kochi

kochi is lovely. i was planning on being here for 3 nights and tonight will be my 5th..... it's such a calm, pretty, relaxed place to be. the first night was a bit stressy as my bus was late and dropped me about 20km from my hotel. then my taxi driver didn't know where my hotel was so we drove around aimlessly for an hour or so to find it. it was all good though and i made it in time to catch the man utd game. kochi is made up of islands and a peninsula, i was staying in ernakulam which is on the mainland and close to the transport hubs.

so on my first morning i jumped on a ferry and headed for fort cochin, the main historical area. i spent the day walking around, looking at the portuguese heritage - churches, old houses and mansions and the like. in the afternoon i went down and had a look at the chinese fishing nets which line the north shore like spiders ready to pounce. one group of fishermen beckoned me over and we sat and chatted a while over chai while they told me about their lives and their work. at the end they asked if i wanted to help them land the catch, which i did (while the oldest guy took some cool pics.) that evening i sat and ate my food and went off in search of a bar with zee sports so i could watch the carling cup final. sadly i didn't manage to find one but along the way i met a german guy and a brit who were also on the same mission so the night wasn't a complete bust as we sat and chatted the night away over some kingfishers and papads.

the next evening i was joined at my table by a girl from salford as there was nowhere else for her to sit in the restaurant. we got to chatting and i joined her for a classical keralan music performance (which we agreed was good but went on a bit...) before going for a pot of special tea. licensing laws in kerala mean that you can't have open alcohol containers on the street, so bars and restaurants which have outdoor seating get around the problem by serving the beer in teapots with teacups to drink it out of which was rather fun and we had a lovely evening nattering away before sneaking a beer to the shore next to one of the nets where we befriended a cat and a dog who were snoozing nearby. becky was staying in a homestay which closed its doors at 11 and by the time we were finished chatting it was almost 1am. the bridge over to ernakulam closes at 1am so we hurriedly made our way to a rikshaw (driven by a nice driver and his barmy friend) and made our way to my hotel. it took bloody ages - i had to get over to fort cochin tomorrow as it was too much effort getting to and from ernakulam. as we got there, there was a surprise waiting for us on my bed... something had managed to get in there and leave me a present on my pillow...... gross. new sheets etc were ordered and we eventually passed out - it's so humid and warm here.

the next morning we decided that it was time for some luxury, so as i write this i am fresh from a night in a 4 poster bed, with attached sitting area, bathroom with a jacuzzi and a swimming pool out the back. it was bloody lush and cost 7000 rupees, which is about 90 quid.

for a few weeks now (well, since hampi) i've been toying with the idea of going to thailand for a mini 2 or 3 week holiday. it started when i heard the canadian girls sharing tales with the people we did the bike tour of hampi with, and has kind of continued as i hear more and more about the place. the way i see it is i have the money right now, i'll definitely be back to india to finish off what i haven't seen, and i just feel like a change for a while. there's every possibility of meeting up with my uni friends davina and david who are in laos at the moment and heading to thailand and the canadian girls are headed that way as well. so yeah, i'm going to spend a few days in varkala and then i'm going to see if i can get a cheap flight to thailand. happy days.

ooty

i've just spent 4 days in ooty, preferred hill station of the british administration in madras when things got a little too toasty in the summertime. it's a lovely little place, and the drive up here through the nilgiris wasn't bad either. my bus was supposed to leave mysore at 8am so i was up nice and early with the intention of treating myself to a leisurely breakfast. nanoseconds after my coffee arrived (at about 7:15) the chap from my hotel reception desk - a spitting image of manuel in his appearance and manner - came bouldering into the restaurant with a worried look on his face "mister david!! mister david!! your bustrip is here!" i grinned up at him, had one last sip of my coffee and followed him outside. my pack was hoisted onto the roof and i settled down for a nice drive in the hills, through a game reserve and everything. we drove maybe 100 metres down the road and picked up a few more passengers, and then sat there. for about an hour...

once we got going it wasn't bad, stopping off at a roadside dhaba where i had a masala dosa (surprise surprise) and i even saw elephants on the way up. i stayed in the reflections guest house opposite the lake in ooty and it was cosy and lovely. whilst it's baking hot there during the day, ooty's altitude means it gets a bit chilly at night and the cosiness of my room would enter my thoughts each evening as i huddled into my fleece hurrying along the main bazaar. i did the usual wandering around on my first two days, and met a lovely chap called ted who was also staying at my guest house who (like me) is fond of a natter :D

on my last day i went on a hike through the nilgiris with a local man named anthony (his real name, we left a lot of christianity in ooty) and it was just amazing. through tea plantations, a thali for lunch in a small village, over hills, up a big mountain and through tribal areas. it was great, the view from our final destination was beautiful and i had a really lovely day, one of the best yet in india i think.


the next day i had planned to take the toy train down to coimbatore and then grab a bus to kochi but i was waitlisted. i hate the goddamn waitlist.... i ended up taking a local bus to coimbatore, down through the hills and it was spectacular - i was right at the front next to the driver and i had a great view of the mountans as we snaked down through them at an alarming speed. the ride from coimbatore to kochi was less spectacular but still really pretty. the scenery slowly changed from rugged hills to palmtrees and waterways as we (inched) our way into kerala and towards the sunset.

kochi is lovely, i'll tell you more about that later. this internet cafe's annoyingly hot and the 'c' and 'p' keys don't work properly. i'm going to catch me a sunset and a beer :D

mysore - city of spices, incense and a big palace

well, needless to say i didn't sleep much. you already know about the state of indian roads, and there was a rather large man sat next to me who kind of spilled over onto my armrest... then onto my arm... then over half my body. he could snore with the best of them as well and was in sore need of a session in one of those decontamination units you see in sci-fi movies.

i arrived in mysore a very bleary-eyed and grumpy chap 14 hours after leaving hyderabad, and was greeted with the usual "rikshaw rikshaw you have guest house you want rikshaw?" i saw the prepaid booth in the near distance and made a beeline for it whilst looking for a place to whip out my guidebook and pick a hotel. normally i like to have this all planned out in advance so i don't look like a complete bumbling idiot - rocking up somewhere looking dazed, tired and confused and pawing through my book like a little lost child. i sat down on my pack, had a flick through and found a place which was really near the palace. i finished my cigarette, trying to wake up a little as i was in a kind of half-asleep daze and things were just a tiny amount too loud and bright. as i looked up the first guy who had approached me was leaning over the railing grinning at me. i must have told this guy no about 10 times in the 50 metres or so between the bus and the prepaid booth so i just looked at him and said (in a rather annoyingly shrill squeal - i blame the lack of sleep) "how many more times do i need to tell you no? no no no no no no!" the autorikshaw i took from said booth was 12 rupees, which cheered me up lots - i'm a big fan of cheap rides :D the "budget" hotel that the lonely liar had recommended glowingly as being "the best budget option of the blah blah bullshit" was 900 rupees a night which brought me right back to being a resident of grumpsville.

i checked in anyway, thinking that for a good night's kip it was worth it and i could find somewhere else the next day. turns out it was a little slice of lushness and i stayed there for 3 nights. i had a proper mattress (mattresses in india usually consist of a slice of foam maybe 3 inches thick if you've been a good boy that day) and 4 fluffy, big, proper pillows (pillows are generally made from gravel, lumps of rock and glass - if you're lucky enough to get a pillow) so on seeing the pristine white duvet (yes, a duvet!) covering a bed that looked ready to swallow me up and comfort all my worries aches and pains away i was sold. the cricket had just started so i watched the indian innings from behind slowly drooping eyelids and eventually gave up and had the best night's sleep since the mumbai expensive-but-so-worth-it hotel.

mysore is a lovely place. it's quite small and open with lots of little parks and monuments and whatnot dotted around. there is very little hassle and the general vibe is chilled out. i had a good wander around on my first afternoon cutting through backstreets, stopping for some chai and watching the traffic slip past and generally getting a feel for the place. there was the usual chaos that surrounds any activity undertaken by indian people from buying some fruit to driving like a maniac, but it was far less frenetic than anything i had seen so far. the climate must have something to do with it - it was bloody hot.

now for a wee history lesson as mysore has quite an interesting past, evident in the wealth of beautiful buildings and monuments sprinkled liberally around the place. it is the second largest city in karnataka and will soon be blessed with a new name - mysuru, which i quite like. in hindu mythology a particularly nasty little demon called mahishasura used to live here until he got a spanking by durga (who you might know as shakti or parvati, her other incarnations.) up until independence mysore used to be the capital of the kingdom of mysore and was ruled by the wodeyar dynasty, great patrons of arts and culture. the palace that sits at the south of the city was their home and a very nice home it is. (screw the history lesson i'm bored - go here if you're interested...) i had rather serendipitously arrived on a sunday, meaning the palace was all lit up and sparkly in the evening. which was very nice indeed, though the resulting power cuts later on were a tad annoying. especially while i was trying to tuck into the gorgeous afghani kebabs served in the rooftop restaurant of my hotel.

i visited the market (the name escapes me now) to look for some incense, oils and spices. it was a cool place to hang out for a few hours with fruit and vegetables and flowers and pots and pans and woodcarvings and perfumes and garlands and dyes and silks and all manner of interesting things to look at. i chatted to a few of the stallholders who really knew their stuff about the perfumes and incense they sold and ate lots of exotic fruits whilst wandering around, sniffing the spice-filled air and making sure i took time to sit every now and then and watch the hustle of the bazaar swirling around me. not much to say about the next couple of days really. i bimbled around, took some photos, drank some chai, sat and chilled out. mysore is grand.

next stop... ooty, in the nilgiri hills. this wasn't originally in my itinerary but i'd heard "man, you have to go to ooty it's great" too many times to ignore it.

hyderabad

i promise to keep this one short, the last few posts have been pretty long...

hyderabad then... it was cool in the noisy dirty smells of wee indian city kind of way. the rikshaw drivers there were an absolute menace, always starting at "400 rupees sir, very long way" for journeys that should only cost 50 or so and absolutely barking mad. it was fun to get them right down, i love how when you walk away or flag another rikshaw down they suddenly think your price is fair! i visited the golconda fort which was pretty cool. i arranged with my driver to be taken back into hyderabad when i was done, so i had an hour to mosey around the fort and look at all the various rooms, chambers, temples and the palace inside. i met 2 hyderabadi lads, both called arshad. their english was great, both of them were studying engineering at the university and they were really impressed when i tried out my hindi on them. as we walked down the hill we chatted about various things, their hopes and dreams, cricket. the usual :D arshad 1 wants to go and work in newcastle with his cousin so i told him that he'd have to call his cousin a geordie the next time he spoke to him which had him in fits of giggles. when i got to the bottom i saw that my rikshaw had buggered off, probably because i refused to give him the return fare beforehand.

i flagged another one down and headed towards the charminar, an old islamic arch that is the earliest example of islam in hyderabad itself (the original city, at golconda, had to move due to water shortages.. hyderabad is where it moved to.) the charminar area is intense. very busy with lots of bazaars, rikshaws, cyclists, chai stalls, people and pearl shops. hyderabad is world famous for its pearls, shop after shop after shop all with fantastically beautiful necklaces, bracelets and the like on display. i had a good wander around there and then headed back to my hotel to get tarted up, as i had heard that a new club had opened in town and it was the place to be seen. i've not really had a chance to experience much middle-class living in india, i'm mostly confined to grotty backpacker rooms and dining experiences so i thought i'd have a look. it was oh so very lush inside, really sleek and modern. the music was tragic, however. really old crap songs - wet wet wet all tranced up and techno'd. it was very strange. as the night wore on i got talking to a couple who were recently engaged called anuj and divya, theirs was an arranged marriage. i was fascinated to hear their tale, anuj is indian but lives and works in america and he had been in hyderabad for a week to meet his new bride, whose hands and arms were covered in the most beautiful henna and mehindi (i'm not quite sure i know the difference between the 2) and her ring was beautiful. we found somewhere to sit and drink coffee and we chatted away until the wee hours about all manner of things. i was most interested in anuj's recollections of arriving in america for the first time as a 16 year old who had never left hyderabad. he had exactly the same kind of culture shock i had coming here, but in reverse.. everything was cold, clean, efficient. nobody looked at him, it was all so big and bright and fast and alien. we spent a very interesting few hours indeed chatting away and sipping our coffee. the next day i was due to head to bengaluru by train. i got to the train station and i was still waitlisted. for crying out loud! what's the point of this poxy waitlist thing? if there's no room on the train don't sell me a ticket, i'll make other plans!! i ended up waiting at the train station for 4 hours so they could print the chart up and see if anything was available. surprise surprise, there wasn't. so i bit the bullet and went to the bus stand to get an overnight local bus. no ac.. no sleeper berth... just me, my bags and a very hard seat for 14 hours. when i got there i was relieved to learn that there was a deluxe ac bus direct to mysore - my final destination! woop! and it left in 40 minutes! woop woop! i grabbed myself some lays and a cakebar (my travelling staples for times of emergency hunger) and jumped on the bus, whacked my seat back as far as it would go and settled down for some snoozing.

next stop, mysore. city of spices, oils, sandalwood and incense.

the andhra pradesh express

so hyderabad was next on my list. it had posed a bit of a problem for me when i was making my initial plans as i really wanted to go there but it is kind of in the middle of nowhere and would have meant a massive detour wherever i approached it from. i was headed back to where i had left karen and jaclyn to go see kim and hannah, which meant going to mysore. hyderabad seemed a good jumping off point as i could then go to bengaluru and catch a local bus to mysore. the journey to hyderabad on the andhra pradesh express was scheduled to take 26 hours (and actually took 28) which scared me a little. what would i do? i had just bought a book but that would be devoured in no time, and i had booked an upper berth so during the day i wouldn't have a window seat. it turned out to be a really liberating experience despite my fears. there's nothing like travelling huge distances on the indian railway. there is a constant supply of chai, samosas, crisps, all kinds of snacky-type foods. and the scenery is amazing. i spent the majority of the waking portion of the trip (around 15 or 16 hours) sat in an open doorway smoking cigarettes, drinking chai and watching india slip past while chatting to the many chai and samosa sellers on their breaks. after the frustration, annoyance, homesickness and general feeling of not-fun i had experienced recently it was the perfect tonic.

as i sat and we passed through nameless villages, small towns and stopping occasionally at random stations i had a lot of time to think and to put the events of the last few weeks in perspective. i had seen some things that people only dream of - the taj mahal, pushkar, the golden temple and the mehrangarh fort in jodhpur. i had seen some things that people hope they never see - heartbreaking poverty, open sewers, filth, grime and hassle. it is all india, and the sooner i accepted that the better i would feel about my trip and the sooner i'd start having fun again. i really can't describe how awesome that day was, the indian countryside is stunning. i saw mountains, forests, great big dusty plains, dried river beds, rice paddies, farm labourers toiling with oxen and wooden ploughs, sari-clad women gracefully walking from the local water source with huge steel containers balanced precariously on their heads. as we passed through the towns and villages the kids would come running and waving, covered in big smiles and cheering us on our way. i was going to be ok. i just need to work out how to deal with india's dark side. i am turning into a fairweather traveller and that isn't the person i am or want to be. once i accepted that i felt more positive about the trip and knew that i had made the right decision to come south again.

as i arrived in hyderabad i was mildy excited to say the least. hyderabad is bengaluru's partner in the new information technology boom that is hitting india. often called "cyberabad" there is internet access a-go-go, and more importantly internet cafes with my game installed. i got off the train and jumped into the first rikshaw i could get, the driver then promptly ran someone over. after he nearly broke my neck by driving over a pothole at warp speed i yelled at him to "chill out!! you're driving like an idiot!" and he laughed and said "you've never been to hyderabad before uh?" and sped us away, narrowly missing buses, trucks and shiny mercs.

there's been a lot of advertising recently promoting india's new formula 1 team - team india. if the drivers learnt to drive in hyderabad they will win hands down. the traffic is mental here, i showed a few of you a youtube video before i came away of a chap crossing a road? that was in hyderabad and it's just as bad, if not worse than the video depicts. the drivers here must have awesome reactions as the amount of split-second braking and turning and swerving that goes on beggars belief. i checked into my room, grabbed a shower (finally!) and shaved off my beard. 3 weeks of growth had yielded varying results.... week one was looking good. every photo taken of me had jaclyn and karen gasping (with a little too much amazement for my liking...) at how hot i was looking. week two was also fairly good, the warmth it offered in the north was good and in shimla i looked the real deal - a travelling man. but when i got to hyderabad and managed to cleanse myself properly for the first time in 10 days i was alarmed to see that my beard had red, white, yellow, ginger, brown and black patches. it was time to shave...

delhi still

so.. where was i? oh yes, delhi. after i had wandered around connaught place awhile and found me some books (woop!) and headed back up the road to paharganj and some food. i went to a bar that served food and beer and sat in the corner on my own reading my new book (i'm reading asimov's foundation series now.. finally!) and as the place filled up i was joined by people from delhi who had just finished work and were looking for beer of their own. i had some really interesting conversations with them and discussed everything from simon jones' injuries to the lack of a welfare state in india. they were all massively proud of their metro system (and rightly so, it puts the tube to shame) but as ever they were reluctant to talk about the poverty and lack of infrastructure in general, giving me the same "yes, it's a problem" before moving on to another topic. i then sat with an english chap and his american friend and we whiled away the hours talking about india and our experiences. i'd been silly enough to have some of the local moonshine earlier with the indian chaps i was sat with and when i got to my room it hit me really hard. my head the next morning was pretty bad... so i reached for the rehydration salts and my party pack of ibuprofen and i was up and about in no time. the agenda that day? old delhi, the jama masjid and the red fort.

i grabbed a rikshaw at the top of paharganj and the driver threw us into the delhi traffic (i took some video footage which i'll show you all when i get back if you make me tasty treats) which is just crazy. old delhi is very crowded, noisy, and really hard work. there is a bazaar at the foot of the mosque which i tried to wander around but couldn't because of the hassle i was getting from beggars, children, stallholders and so on. the hour or so i spent in that area was really hard, there were people lining the steps of the mosque in all kinds of states - lepers, amputees, burn victims, people with severe deformities. some of the howls of anguish they made as they asked for money were chilling. there was one woman at the top of the steps who had no eyes, just sockets and she was rocking back and forth moaning with her hands outstretched. i wasn't allowed into the mosque as i was wearing shorts and that was fine by me. i needed to get away from that place - quickly. i walked along the road which leads to the mosque for maybe a kilometre heading towards the red fort. as i walked i was constantly hassled, kids grabbed my arm, women carrying newborns looked at me with lost eyes and hands outstretched. it was heartbreaking to see and to walk past them. it's such a difficult thing about being in india - how do you deal with this kind of thing? do you give money? do you give food? what can you do? i made the decision very early in the trip to give to one person every day, but it doesn't stop me from feeling like an arse every time i say no to someone.

so i headed to the red fort to have a mill around and take some photos. i don't think i was really in the right frame of mind to be doing the tourist thing and i wasn't that impressed with it. it was in sore need of some love, everything had an aged, decayed look to it - not at all like the hugely impressive mehrangarh fort in jodhpur. i took a few snaps, walked around the gardens and decided that i needed some rest as today had been pretty hard on the senses. i headed back to my hotel, had a cold wash (grr) and went for a beer. i got talking to a french chap who was here with his girlfriend. we exchanged stories on where we had been and what we had seen and solved all of india's problems over a beer or two. feeling a bit better for having talked to someone about the horrors i had seen that day (and the 2 kingfishers i had drunk..) i toddled back to my room feeling a bit better. who knows, maybe the boiler would have been left on for long enough to have heated up some water?

the next day came, my last in delhi and still no shower. i had 2 things that needed sorting - a train ticket to hyderabad, and india gate. i had decided that i really didn't like northern india. it is dirty, smelly, pushy, cold, the people generally aren't very nice and i just wasn't having fun any more. every single second of every single day i was hassled "you want this you want to see my shop you want blah blah" and i was approaching breaking point. i can understand why it is like this - northern india is where the majority of the tourists come, and stay - the golden triangle of agra, rajasthan and the punjab is the main 2 or 3 week itinerary. so tourists = $$ to the people here. it just annoys the hell out of me that you can say no, and they will say "very good price" so you say no again, and they say "but look is free" and i (rather smugly) always reply "my time isn't free though buddy - you pay me 100 rupees to see your shop?" and they finally back off, only to be replaced by the next one "you want see my shop friend?" it normally starts with that or a "where you from friend?" and i have now learnt to just keep on walking, engaging these people just means you have to say no about a hundred times before they get the message. the thing is - how many people who are genuinely interested and want to talk am i missing out on talking to because as soon as someone talks to me now i wave my hand, tell them to go away and keep on walking. so yeah, back to the south where it was hot, the people were nicer and less inclined to hassle you, and the streets didn't smell of wee (in india it's perfectly acceptable for people to just whip it out and take a wazz wherever they chose. well, northern india at least.) i had made plans to meet the girls after their yoga week in rishikesh and do varanasi with them before they went on up to nepal. i think i'm going to meet them in kolkata after i've gotten some of the zing back into my trip and they've done everest base camp. for the first time i was feeling really homesick, i missed my friends, i missed my family, my stuff, being clean. most of all i missed being part of a civilised society. and that's not good - india is a beautiful country, with a long cultural history and beautiful people. i really needed to get out of the north and discover that again.

i headed up to new delhi station, was passed from counter to counter with my reservation slip (each time after queueing for about an hour) without getting a ticket. after about 3 hours i found some chai and sat, defeated, wondering if i could justify getting a flight back to manchester. as i drank my chai and had a quick cig i realised that the lonely planet is always there to either point you in the right direction or tell you fibs. today was a lucky day, the lonely planet was feeling benevolent enough to point me in the direction of the railway tourist booking office. it was like something out of a dream. i walked through the automatic doors into an efficient, air-conditioned ticketing heaven. within 10 minutes i had my ticket and i was ready to get number 2 on the list done. india gate.

i wish i had allowed myself more time to do india gate, the rajpath and the secretariat as it was all very impressive. india gate is huge, and is inscribed with the names of all the indian soldiers who gave their lives in ww1, the northwest frontier operations of around the same time and the 1919 afghan conflict. the rajpath leads from india gate to the rashtrapati bhavan (president's house) which is flanked on either side by the 2 huge secretariat buildings. and it was just lovely. the rajpath is maybe 1 1/2 km long, flanked on either side by grassy areas lined with trees, the view up it from india gate is really impressive. as i walked the secretariat buildings got larger and larger, looming on the horizon. it was a great afternoon and as i walked around the government buildings i experienced a calm silence for the first time since landing in mumbai. it was top. i hopped on the metro back to paharganj, grabbed my rucksack and headed for the train to hyderabad. 26 hours on the andhra pradesh express. this would be an experience....

delhi

i was a very lucky boy indeed. if you scroll down a couple of mousewheel turns you'll see that the first day in shimla was covered in deep deep snow. the second day was thaw-day, so i got to see the last of this year's snow in that part of the world. isn't that nice? i decided to take a local bus down to delhi as i had already seen the toy train and fancied a bit of a roadtrip. the scheduled duration was 10 hours but in all it took about 12 (the indian time is officially i.s.t. - indian standard time. it really stands for indian stretchable time.) the trip itself wasn't too hideous, i had a fairly comfortable seat next to a window and the old man sat next to me was smelly, but tolerably so. the journey took me down through the foothills and onto the grand trunk road, which runs all the way from delhi to amritsar and beyond into pakistan. not much to report really. i ate some crisps and a few dozen samosas.

arrival anywhere after dark sucks a bit as it's really hard to get your bearings and it's impossible to get a feel for the place, and delhi was no exception. the bus depot was rammed with people, cars, rikshaws, buses and cows. by this point i was screaming for a wee so headed to the nearest 'convenience' which was a shed with a trough carved into the floor at one end. i was staying in paharganj which acts as a buffer between old delhi and new delhi. full of budget accommodation and plenty of backpackers. my hotel was ok (the hotel vivek if anyone's looking for cheap and smelly rooms in delhi) and it promised hot showers! the pipes in my room in shimla were frozen so there was no shower there, and in chandigarh and amritsar it was too bloody cold to even contemplate taking off one of the many layers i was wearing for fear of instant hypothermia. so yeah.. i needed a shower. big time. sadly it wasn't to be.. every time i switched the boiler on, waited the hour i was supposed to wait for it to heat up and turned on the shower on i was met with a stream of glacial water. grumbling i'd go into the corridor and check the boiler switch to see someone had turned it off. i asked the nearby porter / boy / manservant / chap who wore a grey top and didn't really seem to do much other than sit and drink chai what the crack was and he would smile at me and say "boiler off sir?" exasperated i'd try and explain that boiler off was the last thing i wanted him to do so i'd say slowly "please leave switched on" while pointing at the switch. "ok sir" would be the reply with a big grin and the head wobble they do here which could mean anything from yes to maybe to don't know. so i'd wait another hour and repeat the whole scene again. didn't look like i was going to be clean just yet.

delhi is a really weird place, paharganj is full of the backpacker crap you get used to seeing when you have been on the road a while, stupid tie-dye smocks and bags and whatever, and is full of the same people you see everywhere (wearing stupid tie dye smocks and bags and whatever.) i've been to a few places now and have marvelled at the lack of traffic accidents i have seen despite the craziness of the roads and drivers here. within 1 hour on paharganj i had seen 2 head on crashes between autorikshaws and bicycle rikshaws, and had myself been hit by a car. of course there were no great tragedies here as nothing manages to get above walking pace. every step you take you hear "hallo sir... see my shop... hallo sir... you want hash.. you want cock (i think he was offering cocaine..) you want rikshaw" which is now becoming more than annoying. at the end of paharganj is new delhi's main railway station, and nowhere on this planet is there a busier, louder, more mental place. on the other side of the train station is the new delhi metro station and i am so very impressed with their version of the tube. the stations were immaculate, the trains were large, airy and not crowded at all, and there weren't any of the hassles usually associated with travelling on the tube. i liked it a lot. 6 rupees took me all the way downtown.

near to this area about a 1km walk along chelmsford road is connaught place and the start of new delhi proper. it's a big circle with a park and a metro station in the centre surrounded by 3 or 4 larger circles all lined with shops, restaurants, and on final count 3 mcdonald's take aways. i spent my first afternoon in delhi wandering around there, looking at stuff and taking pictures to bore you all with when i get home! oh, and i had a macca's - they do well despite the lack of beef on the menu. i had a mcchicken maharaja mac meal and it was top.

jeez.... just seen the time. i've got a train leaving in 4 hours and i need to get to the train station and queue for a week to get a ticket. oo and find some food as well... i'll finish up later i promise (i might put some pictures on as well if you're good boys and girls.) i'm in hyderabad at the moment btw - sorry for the slack blogging but i'm having way too much fun looking at coolness.

that's better! snow in shimla

you do best, he does rest! meet ganesha!

well, he must have been looking out for me, as i am in a wonderland at the moment. after the dirt, grime and hassle of the last week or so i headed up into the himalayan foothils for some sorely needed prettiness. the toy train from kalka was the coolest thing, it was like being on a fairground ride. as it climbed higher and higher up into the hills the views became more and more spectacular, and then it started to snow! big old fat snow as well, none of this sleet effort we get back home. by the time i arrived in shimla it was snowing heavily, and about a foot of it lay on the ground. my hotel was up on the ridge so i had to slip and slide up some pretty steep and icy steps with my pack on. the room is huge, with views of the mountains and the town below. the temperature leaves a lot to be desired, the coldest winter in years is hitting north india and my water pipes are frozen so i have to shower in another room and even with the little heater they gave me i could still see my breath as i went to sleep wearing 2 pairs of trousers, every t-shirt i own and my fleece and hat!

as i woke up this morning the mist that had enveloped the town the day before had lifted and i was greeted by glorious sunshine! so i got dressed really quickly and headed for the mall using a combination of skating on my arse, rolling and walking down the icy steps. i had a coffee and masala dosa in the indian tea house and now i'm off for a wander. when i find a web cafe with a usb thingy on the front i'll upload some pics.