So long, farewell

This was going to be called ‘Goodbye to Gurgaon’, but I don’t really want anything to be as final as goodbye, so this is more of a thank you for the memories. It has taken me so long to write this post I actually left Gurgaon 3 weeks ago and it is sadly my last day in India.

I’ve wanted to come to India for a long time and for one reason or another put it off because I didn’t have any one else to travel with and felt really nervous about coming here alone. I’m so pleased I finally came, and definitely glad it was for 3 months and not just a few weeks. I have definitely only scratched the surface of this incredible country, and if anything what I have seen of places has just made me create an itinerary in my mind for my next trip which would probably take me at least 9 months to complete, but I’ll probably need another sabbatical in a few years time.

It has never been more clear to me that people can make the most important difference to a place or an experience. I need to thank everyone who has taken part in this adventure with me......whether you have taken a starring role, supporting role, a small speaking part, a character who only returned for 3 episodes, or if you were simply an extra, I could not have done it with out you......hang on this isn’t an Oscars speech....but it has been a pleasure meeting most people (apart from Sachin and Susan who made me cry, but that’s another story)

There were definite feelings of horror and shock that Anna and I experienced moving into our apartment, being greeted by 19 stray dogs and 2 howling Alsatians, but that soon changed when we met the neighbours, Rathee,  Dev and Nitish! Not only were they helpful in any kind of advice about the building, the neighbourhood, or any ridiculous question we might have about India but we became really good friends. It has been really strange travelling on my own for the last few weeks and not going back to S block for a beer, a chat, some TV and dinner, or a weekend party with far too much Old Monk and an impromptu Karaoke session......but I think the less said about those the better.....

People have asked me frequently where my favourite place has been in India. I have loved lots of different places for different reasons, Chennai had the crazy atmosphere of the Ganesh festival, the river rituals in Varanasi felt very special, the Punjab experience was hilarious,  the Taj Mahal is stunningly beautiful, Shimla has a wonderfully calm atmosphere, isn’t too hot and the air is fresh. Delhi is vibrant and bonkers from the low hanging electrical wires on the back streets of Old Delhi, to the wonderful markets and the modern and lively bars and nightclubs of South Delhi, how do you pick a favourite? Oh and not forgetting the lazy beaches in Goa, the incredible Rock figures in the gardens at Chandigarh, the spiciest curry I have ever eaten in Bangalore, the magnificent fortresses of Jaipur, the lakeside blessings in Pushkar, beautiful stunning Udaipur.......

I could go on, but what I really want to say is Gurgaon had some of my best moments, and actually I can probably summarise it in a series of waves. I felt at home there, and the longer we were in the neighbourhood the more waves we received from the moustached tuk-tuk driver who was always at the end of the road. Tom and I had a couple of arguments about price with him early on, but by my last week he would wave at me then offer me a free ride home if he saw me in the village and was going in the same direction. Two of the little boys who worked in family restaurants on the main street would always wave as we walked through the village. The two men from ‘Discovery Wines’ – the English beer and wine shop, hated us when we first arrived, they were so grumpy, unhelpful and rude, waved at us from across the street even if we weren’t going in by mid November.

People in the village were really interested and open. From the guys in the village supermarket always asking how we were, to fellow customers at the juice bar who would stop to chat about where we were from, and what we were doing here in S block, at Abdullah’s juice bar. I am going to miss the 60p Thali in Suraj, our favourite restaurant. It’s not much to look at, and the resident lizard freaked me out a little to start with, but the food and staff were both great. I will miss Kathi Rolls and especially the green sauce that came in a miniature zip lock plastic bag to go with them. Despite asking a number of times no one could ever list the ingredients in English. I might try and recreate it when I get home, there was definitely some coriander, onion, lime, curd and chilli in it.

As I spend my last hours mooching around Mumbai I’ve been contemplating the lessons that India has left with me. Despite the craziness around you, and apparent difficulty there is a spirit of optimism and getting on with life, making a solution and  that in India everything is possible. In a country of 1.2 billion people life could get pretty tiresome without this attitude.

Final thoughts come from many of the students I spoke to at Literacy India. Despite a seemingly poor lifestyle, living in one room with 6 other family members the children were openly thankful to their parents for providing for them. They were satisfied with what they had and when I asked if they could live anywhere, in any kind of house, what would it be like many of them said “I like my house, I would live there”. The cynical side of me wonders if they were just saying that to me because they thought that was the right answer. A piece of me wonders if in a country of such extremes between rich and poor they are genuinely satisfied because they know how much worse it could be? Would I find the same answer if I spoke to children in a more affluent school? Will their aspirations change as they grow older and this country continues to grow and develop?

What I can tell you is that as I get ready for my flight to Australia I am sad to leave India, but massively excited to be reunited with my lovely Emma Morris. In 11 years of friendship we a have only once spent this long without seeing each other before, so it is ultimately with a smile that I get on that plane, but the last 3 months have been awesome, and I know I’ll be back.

I’ll leave you with a few photos of some of my favourite times!!

Golden Temples, Bull Carts and some new skills acquired......

I am going to try and be quick, because I realise my adoring fans are missing my adventures. I'm finding it hard to keep up because so much is happening on the road. I spent a few days last week in Amritsar. It is famed for its Golden Temple, home of the Sikh religion, I was told I would eat the best butter chicken there, and more alcohol is drunk in Punjab than any other Indian state. (I find it hard to believe given my experience of Gurgaon....but maybe that was the influence of  us Brits?!)

It''s close to the border with Pakistan where you can go to the Attari-Wagah border closing. A parade of fun, flags and the most impressive and passionate marching I have ever witnessed. These guys really put their heart and sole into stamping their feet, and can knock out a high kick that would put the National Ballet to shame!

It attracts a massive crowd and feels a bit like a sporting event. You can buy popcorn, there's a guy on the loud speaker getting the crowd excited, people are dancing on the sideline, with the same things going on at the Pakistan side as well. Then the marching starts and within about 10 minutes the flag for India and flag of Pakistan have been taken down and stowed in a safe place in their respective countries, the gates between the countries are closed and the whole thing is over. Weird and wonderful. 

The Golden Temple is beautiful and high lighted how little I knew about the Sikh religion......I'm still non the wiser. I sauntered round for ages taking in the sight, reading the prayers that were being displayed on the big screens in every corner, and being given free holy food, which tasted a bit like warm and sweet cous cous, but more dense...

The Hindus loved the Golden Temple so much that they built one too, exactly the same, known as the Silver Temple, but actually gold....I went to see it at night. They are remarkably similar...

However my highlight of Punjab was ‘the village experience’. Organised through Sandy, a guy working at my hostel, I went to a village 45 minutes drive outside of Amritsar to meet with one of his friends who is a farmer. There were also a South African couple at the village. From start to finish the whole thing was another surreal, but hilarious and incredible experience. 

We started off by meeting the whole family. Roop was the elder son,  and now in charge of running the farm. We met his mum  his 2 sisters, his brother, his uncle, his father and grandfather. They were an extremely warm family, and despite language differences they joked constantly and we laughed all afternoon. We met the neighbours, one of whom is 102 and still working in the fields of the farm, advising us his good health at that age is due to continued physical labour,  a vegetarian diet and the fresh air of the countryside. He may be on to something.

Warmly welcomed into the house we were given tea and snacks, vegetable pakora with a delicious sweet and spicy tamarind dipping sauce. The house was down a tiny little alley way, had a large outside courtyard, with a fire for cooking,  a day bed, where a vegetable preparation was taking place, and a covered out house. There were three rooms. We only saw the inside of one which had bare stone walls, a double bed and a set of 8 silver garden chairs. There was a cabinet in the corner which had a television  that reminds me of a black and white portable set mum had in the bedroom when we were kids. The final touch was an almighty sound system with 2 massive speakers, ready for pumping out some classic Punjab music later.

When we had finished the snacks we walked back up the alley to the cow shed and went out for a look round the fields on an old traditional bull cart. Whilst the farm does now have some modern machinery they keep a number of traditional methods, and continue to use things like the bull cart until they need replacing. 

Roop showed us the fields, some had wheat, mustard and feed for the cows growing in them. As we walked around d the fields Sandy and Roop tried to explain  the Indian game of Kabbadhi to me, and Yusuf the South African. When  other of us were still non the wiser they decided the best idea was to play a a game so we could experience it for ourselves. I thought they were joking when they suggested playing, but this was one thing that was clearly not a joke. My explanation  is that it’s a cross between wrestling and ‘tig’. You have 2 teams. We had 3 players on each team. One person in the attack heads towards the three defenders,  has to tap one of them then return to their team within 30 seconds. The defending team member who has been tapped tries to stop the other player getting back to their own team, usually by some kind of rugby tackling, or wrestling to the floor.  We played for a good half an hour and it was really fun, although I think they were playing without as much aggression as they would normally. 

Back on the cart and back to the farm house for more tea and a demonstration of how loud the sound system was....a quick lesson in Bangra dancing. Roop plugged his phone into the enormous speakers and blasted out some Punjabi dance music. The silver garden chairs were stacked to one side and the coffee table was moved out side into the courtyard to give us enough room,  as we were shown how to shake our hands, bend our knees and tap our feet in a traditional way. 

When we were all worn out and moving back towards the garden chairs to finish our tea the next activity commenced....Roop appeared out of one of the rooms with three lengths of brightly coloured fabric, it was time to learn how to wrap a traditional turban. We were given the special occasion cloth, brightly coloured and around 6 meters in length. Every day where for around the farm is black and around 2-3 meters, and if you’re at a really special occasion or some kind of holy man you could have over 9 meters to make a massive turban and show how important you are! I think it suits me....what do you think?

Keeping the turbans on we were walked back to the cow shed, for milking time. They were in fact buffalo, not cows, and pretty big. The milk is mostly used for the family, with any extra being sold locally in the village, so milking is low tech, and still done by hand. Of course today that turned out to be our job. After a calf was used to suckle the udder and get the milk flowing we were given a quick lesson in how to milk them. I was fairly useless to start with, probably because I was pretty frightened of sitting under a cow.....but I did get a bit better. The icing on the cake was Roop insisting that I try the milk squeezed freshly from the udder, I was not quite expect g it so quickly and actually ended up with it all over my face. It tasted just like milk, but was a bit too warm for my liking!

The Mighty Ganga, Cleansing to Cremation

Varanasi is one of the 7 very sacred and holy cities is in Hindisum.  Believed to be one of the oldest inhabited cities in the country its religious legacy dates back to the 6th century BC. It draws in thousands of pilgrims to wash in the holy waters of the mighty Ganga (Ganges to us Brits) or receive blessings in one of its many temples on a daily basis. Like many other Indian cities this also attracts a cacophony of touts, sellers, shop keepers, masseurs, 'tour guides', boat owners, or guys who can offer you all of the services above, whether this is a personal skill of theirs or their brother may own the boat, their sister can do the massage (and henna you at the same time) and their cousin owns a restaurant.....

Despite all this crazyness going on I liked the atmosphere in Varanasi. The Stops hostel where I stayed had a nice mixture of both international and Indian tourists. It was within walking distance of all the main sites, so I didn't have to spend so much time arguing with tuk tuk drivers over 20p, and the streets in the old city are so small you only have to avoid motor bikes. For every mad market stall there was a calm corner with people performing some kind of ritual, and generally minding their own business amidst the chaos.

The second stop on my flying solo tour and I was starting to feel brave. I'd survived the over night train journey on my own.....I mean travelling alone rarely means you're actually on your own.....The train was packed with hundreds of other people. I was in a sleeper carriage and their were 5 other ladies in the same compartment as me. They all worked really hard to make sure I was warm enough, had eaten enough (mostly of their food), knew how to set up the bed, and make it properly, had a tea in the morning, knew there was a 3 hour delay, advise me on the price I should pay getting from the station to the hostel and the bests temples to visit in Varanasi. Having dumped my stuff at the hostel I welcomed their offer of a street map, but declined their advice about needing a guide and set of to the ghats in search of.....myself of course. If I was going to find spiritual enlightenment I felt sure Varanasi would hold the key.

I shouldn't jest because it was actually quite an overwhelming experience. I should have found the river just 10 minutes from the hostel, but ended up in the middle of the markets. I wandered around for a while, took a chance on a few back streets, and found myself even further off the map. As I emerged back into another market, and still not seeing the flowing river, a little embarrassed asked someone 'I know it's one of the largest in the world, but I'm struggling to find it...can you tell me where the river is please?!'

Lucky, who owned a shop, and a boat, knew a masseur, and had an uncle who owned  a restaurant, kindly took me to the river! He pointed out lots of the different sites, named the different ghats and described to me the best times of day to a see different parts of the city. As we walked he pointed in the distance to the burning ghats, where cremation ceremonies take place, and asked if I wanted to walk there and take a closer look. He told me there were a group of volunteers who would show me round explaining the different rituals to me. I was a bit unsure really, I said I would like to go a little closer, but it felt a bit intrusive to have a tour of a such a personal, family ceremony.

However, and this seems to becoming a running theme, before I knew it I was chatting to one of the volunteers who was striding towards a burning body, assuring me the family didn't mind me being there as he launched into his full explanation. A ghat is simply a set of riverfront steps that lead down to the river. Most of them are used for bathing, or puja blessing, and there are 2 used exclusively for cremation. You are cremated at a different level depending on the caste you are from, and how much you can afford to pay for the cremation. As we walked further into the ghat I could see two bodies burning at the lower levels, and another in the middle. They are wrapped in cloth, and lying on a bamboo stretcher, but it is really clear they are people. I could see the cheek of one of the men lying there, as some of the fabric had started to burn loose around his face. I couldn't help but cry as I watched the male members of his family praying around him, even though I knew nothing about him.

It is a surreal experience. By the waters edge people are bathing. Mostly in preparation for attending a funeral themselves. It is customary for those attending the cremation to bathe in the Ganges first, followed by a hair cut and shaving in a small barbers just behind the burning ghat. The bodies are wrapped in different colours depending on what gender they are, red for a young woman, gold for an older married woman, and white for a man. The stretcher is then carried by the men through the back streets and to the river. Wood is weighed and purchased for the fire. It takes about 120kg to burn one body, and 1kg of the cheaper Banyan wood is 650 rupees (£6.50). The higher castes go for the more expensive with Sandalwood costing 2000 rupees per kg. Women are not allowed to attend the cremations, particularly of fathers or husbands. This is because they are likely to cry so hysterically they will disturb others, or become so hysterical they will jump on the fire with the body. I could kind of understand the logic as I sobbed my way into the temple that contained the fire.

None of the cremation fires are started with matches or a lighter. There is a small temple that contains a fire that was lit by Shiva. The fire has been burning for 3500 years, and will never be allowed to go out. It is surrounded by Sadhus tending to the fire and praying for the families. Each family takes a long sheath of dry reeds, or grass and a few small coals from Shiva's fire are placed in them to start the fire burning.

Coming out of the fire temple underneath a pile of firewood were a litter of puppies. It's not unusual to see stray puppies in India, but felt quite moving to see them sheltering in this area so focused on sorrow, and death. I finished my tour and was taken back to meet Lucky, he took me to the Blue Lassi shop....another tourist must, and just like that it's back to being a regular tourist....

The following morning I took a sunrise boat ride up the river, seeing a totally different side to the life of the river. From early morning there are holy rituals, praying and blessing. There are constantly people, especially at the waters edge bathing and cleansing themselves in the name of Shiva, Brahma, Vishnu, or one of the many other Hindu gods. Candles are burnt and sent floating into the water to bring luck and happiness to those who light them. There are several 'Dhobi
Ghats' dedicated to clothes washing. It's hard to believe that you could clean laundry in a place with so many humans and animals bathing, and ashes floating past, but the Dhobi ghats smell really clean! I strolled for hours by the water, watching people and drinking chai.