Verbal Incontinence in the Indian Subcontinent

Dharamsala itself is much like most other towns I've been to, but McLeodganj, a fifteen minute taxi ride up a steep hill is wonderful. It's the seat of the Dalai Lama (whom we heard preaching, sadly in Tibetan) in exile and there is a massive Tibetan community. Monks are everywhere, as are loads of travellers, which for once doesn't seem to be a bad thing. Everyone here meditates, does yoga, and all that kind of stuff, and my arch-scepticism has melted somewhat. We're leaving tonight, as I want to spend more time in the south before the heat becomes unbearable, but I think I'll come back here and do lots of courses etc, ready to peddle it all back to you Britishers.

The denoument to Malana was long, tortuous and misguided. We got a bus to Kullu and checked into a guesthouse to rest awhile. As I wandered around the town, I realised we'd hit another shithole. We left that evening, forfeiting a decent night's sleep and took the overnight to Chamba. Another guesthouse, another shithole. Actually, I'm probably being unfair as I've not been very good at doing the guidebook temple-museum type stuff, and if we'd been up for another trek, we'd be in the right place. But as it was, bad food and bad people put us on the next overnight bus to Dharamsala. A couple of wasted days with little sleep made me extremely irritable and I started having murderous thoughts.

The next day, we set off for Malana. We had heard about the village, with its own democracy, where no-one marries outside and outsiders are untouchable, quite literally. We took the bus to Dhunker and started walking. A gentle walk to the river was followed by a choice. Take the long, winding road to the top of the hill or take the steep steps up by the waterpipe. We chose the latter and instantly regretted it. We had to stop four times on the way up and were exhausted before our real walk had begun. Pratap, while playing with a water bottle had dropped it down the hill. It was only a quarter full, and there was a bridge with a shop down the road, so I didn't mind too much. It was a gentle walk and we felt pretty confident. As each bend failed to reveal a bridge, though and the sun got higher and higher as our water bottle got lower and lower, I began to have murderous thoughts. Finally, we rounded a corner and were suddenly surrounded by butterflies and saw the dam and bridge not too far off.

At the shop, there was a school party who had just been up to Malana. They were shocked to find that we were only starting to go up now and warned us that it was two hours steep climb, so we'd better leave soon. They eyed our packs with pity and as we set off, they shook our hands, wishing us luck as you might a condemned man. After fifteen minutes, I was shattered, and we passed a guesthouse. Not wanting to be a complete wuss, I decided that I would stop at the next one. I wasn't wrong. An hour and a half in, we were stopping quite frequently and people coming down the hill kept saying Malana was ages away. Then at one rest, Pratap's legs started cramping. The rest of the climb was frustratingly slow, with frequent stops. As the light began to fade, I felt like a complete bastard, pulling him to his feet after a few seconds, but I didn't want to be out there in the dark. After a few abandoned buildings, we rounded a corner and I saw lights. I started jumping and yelling, and we collapsed on the doorstep of the guesthouse. We had been walking for eight hours, most of it steep uphill, and I was more tired than I had been in my entire life.

The next day, our guesthouse person took us around the village. People from the neigbouring valleys are allowed to touch Malanans, just not outsiders. For an ancient (no-one could tell us how old exactly) intermarrying community, the faces of the people were very diverse. There were Tibetan, Nepali, Afghan and Arabic faces, as well as all the usual north Indians. Apparently out of a population of 2,500, only three have married outside the village in living memory. I reckon there must be more mixing than they care to tell. They are not backward - there were a few satellite dishes poking out, but there is very little education, and hardly anyone can read. The local language is unique, bearing no relation to the dialects of the nearby valleys, let alone Hindi. Some young men do leave to travel, but they almost always come back. This might be because the women are both incredibly beautiful and also seem to do most of the work, while the men seem to sit around and play dice games. The village mainly grows charas, and sells it to 'gangsters' from the big city. Last year, 350 police descended in the night (like us) and cut down the entire crop. No-one was arrested, and it took a few months for it to grow back. We couldn't see any fields of it - they are hidden away in really remote parts.
The no touching rule was less weird than expected. People kept a safe distance, but on the whole were quite friendly. One kid shoook our guide's hand, then squirmed out of our way as we passed, but apart from that, there were mostly smiles and namastes. There was a sign on the temple saying there is a 1000 rupee fine for touching it, and apparently they use the money to buy a goat to sacrifice to appease their god. On the whole, they seem very peaceful, which might have something to do with the fact that kids start smoking charas at the age of 4.
On the way down, I paid someone to carry my bag, and he told us that next year the road would be extended to reach Malana. He seemed quite happy about it. I wasn't. The thing I didn't like about Kasol was that tourists are treated like a resource and treat the locals likewise. Starting a conversation with the locals was impossible. In Malana, there aren't many tourists, thanks to the horrible climb, and even in spite of the obvious us-and-them divide, is much more welcoming.

The next day, it rained, so our planned trek didn't happen. Instead we got on a bus to the Parvati valley, which some Israeli travellers had recommended. On the way, the bus stopped at a police checkpoint and some dude in civvies came on and demanded to search my bag. We had turned down babaji's kind offer of some charas to take with us, so I didn't mind and let him continue. Pratap started asking questions, though, and the guy got pissed off and hauled us and our bags off the bus. A long argument ensued with lots of policemen, mostly in Hindi. I stood there and tried to look menacing. Eventually, Pratap phoned his father in Delhi, a retired major-general in the Indian army. He put the police guy on the phone, and from "You're not getting out of here without a strip search, filthy pigdogs," it became, "Yes, sirji, yes sirji, thik hai (that's fine), thik hai" and he let us go. Only then did we find out we were on the wrong bus, so it was quite lucky, I suppose. We spent the rest of the journey on the roof of the bus (thank you Jenny). Inside the bus, everyone stares at you and your thoughts turn inward. On top, you are surrounded by mountains and orchards and the wind, and keeping alert for trees and power cables is quite invigorating.

We got to a village called Kasol and decided to stay there. It is a beautiful place, with forests all around and lots of good walking. We met an English girl and an Israeli girl and spent the evening in a nice restaurant, chatting away. At the next table were a crowd of ten or fifteen hippies. There were more tourists in this little random village than anywhere else I have ever been. Most of them seem to have been here for ages, judging by their native clothes, just getting stoned and wandering around. They were pretty unfriendly, and by the end of the evening, there were a few of them left, just staring into space. My 'babajis only' rule was reinforced. When we got back to the room, we watched the end of the cricket series, and it felt a shame not to be somewhere that would make a big deal out of India's crushing, spectacular victory. Oh, well.

The next day, we walked to Manikaran. Instead of taking the road, we walked along the river, hopping from rock to rock, which was tiring, but made me feel like a goat, which is always nice. We saw some Nepali-looking women in native dress along the way lugging sacks of sand. It is weird to see such people doing 'men's work', on construction projects and so on, but then there is a lot of it around here. There are loads of dams and hydro-electric projects being built, and all along the roads, there is the occasional pile of concrete tubes and building material.

Most of Manikaran is taken up by a huge Gurudwara complex with a Hindu temple attached. It is a place of pilgrimage because of the hot springs, apparently discovered by Guru Nanak himself. Pratap is a Sikh, so he led me into the belly of the complex, which is mostly underground. A deceptively simple warren of tunnels links the main temple (where sahibs take it in turns to chant the holy book from start to finish all day) to the eating area (free food!), the hostel bit (free rooms) and the underground baths. The women's baths are down a long, winding tunnel and completely shut off, obviously. The men's are partly underground, in a dark, dank and sulphurous cave, and partly outisde in the open air, surrounded by mountains. We got a room, dumped our backpacks and went for a dip. Totally refreshed, we went for a meal, prayed a bit and walked around the bazaar. There isn't much else in the town apart from the Gurudwara, so we walked back to Kasol.

There we met a nice couple who we agreed to meet up with later, after a rest. When we got to the restaurant, they were sitting with a bunch of the hippies from the night before. We sat down, and got stared at, even more so when I refused the chillum and tried to talk about the outside world, and their lives beyond Parvati. One of them, a Spanish chap called Jesu, had been there for months and made his living by making chillums and selling them. He had a really nice little bowl for mixing up tobacco and charas, and I asked him about it. It was made from a coconut shell, with semiprecious stones set into it, so that when you held it up to the light, it looked like a technicolour spiderweb. I asked him how much he sold it for, and he told me $120. I hid my astonishment as he told me it was two months' work, filing down the little stones and supergluing them into place. I can imagine an Indian craftsman churning out five a day and charging the same amount in rupees. Everyone else was amazed and we all agreed it was well worth the price, considering. I resisted the urge to tell him that working for ten minutes a day before getting bored and picking up your chillum is not the same as two months of work. I guess one gullible tourist every two months might buy the thing, and pay for Jesu to stay there long enough to make another. One guy came up with the chant, "Chillum, chai and chapati, I want to stay in Parvati." We left soon after.

Shimla was fairly boring. We were staying with friends of Pratap's parents, about 4km from central Shimla. The town is quite small, and as befits the summer capital of the Raj, feels quite like a run-down version of a small English town, say Taunton, but with more brown faces, natch. We walked around a lot, and saw some pretty views, but we left pretty quickly for Manali.

The first of our horrible overnight journeys on Himachal buses delivered us to Manali at 4am. The drivers are mental, careering round bumpy, steep hairpin bends as though they were in a Mini. Trying to sleep is the only sensible thing to do, and even that is completely futile. Manali is surrounded by snow-capped peaks, and at night, they're pretty much the only thing you can see, as the starlight reflects off the glaciers. For the first time, I knew we were in the Himalayas.

When we woke we went off to a village about an hour away to drop some things off to a friend's grandma. The drive was beautiful, following a river through loads of apple orchards. Everyone here grows apples, with some wheat. The other thing that grows here, in vast quantities, is weed. Just looking out of the bus window as we jumbled along, along every verge where in England you might find stinging nettles or brambles, here were lots of marijuana plants. It was truly odd. After we left grandma's place, we went for a little ramble along the river. Pratap's less-than-graceful attempt at stepping stones got his socks wet and we headed back toward the road. On the way, we saw a little shack with a babaji sitting outside. He had his beard in twin dreadlocks and a nasty scab on his knee which was seeping yellow gunge. We went to say hello, and he offered us some chai. He said he was a very famous holy man, but he didn't like to publicise himself. His only English, bizarrely, was "No Declare" with regard to his philosophy. Then he offered us a chillum, and invited us into his hut. He was bizarrely houseproud, insisting we take our shoes off before we step on the dusty floor, and apologising for the roof, made of tarpaulins. He told us at great extent how he was going to get some zinc panels to put up there and maybe some lamps. His first draw of the chillum made him cough and splutter, so I approached it tentatively. I couldn't get the action right at first, but when I did, it hurt like hell. He told us how he had travelled all around south east Asia, and how he was planning to walk to England soon. He was under the impression that it was just beyond Pakistan and Italy. I tried to correct him, but he wasn't having any of it. We said our goodbyes, and I said I'd see him in Ujjain, the big Kumbh Mela that's happening next month. I thought I was fine from the drug, but on the way back on the bus I started having extremely weird thoughts. I decided I'd only have more with holy men.

The Queen's Birthday was quite bizarre. I went out for two hours, and when I came back, the garden had been transformed with light, there were Gurkhas everywhere and I had a hell of a time just getting back to my room. Worcester PPEists may remember Emma Stanton who was in her final year in our first. Her unexpected, familiar face found me early on, which was nice. However, I spent most of the evening talking to an extremely dull man, the husband of an Aussie diplomat. He kept saying how he was scared shitless in Delhi, to cross the road, to take a taxi, etc. Everyone here is out to get you, apparently. I had heard tales of diplomats who never leave their nice compounds, but here was one, in the flesh. As far as I've found, everyone in Delhi is really nice, and as long as you don't fuck them around, they'll help you out. Even the legendary traffic is quite accommodating. They might not use their mirrors, but their senses are very jumpy to what's in front of them. If you step out in the road, with a reasonable amount of warning, they will stop, or at least swerve round you. No-one really wants blood on their hands, after all.

I moved out of Liv's the day after, as she is off to Pakistan to take photos of the cricket. Everyone here thinks she's crazy. I am extremely jealous. I went to stay at Pratap's house, and was showered with Indian hospitality once more. Can't complain. That evening, we went to one of his friends' birthday party. I spent a while talking to a girl who also didn't know anyone, and everyone had me down as a stud and us as practically engaged. People are very weird about that sort of thing here.

Having sorted out various things (my iPod has stopped working), we got on the bus to Shimla early Sunday morning. It was a horrible journey, although Pratap was enthused by our stop in Chandigarh. This is a planned city, built by Le Corbusier as the new capital of the Indian half of Punjab. P likes it because everything is organised and clean, and it all works, but it looked like a sim city to me. All the roads go off at right angles to roundabouts, and everywhere looks the same. I guess I'm a tourist.

From magical Jaisalmer to Barmer, a filthy, dusty, rude and weird shithole. All these desert towns seem as though people have just been plucked out of the countryside and stuck in a city with no real change in habits. It's not just cows - every family has some cattle, pigs, maybe some chickens and occasionally you'll see a herd of goats on their way to nowhere in particular clogging up rush hour. After the bus ride, Liv conked straight out. She had sunstroke, and with good reason - apparently, Barmer was the hottest place in India that day, with a peak at 42 degrees C. We ended up sitting in the hotel sweating for most of the afternoon before heading out in a jeep again for yet another amazing sunset. Apart from that, a bit of a nothing day, really.

Morning bus to Jodhpur should have taken about three hours. So off we went, thinking we'd be there by noon. I think our driver must have had diarrhoea, as he stopped the bus every kilometre or so and disappeared somewhere before getting back on and asking for tickets again with a very ill temper. We only got there at around two, and wandered very slowly through town. Lots of pretty markets piled high with grain and spices as you'd expect. The walk through the old city to the fort was quite special. Most of the buildings are painted in various shades of sky blue, and it feels a bit like Spain. Many of the streets were no wider than a single bed, and the fort would appear only occasionally, tantalisingly through a gap. Whenever we turned a corner, someone would beckon to us, pointing us wordlessly towards the fort. A snarling dog would block one road, so we'd take another, until the next local waved us along. Two people would point in different directions, and they would not discuss between themselves, only insist smilingly and silently on their particular path. It was left up to us who to trust. I have no idea how long the walk took, it was quite dreamlike, but we got up to the fort just in time to see it close. That evening, we got an overnight train to Delhi, where I am now. Queen's birthday party this evening, then who knows?

A slightly more active day, we got up early and got to the lake outside the walls just before the tourists. Sunrise was lush and we saw lots of holy men splashing around with some truly unorthodox strokes.

The jeep safari started ominously. About 10km out of the city, we saw some spots of colour in the distance. Our driver said they were casual labour working on the roads so we went to have a closer look. We were immediately surrounded by grabby, grubby kids and their aggressive parents who really didn't want us taking photos without a considerable cash advance. It started getting ugly, so we headed back to the jeep. As we were driving off, Liv checked her bag and found her purse, with Rs.3000 was missing. Our driver (appropriately named Hero) came over to the camp and everyone gathered round, about forty random labourers, tons of kids and us, with everyone screaming in Marwadi. For a bunch of people for whom that amount of money literally represents about five years' wages, they were surprisingly honourable about the whole thing. The thief was a tiny boy, not more than seven years old, and his parents were keenest to give the money back. We got all but about 200 rupees and that sounded like a decent fine for being so stupid.

The rest of the villages were all very different in terms of friendliness, greed, curiosity and temperament. In one village, Liv went one way and got stones thrown at her, while I went the other and was mobbed and seemingly showered in gifts. That was a Muslim village, but in another Mussulman area, by an oasis, we found the nicest, most chilled and friendly goatherds we met all day. There seemed to be no predicting what kind of reception you would get. In one village which had mud huts with thatch roofs and solar panels, I was asked how many camels I would accept for Liv. But then Shankar asked that, too.

It really was a fantastic day, and it felt quite un-touristy, as most people get camel safaris to the nearby villages instead. We got a few beers for sunset and sat with our hero on a sand dune, with no-one else in sight for absolutely miles.

From my room in the fort, there is an amazing view over the city, with the tesselating roofs jostling for space inside its walls and the desert beyond. You can imagine Aladdin leaping across these terraces. We spent most of Sunday with Shankar, a friendly shopkeeper. He lured us in with his hilarious signs ('make your mother in law look human' on a dress. OK, it's funny for around here) we stayed for hours. He gave us free bottle holders and a lot of good chat, and Liv left much poorer.

At Liv's insistence, we took a rather difficult path to Sunset Point, and were rewarded with a secluded spot. It was only ruined after sunset, when a gang of teenagers started throwing stones ominously and mocking our 'Western' progress down the slope. Liv's shopping urge not yet sated, we stopped to buy some shoes. She insisted they dye one pair of shoes dark, but when they had finished, they looked shit. She was put in the thorny position of having to buy something to make up for it, and wanting absolutely nothing in the store. I just sat and laughed. To finish the evening, beers and dinner overlooking the city were absolutely magic.

After a hungover morning, we got the overnight from Delhi towards Jaisalmer, out in the Rajasthan desert. Waking up on the train was beautiful. They feel really slow and stately and even the horn has an elephantine majesty to it. I'm sure it's not just me. Liv's friend at Action Aid had arranged for us to be shown around some projects further out so we got off at a little town called Pokaran. There are a couple of temples here, but we were mostly on the edge of town and in the villages. As soon as we got there, we were whisked off to a meeting of the women's group in Odhaniya, which had been arranged just for us. There was a Q and A, which was a bit stilted, as Toluram, our host, had a habit of not translating very well and laying on NGO speak instead of what the women were actually saying. I asked why the women thought women's rights were important, and he translated the reply from a semi-literate weaver beginning: "There are three points, economic, political and socio-cultural." To be fair, everywhere we went, people seemed very aware of the political structures they worked with - block leaders, subcommittee district assembly, Delhi etc - but were much worse at explaining what problems these meetings actually address. Photos were difficult as the children crowded around wherever we tried to take shots, but lots of cuteness, for sure. The other villages were better in terms of photos, and also because Toluram's influence declined as the day wore on, possibly because of the desert sun which was killing us slowly. I found out that Marwadi, the local language, is closer to Gujarati than it is to Hindi, so I started communicating quite well with some of the villagers, although it was pretty basic stuff. All the locals called me gora (white man), and they were quite tickled to hear me speaking Guj. We left the next morning promising to return with our fingers crossed.

The last night in Delhi was incredible. Liv was invited to a party at the 'farm' of Atul Punj, some lawyer/industrialist. It started after dark, and when we got there, a long walk up the drive offered glimpses of the star attraction. A swimming pool of at least 300m in length! Of course no-one was swimming, but the sight of all that pristine blue water lit from below was amazing. The rich here are just silly. The house itself was straight out of Boogie Nights, a Hollywood Hills extravaganza with glass walls everywhere, a bandstand and a jacuzzi in the living room. Champagne, wine, lobster curry and all kinds of other good shit followed as we met the leading lights of young Delhi. Of course I didn't let it go to my head. There was not a sari to be seen in this insanely Western crowd, and everyone had spent time in New York, London or Paris. I got the phone number of a former Miss India, got water thrown over me by a drunken filmmaker and hit on by some TV technician. We got extremely drunk and danced to Filth music until very late and got home v happy. I was definitely ready to see some poor people, though.

When I got to Liv's house, the lady herself had just left. She was curating an exhibition due to open that evening, and my delay meant that I turned up at a really bad time. No matter, as I really wasn't much company. When she did get back, her friend/chauffeur for the day Gagan and she and I sat around the pool for a while and I stared off into space and blithered about how beautiful the garden was. While they ran around town sorting stuff out, I took naps of unknown length, woken periodically by Liv, the last time with two minutes before we left for the exhibition.

The photos were very impressive, mostly, and all the famous Indian photographers were there and it was all very exciting. Liv is doing really well in Delhi, getting lots of work and exposure in a way that might not have happened in London. There are articles about her and her fellow curator in several national broadsheets and a TV crew want to follow them around for a week sometime. A very different life.

I was quite knackered, and after I had looked at all the pics, I slunk out and got some chai and monged for a while. Gagan was tired, too and we sat outside for ages while the nobs hobnobbed in the gallery. He, like many others, it seems, did not get that I am Indian by blood. He thought English, perhaps Spanish. The only person who seems convinced I am Indian is Liv's mum. Must try harder.

I was particularly taken with one photographer's work. She had married young and traditional, but as seems to be the case with so many of the sophisticated women in Delhi, it was a bad marriage. Her husband beat her and when after ten years she had not conceived, he wanted to take another wife. She left and after a while, someone handed her a camera. "The day I picked up that camera was the same day I cut off my hair." She has a reputation as being a bit difficult, but when we went out that evening to celebrate, she seemed really sweet, making up for our lack of a common language with lots of big smiles. A short tank of a woman, apparently she got into a fight with some security guards just after the exhibition when they wouldn't let her out of the car park because she had lost her token.

We went out to the India International Centre, which is supposed to be an exclusive club for politicians and the powerful. The organiser of the exhibition is a member. IT looks a bit like a crumbling student union crossed with a Travelodge conference centre, really grimly lit, with bad food and lots of crusties rambling into their whisky. There were all kinds of crazy rules which led to us carrying chairs back and forth and up and down stairs - you can drink beer and wine (if you can stomach Indian wine) anywhere, but 'hard liquor' is only upstairs. Bar snacks here, food downstairs, but please do carry your glasses down. No, not you sir. Is that whisky? sorry, you must stay here. Smoking here, not here. Yes, there is no-one else in the restaurant and the smoking section is two metres away. OK, go ahead, smoke, but we will not bring you ashtrays. The photographers were a really good bunch, though and my tiredness dissipated as the beer began to flow. Politics, culture, art and society were all discussed, but most of all, they bitched very entertainingly about other photographers and other notables who I had never heard of.

The next day we woke late and Liv went off to do some TV interview (!). I sat around reading up on Delhi and went for a little walk. Outside the enormous Presidential Palace, I was followed by this security guard who told me not to take pictures. He then started making small talk, but snapped every time my hand even strayed near my camera bag. I wandered around trying to find a cigarette stall, and eventually got pointed along this road. As I walked along, I saw a crowd of men holding up coins above their heads. Occasionally, a man would pop out of a chink in the wall, take a coin and hand over two fags. I watched for a while and some dude realised I didn't have a clue, so he asked me what I wanted. Everyone looked at me when I said I wanted two packs, Later, just outside Liv's compound, two men sitting on the grass beckoned me over. For some reason, my orange glasses, pedalpushers and huge camera bag were attracting lots of attention. I'm not sure what they wanted, but I sat down and said hello. As usual, very broken communication, but they figured out that I was from England and told me to marry an Indian girl. They kept laughing at me and pointing at my camera, so I took their picture. Turns out that this urbane pair were civil servants at the ministry of defence. Ho hum. That part of New Delhi still feels very imperial, unsurprisingly, but the rest of it is almost suburban. Wide roads with blocks or 'colonies' tucked away behind walls give the impression that you are still on the outskirts travelling to the city centre.

In the afternoon, we todled off to the Jama Masjid, a huge mosque in the old city. The main part of the mosque is just a vast sandstone plain where people gather to pray, surrounded by imperious Mughal arches and a stunning view. We had five minutes before we were kicked out for prayer time. Loads of kids and grannies were loving the digital camera which let them see their own picture. Then we went off for a wander in the old city, to find some tea. It couldn't be more different from New Delhi. It's a warren of tiny streets, and you have to almost swim against the people, rickshaws, scooters, cows, fruit carts and the occasional foolish car to get anywhere. Overhead run the cables which supply electricity to the densely packed shops and apartments. Each cable is individually, badly wrapped, and the whole thing looks like the branches of some industrial creeper suspended in mid-air over each lane. Each building has hundreds of smaller cables wrapping around its outside. The whole place just looks like a deathtrap. Some guy told me that the 'chief of Delhi' was planning to bury the cables, which would be sensible, but I can't see it happening.

Anyway, I've spent way too long already. I"m off to buy a SIM card and wander about some more. If anyone's reading this, send me emails, goddammit! More soon.

Posted by: Nik / 10:49 AM

I am writing from the closest I have yet found to paradise on earth. My wrists are currently perched on the desk of the British High Commissioner to Delhi and outside is the most beautiful garden imaginable, with eagles soaring above and moths the size and colour of small birds of paradise. The following is an account of the tortuous journey I took to get here.

We were supposed to leave Heathrow at 930 on Friday morning. After queueing for over an hour, the check in lady told me that the flight had been delayed until 1130 that evening. A hotel would be provided. Eventually I got a room in the holiday inn. having had one hour of sleep, I went straight up, had a shower, and fell asleep. That evening, I was put on a flight to Abu Dhabi. My original destination had been Muscat, but I chose not to question and meekly boarded the plane. We landed at Abu Dhabi some time on Saturday morning, though it was the middle of the night UK time. The airport looks like something out of Star Wars, with beige, vaguely Islamic onion-domed pods with green glass connected by walkways to a large central hub shaped like an enormous donut. All around, there is featureless desert.

For the next ten hours, in the absence of Balkanizing hotel rooms, the 34 of us bound for Delhi coalesced into a curious community. A motley group of fiftysomething polite English couples and Indian families and young Indians going solo, we were bound by arrogant staff, scrum-like queues for the inquries desk and a complete lack of knowledge whether we would be leaving in half an hour or next week. False starts and dashed spirits provided the rhythms to a day that was mostly spent making small talk and screaming at blank-faced Gulf Airlines staff. After ten hours, they agreed to put us up in a hotel for the whole of the next day and put us on a flight sunday evening.

My Sunday was mostly spent in the company of Pratap, a merchant navy officer returning home from two years studying in Blackpool. We shared a room, swam, played pingpong, went to the gym, played pool, got pissed and ate together. It was beautiful. It would have been a fantastic day were it not for the fact that we were
missing Holi in Delhi, when everyone goes out and throws brightly coloured dyes at each other and generally trashes the town. Instead, we sat in the pool, looked out at the empty desert and blithered.

Sunday evening in the airport, I was sitting with the 'elderly' (Indians call anyone over fifty elderly. The muted, English offence these Annapurna-trekking pensioners take is hilarious.). As I pulled out a cigarette to give to someone, a large Arab sitting
opposite with his beard down to his belly said, "cigarette very bad. Do this instead." He produced what looked like a joint rolled with straw and proceeded to rub it across his teeth. Bewildered for a moment, I figured out that it was a stick used for cleaning teeth. He ranted on affably about how this would give me clean teeth, good stomach, strong body and strong mind. I was interested, asked lots of questions and he gave me my own suwak stick. While I chewed, spat and brushed, he told me how Allah gave him this stick, leading into a crash course in fundamental Islam. The stick was a useful way to conceal the laughter I couldn't suppress at some of his patter. Paradise was his main topic, especially the women who would be so beautiful they would be "like mirror". I tried to tell him I'd rather not kiss myself, but he rambled on with a big smile, only stopping when his flight to Colombo was five minutes from takeoff. He dragged his heavily-shrouded wives onto the plane and left me chewing happily on my new toy.

After stopping in Muscat for three hours in the middle of the night and getting no sleep in the process, we saw the sun rise over India. Massive relief as we finally hit the Delhi tarmac and the distinctive stink washed over our nostrils. More hassles as we found that our bags had been sent separately and were impounded in a warehouse. Indian bureaucracy meant it took three hours to retrieve them, but then we dashed at the exit like greyhounds from a trap. Squashed in the back of the car with Pratap's mum and my rucksack, I didn't see much of Delhi until we pulled up at the High Commission and I explained to a suspicious guard who I was. The gates opened and a brilliant servant came to meet me with a smile, asking me where I'd been and they'd all been so worried and here is your room and anything you need, just call me.

Lush.