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Amazingly I have spent almost a week in Delhi without either:
- Killing half the population
- Finding cheaper accomodation
- Bitten my arm off in a fit of boredom
- Tried desperately to leave
I have, in fact, quite enjoyed my time here. After traveling for more than 2 months its nice to just camp down somewhere and have the same pillow for a few nights in a row. Also there have been important football games and other reasons to stay indoors and just watch tv in the evenings.
Hanging out with Paroma and Raj has also been great fun. I am seeing them again tonight.
Tomorrow I finally DO leave Delhi. I decided to splurge on return flights to Guwahati in Assam over in the small teardrop of India that sits between Bangladesh and Burma. An area I have never been to. An area I have always been fascinated by. So I get up incredibly early tomorrow, take 2 flights and end up in the capitol of Assam. I will kick around there a couple of days and head to Shillong in Meghalaya which I have heard is beautiful. A couple of day trips to waterfalls and peaks and I will be on my way back to Guwahati. From there I fly back to Delhi, 2 nights here, Mumbai, 3 nights there, London, 5 nights there, Copenhagen, 6 nights there.. and finally touch back down in the country I left for all of this insanity. Norway. The day after I arrive Le Corbeau are playing at Mono and the day after that Why? are playing at Mono too. So.. Ozlo-ites know where they can find me!
Guwahati-Shillong Once again I am sitting at my local internet cafe in Delhi. Paharganj. The shithole. Having just checked in to Anoop for the 5th time this trip. I have slept on all 4 floors now. I am in a slightly irritated state. I landed after flying from Assam (Guwahati) back in Delhi and managed to jump in a Pre-Paid taxi with the directions and the name of the place written ON the paper. The taxi driver said OK. I told him at least 5 times during the trip which end of Paharganj I wanted to be dropped off at (since its an incredibly long street and totally blocked by traffic so it can take an hour from one end to the other, hence my extreme caution in being clear) however as usual in India if there is one single thing they can fuck up, they will. He drove straight past my turning even though I shouted at him way before the turn to go Left... I repeated over and over NOT MAIN STATION SIDE, RAMAKRISHNA MISSION SIDE. "yes sir...yes sir"... STATION SIDE NO. "yes sir...". Needless to say the Chootiya drove straight past with that infuriating Indian signal with the hand that points to some distant place as if he miraculously knows better than I do which road to take when there IS ONLY ONE ROAD and I have been on it countless times. Obviously the taxi gets stuck outside the central station and I let go at him... I was not in the mood today... not after the afternoon I had had. Instead of dropping me off so I could just get a cycle rickshaw he turned around, went all the way back around Connaught Circle, finally found the place (down the road I told him to take and via him asking 2 rickshaw drivers despite me knowing my way) and then he has the nerve to turn around and ask for 50rupees extra for the diversion. I left nothing to imagination and walked away as he honked his horn for about 2 minutes trying to get me to come back.
Oh India. The land where you are madly in love and violently in hate the next second.
Lets go back.
I left Delhi after having a few more cosy nights with Paroma and Raj which included a trip to the Gymkarna Club where I was not allowed in the bar (no formal shirt) and we say outside, got locked out, got back in, found out it was all closed, tried to find the right gate to leave by, then sat in a roundabout for 20 minutes as Delhi Police went to find a taxi for us. I then headed back, had another lazy day, headed back out to Paroma and Raj's place in Malvya Nagar, enjoyed a cosy night of music and chats, got back to Anoop at 2am. Woke up at 5am. Taxi to the airport. Air Deccan. Flew to Guwahati.. my first ever trip to the North East... pretty damn excited...
Landing there seemed like we had headed further east and ended up in Northern Thailand. The nature was very lush, rice fields and houses on stilts, people resembling South East Asians rather than Subcontinent Indians.. I managed to get a room and spent the afternoon walking around and eating a fancy meal at a slap-up place with live band and waiters dressed in opulent uniforms. Then back to attempt sleep with so many new impressions and smells.
I caught a share-jeep to Shillong at midday. A place I had always wanted to go to and never had the chance. The journey was unforgettable. Slowly venturing higher and higher up into the folds of the mountains, with huge spreads of rice fields, trees of every sort competing for colour, flowers wild and tame showering the countryside with scents, lazy workers lying in spots of shade, oxen at work in the fields, stilt houses ready for flood.... onwards further, the air becoming cooler, clouds beginning to collect like puddles in the valleys, cloudberry coloured leaves being slowly washed in the mild rain, deep red soil pierced by old roots as they force their way through rocks and roads in the search for moisture...the slow rain pulling its delicate mantle across a humid forest, trees lost for fog, lakes dancing with smoke on their backs, river caught fish hanging on bamboo rods ready to be sold, the roads becoming steeper, the valleys deeper.
Then suddenly the brutality of progress. Valley tops smothered in the stained, ugly carcass of concrete.... pylons and sewers cutting paths that once flowed with water and leaves, Clouds of cheap exhaust choking the narrow streets, cars honking their infernal horns as if the gas pedal was connected, the throngs of people walking in unison and illusion.
Shillong.
Not the prettiest place on earth, perhaps, but set in stunning surroundings. The actual city resembles little more than a typically awfully planned Indian city with roads far too small for the amount of cars and buildings that all look the same save for the choice of paint. Modern, horrendous concrete shops and hotels violently placed overhanging the streets. I checked in to a tiny room with no attached bathroom... and spent the next few days dissecting Shillong. Thank God the area that resembled such a monstrosity was only a small part of the city. A few loooong walks and many taxi rides later and I was absolutely in love with the place. The outskirts of the city had that old British nostalgia about them, the hills were spread with lovely old cottages, the markets, especially the Kashi Market, was one of the most interesting I had ever been to. The lake, the park, the Polo Ground, the hills around were all charming and well worth the nightmare of staying in the centre of town.
I spent 4 days there. Thoroughly enjoyed myself. Nights at Cloud 9 bar playing my Ipod to people who would rather listen to Bryan Adams, stalking the streets with all the youth dressed in hoodies and KORN t-shirts (Shillong is Indians "rock city") looking angry and disaffected.. trying in VAIN to find stable internet...making small talk with Indians in every place I went since I was the only tourist there.....(that gets tiring).....And then the Arsenal match came round.. and I couldn't risk a powercut in Shillong so I retreated down the hill to the hellhole of this mortal planet: GUWAHATI. If I ever have to go there again I might just shoot myself. Everything that could possibly be wrong with an Indian city seems to have collected in the minds of the city planners and been put to the test here. It is incredibly ugly. It has more dust than anyplace I have been in my life. The roads are so minute and every person in the whole city seems to have 15 cars all beeping their damn horns and trying to move forward every 30 minutes or so. It took us 45 minutes to move 2 kilometers. If it hadn't been for my backpack and the intense heat I would have walked. There are no good hotels for budget travelers. The locals are very aggressive. The food was positively awful in the 4 different restaurants I went to. The city has not been planned at all so there are just sprawling turds lined up all over the place creating a feeling of being on drugs when walking around because nothing at all makes any sense. Absolutely awful. So I stayed in my hotel room basically the whole 3 days watching T.V and ordering atrocious room-service. Which brings me to my "funny story". I woke up. Ordered chips and fried egg. Repeated it to the waiter 189 times since the first reply was "chips and veg or non veg rice"......RICE? ..."yes sir.. fried rice means veg or non veg?". NO RICE. EGG>EGG. FRIED EGG. "ah... means omelette?"... NO FRIED EGG. "ok sir".
Twenty minutes later the waiter came with a plate of chips and 2 boiled eggs that had been FRIED in oil...............go figure.
I actually went down to the kitchen to teach them how to fry an egg but couldn't be bothered because frankly they didn't give a shit.
Guwahati had ONE redeeming quality and if I had followed my feelings and stayed in bed I would have missed one of the most serene and beautiful places I have been to. Of course with some typical Indian idiocy thrown in. (Yes... 3 months is beginning to feel long now)
I hired a cycle rickshaw and went down to the Ghats. From there I waited on a floating boat/restaurant for the motorboat to take me and a huge group of people over to Peacock Island. An island set in the middle of the brahmaputra river with a Shiva Temple set a top the rocks. The boat journey was only 10 minutes but as soon as you left the shore you got that feeling of being on the water and the calmness that it brings. The sun was not setting but it was low in the sky and the clouds and further views were all a strange mix of grey, blue and purple. Absolutely stunning. The temple itself was not much to behold but I walked around to the other side of the island and sat on a huge rock high up looking out over the wide river and the sun slowly sinking straight ahead. The water was shimmering... silver streaks being painted on it every second.. the suns reflection was dizzying.... I followed the sparkles in the water for a long time just sitting there in the cool of the afternoon, in silence, solitude, enjoying every precious moment. A feeling I had not experienced since the Golden Temple at sunset. I managed a blessed 15 minutes before the inevitable happened. For every fucking rock in the entire island an Indian guy walks over, stands ONE FOOT away from me, DIRECTLY in front of me completely blocking my view of the river and exchanging it for a full view of his ass. Not something I am in the habit of staring at. No sense of "oh.. maybe I could move ONE STEP to the right or left since he was sitting there before me..."... No... Ass straight in front and stood there for a good 2-3 minutes. I averted my glance to the left in the hope he would move but instead he turns around and asks me if I have seen the movie TITANIC. "ugh... yes"....."this place means like that scene. I feel like front of ship and looking down at sea. But then if ship islands should not be here, land should not be here..."... YES...." So.. you are coming from which place"..... and my solitude and the promise of a perfect hour of contemplation disappeared as quickly as it took a sunset to be replaced by a bottom.
At least those few moments prior were moments that were worth the whole hell experience of Guwahati.
The boat back was 1 hour late and the "bum man" kept asking me questions which I was not in the mood to answer... its fine at the beginning of the trip but 3 months in when you get asked the same shit every day it just suddenly clicks and you have no grace left anymore. Thats my current condition.
I went back to the hotel. Had a relatively good meal which I paid dearly for. Watched some tv and fell asleep.
Got up early. Checked out. Walked in incredible heat to find a taxi.. ended up walking a couple of miles... got squashed into a tiny Maruti car with 4 others and then endured the final fling with Guwahati traffic sitting with an Indian mans armpit next to my face, the car window open and the exhaust of a million dying vehicles pumping all over my irritated expression. It felt like hours before we left the city limits and the traffic eased up. Checked in. Had some coffee. Sat in the departure gate for over 2 hours not knowing when or where our plane was because nobody informed anyone.... it left 1 hour late and I sat cramped in possibly the worlds smallest airplane seat for 3 hours grumbling and listening to Pantera.
Now you understand why I got so mad at the taxi driver today. I am just running a bit on empty and am blissfully glad to be back in Delhi where I know I can get good food, see good friends and then back to Mumbai for 3 days of fun in the best city in India before heading back to Europe with a content heart and not one that really wants to squeeze any more experiences out of this trip. I have enough to mull over for the next few weeks/months and will enjoy some time with friends after so much solitude and enjoy the European summer if she offers us a glance.
Back to Mumbai Suddenly the familiar sounds and smells are left behind. What was almost taken for granted for three months is now a memory and will have no immediate continuation.
Three months of travel, from north to south and east to west can now only be traced in hotel ledgers and not in my movements. The time for rest had come to an end.
I am not sure whether I rested.
India is a challenge, not a luxury.
India is a country that consumes you as you slowly conquer her. India leaves her traces in your hair, on your skin, under your fingernails. India has left my head feeling empty at the lack of sounds. Everything in the west seems so quiet. So organised. So boring. I will have to adapt to that once again. At least for the duration of a few months, before hopefully fortunes saved are not squandered and can once again give flight to journeys of exploration and reflection.
I feel a strange vacuum. Adaptation is something that happens without one's knowledge. Suddenly your maneurisms, behaviour, tolerance, routines are halted and the time comes once again to return to that which is most "normal" to you.
The art of surviving in India, of talking to Indians, of managing situations is no longer needed. It is locked away once again to await its return. The western world is now the challenge. The return to work. The return to tax papers. The return to cold weather and depression. The return to friends and family. The return to reunions. The return to cities fled from years before. The return to.......
Oppressive heat is exchanged for bone-chilling cold.
Pollution and poverty exchanged for progress and corporate ladders
Joy and freedom exchanged for silence and duty
Cooling fans exchanged for cold floors
I cannot say that I felt at home when I landed at Heathrow yesterday morning. Though England, the country of my birth, has been such an instrumental part of my growing up I still have a marked distance towards it. This is not a negative attitude. This is simply an awareness that I am not intrinsically British. Though I may have exposed some of her traits. I do not subscribe to the British mentality. I am a complicated mixture of many things.
There are things that I adore about Britain. About the British. I just cannot fully accept and identify myself with them. I always feel like I am seen as a stranger, tourist, exchange student. I am never and will never be one of "them". In their eyes, and my own.
I feel the same way about Norway.
I feel the same way about India. Finland.
Leaving India always evokes emotions in me. I am connected to that nation on an emotional level more than any European country. But I have no idea what that really means. Or why. I have an affinity with it, but also a grace period. It is a country of contrasts but perhaps thats what makes it so "whole". Its complete lack of foundation makes it the firmest place to stand, if only for a short time at least. India is therapy. It is a tonic. It is an escape from the mundane. However prolonged stints tend to leave you exhausted at the sheer amount of impressions and noises that you are left to deal with under a sometimes merciless sun. The eternal bureaucracy and incessant delays also test the patience you tried so hard to temper. It is an oxymoron. It is an impossibility. It is a mirage.
Leaving Delhi did good for my soul. Apart from some choice restaurants, beautiful temples and a few noteworthy tourist sites Delhi is an utter nightmare. Choked roads. Constant hassle. Murderous temperatures. Edgy people. The bloated newly rich. It is a graveyard. If it hadn't been for some dear friends and some memorable nights out the times there would be swept under the rug to be forgotten as soon as possible.
Mumbai arrived like a soothing embrace. Ordering feasts to be delivered home while the gang sat and choked on their cigarettes and downed beers. The constant buzz of the city. Inept and overwhelmed yet vibrant and proud. A city drowning in its sheer size, yet capable of retaining the charm of a village in shaded corners and holy pools. Endless choices. Food capable of flooring the most ardent snob. Old victorian buildings shielded by mighty banyan trees and scattered shrines. The sea breeze.
My last night ended up being a fitting farewell. An indian farewell. Luscious food at Soul Fry. A couple of drinks. Riding to the airport while Viraaj blasted The Bends from the stereo. Bandra passing by with all its stains and shines. Farewells. Check-in. Delays. La Vie de Boheme. Cramped economy seats. Horrific in-flight cuisine. A couple of red wine's. Sleeeeeep.
And suddenly my three months seemed like a ghost. Time passed is as intangible as it is invisible.
Time has once again eluded me and I am thrown into the future with no expectations or preparation.
London- Copenhagen- Oslo For a seasoned traveller it is a mild irritation that the mode of transport I use more than any should be one that I so abhor. British Airways did nothing to change my opinion of long-haul flights. Firstly leaving 2 hours after announced without any announcements (typical India, people standing for one and a half hour to board and not being told anything other than "few minutes sir"). Finally got on the plane. Cramped seats. Some of the most putrid food I have had on a plane, the whole row I was sitting in stared at their plates wondering what on earth it was we were eating. It seemed to be a deep fried baguette with potato's in the middle. I thought it was a sea cucumber.
Then in a blink I was sitting on the rambling underground heading to Sarah's house in Barons Court. Hugs and hot cups of tea and all was back to normal again. 4 days passed quickly in London catching up with Ann, Aaron, Angela, Deebo and Josmar at Aladdins, pints at the Foundry, late night chat's with Sarah at home, an absolutely blistering concert with Trouble in Camden with Ann and Keith, a horrendously boring show with Blond Redhead the next day, Fish n Chips at Rock & Sole Place (YUM), briefly meeting up with Neil and Karen in South London, and then it was time again for London to be left behind... an insanely early wake up after a very late night and I was sitting on the Gatwick Express listening to my Ipod trying to comprehend the huge change it is to come back from the East to the West. I decided in that train that I must attempt to return as quickly as possible.
The pilot announced that Copenhagen was experiencing a heat wave with temperatures of over 15-20 degrees, blue skies and sunshine. He wasn't lying. I touched down on the runway at Kastrup like so many hundred times before, walked through the gates and was chuffed to see Sarah waiting for me on the other side. We headed into town on the metro and 6 days passed in Copenhagen.......playing disc golf with Mikael at the park, watching Champions League with the boys, hanging out at J & S's house, going to Bloomsday, eating pizza, having a night of nostalgia at Jan Erik's house, walking around town in the sunlight, developing rolls at my Cambodian friends lab, eating Malay curry with Jan, Sarah and Marna, Recoring Baba Upanishama silliness on the last night, and the one blow-out night when Sarah and I DJ'd at Copenhagens hipster bar Apparatet.....which turned out to be fantastic after the first hour was wasted with bad sound....lots of friends came and lots of catching up and questions and cheers.....and just as quickly as it began, Copenhagens time was also out...
Another early morning. Brunch with Sarah. Ride to the airport and a flight of only 45 minutes to Oslo. Back here... back here where I don't feel at home but have enough friends to make it a good alternative....where the weather is warming up nicely....life seems the same as when I left....the future is again uncertain.... jobs..housing.. money..future....all in the air... but its a good opportunity.. and I know how much I want to get back out to Asia..and hopefully that will spur me on.
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concerned local
non-member comment
Guwahati is not in hands of local people any more , most of the people now there are from indian mainland.