Heading North

Distance covered since last blog: 1200km

So as previously mentioned, a few things went wrong for me once I arrived in Hampi. In fact, the first of these things happened before I had even arrived there - the bed bug attack. I had a 15 hour wait for my train to Hampi at Bangalore, so I decided that rather than spend money on a hotel room to wait in for the day, I would spend a fraction of the price on a bed in the train station 'Retiring Room'. This was a big dormitory above the platforms, with rows of beds. This didn't much concern me at the time, and I settled in to reading my book. These beds were to prove the problem. I did get to see this lovely sunset from the window.

You don't feel the actual 'bite' of the bed bug, you just see the big, red sores starting to develop about 12 hours later (I'm an expert), therefore I wasn't aware of what was going on at the time and happily boarded my overnight train. Upon arrival in Hampi I was conscious of itching my back and arms a lot, but tried to ignore it. I had bigger concerns at the time - 1. My camera appeared to have stopped working 2. My Visa card wasn't working at the only ATM in town 3. I had been talked into accommodation and an all day tour at a price that I could ill afford. The tour was fantastic, despite the price tag, and would have made for some incredible photos (I urge you to take 30 seconds to Google Hampi and see what I'm talking about). There was one rather distressing moment when the lorry driving in front of my tuk tuk ran over and crippled a dog. My driver was outraged, stepped on the accelerator, and gave the lorry driver a stern telling off.

That evening I gambled and used my last remaining rupees to get a bus to a nearby village, which I was informed had an ATM. Thankfully it did, and my card worked. I cheered and kissed the money once it was in my hand - not really advisable on a pavement in the dark, but I was relieved! The next day (after being ripped off by two middle aged women in cahoots with each other), I got myself to the bus station for an overnight bus to Hyderabad.

Hyderabad hasn't got great reviews from people who have been there - it is basically just a big city with no real sites and oppressive heat. I can confirm this. I went on a walking tour of the city with an English bloke I had met on the bus - we called it off after 30 minutes and retired to a bar to watch some cricket. The city is unattractive and it was pushing up towards 40 degrees. Much to my amusement the bar we were in had a family of rats living in it, who would prey on any food left unguarded. I deliberately put some cashew nuts on the neighbouring table to entice them out and provide me with some entertainment (Ian had left me, and their was a power cut in the bar - power cuts are daily occurrences in India). The two other big 'stories' from Hyderabad is that I had my first shave of the tour. A professional chap did me a cracking job with his cut throat razor. He tried to get me to leave my mustache - "all real men must have mustache" - but I declined. Also, I purchased a new camera - not that I took any photos of the rather unphotogenic Hyderabad. I left after two days on another overnight bus.

Next stop - Nagpur. The geographical centre of India. I am now officially in 'North India'! Sadly, like Hyderabad, Nagpur is also famous for having bugger all in the way of sites. In fact locals joke that the most attractive building is the prison! The highlight of my time in the city was a brilliant vegetable byriani, and having a plasma TV in my room. This sort of made up for the fact that the shower was broken - at this point I hadn't showered for 5 days (I refused to get in the shower in Hyderabad because it smelt so hideous it made me gag).

Uninspiring Nagpur

During my one night sleep in Nagpur I started to get the suspicion that there were insects in my bed. I flicked the bed side light on, surveyed the scene, and to my horror, laid eyes on a bed bug. As many of you will know, I have been savaged by bed bugs all over the world, but have never actually seen one. This was the first time my mortal enemy and I have come 'face to face'. I slid quietly off the bed so as not to disturb it, snuck round to the other side of the bed, and then mercilessly smashed it to death with my book. In a few short seconds I took out years of hatred for the entire bed bug race on this one little bastard in Nagpur. I left the corpse on the bed as a warning to others.

Early start the next day, with a 12 hour train to Jhansi. Unfortunately this was to turn out to be another one of those nightmare train journeys. It started off badly when I found that my seat was the middle of a row of three, which is not at all comfortable and I made that clear by looking grumpy. Not helping my mood was the fact that most of the carriage was filled with exactly the type of Indian who is so fascinated by me - 20/25 year old men - so needless to stay the staring started immediately.

The seats opposite me freed up after an hour or so, and two young lads came over, sat down, and grinned at me with a look combining excitement and awe. Eventually, once they had calmed down, they asked me the usual questions - name, age, where I was going, what country I came from etc. I don't mind this so much, but the next question, 'Can I take your photo?', is one I shall never get used to. I reluctantly agreed, and he took one. He then proceeded to show it off proudly to other passengers, which I didn't approve of. I got my camera out and took one back in retaliation - they seemed rather shocked.

Soon after the photo incident, things between the three of us started to take on a rather gay vibe. I'll just give you a flavour:
1. They told me that my skin colour was 'very nice'
2. Constantly asking me: 'Do you have a girlfriend?' then adopting looks of utter shock at my answer, 'No'
3. Warning me, from a distance of about 6 inches from my face, that I had cracked lips. Why he was so interested in my lips was a worry.
4. 'Accidentally' stroking the back of his hand against my crotch when passing his mate a bottle of water. He didn't apologise, just looked me in the eye as if to say 'What did you think of that?'

I really kept my head down after that and basically refused to look at them, or offer them anything other than one word answers. I was suitably grumpy (and feeling slightly violated) by the time I got to Jhansi. I was actually heading for a village 25km away called Orchha, so needed to organise a tuk tuk, which I did without a problem. He took me to a hotel, claiming it to be the only one in town that wasn't booked. I was skeptical, but took a look at the room anyway. It was a dump - rock hard bed, no water in the toilet, and broken glass on the floor. He kindly reduced the room rate from 450 rupees to 400 and I, in my weary state, agreed. When filling out the 'guest log', I noticed that the Indian bloke who had stayed in the room before me had only  had to pay 200 rupees - I flipped out and uncharacteristically raised my voice at the manager. It was at this point he decided his English wasn't good enough and wandered off from my conversation. I went to bed seething.

Thinking back on the contents of this blog, I realise it is basically one rather negative story followed by another. I'm having the time of my life though, and am sure Orchha, Lucknow and Varanasi will be better times in my final days in India.

Varkala, back to Chennai, and the end of Squad

Distance covered since last blog: 500km

(Unfortunately my camera is temporarily out of action, so this blog is photoless I am afraid)

As you can probably imagine, when you get to somewhere as chilled out and picturesque as Varkala, it isn’t easy to leave. We ended up staying for four days, and I pretty much did exactly the same thing on each of those days. It followed basically this pattern – wake up, breakfast noodles, internet café, a few beers, lunch noodles, a bit more cricket, an incredible sunset, a few more beers, then bed. 

On our second night, we did a cooking course one evening at one of the local restaurants. I started off absolutely hating it. Chopping onions, potatoes, chilies, garlic etc. The fact that Squad can chop vegetables really well and was always finished well in advance of myself only added to my rage. The actual cooking was better though, and I knocked up a tip top barracuda curry and vegetable biryani. Part of the experience was getting to eat your cooking for dinner, so we had a romantic table for two organised for us in the middle of a courtyard surrounded by 12 bungalows. We found this pretty amusing, and tucked into our dinner (which if I’m being honest, wasn’t very tasty). However, the main entertainment was only just arriving. A couple, who had obviously been on the beach all day, returned to their bungalow, midway through our second course. The girl began to rub moisturiser into her sun burnt boyfriend’s back – one thing led to another, and Squad and I were ‘forced’ to witness the couple having it off through the large gap in the curtains which they were clearly unaware of. It took the attention off the average food at least!

 Night three started off with Squad and I engaging in a Connect 4 tournament in our favourite bar. I don’t mind admitting when I’m beaten, and in this case, I was. I went down a humiliating 14-2. This was made even worse by the fact that various other travelers had joined our table, and seen me getting thrashed. The good news was that one of them invited us out to dinner, and a rather eclectic group (two Brits, a South Africa, two Dutch girls, an Aussie lad, and an American girl) when out to a little restaurant called ‘Jonny Cool’. The food was an amazing red snapper curry - worth the two and a half hours it took Jonny to cook it. 

17 hour train from Varkala back to Chennai the next day. Not a lot to add about that journey really. Apart from that fact that I was too cold and kept getting stared at by the bloke across from me.

The reason we went back to Chennai was for our second match of the World Cup – England vs West Indies, so apart from the match, we didn’t have much else to do. Just like the previous match we went to, this one was a thriller that went down to the wire. And once again England came out on top in a match that they seemed destined to lose! We hadn't eaten before the match, so afterwards we treated ourselves to some celebratory chicken noodles and chicken tandoori!

 
Unfortunately the next day I was struck down with my first illness of the tour, and was randomly sick after I woke up. We put this down to me drinking the tap water at the stadium the day before (I begrudged paying 20p for a cup of mineral water). Sadly this knocked me out of the day, so Squad went exploring the port and a(nother) Hindu temple. I was feeling better by dinner time though, and we went out for his 'last supper' at our favourite little local restaurant in Chennai. This brings me onto a more general point: I am quite getting into life in India:
 
1. Eating with my hands. At first I used quite a lot of cutlery, but in the last few days have spurned these rather restrictive Western tools in favour of my hand. Pour a big mound of rice onto your plate, cover it in curry, mix it all up with your hand, then just shovel it in!
 
2. Homeless Indians. They aren't as bad as I thought they were going to be, and in some cases can be quite friendly. There is an elderly man outside my current hotel who never fails to say good morning, and the street kids are lively also (especially the one who tried to pick pocket me the other day - the cheeky scamp!)
 
3. Bollywood/Indian pop music. It's upbeat, the music videos are funny and over the top, and the girls are hot. What else could you ask for?!

My next destination is Hampi, a small town about 400km north of Bangalore, where I have to return to change trains. In fact, I am typing this in Hampi, and let's just say that my trip has taken a few bad turns in the last 24 hours! Details of that to come... 

Chennai to Varkala

Distance covered since last entry: 800km

Nightmare trains, beer, cricket and sunburn. These would without doubt be the main things that have characterised week two of my tour, which has been just as enjoyable as the first.

We have become quite good at exploring these massive Indian cities in a single day, and Chennai was to prove no different. First thing was to pick up our tickets from the stadium for the England match the following day - needless to say we were set upon by tuk tuk drivers the moment we walked out of our hotel, and the decision was made to go with a chap called Giri (who amusingly claimed to recognise me from the last time I was in Chennai - I played along). We got the tickets and found Giri still waiting for us outside the ground, so let him take us on a tour of the sites of the city. Chennai has some really interesting history, as you would imagine, with it being the first major white settlement on India's east coast (try and stay awake) - my highlight was seeing a copy of the 'Book of Common Prayer' from 1640! Amazing! Squad wasn't so impressed. After a few more sites, Giri pulled the tuk tuk over to fill up with petrol, for which he demanded 100 rupees for. Up until now price hadn't been discussed, so after we pressed him he demanded 1000 rupees (13 pounds). This doesn't sound like a lot considering he had been with us for 5 hours, but Squad gave him a stern talking to (some might call it a 'verbal shoeing'), and we blagged it down to 650. Nothing like ripping off a poor Indian tuk tuk driver! Chennai is oppressively hot by the way, and our room was serviced poorly by a single fan so I struggled to get to sleep. The option of sleeping 'au naturel' is out of the question until Squad leaves.

The big day arrived! England vs South Africa at the wonderfully renovated Chepauk Stadium. I am pleased they have worked on the stadiums for the World Cup, because I imagine they were pretty grimey before. They still don't feel the need to provide toilet paper though - apparently a hose and bucket will suffice! We were seriously excited, and arrived at the ground for the gates to be opened at 7.30am. Our excitement was immediately deflated when security told us that we weren't allowed cameras in the ground. We put up a bit of a fight, but left defeated and returned to the hotel to drop off the cameras. I have vowed to sneak my camera into the next match!
I won't reel off the details of the match, because I'm sure most of you will be aware that it was a cracker, with England scraping to a narrow win. Indians don't seem to choose a team to support - they just got mental whenever anything happens. England lost two wickets in the first over, and they were all loving it, but then when England won they all came racing over to us with hugs and high-fives! Great scenes! Curry for dinner (obviously): my bowels are still holding up brilliantly by the way, just in case you were wondering.

From one massive city to another - we got the early morning train to Bangalore. It was a total mess from start to finish. Our tickets weren't "confirmed", so we had to go into the 'General Class' of the train with all the riff-raff. Everyone is obviously aware of this, so arrive extra early to get a seat - we turned up 20 minutes before departure and were crammed in, standing up next to the toilet with a load of young Indian blokes. You can imagine how much they were loving being in a confinded space with us, and how much we were hating it. All the usual stuff - giggling, whispering and staring. Squad opened his eyes at one point to find one of them with a camera phone about 6 inches from his face. He was also refered to as "super glamour"! If only the Indian girls liked us this much! It turned out that the train was so full because it was a Monday morning, and everyone was heading to work. We eventually squeezed into some seats and arrived into Bangalore at midday.

Two hours of standing

Bangalore seems like a pretty nice place - it's oddly Western, and sometimes you can forget that you are in India (that is until a begger approaches you, or you breathe in the overwhelming smell of garbage and human waste). Now I'm supposed to be on a serious budget, but I have to admit that this night in Bangalore I might have overspent slightly. We went onto a rooftop bar, sat outside, and had some swanky food, a few beers, then a nightcap whiskey - the bill was 45 pounds, which is massive in India, and I felt suitably guilty for my brazen spending.

Big spenders: drunk in Bangalore

There isn't a whole lot in the way of 'sites' in the centre of Bangalore, so we wandered aimlessly for a while, before deciding to go 10 pin bowling. Squad was giving it the bigg'un, which got me really pumped up to beat him. I bowled two of the finest games you are ever likely to see, and handed out  2-0 drubbing. I really hit my straps in the second game and bowled a PB 165, including a turkey (Squad will question the legitamacy of the turkey, but ignore anything he says. He's just bitter). Overnight sleeper train to Cochin that evening. We took a little bit of 'liquid entertainment' on the train with us, which made it a little bit more fun, and much easier to fall asleep.

Woke up at about 7am and took my first look at Kerala out the door (interesting fact: 'Kerala' means 'Land of coconuts'). I could tell straightaway that I was going to like it, but that it was going to be awfully hot and humid (two things my body deals with badly). Spent some time exploring the 'Fort' area of the city - it's lovely, but very small and you can easily see it all in a couple of hours. A couple of hours was all I could manage anyway because I was hotter than I have ever been in my life. We're talking 'sweat dripping off my nose' hot. Had a freshly caught squid for dinner.

The Chinese Fishing Nets in Fort Cochin

The next day we did a 'backwaters tour' - which is basically sitting on a small boat all day going round the little streams and tributaries that are all over the Kerala landscape. This was our first proper contact with other travelers, and it was interesting to talk to them. There were quite a few American blokes, some Norweigans, some Philipino women, and two smoking hot Swedish girls (I had a total flirty banter fail with them all day). The heat got the better of my in the evening when we were trying to find somewhere to have dinner, and I had a bit of  rage. Some chicken noodles calmed me down, then we went to a bar to watch the cricket.

Fancy another story about a horrible train journey? Good. Well here it is. Varkala was our next destination, and it takes 4 hours by train to get there - our journey took 8 and half. First of all we got in the wrong carriage, so had to stand up. Cue Indian blokes speaking to us. Highlight questions was me being asked 'Do you like love?' and Squad being asked 'Are you a Communist?'. I bought a chicken byriani just so I would have food in my mouth so couldn't answer their endless questions. Anyway, they were doing some repairs to the line, which meant that the train had to go very slowly, and for some reason had to stop for about 30 minutes at each station. In the end I gave up my seat and sat in the doorway - the fans in the budget class are ineffectual at everything except blowing hot air around the carriage. I kept my morale suprisingly high though, even when I got off the train to find that England had been beaten by Bangladesh.

A typical interrogation on a train

 Varkala is bloody amazing, and our first day here was one of my favourites sinces I've been away. It is a small town built on the edge of a sheer cliff, with a beach at the bottom. We spent the morning sunbathing, frolicking in the waves and throwing a tennis ball about. Most people seem to be Western, so my pasty white skin didn't stand out so much. Despite getting out the sun at about midday, both of us managed to turn a bright shade of pink and spent the rest of the day reading, watching cricket, drinking beer and liberally applying aftersun.

Varkala

So there you go, as promised, nightmare trains, beer, cricket and sunburn! Now if you'll excuse me, there's a hammock I need to go and lie in...enjoy your day at work!

First week: Kolkata to Chennai

Distance covered: 1,700km

Hello everyone, and thanks for reading my travelling blog. I hope to keep you informed and entertained as I make my way from Kolkata to Auckland over the next six or seven months. I am currently in a little internet cafe in Chennai, having spent the last week travelling down India's east coast, so read on...

We (David 'Squad' Reynolds and myself) arrived in Kolkata at about 10pm after a 20 hour trip that took us via Mumbai. Walking out of the airport (where incidentally within a couple of minutes I'd been bitten by a mosquito and walked into a bench) I was hit by the India I remember from last time - humid, hectic and a little bit smelly. Not that I'm complaining, I love it! After getting lost a number of times, our taxi eventually pulled up outside our hotel and we got a good night sleep in a rather intimate double bed (something we're going to have to get used to).

The next day we did a quick walking tour of Kolkata, taking in the sights of the city that was once centre of the British Raj. I'm a big fan of Kolkata - it is very much like the other big Indian cities I have been to: a contrasting mixture of beautifully maintained colonial buildings, bustling markets and massive poverty. As some of you will know, the original reason for going to Kolkata was to see the England vs India game in the Cricket World Cup. Unfortunately it was moved to a different city, so we had to make do with watching it in a bar. What a game! A tie! We watched the entire 100 overs, so needless to say we got through a fair few lagers and stumbled home at about midnight. The walk was funny though - I went to take a photo of a stray dog, but got a little bit close and he started barking at me, then two of his mates turned up and started barking as well. It was a stand off. Squad sh*t his pants, while I adopted the method of marching straight at them looking intimidating - they fled and I celebrated my victory. Calm down Mum, I've had rabies injections remember!

Feeling slightly fragile the next day, we got a tuk tuk to the main train station to start our journey south towards Chennai. First stop - Puri on the Bay of Bengal for a bit of beach time (Squad is in the market for a serious tan). But first we had to negotiate Kolkata's main train station - it was without doubt the most mental place I have ever been. 26 platform, thousands of pranging Indians runninng about, 30 degrees, and me storming around with a massive backpack on, sweating profusely. As it turned out, our train was four hours delayed so we had a serious wait at the station. This seems a good opportunity to mention something Westerners have to deal with in India: staring. Everywhere we go, people seem utterly fascinated by us - girls point and giggle from a distance, but the lads either stand still and stare, or just come straight up with a smile and a handshake, and occassionally ask to have their photo taken with us. It is very bizarre, but always very good natured!
Anyway, we arrived in Puri at 02:15 and set about finding somewhere to sleep. A tuk tuk driver took us to this absolute dive, but we were so tired so just agreed to spend the night. Within a couple of minutes, two of the biggest cockroaches I have ever seen were spotted in our room - once again, Squad had a massive panic attack and armed himself with a pen knife. We got our room changed eventually, much to his relief.

Riding a tuk tuk

After spending a short while on the beach in Puri, we hopped on a bus to Bhubaneswar. I enjoy travelling by bus, you can really take in the countryside and the people who live in it. It seems that most of them spend their time asleep in public, squatting by the side of the road, or wandering round rice-paddies. Bhubaneswar is famous for its Hindu temples, so we hit a couple of those (but were never allowed in because we aren't Hindu, which I thought was rather discriminatory). I also got ripped off buying a sari. For dinner I had my first Chicken Byriani of the tour - I think it's my new favourite food. Speaking of food, I would say that so far the food has been nice, without being spectacular. Amusingly, I cried at dinner the other night because a curry I ordered was so spicy - who would have thought 'Butter Chicken' could be so brutal?!

Like most places, we only spent 24 hours in Bhubaneswar before moving on again. We got the 05:45 train to Vijayawada which takes 13 hours. The journey was actually very enjoyable. We could open the window and properly experience India whizzing past us. Also, they leave the train doors open, so I was able to stand in one and watch the sunrise (and sunset 10 hours later). Amazing! I spent the rest of the time reading my book (some classic Conn Iggulden), which I think upset Squad who demands constant attention and entertainment (high maintenance travelling partner!)



Sunrise in India

  Vijayawada has probably been both of our favourite place so far. It is a centre for Hindus in the area, so they are all over the place - I like Hindus, they're good banter. Infact it was at one of their temples I got my first 'red dot' on the forehead, but I got self conscious and scrubbed it off. Disrespectful? I gave a donation to one of their gods, which I think made up for it. We visited a 'ghat' (stone steps leading down into a river) where there were loads of people larking about in the water. I have never experienced attention quite like it - within a minute of us sitting down on a bench, a semi-circle of about ten blokes had formed infront of us, just staring. It was incredibly awkward! One of them was quite fun, Santosh, but that was mainly because he could speak English - he got chatting about WWF though, so after mentioning 'Triple H' I was basically out of conversation topics, so legged it.
Even more attention was to come our way at a temple up on a nearby hill. A group of blokes went crazy for us, each one of them asking to have their photo taken shaking our hands. As I said earlier, very bizarre, but very friendly (in an odd way!) We were then shepherded into the VIP entrance to the temple, where we were blessed after making a donation. I think I could get into Hinduism. Seems like a laugh!

Hindu lads

Today we did another early train, and got into Chennai at about 1pm and found a hotel that charges about 5 pounds a night - perfect! We are going to stay here for a few days, because we have tickets to the big England vs South Africa match here on Sunday. Keep an eye out for us on the TV! We'll be the two white guys with the England flag.

Oh, one final comment - Indians are without doubt the most mental driver I have ever come across (and that includes you Closey). We have been in two minor accidents in tuk tuks so far. One in Kolkata - we clipped a motorbike. The driver was fine, but angry. And earlier today our tuk tuk knocked another bloke off his stationary bike. Again, the driver was fine, but angry.

What a brilliant first week it has been. Heading further South in a few days - cue more heat, humidity, and underarm sweat patches from me!

Over and out from Chennai!

Also, if you would like to email me, I'm on the usual address - mogsy@hotmail.co.uk