Back on the road

We are back on the road, actually in a place we don't particularly want to be - near Delhi airport in transit en route to West Bengal. It has been a rough week and our trip to the far south of India has been much disrupted of course and several of those sorely won train bookings lost and replaced with internal flights.

I posed a challenge to the urology guys at Lakeshore, how to solve my immediate problem and get me back on the road without an extended stay in Kochi. So far they seemed to have found a solution but obviously we will be keeping a close eye on health issues. It was a hospital that most of us in the UK would recognise, I would guess not far below the standards of Addenbrooks and I certainly had no worries as I went into theatre, the whole team had visited from big boss down and they had bags of confidence. Unlike in the UK we had a private ac room with tv etc which cost us (or rather the insurance company all of 20 pounds per night), my whole treatment cost just over 500 pounds. We had the usual stream of visits each day from nurses, from dieticians, for laundry and for food delivery. These rose to a crescendo the evening prior to going into theatre and we were particularly puzzled by the guy with the large wash bag - he had no English so got a nurse who explained he had come to shave me. He hussled Tess and the nurse out, carefully locked the door, got me stripped and lay a sheet of newspaper under my trunk. He marked out with water the area to be shaved - just below my nipples to my upper thighs with nothing missed out inbetween!

And then out came the cut-throat razor. I immediately thought of the slogan we saw on a barber shop in Jordan 'Show your wife how brave you are' encouraging men to come in and have their beard shaved - nothing compared to the bravery I was about to demonstrate! As the scraping began and he got to delicate tissues I needed some distraction so peered around him at the tv - which was showing the Coen Brothers' film 'Fargo' and had just got to the woodchipper scene!

The hospital at Kumily could hardly have been in greater contrast, a very simple country hospital with a smiling Nun as Matron, the day began with a small bell rung for prayers, then the dawn chorus of birds started up and as daylight came the hospital was shrouded in mountain mists. Gradually these drew back to reveal the jack fruit trees and coffee bushes on the hillside opposite. Not quite Shangri La but a better view than anything Addenbrookes has to offer! But the beds were hard - you had to be ill to want to lie on them and poor Tessa had an even harder one.

Brian

I just want to tell you all about the Hospital Canteen at Kumily. When I returned to the hospital with night things after Brian had been admitted I suddenly though 'oh, here we are miles from anywhere, what are we going to eat' but was reassured by the Matron, who said 'We have a canteen, its over there' (pointing to a single story building to the right of the hospital building) . I didnt get a chance to check it out till after dark (remember there was a power cut) and was amazed when I went in to find first a counter and cash desk and small shop area, sweets and stuff like soap called 'Dr Wash', then a small room with tables and on the right of this the kitchen. The kitchen was lit with a lamp and the light of the open fire over which the fierce looking male cooks had their cooking pots hung. For 18 rupees I was given more rice than I could eat, a portion of potato curry in a plastic bag and four small portions of sambals (sort of accompanyments) and no cutlery. When I got back to our room I had to eat out on the balcony, sort of hanging over my food, so that I could get at least some of it into my mouth and not all down my front!

Sometimes they took pity on me and delivered my meal, it would arrive wrapped up in a sheet of news paper to protect it from the elements. Tea was dispensed in glsses and carried over in a metal glass holder with a 1/2 sheet of news paper over the top of the glasses. The food was really good and because the kitchen was so dark it was impossible to judge the hygiene standards, but it was a hospital so presumably they didnt finish off too many people (Heston Blumenthal please note). Also no concessions to bland food for invalids, it was hot, like it or not.

Tess

The Patient Speaks

Finally about to be discharged after our week in the two hospitals, this was a good choice, only six years old and aiming at world class treatment and with what certainly seems like a competent urology department. I have an extra bit in me and providing I can start peeing soon will be out the door very shortly. We have booked flights for Saturday and Sunday to take us all the way to the other end of the country - up in the West Bengal Hills. I hope to have time there to reflect a little on my time in hospital but for now will just say a lot of thanks to bystander Tessa (its a formal title here - she has a pass), Suresh at Green View who helped so much in Kumily and then got us to Lakeshore which proved to be just the place I needed to be and to all the others who have sent best wishes.

Brian

The English Patient

Hes doing OK, at the moment he should be having a stent put in to relieve the pressure on the kidney and stop the pain. The stent needs to be taken out and the stones dealt with in the next few months, so hopfully the journey will continue after discharge and a few days recovery.

The Drs here are very nice and seem to be very thorough. I will let Brian give you the patients point of view as soon as he can, as his 'by stander' (thats what i am known as here) it seems good to me.

Tess

Well stone me!

As family know, but most friends dont yet know, Brian is road testing the Indian hospital service.

On Saturday morning we set off from our lovely hotel Green View (owned by the charming, kind and very helpful Mr Suresh) for a "Spice Tour". It was in a tuc tuc and on very bumpy roads and Brian soon felt sick, he perked up after that and we carried on, only for him to start feeling really unwell as we were going round a tea factory. I decided that we needed to take him to hospital so a car came out from Kumily and took us off to a tiny hospital, St Augustine's.

The staff at Hospital were so kind and helpful. We saw a Dr Babu Pullicken, who quickly diagnosed Kidney stones. The pain had gone away and so he sent us back to the hotel, telling Brian to rest and come back if the pain returned. Well, we were back at the hospital by about 5pm, with a very sorry for himself Brian, the pain was coming and going, so it was decided to admit him.

I went back to the hotel to get assorted necessary stuff and returned to the hospital to stay over night with the patient. I found him in a single room, he had the bed and I had a much norrower bed, his was hard and mine was indescribably hard. The place was basic but spotless and the staff, some of whom were Nuns were so kind and helpful, some people could speak English, the Dr, a couple of the nurses and the Nun/ Head nurse (she may have been Matron), any one who couldnt speak English smiled a lot and tried to find someone who could.

I arrived at about 7pm, in the middle of the daily 1/2 hour power cut, sadly this power cut lasted till about 2 pm the next day. The Hospital had a small generator, but that was kept for emergencies, so the whole of Saturday night any nurse who appeared was carrying a large lamp torch and we were given a candle for the room. Thank goodness we had the windup torch with us.

Poor Brian had a very uncomfortable night, lots of pain, groaning and throwing up, he was on a drip and I had to keep trying to get him to drink water. Eventually a male nurse gave him some thing for the sickness and some knock out injection, so he did get some rest. The next day he felt very bruised, but improved as Sunday went on. We had a scan done on Sunday afternoon ( a taxi ride away at a scanning and diagnostics place. A bit of pain Sunday night and then very much better Monday morning. At this point it was decided that the stone must have come out and he was discharged.

Well, it hadnt come out and about 2 hours after we got back to the hotel, just I had come into our room with some lunch, Brian said ' I hate to say this, but the pain has come back'. We consulted with our fantastic landlord and the upshot was that about an hour later we set off on the tortuous 5 hour journey back to Kochi, heading for the large, modern Lakeshore hospital, where Suresh's brother in law had had the same problem treated. Here we are, an overnight stay in a reasonably comfortable A/C room and Brian is at this moment having xrays and discussing treatement. I have been emailing relatives and letting anyone else know via this blog. More news later.

Tess

Mountain Greenery (and monkeys)

We were awakened around 7am with scrambling on the roof, sort of lolloping noises, lots of creatures and then a little while later they were back. Monkeys I thought and later as we stood outside our hut watching some of the cornucopia of exotic birds we see all the time in India and young German confirmed that a raiding party of monkeys had attacked the hotel - some had entered his room and his banana was missing! They have obviously learnt that at that time people are still asleep and have balcony doors and windows left open.

We were sleeping in a small hut at the end of the hotel garden, over the wall is the wildlife reserve complete with water buffaloes (which we saw) but even some tigers and wild elephants (which we have not) but it is nice to look out on. Mind you we realised we were on the front line - not for tigers or monkeys - but for mosquitos and made sure the hotel mended some holes in the door screen and then had to use our bodge tape to repair their mosquito net. We slept fine until the monkey raiding party but have moved to a much better hotel - a lovely 3rd floor room at tree top level, a sweet breeze and gorgeous view and probably fewer mossies.

We are in Kumily, still in Kerela but up in the Western Ghats and right on the border with Tamil Nadu. We had the most extraordinary bus ride up here, actually two buses, a 6 hour journey in all that cost us all of one pound fifty each. The first bus was fine, took us to a large town south of Kochi from which we sought out the Kumily bus. We have discovered that timetables mean little, we had turned up at Kochi 45 minutes early and still missed our direct bus to Kumily so we (and two German girls travelling the same route) took local buses. We discovered that our final 110kms up to Kumily in the hills was to be on the most decrepit bus in the bus station and the driver started her up and drove like it was some kind of race, there were no straight stretches on the road and we roared around each corner. We all jammed ourselves against the side of the bus (I have a bruised elbow and shoulder and Tess has a sore bum - excuse the technical term) but actually it was a fascinating drive. We passed many places covered in bunting for one political party or another, loudspeaker vans driving up and down - its election time here. And then as we ascended the Ghats there were jaw dropping views (Tess did not look), the bus careering around corners. As we got higher the lush jungle suddenly gave way to a bright green landscape of pin cushions with a few tall trees growing among them - it looked like a sort of Telly Tubby land and we realised that this is a big tea planting area, it looked just like the packets of tea, lines of pickers working on the steep hillsides. There are also spice gardens everywhere and Kumily is filled with spice shops. Just down the road we came across a Cardomen wharehouse with lines of women chatting and sorting piles of seeds - it looked very sociable work.

Brian

Brian isn't quite right, I did look but was extremely thankful that he was on the side next to the drop, we had both wedged ourselves in the corner of seats on oposite sides of the ailse to preven the one on the outside of the seat form ending up on the floor, I am not kidding the driving was that frantic. Strangely, I didnt notice the uncomfortable seats so much, probably due to the fear factor.

I have turned into a right moany old bag. I got us our 400 r back at the hotel in Kochi for a non appearing but prepaid taxi. At the Coffee Inn, very good write up in Lonely Planet; I had to ask several times for the many rents in the bug mesh to be mended, complained that the room was dirty (which it was) and complained about the wildly over salted pasta sauce. I was told that the room was dusty because their machine was broken, when I pointed out that a damp duster would have done the trick the man went into full Basil Faulty style hotel management school performance and got very sulky.

As compensation for the rigours of the journey and not having had a proper meal yesterday we went to the most expensive hotel here "Spice Village" (we now overlook it from our balcony). It's one of those 'if you have to ask the price its not for you' places, but had a very good buffet super for a reasonable amount. The food was lovely and you could have gone round again and again, if you'd had the appetite and the nerve. We ate plenty, had a beer and watched some lovely Indian clasical dance and went home tired but happy.

Tess

Fort Cochin - fine as long as you don't move

Our second flight with Jet Airways from Mumbai to Kochi(Cochin) was as good as the first one - Mr O'Leary of Ryanair would no doubt not approve of the real cutlery, free food and excellent on the ground service. And the comfortable brand new budget airline terminal was great - and we enjoyed reading all the papers which without exception had the front page and much of the inside devoted to the success of Slumdog - plenty of good natured discussion on how British or Indian the film was but mostly they were celebrating the partnership and the success of their music man in particular. As we taxied out we passed one of those slums, hard against the airport perimeter wall, packed solid boxes of corrugated iron, wood and other building materials, not apparently an inch of space left - but presumably people were moving about in there (and being deafened by the jets).

Kochi is hot, I mean real sauna like, the taxi ride from the airport was fine and the ferry across to Fort Cochin was fun but as soon as we started walking into the town we realised that any movement leaves you wringing wet. We found a place to stay for two nights with AC and stood in front of the cool air until we had the strength to go outside again. It was dark and we noticed blue lights zooming up above the road and then floating down - we soon came across the boys selling 'Indian technology' - blue light on some kind of catapulted parachute, there is something every place we go!

After a stroll by the sea we had a meal in one of the road side places - this is a tiny place of small roads and full of Dutch, Portuguese, French, British and other foreign names and buildings, quite unlike anywhere else we have been - as you approach most eating places a whispered 'Wine? Beer?' greets you, and in the place we ate the beer was brought to us in a teaport and two mugs for drinking. On the bill we were charged for 'Special Tea'. They have no licence of course (and even the poshest place we stayed in Mt Abu went to lengths to disguise the availability of beer) but you might think that the presence of Kingfisher beer umbrellas and napkin holders might alert the local authorities to the prohibition breaking! Oh and on the adjacent tree an eagle sat and watched us ('Its our pet'). I should say its also an extremely friendly place and full of travellers, its another chill out place like Dahab only with a lot of Indians here as well - but chill out is hardly the right term when a nights sleep depends on a blast of the AC every few hours!

We have already told you of how we booked twice for our first flight on the way here. In fact we got Rifaq to take us out to the airport on the evening before we were due to fly to try to sort it out with the Kingfisher airline office. A young woman Garima (I think that is spelt correctly) checked our booking
'Here it is you are four people"
'No, we are two people but booked twice by accident, we need to cancel one booking. We need to then catch an afternoon flight to Kochi'
'But this is an evening flight, we have no morning flight, its 8.30pm not am'
You can imagine our crestfallen faces followed rapidly with a stream of invective against the web site not using the 24 hour clock - nor actually including the pm. Seeing our faces Garima sprang into action - I will help you, I will sort this out!
Then despite all the phone lines being down (like power cuts a constant problem) she got on her mobile for a long discussion and negotiation, culminating in a big thumbs up sign as she got both sets of now useless tickets cancellend for only a small fee. Then she went into the airport to the Jet Airlines check in desk and got us cheap seats on their flight in the morning - and all she asked was that Tess wrote a good comment - we would have struck a medal for her and given her the freedom of Cambridge we were that grateful! So Garima is front runner for the most helpful person we have yet met.

We are off for a short ferry ride to Vypeen Island and then up to a beach about 25km away shortly and are due to leave here in the morning for the mountains - a nature reserve where we will not need AC to survive!

Brian

From Mumbai Airport

This key board is very sticky, I am typing standing up, look on the bright side, it's a free connection
but it may have even more typos and spelling mistakes than ever!

Aurangabad was good. The hotel was basic but clean, with the most amusing loo. It had a very large sort of wing effect around the seat, ridged too, we thought it might have been an unsuccesful prototype of a combination squatter come western style toilet, regected because of health and safety issues.

We also had a lovely, safe, slow, cautious driver called Rifaq, he drove us about for 2 and a bit days and was so nice and helpful. Best of all his car was an old Ambassador, white and shining, bench seat at the front, some thing from the 50,s.

We saw the Ellora ansd Ajanta caves and they are just fantastic. I had never heard of them till we got here and as no one had properly described them I thoughtwe were coming a long way to see some caves ? They are better described as rock temples, carved out of cliff faces in the way that Petra is. Talk about impressive, we will up load some photos when we have an opportunity.

Ajanta caves are hughe and it was extreemly hot in the deep gorge in which they are situated, there are 30 caves, I saw about 7 and Brian made it round the whole lot. I sat in the shade and waited for him, between us we drank 2 l of water in about 2 hours!

Ellora caves are more easily accessible and much more exiting, they are so carved and decorated, just beautiful, with much more of the origional colour visible and one of the caves is actually a complete Jain Temple carved out of a cliff. Loads of Gods of all sorts and many live bats in the darker deeper recesses. My 50p torch from the Marks sale came in very handy.

Travel today much better, we left the hotel in the dark due to a 6am power cut, we had packed last night and had the wind up torch for room checking. No breakfast, hotel staff still asleep on their quilts in the lobby. Fortunatly the budget airline jet is fantastic and we had breakfast on the plane.


Tess

Aurangabad

We are in Aurangabad and this might be a short blog - power cuts a constant threat and even when you have power there are load sharing arrangements - good way to get you up is to cut off power to the ceiling fan at 6am! Its hot here and a fan is essential.

We had one of those great railway journeys you hope to forget on the way here from Mumbai. We know you like to hear that we are also suffering and this was suffering - we were on Sleeper Class, not AC and thought that would be OK as it was a 4.30 - 11.30pm ride not an overnight. It was in any case all we could get. But we could not have been more wrong, at the first stop in a Mumbai suburb loads of people swarmed into the carriage, some commuters and some longer distance travellers, any notion of seat or bunk booking went out the window (well there weren't windows there were metal bars). Tess looked out to see a face looking in - someone hanging on the outside! Well it might on paper have seemed like a shortish journey but on those hard seats with little padding and several extra people crammed onto the seat and up on the top bunk it seemed an age. Things got worse when India's version of Harold Steptoe arrived with two women (wife and daughter maybe) and started busying himself inserting them into non existent seating spaces and inserting his copious bags under seats - even chucking out other bags. When he started under our seat it only took about 10 loud Noes and Tessa's legs firmly in the way to convince him he was not going to move our bags as well. Mind you the way he got those women seated (and eventually on bunks) got space to lay out the evening meal was a sight to behold. We did not have seats together (the big problem of having Reservations Awaiting Confirmation we discovered) so sat togother anyway and then declined to shift for bunk putting down - Tess had the bunk but we would have had to shift an old couple and have me got back to shift the several people occupying my bunk space. So they hated us but had to wait until midnight when we and most of the train got off to get their final bunks down.

We decided that with the RAC status for our long trip down to Kochi that we had been overenthusiastic about the following days travel. We have a nice cheap hotel here with other travellers to chat to and we have already been to the stunning Ajanta Caves and will go to the Ellora Caves today. Tomorrow we fly out of here to Mumbai and then onto Kochi - arriving the day we would have in any case if we had taken the long train ride. We got our money back on the train tickets and have spent a good deal more on the flights - and the constant power outages meant we have managed to book ourselves on the first flight twice! Just as I was about to press Send the power went so with a loud OH NO! we started again - and how have two tickets each! Hopefully a visit to the airline might sort it out but its one of Indias' budget airlines so we might not get a refund - that will mean that power cut cost us 100 pounds.

Brian

Impressions of Mumbai

Brian enjoying the true backpacking experience at the Taj hotel.

We have bid a sad farewell to the Shahs, Sunaina struggled through horendous traffic last night to deliver us to the station for our overnight train to Mumbai. I had told Tess that when travelling in 1974 I noticed that I was always placed in sleeping compartments with 'suitable' fellow travellers. When we reached our compartment we met an elderly Indian lady with good English and then were joined by a man - our immediate discussion of the level of senior discount for train travel immediately identified us all as pensioners - and it turned out both the man and woman were visiting from the States - so we were a compartment formed of international pensioners! It seems our wedding in Ahbad made the local papers, when we mentioned we had been to a wedding the man said we might have been in the papers as he had read about it that day.

Across the ailse in the further two bunks were a young woman, her sister and a 1 and a half month baby - presumably on the basis that pensioners would look kindly on babies! The Indian rail system really in a marvel and this business of forming up suitable groups is just a further aspect of it.

You get perhaps half a nights sleep on the sleepers and we were in to Mumbai Central station before 7am - most passengers having left at an earlier station in the north of the city. At the station we discovered two things, they dont have tuk tuks here and they don't have the small stripey squirrels that have been dashing in and out of the corner of our sight ever since Delhi. What they do have is taxis - yellow and black ones, all exactly the same, old model Fiats I would guess and every one built maybe 25 years ago at least and perhaps delivered covered in bumps! As it was so early and we had to get to the other station to leave our bags (we leave on another train this afternoon) we took one of the taxis to discover that they were double parked on every street - too early for business and enough taxis for the whole of Asia by the look of it.

Depositing our two bags for the day took just about one hour! First our rucksacks were not acceptable without locks (how can you lock a multi-pocket rucksack?) so we were sent away. We discovered a stall selling small locks and set about fixing them to Tessa's pack whilst I used my cable and lock to bind up mine. So back we went. Now we had sticky lables wrapped around each of the locks and were sent away again - a vague wave across the station forecourt (this is the busiest station in Asia so for 'forecourt' you need to imagine a version of Hades), then we saw a xray machine and put our bags through - the man at the end then waving us away when we pointed to the Left Luggage. So back to the Left Luggage to be sent away again! We needed a signature from the man at the machine (well obviously - but why did he just sit there?) so back to him and then finally back to the left luggage where this time our bags were accepted, forms were completed and we were left to get out of the steamy station. Tess was meanwhile warning several other travellers of the process and sending them across the station to purchase locks.

So we wandered down to the Taj Mahal Palace hotel - the older part now closed after the attack of November, in fact we walked from one major site of the attacks, the CST station to the other one. The new part of the hotel is however open and after bag and body searches we entered the hushed and air conditioned splendour of those able to spend about 600 dollars per night. Our target was a quick wash and then a sumptious breakfast. The buffet breakfast has to be seen to be believed and we spent just about half our daily budget on filling up for the day! You could get used to the level of service mind, Tess wanted a stamp for a postcard and it was immediately taken away to be posted for her - mind you she did not wait for the change as that seemed out of place!

So eventually it was back out into the haze and humidity of Mumbai, a stroll around the Gate of India from which the British finally left in 1947 and then to a nearby internet cafe - although we were somewhat alarmed to see smoke pouring from every window of the first building of the street and then from every other building - including the internet cafe, a fearsome smoke machine was being used to fumigate everything for mosquitos. But we found this cyber place away from the fumes.

We taken another train this afternoon to Aurangabad arriving about midnight and tomorrow we will go to the Ellora Caves, we leave that night on another overnight train back here to Mumbai and then begin our 35 hour trip down to Kerala - we suspect we will have had enough of train travel by then and may end up regretting not flying. Our train this afternoon is not air conditioned either, it will be a case of hoping the open windows create enough breeze.

Brian

We went to a marvelous party!

Photo of the Shah's new house - designed by Snehel Shah

Well, it was two parties really; our hosts in Ahmedabad, Snehel and Sujata Shah asked us if we would like to go to part of the marriage celebrations of the daughter of Snehel's cousin. The Shah family is large and very close and there are many Uncles, Aunts and cousins.

Of course we were really delighted to be asked to join in the celebrations, it is marriage season here and we have seen and heard many wedding parties as we have traveled about, to see more at close quaters was a priviledge not to be missed. Also, because of our 'traveling light' policy it meant that the shopping embargo was well and truly broached, because we could not go to two wedding party evenings looking only slightly better than tramps (at least in the very well dressed context of an Indian wedding). Brian, as previously reported had a silk Kurta and a nice pair of white trousers made. I had bought some fabric in Udapuir and had that and some more fabric I bought in A'bad made into two 'Punjabi' suits (its what they call the top with split sides worn over trousers here). I needed two though Brian could get away with one outfit and his smartest Rohan trousers and shirt for evening no 1.

Evening one (for us, it was about evening 4 for the brides and grooms family) was an evening of music and dance put on by the Grooms family. We drove quite a long way out of A'bad to a sort of country club. There was a stage and the biggest buffet supper you can possibly imagine. The catering at these do's is on a very grand scale and so slick. Tables staffed with chaps who might be cooking rice pancakes or puris or chapati, others with heated serving dishes with about 5 varieties of different curry, salads, relishes, rice, dahls and some things like soups, bruchetta, pasta etc etc,all vegetarian all delicious. You go round with a huge plate and a spoon and are served small portions of everything and encouraged to go back for more of anything you really like and then there is pudding, at this event it was a very nice chocolate cake. As Jains are vegan and teetotal the drink is water, pepsi, fruit juice, Indian tea (spiced, sweet, with the milk already in it) or coffee.

After eating and talking the party all drift over to the seated area to watch the show, the gathering is of at least 400 people, all related to the bride or groom or very close friends. The show, lasting about three hours is a mixture of professional singers and musicians doing a mixture of film music and Indian oldies but goldies and younger members of the family (bride and groms age) who do dance routines and put on a cod quiz show called 'Perfect Partner' and based on 'Do you want to be a millionaire?' Everyone sings along to the oldies but goldies and the evening ends about 1.30am with dancing to the band. By about 10.30 its begining to get a little chilly so at the rear of the audience some braziers are lit and the old (and those who hadn't the forethought to bring a warm top) sit around them and talk.

Every woman at this event is dressed to tha 9's. Jewelery (real not costume) glitters on arms and ears and at throats. The gleam of high carrat gold is soft and luminous, red beads really are rubies and the earings have to be seen to be believed. Women are dressed in a variety of styles, saris of every hue you can immagine, punjabis, dresses with high waists and gored skirts worn over tight trousers (like the outfits you may have seen in Indian minature paintings), there are also Rhajestani style outfits of full skirt, tight blouse and a length of fabric sort of wrapped round the waist and up over the shoulders. Seqins glitter, gold and silver brocade falls in elegant folds, little girls skip about in pretty skirts and blouses and silver or gold sandles.

Many of the men have also put a lot of effort into their dress. Many wear Kurtas, some wild silk, some made of fantastic brocade in all sorts of colours, trousers are often quite theatricly baggy and of a different colour to the Kurta, almost everyone wears sandals.

The next day was the actual wedding ceremony. All the women had stepped up their outfits and the jewelery was even more dazzling, I really have never seen anything like the display put on by Indian women at a big wedding, they looked fabulous.

The bride arrives and is danced into the wedding ground by her family to the noise of a very loud band. The groom arrives in a car covered in flowers and they are both escorted in. The guests sit around the sacred area (where the priest conducts the ceremony) chatting, eating delicious snacks, listening to musicians playing traditional music while the ceremony carries on under the tent in the middle. The ceremony takes about an hour and a quarter and is quite complicated, ending up with the bride and groom being tied together with a red rope and then a pink scarf and doing 7 (I think) circuits of the sacred area, the groom leads for 4 times and the bride for 3, signifying that this is a partnership.

Then the bride leaves with her new husband and his family (she returns after an hour or so) the guests all mill about and talk. There are at least 750 people so there are plenty of people to talk to. Later the bride and groom come back, more friends and business associates arrive and the huge buffet is served. Much like the night before but more of it!! While guests are eating the bridal party sit on a dias and receive their guests, much shaking of hands, embracing and taking photos. The bridal party and their close family (100 or so people) sit down to eat at about nine, after everyone else has had the buffet.

We left at about 9.30pm, our hosts did not get back till midnight and they have the final function of the week long event this evening!

Sorry this is a bit long, hope you find it interesting,

Tess

I don't think I will ever forget the scene as we arrived. The band was in full pelt, the young men and women dancing - particularly the young men forming circles, hands in the air, gyrating, it was a complete thrill to be part of the accompanying throng moving towards the marriage ground.

There were some very touching points of the actual ceremony (Sujata had persuaded us to sit with the close family in the front row so whilst most of the guests sat further back enjoying chatting and the excellent Indian classical music Tess and I could have a very good view of the actual ceremony - with relatives explaining what was going on from time to time). Tess has mentioned the seven steps taken by the bride and groom, there was also the point at which the two fathers came forward, sat close facing each other and placed food in each others mouths signifying that the marriage was the joining of the two families and not just the two young people. The ceremony was conducted by the priest and two assistants with a complex series of symbolic acts involving fire, liquids, flowers etc and all the while the priest explaining to the groom and bride the significance of each act and how it provided guidance to them in their future lives.

Afterwards as the only non Indians there we were constantly approached - particularly by Indians who had lived in England - for a chat. The atmosphere was quite unlike any English gathering, the ability of Indians to explain exactly how they are related to each other is astounding - it made my head spin to try to keep track and I had to observe that the complete lack of alchohol was a definite advantage, just copious amounts of excellent food and trays of cold water brought to you every few minutes. We had many good discussions about India, its economic growth of which Gujartis are very proud - and of course of the success of Slumdog Millionaire about which they also take great pleasure! Two days we will certainly not forget!

Brian