Dharmsala and then…….???

Been a good few days since I last wrote anything and even then it didn’t exactly tell you a lot about what I have been doing so before I move on I suppose I should write a bit about where I have spent the last week and a half.

Dharmsala as I am sure most of you know is the home of the Tibetan Government in Exile and His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama.  Unfortunately for me he has decided to go to Nottingham for a week to do some teaching at the ice stadium.  My efforts to try and fill in for him whilst he has been away have not been very sucessful, probably for the best thinking about it.   To be a bit more specific I am in Mcleod Ganj, a couple of km above Dharmsala but when people generally talk about Dharmsala they mean Mcleod.  As a result of the large Tibetan population, the place feels completely different to anywhere else I have been in India, a little bit like Darjeeling but much more diverse.  It is clearly a destination for Indian tourists as well as there are hundreds of them knocking about escaping the raging heat that is prevalent elsewhere in the country at the moment.

Mcleod Ganj is essentially very small.  The residential areas spread out a bit but everything is generally on 2 parallel roads and another road that runs down to the Tsuglagkhang (Dalai Lama’s Temple) and a monastary.  The roads are lined with shops selling Tibetan knick knacks, although a lot of the shops seem to be owned by Kashmiris so if you want to support the community and buy locally produced stuff then you have to look around a bit.  Any other time of the year i.e. when it isn’t the tourist high season, monks probably outnumber lay people on the streets.  Quite funny but you don’t really imagine monks to have mobile phones hanging from them!  Progress is progress I suppose!

Weather has been really good the last couple of days.  Clear views across the valley and if you look ‘behind’ the village then you can see the snow lined foothills of the Himalaya.  It’s nice to be basking in the sunshine but not covered in sweat for once.  Plenty of short walks around the hills, up to Dal Lake, the waterfall at Bagsu and Daramcote a couple of miles away, a good way to work up an appetite before coming back to one of the countless Italian restaurants that are around here.  Lord knows why they chose Italian but some of it is pretty good, makes a nice change from Channa Masala anyway.

I’ve been helping out some monks with conversational english in the afternoons over tea which has been cool.  A good way to learn a bit more about the whole situation and in particular their own personal stories, very interesting.

I’m struggling a bit with what to say really, I honestly havne’t done that much over the last week and a half.  Lots of reading and pottering around….Macleod is a great place for pottering and that is about it really.  Been good to stick my feet in the ground for a while and just stay in one place but I am beginning to get itchy feet again.

Hence I have decided to move on, not entirely sure where yet but have sorted out some of the travel arrangements.  I won’t tell you exactly where but I will say that I will be leaving India.  I have realised that my personal threshold for one country seems to be about 2 months.  I had the same feelings towards the end of the time I was in Malaysia and it isn’t anything to do with the country really.  There is still loads of stuff I want to do in India but beginning to pine for something a bit different, the food and the people and beaurocracy is beginning to get my nerves a bit.  I will be back there is no doubt about that, India is an amazing country with so much diversity but unfortunately it has breached my 2 month threshold.  The weather isn’t helping either to be honest, it is unbearably hot and humid in most of the country which makes travelling and walking around pretty uncomfortable
for the most part.

Still as I said plenty of chances to come back in the future and knocking another couple of places of the list is no bad thing.  Question is where am I going?  Jenny’s bet is on South America, Kate’s money is on Australia (although i did convince her I was going to Hawaii for a while).  I will let you all know in due course but for now I will say goodbye.

Goodbye

A Short Tirade on Certain Tourists

So a couple of weeks ago the night before Kate was due to fly back to the UK we decided to splash out on a nice (more like very nice) hotel for the evening. Now forgetting the fact that the night turned out to be pretty much a complete bust with both of us feeling sick at some point and my good self having to leave the dinner table as a result of that feeling, it got me to thinking. From the second I walked into the hotel in question, if you must know it was the Shangri-La in Delhi, I just didn’t feel comfortable. Maybe it was the doorman dressed up to the nines bidding me good day every time I went within 10 feet of him, maybe it was the large groups of well heeled businessmen who were just in the city for a meeting or two or potentially it could have been the fact that I looked like crap and thought that everyone who glanced in my direction thought was mentally composing the letter they would send to the hotel manager berating him for allowing ‘undesirable types’ into their little sanctuary of luxuriousness closed off to the claustrophobic, hot, dusty and poverty ridden outside world.

I have been lucky enough in my 22 and a half years on this fine planet to go to some amazing places and stay in some equally amazing hotels. Hardly any of these trips would not have been possible without my parents (thanks guys) and the following is no reflection on any of this, indeed I am more grateful than I could put into words.

Over the last few months, out of necessity it must be said, I have stayed in some seriously cheap places and eaten most of my food from stalls on the streets and local cafes. Whilst I have been in my fair share of cockroach ridden rooms and eaten some downright questionable food (the place next to the rat populated butchers alley in KL springs to mind) the majority of it has been superb. Some of the hostels and guesthouses I have stayed in have been absolute gems, clean comfortable rooms, rooftop restaurants and swimming pools in the odd rare case, but above all, what has made them stand out is the atmosphere in these places; a sense of ‘homeliness’ and welcoming that you just don’t get in your identi-kit international hotel. The Shangri-La had everything that would could want, your every need was looked after in some way. The rooms were large and comfortable, the pool was cool and refreshing and was very ably complimented by the spa like changing rooms, the restaurants were 5* and the staff were courteous. Why then did it feel so unwelcoming and sterile? There are simply no quirks to a place like this, nothing to make it stand out from the crowd and from its countless brothers and sisters in any large city around the world. It is a carbon copy of the western ideal for an international hotel, a place where people can come, know what they are getting and lock themselves away from whichever city they happen to find themselves in. What is the problem with this you might ask? You might say that being able to log onto the net, give over your credit card details and then turn up knowing that you have a restaurant, fluffy pillows and those little bottles of shampoo in your bathroom is a great thing, it takes the worry out of traveling. Well sorry but you are wrong. What it does is take the surprise, excitement and the slight feeling of nervousness you get when you arrive in a new place out of the equation.

It is possible to go somewhere like Delhi, Kolkata and Kuala Lumpur be met at the airport and taken to your blacked out air-conditioned car, step out of the car and straight into the air-conditioned lobby of your hotel. You can then step back into your car as and when it suits you and be driven to a couple of select sights for a mosey around with your hotel organised guide before returning back to the hotel for a quick swim and dinner in your Scottish-Cambodian fusion restaurant. Now I don’t have a problem with this so much, the individual elements are part and parcel of the world we live in (perhaps without the Scottish-Cambodian fusion restaurant, praise the lord). What I do have a problem with is that people travel thousands of miles for 12 hours or more in order to take part in this ludicrous ritual, return home and over drinks at their $8000 a year country club and begin to lecture people about how they saw the most awful things whilst they were away and something just has to be done about it. What did you see love? A couple of people begging outside of the Taj Mahal who were deftly shooed away by your guide? A woman and baby walking between the cars at a red light begging for a couple of rupees? How about next time you travel you get out of your car and walk along the streets, smelling the rotting garbage and stench of human excrement, take in the sights of countless destitute people on the streets or living under a cardboard shack at the side of the road. How about you look the legless man in the eye as he wheels himself around on a piece of ply wood with scavenged wheels attached to it or the woman who has three naked children covered in flies asleep next to her? As you walk past all the people plying their wares, the small family run cafes, chai shops and juice stalls in order to get to the nearest Starbucks or air-conditioned mall try and think about the impact you are having. Think about where your tourist dollars are going and who they are benefiting because is sure isn’t the local people. Instead some fat sweaty white guy sitting behind a desk in a high backed leather chair and stroking his fluffy white cat is thanking you for providing him with a bigger bonus and keeping his already well off shareholders happy.

By frequenting chain hotels and walking by the small coffee bar to get to the Costa behind, you are just sticking your middle finger up at the local people who thought that with a bit of entrepreneurial spirit and hard work they could make a few bucks from the rocketing tourist trade. You are in effect discouraging people from trying to start something on their own, from turning those cheap semi-dilapidated rooms that only appeal to the budget conscious backpacker into places that for a couple of extra bucks can offer something that no chain hotel can do; atmosphere, a sense of welcoming and above all the knowledge that you are giving your money to the local community, to people who will actually benefit from it.

I’m not saying that every time people go somewhere they should spend hours searching for the small privately guesthouse. Of course there are times when that just isn’t possible, but instead of just going onto the Hilton Website, spend 5 minutes looking though Tripadvisor or scrolling through your Google results for a well run hotel that is not owned by a huge conglomerate or private investment group. Then eat within their restaurant or step outside and walk around for ten minutes until you find a restaurant where the chef hasn’t been imported from Swaziland and the food has been sourced locally.

Before people start calling me a hypocrite and the like I will say that I’m sure in the future I will stay at group owned luxury hotels. What I won’t do however, and I urge you to do the same, is allow myself to be drawn into the cocoon that they offer. I will walk around, smell the air, watch and speak to the people, buy things from well run shops that source their goods locally and eat some amazing food in small local restaurants. In other words after traveling thousands of miles and for tens of hours I will get to know the place I have traveled to.

A Trio of Holy Cities

Sorry about the lack of updates, I haven’t had much time recently, or if I have done then it has coincided with either a power cut or the phone lines being down and thus all the internet connections. I suppose this is going to be a fairly long post so you pay want to go and make yourselves a cup of tea before you start (Darjeeling of course).

So I left Darjeeling about a week and a half ago and headed back down to Kolkata for the day before getting a late night train to Bodhgaya. Bodhgaya as some of you may know is the place where Siddhārtha Gautama sat under a bodhi tree for 49 days until he gained enlightenment and became know as the Buddha or ‘enlightened one’. What you may not know is that the Buddha was born to the son of a king and destined for the life of a prince he instead turned his back on the material world and began the life of an ascetic. In due course he nearly killed himself after limiting himself to a small nut a day for nutrition and he realised that rather than completely discarding the material world he would need to follow a ‘middle way’ to enlightenment.

Anyway Bodhgaya is the home of the Mahabodhi Temple, built on the site of the bodhi tree. A truly serene site to spend a few hours walking around, reading or watching the coming and goings of the numerous monks who are knocking around. I got to talking to a group of old Indian men for about an hour one day in the grounds comparing the differences between the UK and India. They were very concerned for my moral well-being because my parents were divorced. Divorce was pretty much non-existent here and they were very concerned about the whole thing, struggling to understand how in many cases it can actually be an event that makes people happier. They didn’t look to happy when I suggested that if it was not so taboo in India then maybe so many women would not have to suffer in silence whilst being systematically abused by the husbands or stuck in a loveless marriage that was arranged by their parents.

Because Bodhgaya is so important to Buddhists, generally every country which has a large Buddhist population has built a temple here. What makes this more interesting is that each country has built their temple in the style of their home country. So the Thai Temple has a multi layered and angled roof allowing the sun to shine of the golden edges, the Japanese temple is more colourful than an episode of the tellytubbies and the Burmese temple is fairly understated, at least from the outside. I spent an hour at the Japanese complex in a beginners meditation class. Not that I thought it would be but I can now say for certain that I don’t think meditation is for me. I could barely stand up after an hour with my legs crossed and trying to to let your mind wander just makes it wander even more. But it was an interesting experience none the less. The only problem with Bodhgaya is that it was over 42C everyday and the power kept going out…hence the fans in all the buildings did the same, not a comfortable place in which to try and get some sleep.

From Bodhgaya I went to Varanasi, one of the worlds oldest cities (previously known as Benares). Mark Twain once wrote that “Benares is older than history, older than tradition, older even than legend, and looks twice as old as all of them put together.” I can fully recommend a day or two there because I honestly don’t think that there can be another city like it anywhere in the world. It is a city where the inhabitants and Indian people that travel from all over the country to visit go about their business in a whirlwind of colour and noise. Varanasi is considered a good place to die as bathing in the Ganges is supposed to wash away sin and dying here supposedly it ends the cycle transmigration. The river is lined with over 100 Ghats, most of which are used for bathing or washing with a couple used as burning ghats. There is nothing to prepare for the the shock that goes through you when you walk the through the thick acrid smoke at Manikarnika Ghat and realise that it is a result of a cremation ceremony at the side of the river. As you carry on walking that chances are that would will walk past a group of people carrying a dead body covered in a sheet and chanting in preparation for the burning. The old city itself is just a gigantic maze. Honestly I have never been anywhere where you lose your sense of direction so quickly, arriving at night with no idea how to navigate through the old lanes is a fun experience. I ended up paying a couple of kids 10rps to take me to my hotel as otherwise I would have ended up sleeping at the side of the river, money well spent in my opinion.

Got up at 5am one morning for the sunrise and to watch the hive of activity at the ghats from a boat on the river. That was amazing, definitely something I can say that everyone should do. Watching people go through their daily rituals and or cleaning process in full public view is something that even after 3 months still gets to me over here. You feel like a bit of a perv sometimes! Alas in my sleep deprived state I managed to forget my camera so I don’t have any pictures which is a shame.

Varanasi although a great place to visit is not somewhere that you want to linger, the heat, hassle factor and general lack of things to do after the first full day all encourage to scarper fairly quickly and that is exactly what I did. Feeling the heat a bit I decided to head back up north to Dharmasala via Amritsar (the site of the Sikh Golden Temple. Caught a flight from Varanasi to Delhi (lots of points for Jet Airways….a full meal with real cutlery!) and then was then supposed to get a connecting flight to Amritsar a couple of hours later. That did not happen. First they said we had a delay of a couple of hours because there was a problem with the plane, then they said that if the plane could not be used then there was a flight coming in from Bangalore a 10pm that would have enough flying time left to take us to Amritsar. Sure enough come 9.45pm we were told our flight was cancelled and there was no other plane available. Met up a couple of British guys and after much hoo-hah managed to cancel that ticket and get a flight for the 5.45am the next day. Turned out that the guy lived in Leicester and went to Loughborough Grammer of all places, so that provided a bit of banter for a couple of hours.

I don’t know about you but when a new airport has just been built (Delhi is being completely overhauled, to the extent that the indoor bench I slept on last time is now 10m outside the front door) but I expect them to own their furniture. This is obviously not the case though. Around 3am when eventually i drifted off to sleep I got woken up by a guy who said that the bench I was sleeping on (I know a soft leather c\sofa with no arms was too good to be true) had been recalled by the rental company and had to be removed. So at 3am they went about waking up everybody and removing about 10 benches from the airport loading them up into a van outside. I think that they were just robbing the airport but there you go.

Eventually got to Amritsar and found a place that had rooftop views over the temple complex. The city loosely the Sikh equivalent of Mecca or Jerusalem so it had a real air of spirituality about it. The great thing about Sikhism is that it is an inclusive religion. Every temple has a communal kitchen that caters for the people and everyone regardless of wealth or class sits together on the floor to eat……a real difference to the caste based system that can be so prevalent elsewhere in India. The main part of the temple itself is set in the middle of a big pool and covered in around 750kg of pure gold, spectacular when the sun is shining on it. Met up with an elderly Sikh guy with a cycle rickshaw one night and got him to take me around the city the next day. Really nice guy, his grandfather was a Punjab soldier in the British army as it turned out, he turned out to be a mine of useful information. No where less than at the Martyer temple which he showed me round and explained the various different parts, including why I was meant to crawl on my hands and knees through a 2ft high tunnel!

Caught a bus from Amritsar and arrived in Dharmasala yesterday evening after 7 hours. Caught a jeep up to Mcloid Ganj (where HH Dalai Lama) usually resides. Think I am going to try and find some volunteer work here and maybe stay for around a month, haven’t looked into it yet but it shouldn’t be too difficult. Not been here long enough to write about the place yet but will do so shortly!

That in a rather large nutshell is what I’ve been up to. Will report back soon and will get some pictures up as soon as I can.

Update Shortly

Sorry there hasn’t been much news recently.  In a nutshell I went from Darjeeling>Bodagaya (via kolkata)>varanasi>amritsar (via delhi).  I had a flight cancelled and haven’t slept in around 36 hours so not really in the mood to be writing, but I will get something up shortly.

Love to all xx

Cooling Off in Darjeeling….Nay Freezing in Darjeeling

I left Kolkata on the 6^th to head up to Darjeeling. Not before time either, the humidity in Kolkata was becoming a bit of an issue, as was my rate ‘expensive’ accommodation. Had a quick look around the Victoria Memorial before I left, all very impressive. I am getting slightly sick of seeing all these gorgeous monuments, statues and buildings that after a bit of examination turn out to be dedicated to a dead British queen, or in rare cases king. There isn’t much that can be done about it now and generally I am dead against the rededicating of buildings to suit a new purpose or because they remind people of certain historical events, it just seems a shame that many of India’s best buildings and attractions were built to commemorate the death/visit/sneeze of someone who either never set foot on the shores of the country or stayed only for a short time.

The train to New Jalpaiguri was uneventful apart from waking up 2 hours earlier than I needed to (6 instead of 8am) and not being able to get back to sleep thanks to the unfortunate snoring of quite an attractive Indian girl. Took a cycle-rickshaw from NJP station into Siliguri where I found a jeep that was heading up to Darjeeling. I could have taken the famous toy-train, but that takes nearly 9 hours so that was out, I could also have taken the bus but that took 4 hours and the buses are not what would pass for road worth in the UK (the ‘mountain pass’ to Darjeeling would not be a good time for the brakes to fail’, so I took a share jeep much more comfortable, or so you would think. In something about the size of a Land Rover (some Tata 4×4, who incidentally now own Jaguar) we managed to get 13 people in, at the start. Not as bad as it sounds really and at least we were all inside rather than riding on the roof!

The journey wasn’t exactly smooth however. If you can imagine your average alpine pass in France, Italy or Austria and then cut the road width in half, take away half the tarmac so that there are holes in the road the size of Mason Crater (look it up) then you would be just about there. Oh and there happened to be a large political rally going on in Siliguri which attracted pretty much everyone from up in the valley who were obviously all coming in the opposite direction, it didn’t make for the quickest of journeys. Some of the trucks and jeeps that were coming the other way were brilliant, looking like old British Leyland trucks, people were crammed inside, on the roof, on the flatbed and pretty much anywhere they could hold on to. Flags were being waved, music played and much chanting by the occupants meant that having to wait at various switch-back bends for half an hour or so while they all passed was not all that bad. Alas that was not the end. Bearing in mind that I was the only white person in the truck, only an issue because everyone else spoke Bengali and not very good English, when the driver kept arguing with my fellow passengers about something and stopping the truck every now and then to shout even more, I wasn’t in the best position to be able to understand what was going on. Through a bit of guess work and basic conversation with one guy, the problem seemed to be a combination of the following; the driver did not want to go on because of all the traffic coming the other way, he to meet some friends/wife, or wanted to go to the rally. We stopped at a village about half way to Darjeeling (40km from Siliguri) where upon 2 more jeeps stopped behind us and then drove on and our driver got into a big argument with the traffic police, who are everywhere in India by the way. Eventually after cramming in the policeman and another 3 people jumping on the roof (a total of 17 people now) we moved on, getting to Darjeeling about 2 hours later than we should have done. Just to rub it all in a bit more, it seemed every single person apart from the tourists had left Darjeeling to go to the meeting, so everything apart from 1 crappy restaurant was closed for the day, not so good when you haven’t eaten in 20 hours. All good fun though.

Darjeeling is not what you may expect, certainly not what I expected. Built on a steep hill, it is a maze of interconnecting roads (funny that) and steps that can tire you out quite quickly, it’s also a lot bigger than I thought it would be. There is a large Nepali and Tibetan population (which I did expect) which makes for a town that is completely different to anywhere I have been so far. For one it is bloody cold. About 16C when I got here at 1.30pm, coming from 40C and high humidity in Kolkata it has been a bit of a shock. Last night I slept in trousers, a t-shirt, jumper and heaven help me my socks, and was still colder than Hilary Clinton’s personality (bada bum tsssh). Doesn’t help that I have gone uber budget here, staying in a 100rps a night room with no shower or from what I can tell running water and hot water available for 1 hour in the morning heated from a gas stove.

Once again thanks to the timing of my trip to India possibly the best thing about Darjeeling is out of my reach, the views. The cloud cover in the valley is nigh on impenetrable for most of the day, completely covering the valley on both sides. When the sun does come through however, as it did today for a couple of hours, it really is stunning. Rolling, undulating hills covered in tea plantations with small villages nestled in amongst them as far as you can see. If you look close enough then you can just about make out the Himalaya in the distance. Depending on what people say, I’m going to try and get up to Tiger Hill, a viewpoint 11km above Ghoom from where you can see the sunrise over the mountains……4am wake up though!

It would clearly be a crime of enormous proportions not to come to Darjeeling and get involved in that quintessentially English (and Indian) drink, I am talking about tea of course. Having had numerous cups of varying brews I can confirm that they are all different, albeit in a subtle way sometimes. I am heading down to one of the tea estates tomorrow to check out the factory and the fields, I will report back on what I find….probably nothing more than a bunch of tea leaves – but there you are.

Today I rode on the Darjeeling Toy Train, a world heritage site don’t you know. Winding its way up and down the mountain, it was apparently originally built to exploit the price difference of potatoes in Darjeeling and Siliguri…..bit of an extravagant way to make a profit but there you go! Anyway it is still in full working order and powered by some of the same engines as it was 60/80 years ago…i forget. In reality that means a painfully slow journey along narrow gauge tracks with steam/smoke billowing from the coal fired engine. Quite an experience though and definitely a feat of engineering. The slow pace is not actually that bad, it allows you to appreciate the views around you – the cloud cover was not too bad this morning. The valley really is stunning, would be amazing to see it in clear blue skies and the shining sun. Having say that, as I was walking down to the internet place the sun was breaking through the clouds on the horizon creating shadows of the various different crests of the hills/mountains, really beautiful. So I guess that no matter what time of year you go somewhere, there is always a positive.  The picture on the left below shows just how small the train is compared with a london carriage back in the day.

Today I have drank about 9 cups of tea, half of them lemon. I may be in danger of becoming something of an addict. Not sure the priory treats people for tea addiction however.

More in a couple of days, or even tomorrow if you are lucky and the weather keeps me indoors for most of the day.

xx

Pushkar, Corbettt NP, Kolkata

I can’t really remember where I left off last time….and more to the point the internet here is too slow to persuade me to make the effort to check, so I will ramble on from what I think is a suitable point.

Kate messing up her flights gave us an extra few days to fill but as we had already visited the ‘major’, there are obviously countless other places to visit, cities of Rajesthan a bit of creative thought was required.  The constant heat (and Kate’s fear of camels) meant there was no point going to Jaisalmer so we instead headed towards Pushkar.  For those that don’t know, and I’ll assume that is most of you, Pushkar is one of India’s holiest sites.  It is said that the city rose up from the ground after Brahma dropped a lotus flower to the earth.  Consequently it has one of the few, if not the only, Brahma temple in the world and close to 500 smaller temples dotted around the city.  Stayed in a fantastic guesthouse that had an interior courtyard surrounded by plants and fountains, the food was top-notch as well.  Pushkar was a great little place to spend a few days in.  Much quieter and laid back than many other places…..apart from when you go down to one of the ghats and get hassled by a fake priest for a blessing and ‘pushkar passport’ (piece of string around your wrist for which they demand an extortionate sum).  But the temples and general atmosphere are great.

From Pushkar we went back to delhi for 15 hours and caught another train up to Ramangar, home of the Corbett National Park.  Had a couple of nights at Tiger-Camp during which the following things happened:

a) We went on a jeep safari to find a tiger.  No sign of said tiger except tracks until we heard a bunch of deer shouting out warning calls to each other.  After sitting still in the blazing hot sun for half an hour and hearing the tiger crawl through the long grass to change position it was clear he wasn’t coming out.

b) Stood next to an elephant whilst she was being washed and scrubbed by her handlers in the river.  I won’t go into details about this as I had a few problems with it.  But watching her play around in the water for the half hour or so before the handlers started scrubbing her was really cool.

c)Missed an elephant safari because Kate was ill….no hard feelings darling.  I’m going to do it in a couple of weeks anyway.

d)Ate some pretty shocking food which seemed to make a number of people ill (inc kate).

From Ramangar it was another train journey back to Delhi for a night before Kate flew home and I caught a flight down to Kolkata. The couple of weeks with Kate were fantastic, was really nice to have some constant company for a while, and of course seeing kate after 3 months was pretty good to!  Right, now I don’t feel as if I have to explain every move over the last couple of weeks!  Having only written once since kate arrived, trying to catch up on it all is not fun.  But now for the more relaxed and interesting person that you all know and love…….potentially.

Kolkata has really suprised me, in many different ways.  It is green for a start….really green.  Trees grow alongside the roads, the ‘Maiden’ is a 3km long park in the middle of the city and as you fly in, you actually find yourself looking to find the city, rather than somewhere like delhi where the ground just turns from brown to, well a different shade of brown with buildings.  I haven’t got about the city as much as I wanted to, felt a bit lethargic the first 2 days and the humidty down here is just unbelievable, but certainly the parts I have been to have been quite nice.  Yes, the buildings are often crumbling, yes the side of the road is often covered with rudimentry shacks and yes if you look underneath the skin of the city there is quite clearly a huge amount of poverty, but there is also a bustling metropolis that is throughly modern, a population that is obviously proud of their city and a centre of learning.

Looking back into the history, you could argue that no other Indian city benefitted from British ruleas much as Kolkata (or Calcutta back then) did.  It is also quite though that no other city suffered more as a result of the empire.  The floods of refugees that came into Kolkata after partition and during the India-Pakistan war choked the city and were a major part of the reason why Kolkata gained such a reputation (justifiably) for poverty. 

Anyway, I went round the Indian museum which was dusty old and just rammed with exhibits.  Admitadly most of them were rocks or tiny tiny tiny fossils, oh and numerous human embroys at various stages of development in a jar of formeldahyde (gag), so it wasn’t the most informative of museums.  The Victoria Monument (yes, yet another Indian building dedicated to a deceased British monarch) was stunning and had a great history of Kolkata inside of it.  Other than that and general wanderings, I haven’t done a lot.  Oh I found an Italian restaurant that served risotto…it was gooooood!

Off to Darjeeling in a couple of hours on the sleeper train.  Annoyingly the train doesn’t go to DJ it goes to a town nearby, where for the last 80km you can take the narrow guage toy train (9 hours) or get a jeep (2 hours), I think I know which one I will be taking.

See you in Darjeeling….hopefully where the weather will be cooler and I get a bit of luck with the views…..which at this time of year the chances of are nigh on zero.