Things are different here

Brian is suffering from a bit of a hay fever out break, the mustard harvest at Mount Abu meant there was a lot of 'stuff' in the air and it has made him very sneezy and bunged up.

So anyway I thought I would do a list of a few things that have made me look twice, wonder 'what on earth?' etc. This is not in any way critical or intended to be rude about India and its people, it is just stuff that is different.

People work really hard here, if you only have a basket and a few vegetables you display your veg nicely in your basket and sit by the road to sell them, if you have a brush you sweep things, the old (men and women) pick up rubbish or dead leaves or dust monuments etc. Whole families do building or road works, women in beautiful saris wield pick axes or carry stones or sand in big bowls on their heads, the oldest child looks after the little ones and the baby sleeps in a cradle made out of two A frames with a pole between them, on the pole is tied a large cloth by its four corners and inside is a baby - this can be on the central reservation of a 4 lane highway. Seen this morning on our way by road from Mount Abu, a woman grouting between the kerb stones of a bit of central reservation under construction while her two small boys (aprox 18mths and 3 yrs) played in the gap (maybe 3 feet) between the two sets of kerb stones that made up the central reservation.

People also work by shifting things or people about, there must be millions of tuc tucs in India all ready to squeeze in up to about 10 people (possibly more). There are also bicycles and these are used for personal transport and for delivery. There are 4 wheeled trolleys that people push about, some are used as stalls in markets or at road sides, some for delivery of goods, next come the large 3 wheelers, like a really big tricycle, over the two back wheels is a flat bed and this can be a mobile stall or a peddle powered delivery cart, at night the place where you sleep. There are also carts pulled by animals, donkeys, oxen, and most exotic looking, camel carts. Sometimes you see donkeys with panniers carrying building rubble or bricks, occasionally you see Elephants carrying people and stuff (I'm not sure what, something no one needs in a hurry).

There are also tuc tuc vans and Apis, just like the ones you see in Italy, these are often laden with gas bottles, produce and huge numbers of cardboard boxes. Motor bikes and scooters are used for personal transport, but rather more people on them than we are used to seeing at home. So far my largest count has been 5 - small child on petrol tank, dad driving, larger child, mum side saddle (in sari) with largish toddler casually under her arm. Only the driver wears a crash helmet (and not always) often even if worn the helmet has not got the chinstrap fastened. The young drive scooters, girls looking like exotic bandits because they swathe their faces in scarves so that only their eyes show, in order to protect themselves from dust I think.

There are also very old fashioned invalid chairs that are a large tricycle with the chain worked by handles rather than peddles. I have not seen a single wheel chair as we know them.

Lorries here look very solid and quite old fashioned, I think its because they don't seem to have many of the sort that are a cab that you can hitch a container to. Also they are decorated with tassles, painted patterns, shiny metal that has been punched with patterns and aways "horn please" or "Horn OK" in fancy writing on the tail gate.

Things you may have read about the way people crowd onto transport are all true, shared jeeps are filled beyond reason and then people get on the roof, small lorries transport swaying crowds squashed into the back, people ride on top of loads of sacks of produce or on lorries full of bricks.

Bricks, that reminds me of the huge number of brick fields and brick kilns we have seen as we travel around. Also miles and miles of firms selling cut marble and granite, you can hardly think there could be any mountains left.

Oh, lastly (for now) there is absolutly no concept of 'mutton dressed as lamb' here. No matter how old , tiny and bent you are you will never think 'perhaps I am past the age where this cerise/turquiose/red/peacock blue/lavender/baby pink sari will look good on me'. No; pattern, colour, sequins, embroidery - bring it on, and very good they look too. You occasionally see a woman in a white or grey sari and women in banks and offices sometimes wear darker colours, but they certainly are not the norm.

Tess

Jain Temples, Mount Abu

This is day one of week seven, I can't believe we have been away from home for so long. The time is flying by!

Yesterday we traveled by by train, 3 A/C (three bunks , one above each other, in an air conditioned carriage) train was not very full, it started from Amhedabad at 9,30 and got to its final destination, Delhi many hours later. It took till 3.20 to get to Abu Road only a couple of hundred K from A'bad. We rocked gently along, sometimes looking out of the window at life in the villages and fields, sometimes sleeping like the rest of the passengers. Indians seem to be really good at sleeping - on trains or almost anywhere else they seem to be able to take their ease.

Once we got to Abu Road we found a taxi to take us up to Mount Abu, about 45 mins up a huge lump of rock that just errupts out of the plain. We are staying at the Kishangarh House , the former summer residence of the Mahararaja of Kishangarh. It is very pretty and very quiet, there were only three of us in the hotel last night. Brian and I had our dinner about 7.30, in the large, gloomily lit dinning room, watched closely by the waiter who rushed forward as each dish was emptied. Slightly un-nerving but you couldn't fault him on polite and prompt service.

When we finished eating we read for a bit in the very attractively decorated sitting room, sitting on one of the many red covered sofas. The room and adjoining corridor are decorated with assorted princely photos of wonderfully dressed family groups, there are also large brass elephants and a range of decorative items like teapots and such.

We slept well after the lovely hot shower, I was warm enough but Brian could have done with another blanket, its much cooler up here at night. Today breakfast in the sunny courtyard and then a walk round the very pretty lake, followed by coffee and a cake (a rare indulgence). After that a jeep up to the Temple complex at Delwara.

If any of you reading this ever come to India these temples are not to be missed, the carving is the most beautiful and the most detailed I have ever seen. The stone is mostly white marble and honestly some of the carving looks more like piped sugar paste than stone. The workers were paid by the amount of dust they collected, so I guess it was in their interest to carve in the most tiny detail they could manage. Just fantastic and glowing in the noon day sun. There were loads of people being shown round, but only two other Europeans that I saw. It is a pilgrimage site of great importance to Hindus and the temples are of the Jain sect.

Tessa

Valentine's day

We are just back from two days in the lush and beautiful Gujarat countryside. Snehal Shah was taking a group of students out to the world heritage site at Champaner on which he is completing work on a book on the many beautiful mosques and other monuments in this 'lost city' of the 15th century.

We first visited a hunting lodge at a place called Jumburghoda where we were to stay the night - in fact an old rambling building with outhouses (in which our bedrooms were situated) at the end of a sandy track amonst the fields growing just about everything - including rice. This track is called Palace Road - the reason for which became apparent when we were taking tea and a distinquished woman approached us and to whom we were introduced, Snehal had almost snapped to attention when she came and I did likewise. We discussed our visit and the evening meal - all organic food from their fields and we all broke our strict vegetarian regime to try their chicken dish (peacocks and guinea fowl were wandering about but are apprently not for the table) and we were also introduced to her daughter. Our meal arranged we bade farewell when Snehal told us she was not just the proprieter but in fact the Queen of Jumburghoda - a former Princely State prior to Independence and of course with no remaining powers. The Lodge and grounds are the royal residence - hence Palace Road, a grand name for a sandy track!

On to the Champaner sites, and whilst Snehal took his student group off we were passed onto Professor Joshi as our guide - a 75 year old former Professor of Economics who is a resident of the area and an enthusiast of the monuments. Having been shown around one of the astoundingly beautiful old mosques Joshi asked us where our car was so we could start visiting some of the other widely scattered sites, we replied of course that we did not have one when lo and behold we spotted Ghiselle, a Swiss woman we had met in Ahmedebad who had just arrived with a driver! So Joshi immediately hijacked Ghiselle and driver to make a single group to visit further sites.

After the site visits we were dropped in the village to get a bus or shared jeep back the 25km to the Lodge and our problems began. Noone spoke English nor could anyone understand my obvious mispronunciation of Jumburghoda so we got only vague wavings of fingers or assurances that there were no buses. Finally one shared jeep said 'yes' and we squeezed in the back, Tess with a small child on her knee, when the jeep was full (that is with five in the front seat, people hanging on the side and back and squatting on the roof ) we set off - the wrong way!
Finally we got him to stop and trudged back to the village (and past the dead dog again!)

Snehal was texted, came to our rescue and eventually located a bus, already full but we squeezed in and even got seats at the first village - not for long however as we turned a corner to find a whole bus load of people beside a broken down bus, all plus their driver were somehow squeezed in and we set off - with us now quite unable to see the road and to spot Palace Road - however the driver had been asked by Snehal to stop and he did so. Very hot we walked the kilometer or so to the Lodge showered and took some tea in the shady gardens.

As the sun was setting we decided to take a walk through the fields, as we left the Lodge grounds a car with Queen and daughter and another couple drove out, the man driving wished up good evening in excellent English and told us about a step well across the fields and how to reach it. We replied that we had just been discussing the six storey underground step well at Ahemdebad so would indeed be interested
'Well this is a very simple country one, but well worth the visit' - and as he said farewell and drove on we concluded that we had just met the King!

We found the well, the way pointed out by a woman among what I guess was a tribal group, they all occupied small tents made of blue plastic gathered around a couple of trucks. The well was a large circular construction with a spiral of steps leading down to the water. We passed also coconut palms, all their trunks burned to make climbing easier and with poles and foot holds lashed to the trunks.

Returning to the lodge as the light failed we noticed that all the egrets (which are in every field) had gathered in flocks and were flying low through the trees along a small river valley. Reaching our bedroom block we found the hot water wallah busy making a fire under the old boiler attached to our block wall - for Snehal's shower as it turned out since he had just returned with a promise of cold beer to accompany our looked forward to dinner under what was now a very starry sky. And Tess and I agreed that this was a lovely place to be spending Valentine's Day!

Brian

News from Ahmedabad

Life since we reached the Shahs' wonderful, modern house (Snehel is an architect) has been really fantastic. Sujata is a truly talented cook, what she can do with vegetables, pulses, grain and spices is a treat for the taste buds and the eye and the nose too. We are being looked after, taken out and entertained in a very generous and friendly way and we are profoundly greatfull,

One of the treats we have been offered is to join the Shah family when they attend the wedding of the child of a cousin of Snehels'. As you can immagine this is an opportunity not to be missed, a Hindu wedding is a feast for every sense, but not to be entertained in our present disreputable traverlers clothing.

I am glad to report that the shopping embargo has been well and truly breached. I have bought fabric in a shop that would make my fellow textile friends weep for joy. Bolts of cloth in every colour, texture, pattern and state of embelishment that you could wish to see, some very resonably priced to stuff that must have been very expensive even here. The staff in the shop were willing to take down endless bolts of cloth and let one hold it up, feel the texture, try and match colours and advise on fabric content etc, none of the serve your self malarky.

I have bought stuff for a trouser/top combo that I think is really nice and that will look not too exotic to wear at home and have been measured up and it is being made up as I type. The tailor lives across the way from the Shahs and Sujata has known him since he was a by and played with Sunina. once we hace the card reader sorted I hope to be able to show you my outfit. Sadly, because of all ths hospitality I have regained any weight I managed to lose in Jordan and Egypt, so I will look as chuky as ever.

Brian has also been measured for trousers and a Kurti (mid thigh Indian gents shirt) and trousers. He also had to be taken to a shop to choose fabric and has a very tasteful raw silk in creams and pale browns, the natural colours of the silk. We both have new sandles as well. We will have to post stuff home, but there you go!

Tessa

Senior Citizens, Disabled, Freedom Fighters, Tourists

Yesterday we achieved a very important task - booking our train tickets for the final weeks of our time in India - involving getting down south to Kerela and then (via one flights) travelling up to Darjeeling and (we hope) a good view of the Himalayas.

Getting all the tickets booked was little less than miraculous - after some initial research using the timetable book we approached the ticket counter marked for tourists (and freedom fighters among other groups) checked out some further information and were sent away with request forms to fill in for each journey - a total of 8. Back to the counter where the clerk started checking our forms, finding a number of mistakes and correcting them, it all took time whilst the line behind us grew longer and restive, perhaps even mutinous! So we were sent away when the checking was done to wait whilst the queue was dealt with and the clerk took his advertised 'recess' after which we were finally called back. One by one he started issuing our tickets but inevitably by the time one was done someone had pushed forward, guesticulating, shoving their form through, shouting about one query or another. In truth we were quite happy to let him deal with people - international relations could otherwise have been damaged!

Finally we had our tickets although I had no idea with what degree of success, the high noise levels and my poor hearing meant I had nodded through all sorts of queries in the hope that it would work out. We staggered away from the counter after three hours with what we hoped were the right tickets.

The Shahs driver Ghitu drove us back to the house but it was only later when Sehal Shah came home that I was able to check the tickets with him.
"All OK, you will get on every train and because you are a foreigner they will definitely allocate you a berth"
I said that back in 1974 before computers that booking that number of tickets could have taken three days
"Three days! Three months - they would have had to telegraph all your destinations!"

So we have our tickets, we travel thousands of kilometers, there are six overnight trips and one trip to Kerela is about 30 hours. And the cost for second class with our senior citizen reduction?
About 125 pounds for the two of us - match that Richard Branson!

Of course we have already done one rail trip from Udaipur to here on the very slow and old fashioned narrow guage railway. We had a four person compartment but shared only with a nice psychiatrist from Chittogargh, it left on time we chatted for a while, made up our bunks with the supplied bedding and settled down at about 9.30pm whilst the train wended its way through the invisible hilly landscape. It rocked and bounced, rather comforting, rather like being in a large pram pushed by a drunken nanny. It got us here on time, the night passed reasonably quickly, a knock on the door at 4am to get ourselves ready for arrival where we were met by Snehal Shah and his daughter Sunaina.

Brian

Udaipur

What a lovely town! It is in a very hilly area and the town (at least the old part) is quite hilly too. Small streets crammed full of people, animals, fruit, veg and animal feed being sold on the pavements, shops, loads of cooperative groups who do traditional minature painting and many temples and cows - absolutely loads of cows.

Subhash told us that people keep cows in their houses (I think he meant courtyards) they feed them in the morning and evening, but in the day they are free to roam the streets and they eat any vegetable left overs that people give them and chapatis.

We have been to the "City Palace", home of the former ruler of Rajesthan and he has a very extensive home indeed with a very great deal of colourful decoration, carving, painting, whole rooms done out in coloured mirror glass etc, etc. The Indian Princely dewelling is big on decoration and it looks wonderful.

Today we have been to a lovely park, nice and quiet after the busy streets; seen a wonderful wedding procession on the way back to town. There were the bride and her attendant in a carriage pulled by two white horses, followed by the most colourful group of about 100 ladies you could ever wish to see, followed in turn by the town band in their red uniforms all blowing their brass instuments fit to bust.

Once back in town we went to visit the largest of the temples and watched a bit of a ceremony, a lot of very elderly women chanting, a couple dancing (far more gracefully than most English pensioners could manage) and a chap in white doing priestly things at the back in the shrine. After the chanting everyone got something to eat and had a chat to each other. It was so interesting to watch and as long as you keep still and quiet, no one seems to mind. Also I did donate to the food fund.

Tess

We really like Udaipur, its a spectacular setting and as you will see from the photo when we can upload it, surrounded by hills and set among several lakes. Its also a place we can navigate - the streets are a teeming bustle like all streets in India (particularly fascinating are the group of four donkeys laden with rubble from a building site which navigate their own way across town and back again - how do they do that?) but the central part of town is compact and after being totally lost the first time we walked through it we rapidly found our way around. Of all the places we have been in so far in India this is our favourite and the hotel we had for our second night had the most wonderful view both from our room and particularly from the roof restaurant.

I have to report that the shopping embargo has collapsed and we have been in several fabric shops today where substantial (in Indian terms but not in Sterling perhaps) purchases have been made - just irresistable to T. We also visited one of the painting cooperatives yesterday and a further gift was purchased there.

In a few hours we leave on an overnight train for Ahmedebad - where we are greatly looking forward to staying with the Shah family. From there (and with advice we hope from the Shahs) we will be making our way further south.

Brian

Through Rajasthan

We are currently in Udaipur and have just been watching the sun set over the lake with the palace -or rather very expensive hotel - sitting in the midst of the water. Last night we were in Pushkar again at a lakeside at sunset by the bathing Ghats and in the crowded market street. Both these places are rather more user friendly that the previous places we have been - nice to wander the streets and enjoy the bustle.

We had better come clean - we are living in luxury at the moment, being driven from place to place by Subash our driver and enjoying some rather up market accommodation -last night in Pushkar we had a room in the finest place there complete with beautiful gardens, swimming pool,man in turban at the gate who saluted you. We are going to be drummed out of the backpackers fraternity for this. And today we are in a similar place overlooking one of the lakes. We took this form of travel when it became clear that getting a train out of Delhi to Agra and then training it down in stages to Ahmedebad was going to entail at least two extra days in Delhi so we have taken a budget busting decision to go in comfort. This means we get delivered to lots of sites, get advised on what to pay, get told stories and sung to a bit as we go. The downside is some very long journeys and the indescribably dangerous driving that is the norm on Indian roads. We are here two nights and then at last we get a train to Ahmedebab - an overnight and very slow sleeper which I can assure you we are greatly looking forward to - particularly as we are in first class (and this means first class with bunks not the Egyptian version) but as senior citizens we get one third off all rail travel so that puts first class in the good value category.

Brian

Pushkar was realy lovely and I am beginning to think that I might be able to manage India.
The god all the temples are dedicated to in Pushkar is Brahma, he went to Pushkar with out his wife, took up with a young woman selling yoghurt and married her. His wife came along and was extremly cross and said that his punishment was that the only place in India that would have temples to him was Pushkar. It is lovely, higledy piggledy little streets full of shops selling lovely things, the mosy gaudy temples you can think of, all coloured lights and garlands of flowers. Monkeys, cows, loads of little birds, pidgeons by the hundred and hippies of all nations.

At the lake side there are steps down to the water (a bit murky looking for bathing) and people walk down to the water and pray and throw in flowers, all sorts of ladies in the most beautiful cloured clothing, old chaps in dhotis, youngsters in western style clothing and lots of chanting and bell ringing coming from the temples. Also you can look at people's shops with out being chased down the street, its all fairly relaxed.

Tessa

ps added a few pics to this one and to the Taj Mahal, here is a picture of the lake at Pushkar, Standing by the swimming pool at our Pushkar hotel and (sorry its the wrong way round, its the wrong pic) a picture from the Amber Fort, Jaipur

Taj Mahal

We were advised to start our day with an early morning visit to the Taj Mahal, so we were up at 6am and off into thee dark and quiet streets. Subash dropped us off at the battery bus for the short trip down to the Taj, we didnt have to pay, but I think that was because we got on an empty bus and then a group also got on and I think it was assumed we were with them.

At th gates to the Taj we got out tickets and were then formed up into Mens and Ladies queues in order to go through security. You cant take in any electronic stuff, pens, pencils etc. I had to give up my felt tip pen and Brian his torch, we were able to put them in a locker, though that meant Brian had to go through the search and electronic gate again. Finally about 7.25 we were walking towards the gate into the Taj from which you get the first veiw of the building. Having seen so many photos of it it is difficult to explain how very much more beautiful it is in real life. The early morning light was pearly but with a touch of gold in it from the rising sun and the building does look as though it is simmering and floating. It is so hugh and so solid, but it does look delicate and airy.

Up close the decoration is so beautiful, every surface is patterened in some way, either white on white with delicate carving or the lovely flowers and patterns in coloured stone that you have all seen. Also the building its self isnt plain , stark white but a mirriad of shades of white, grey, buff and the palest pinl all gleaming in the rising light, just lovely.

Tess

It really is the best time to see the Taj I think (and apologies for the lack of photos but this is yet another PC that won't accept our card reader) and all the better for being relatively quiet. I first saw the Taj Mahal in 1974 and that was in the dying light of the day. I had been attending a conference in Delhi and a couple of coach loads of us set off for Agra only to find the road blocked by an accident. The coach drivers decided to take a side road and inevitably one coach became stuck on the unmade road, it took several hours to get a tractor and enough villagers to get it moving and by the time we arrived at the Taj it was closing. In those days there was just a guy on the gate, not the extensive security of today and I guess somehow ("important guests from Delhi!") we were allowed in after hours. So just a few dozen of us had the place to ourselves in the dying light of the day. I was with a young Indian woman Veena and one other person looking down that long stretch of water towards the main Mauseleum when Veeen (named after a musical instrument) began singing as we walked slowly in time along the path, a rather lovely way to arrive.

Emerging from the Mausoleum we noticed a bit of noise at the railing along the river bank. The Taj stands high above the river and we saw down at the river edge an old man shouting and gesticulating, with a small boy beside him. I asked some others what he was shouting
"he is saying if you throw down some Rupees the boy will jump up and stand beside you"
This seemed an unlikely feat given the height so I asked what would happen if you threw some money down
"The man will laugh at you and tell you what a fool you are!".

Another person in our group from Bengal told me of his first visit many years before when he was a student. It was the time of full moon and he had of course heard of how wonderful the building looks in the moonlight. As he left he asked the gatekeeper if he might return to view in the night
"Absolutely not. Garden closed. Entry forbidden".
He pleaded with the gatekeeper, telling him he was all the way from Calcutta and might not get the opportunity again. Eventually the gatekeeper relented, pointed to a small gate and told him that if he came back later, paid a little money, he might be admitted for a short private view.

So he turned up, the gatekeeper emerged from the shadows, pocketed the bribe, opened the gate just wide enough for our friend to enter. He was immediately entranced by the glow of the dome through the trees and walked forward his eyes only on the dome. But then a soft sound reached his ears and he stopped gazing at the beautiful domed building and looked about him - to see hundreds of others, sitting, standing and lying on the grass - all who had bribed the gatekeeper for a private view!

Brian

ps: we noted a comment from Mike (do we assume that is Mr Levy?) about Delhi asking if it has become more middle class since his visit in 1974. Well yes and no is the answer. There are plenty of large banks and other indications of a large burgeoning economy and I would guess all that goes with a large middle and industrial class. There are for example places like Costa Coffee in the New Delhi area and one we went into twice (it was opposite the office of the company of our driver Subash), the second time was just before we set off on our current Agra-Jaipur-Udaipur-Ahmedebab trip and Subash has to repair a puncture. So we sat in the Costa Coffee enjoying the same coffee you do wherever you are (and at nearly the same prices) but we could not help noticing that directly across the road a parade of single story offices has a great number of people living on the roof, out in the open and no doubt one step up from living on the pavement. And we had also tried not to look at the group of crows breakfasting on a dead rat on the pavement outside. So yes there is a new trendy middle class Delhi with its laptops and coffee houses - but the crows are still feasting outside!

Impressions of Delhi

We had meant to blog a bit more about Cairo and to conclude that it was not for the fainthearted but lying in bed last night and thinking about Delhi I take it back, Cairo was a doddle compared. We walked wherever we wanted, we used the metro (although we never saw a single obvious non-Eqyptian on it) we were out in the evening sitting with a tea, we went into the old area and its markets, it felt OK and we only came nearly adrift getting to the Pyramids where we met the oldest Pyramid selling scheme in the book - taken to a 'government office' where we were told we had to take a camel/horse/buggy to see them 'its the desert" "its 15km to see them' etc etc. We got out of it but it was the only real problem we faced.

But Delhi is something else, simple chaos in the streets, large distances between places, no understandable public transport, the crappiest vehicles plying for hire, human life on the streets in more forms that you can imagine, horses, dogs, dogs, cows, goats and sheep. We have copped out and hired a driver Subash to take us around, its the only way to do it. And we had a fairly expensive hotel after I read some horror stories about Delhi's cheap hotels on the web.

There are the odd moments however - we heard a tremendous noise outside our hotel one evening and looking out from our fourth floor balcony saw a wedding party moving around the block to a large open banquetting area opposite, the groom on a large carriage pulled by two white horses, a huge number of people banging drums, playing trumpets and dancing wildly carrying lights and stopping every now and then to let off fireworks, it almost made Delhi seem human. And I was amused when we were stopped interminably at a traffic light to be assailed by the usual sellers of cloths, large bunches of peacock feathers (which look splendid) but also by a young man with a pile of novels all wrapped in plastic including the Booker prize win
ner and William Dalrymples City of Djinns about Delhi - both of which i have read - and many others that could have been carefully chosen by a literary critic for him.

Brian

What can i say about our two days here? Well the traffic is asstounding, Brian said its like a ball bearing run, where all the balls just manage to move around each other and really it is. Motor bikes with ttwo adults and children wedged between them, the man has a crash helmet but no one ellse does, a woman riding side saddle on a motor bike and holding a baby, tuk tuk's with upwards of ten passengers and a driver, carts pulled by poor old horses or very large bullocks with huge horns. All the time the noise of car horns, they hoot at each other all the time, from little toots to long sonorous blasts, that was Delhi and our journey to agra today has confirmed the though the traffic thins out slightly you hav to factor in herds of sheep, loads of donkeys, camel carts and lorries driving the wrong way up the fast lane.

This makes it sound as though all we have done is drive aboutbut we have seen fantastic monuments, all sorts of wonderful buildings set in tranquil expanses of green with beautiful green parakeets flying about, monkeys and the most delightful little squirels hopping arround.

Today we have seen the agra fort, hugh and wonderful and seen the Taj Mahal fron the top of the Fort, looking along the river. Tomorrow the Taj at dawn.

Tess

ps managed to add some pics see blogs below and to this one the pics are:

the wedding celebration outside our hotel in Delhi, monkeys at the Presidents mansion and Subhash and Tessa by the final steps of Gandhi prior to his assasination

Delhi and before

Our taxi ride into Delhi at 5am rates as one we are surprised to have survived, just our luck to get the smallest and most decrepit taxi on the rank and as he swerved throught the mercifully light traffic in the pram sized vehicle we did wonder if and in what state we would get to the hotel - the major accident we passed on the way did not help.

Our overnight flight was on a cheap shuttle flight for some of the millions of workers in the UAE from this part of the world, we think there were only three women on the flight of which Tess was one and that we were the only foreigners. Everyone else of course had huge amounts of excess luggage as booty was taken back home.

We left Dubai after three astounding and amazing days with Ahmed's family in Abu Samra. The experience was at first a totally disorientating one as we arrived in the bosum of a large extended family in a very large house served by numerous servants. After we arrived we thought our visit was about to be severely truncated when Ahmed came to our room to say his cousin has just died as a result of a car accident the previous night - we decided we really should not stay in the house in the circumstances and made some unsuccessful efforts to get an earlier flight onto Delhi but in the morning Ahmed would not hear of our going and arranged for a driver and housemaid to look after us and take us about until after the funeral. Once that was over the family assembled and we began a round of visits, coffee and teas, meals traditional style on the floor, visits to small farms, to camel stables, and late nights (the main meal is not until 10pm with men always eating first and ladies afterwards) with the family chatting. We soon were dressed in the traditional Kedora and I hope tomorrow we can get some photos posted to show you how we looked.

Brian

The differences between our life in Egypt (clean but tatty hotel, lots of walking, eating very modestly) and our three days of complete pampering in UAE are just so huge that it is difficult to describe. We were looked after, our washing and ironing was done and we were fed in a lavish manner, the food in Abu Samra was fanstastic. The household is traditional so men and ladies eat separately, men first, women next. You sit round a large plastic covered table cloth in a huge, carpeted room. I was given a spoon (I discovered that I am useless at eating with my hand and being left handed is a bit of a problem because of course the left hand is only used for one purpose and it isn't eating), even with a spoon I still spilled more rice than anyone else.

The house hold concists of Ahmeds most charming mother, his Dad (very handsome), Ahemed and up stairs his older brother (who is a policeman and not about a grat deal), his brothers wife, Minou and their four very lively children - Mubarak (9), Moser(7/8), Meera(5) and Salem(3), with the exeption of Salem who dosnt go to school yet, they all speak really very good English and even little Meera can write and knows all her letters. They are lively though and the reason we couldnt get on the internet at Abu Sabra was an unfortunate incident with a glass of Ribena and a laptop. We did however manage to look at the wedding photos of Sophie & Laurences wedding, which every one love (they were particularly taken by Elspeth, ooh went all the ladies.)

Only the young people speak much English and they speak very good English, women of 25 to about 35 speak some English and older ladies only speak Arabic. Every one was absolutly lovely to us though, very generous with their time and with assorted gifts and as I was taken about to tea with various ladies the younger ones always translated. I was also allowed to do 'Man' things, like visit the camels and the camel racing training place and Brian was allowed to be in the same room as unvieled ladies (as a sort of adopted family member). We both had a lovely visit to a cousin of Ahmed's who showed us her traditional holiday home in the desert and told us about the ways in which people used to do things.

I could go on for ages, but I will finish here.
Tessa