way to reception, even though it turned out to be about ten metres away, which meant he was expecting payment, I gave him 10Rs, which is about 15p.

I was worried that judging by the reception, which was really scruffy, and the fact that the porter nearly frog marched me to my room before demanding a tip - that I may as well have gone somewhere else for the night for about 4 pounds rather than the 10 I was paying - but the room is actually ok. It's clean, and I get a double bed and cable TV, which has about 26 channels of music, Bollywood films, and Bengali religous programmes - as well as Indian news in English and the Commonwealth games.

I have been doing a bit of exploring today, and taken some good photos, but the internet cafe is about to close so I'll say goodbye for now, and hopefully post again tomorrow!

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