India – From Pyrenees to Pennines

Indian Friday: Sri Balaji Hospital, Chennai

My diary, revived from my trip to India back in 2007. Only this bit isn’t my diary. It’s the notes I wrote back home: because diary writing, even if I’d been well enough, would never have been permitted during my hospital stay. Lie back and get better!

Sri Balaji Hospital, Chennai

3rd – 8th December

What picture have you got of an Indian Hospital? I bet it’s wrong. My ward at Sri Balaji Hospital resembled pretty much any hospital ward in an older-style British hospital that you may have come across – only cleaner. It sparkled with clean paint, fresh blue and white candy-striped sheets and general good order. 4 beds in my ward, with 2 nurses by night and 6 by day, all in a smart white jacket and trousers uniform. The nurses, being Tamil, are of quite astonishing physical beauty: I really couldn’t take my eyes of ‘my’ night nurse, Jhoti, whose loveliness extended to her personality. They appeared equally taken with me, and would pat and stroke me, or chuck me under the chin at the least provocation. As I started to get better, they amused themselves teaching me Tamil. With one exception, they didn’t speak much English, but what they did know, they’d learnt at Nursing School. Phrases like ‘Go to the toilet’/’Use the bathroom’ etc. were not understood, until light dawned. ‘Ah! You want pass urine?’

Besides nurses there were:
– nice ladies in saris who appeared to fulfil some kind of auxiliary role.
– doctors – lots.
– men in blue jackets and trousers who seemed to be gophers, called Ward Boys.
– men in brown ditto- porters.

Dili and friends, the Ward Boys at Sri Balaji Hospital

The night nurses did 12 hour shifts and before you feel too sorry for them, they told me that when doing night shift, they work just 10 nights a month.

Medication and tests of all kinds flowed freely – they make the French look amateurs.

No TV, no radio, no nice ladies from the WRVS dispensing sweets, newspapers and library books. No getting up either. You lie in bed until you’re good and better, and meanwhile you do nothing. I was caught attempting to wash on my last day, and was chivvied back to bed and given a bed bath.

The biggest surprise to me was that the wards were mixed-sex. In a country where (at that time at least) it would have been a monumental faux pas for me to have sat down next to a man on a bus, that seemed to me astonishing.

At visiting time, those of us without visitors did not go without attention. Dozens of noses were pressed against the glass wall of the ward as curious onlookers gave us all the once-over. I felt a bit like an inmate of Bedlam in the 18th century.

After 5 days, I was deemed well enough to go home, though I was still feeling pretty ropey. I knew insurance would pay up eventually, but I was terrified at what the bill might be for my stay in hospital, and they woudn’t let me go till I paid up. Would there be enough money in our account? It turned out to be … just a little over £30.00…

Incidentally, the insurance company DID cut up rough. Why hadn’t I rung them to tell them of my indisposition? Well, lots of reasons actually. I was far too ill for such a thing to have entered my head. And on my first day in hospital, because the only phone available was that used by all the doctors and nurses on the ward, I was permitted to make just one call. So I didn’t even ring Malcolm, who was in transit from France to England. It was my son in London whom I called, and he had to contact anyone who needed to know (no, he didn’t ring the insurance company either). I have no idea who took it upon themselves to change my flights, but it wasn’t me. Instead of a direct flight, I had an internal flight to Bangalore, and then a dreadful wait from about midnight to 4.00 a.m. with nowhere to wait but a gloomy hall with no seating, clinging on to my luggage before my connecting journey to London.

And then it was over. We were back in England for a short while before we returned to France. I was by no means the full shilling for a while. Malcolm said I hardly uttered a word for days and days …

My featured photo shows the view from my hospital bed.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is it. My Indian diary. Next week we’ll go to Bradford, where, to ease us gently back to the UK, my post will have at least some Indian connections.

Indian Friday: In Which I Make My Escape

My diary, revived from my trip to India back in 2007. This second part details my solo travels during the last three weeks or so. From now on, increasingly exhausted, my entries become terser and frustratingly light on detail.

In Which I Make My Escape

Sunday 2nd December

Night came and endless hours of listening to traffic and my fellow guests noisily throat-clearing and spitting. I dreaded hanging around till 9.00 a.m. to go out with Y and her driver, being driven around and cramming in three Sites of Interest before 4 o’clock, when I’d be free to … return to the hotel. So at 6.30 I got up, wrote a note excusing myself, delivered it to Y’s house. and got a rickshaw to the Bus Stand. I knew I was being rude, but I was at the end of my tether and beyond caring.

It’s not easy when at the Bus Stand, 3 different people give you 3 different bus numbers, and 3 different stops, and the bus destinations are only in Tamil script, but I was determined to get to my intended destinaton, Mamallapuram, good and early. Chaotic Chennai traffic eventually gave way to palm trees, lagoons, and views of the sea, Finally I was happy.

Mamallapuram struck me as a more congenial place to be. Small seaside town , albeit touristy, With Added Culture. It’s a World Heritage Site with fantastic temple architecture and sculpture. I knew it dated from the 7th and 8th centuries CE, that it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and features intricate stone carvings scattered over a wide area, mainly the beach.

Beach at Mamallapuram with the Shore Temple in the background

Walking down the street, I suddenly thought ‘I don’t HAVE to go back to Chennai tonight’. The first hotel I called at had a room for a mere RS 200, monastically simple, but clean. Outside my room is a shady courtyard, and as I started to talk about Chennai to the American tourist relaxing there, I just burst into tears. I didn’t know just how badly the noise had been affecting me, but I DID know that once I’d decided to stay here, a weight fell from me, and I’ve bounded around feeling I’ve got out of jail free. And of course I only went there in the first place to CouchSurf, which didn’t happen, for reasons that aren’t altogether clear to me.

I sauntered round being a tourist, getting a coffee on a roof terraced cafe, and in a fairly low-key way enjoyed the sculpture all over the place from the beach to sites at the end of town. In among are extraordinary boulders balancing precariously in the manner of Brimham rocks.

I had a salad lunch at an Indo-French cafe before returning to the beach and its treasures. At one destination, I found I’d made the huge mistake of arriving at the same time as 12 coaches worth of local university students. I couldn’t help comparing them with Emily and friends, in the unlikely event that their university course leaders, at her – or any other English seat of learning – would bring upwards of 200 students out on a Sunday afternoon to Do Culture. Instead of distressed jeans, subversive T Shirts and Attitude, the girls were sweetly young, quietly standing in pairs separately from the equally demure young male students. Luckily for me they were all made to wait outside quietly until long after I’d been and gone. Most people seemed to be there to have pictures of themselves and their families taken in front of the more famous sculptures, such as the life-sized elephant, so it was all a bit of a challenge, if entertaining.

I’ll go back to Chennai at the last possible moment to check out of the hell-hole and go to the airport. Luckily there are loads of opportunities to shop here, and I had some fun souvenir shopping – until I came to pay. For some reason, my card has apparently been blocked, which saves money, but could be awkward tomorrow….. Mal rang the bank for me and they say there is no problem, so let’s see.

But I’ve bought a toothbrush for tonight. Sorted. Later, I had a not very exciting meal in the rooftop restaurant above my hotel – in a powercut. My companion was an American/German woman flying home tonight, but she was a bit of a misery. In bed now, writing this, since I couldn’t get to sleep. And actually, I don’t feel very well….

Indian Friday: Sightseeing in Chennai

Sightseeing in Chennai

Saturday 1st December.

Got up. What else could I do? Pounded the area looking unsuccessfully for hotels. Went over to Y’s house – she was out at a school meeting, but we eventually set off at about 10.30. Every few minutes she would stop the car at ‘point of view’ and commanded me and my camera to ‘Take this!’ So we saw the English Church of the Naval Base – surprisingly early – the 1600s.

And at various points on the seashore where we’d stop for half a minute ‘Take this! Take this!’

We ended up in an Indian vegetarian cafe, the expensive bit upstairs, where I bought her a – quite nice – lunch.

Then ever onwards. Various sights on the beach again, then the Theosophical Society Gardens which was a wonderful green lung. It was interesting to see the 400 year old Banyan tree whose main trunk had gone but which had endless ‘babies’ spread over a very wide area.

And back to base at 4.30. I’d hoped to take a nap (though I don’t ‘do’ daytime sleep) but it was impossible – noise again. So I got up and rang and emailed loads of hotel – none with vacancies.

Then at 8.30, over to Y’s for a dry and pretty nasty mac cheese, and so to bed, perchance not to sleep. Y had rung the hotel who promised me a room away from the road tomorrow.

The building in my featured photo is I think the Ice House, which we didn’t visit. What interested me was the group of boys playing cricket. Such groups were everywhere, but not once was I instructed to take a shot of them. So it was quite hard to steal a moment to do so.

Indian Friday: The Bus to Chennai, and Hello Chennai!

My diary, revived from my trip to India back in 2007. This second part details my solo travels during the last three weeks or so.

The Bus to Chennai, and Hello Chennai!

Friday 30th November, and just a little bit of Saturday 1st December.

Today I couldn’t face an Indian breakfast, which is unusual for me, so I went to buy the jacket I’d been looking at for a couple of days and then to Hot Bread for breakfast. Final packing, and another massage from Lakshmi, who is of course very beautiful. She says she can say the days of the week, and times, and ‘please’ and ‘thank you’, so our communication was limited. A flurry of ‘Goodbyes’- Pascale it seems can speak Italian so we had a chat and he said how much better my Italian was than my French (Unsurprising. At that point we’d been living in France for a month). Balu got me a rick to the station and negotiated the price – RS. 30.

The bus was the sort you see in all the pictures. Unglazed windows with bars across, and an engine that had probably been put together c.1953. If the coach were a human body, you’d probably call it ‘lived in’. As it was in fact a bus, I’d say it had demonstrated a long history of near misses. Oh, and it may not have been cleaned since 1953 either. But the big excitement was a motorway. Well, perhaps not a motorway, but a toll road anyway, with dual carriageway, a hard shoulder and a central reservation. The road surface was indifferent, but so superior to anything I’ve previously met here that I can understand why everyone told me it was a fast road to Chennai. Anyway.

2 lanes doesn’t mean slow and fast. Everyone uses both lanes indiscriminately and over or undertakes at will.
Goats use the ‘fast’ lane.
Cows use the central reservation.
Bicycles going the opposite way to the prevailing traffic use the hard shoulder. As do pedestrians,
Men pushing handcarts use the main highway.
The hard shoulder is also for bus stops.
There are zebra crossings. God knows why, nobody ever uses them.
Pedestrians cross whenever they want to. Not at the zebras, obviously.

So I was vastly cheered to reach the outskirts of Chennai a whole hour ahead of schedule. I was immediately seized upon by a rick driver who suggested RS. 250. Ha! Mind you, I never got him below Rs. 150. He said he was helping me, which meant that he took the wheelie case, me the rucksac.

I didn’t realise what a chaotic city Chennai is. It makes Bangalore look like a market town. Busy busy busy with chaotic housing and business districts jumbled together with shanty towns and piles of uncollected rubbish. I thought I’d got used to all that, but this was in a different league, especially after Pondicherry.

My CouchSurfing host (‘Call me Y…y’) plans to spend the weekend with me, but said she can’t after all put me up. So she booked me into a local hotel, the only one in the area. The Manager and I immediately fell out when he first of all denied the booking, then I declined to pay 3 days’ money up front, and it’s gone on from there really. I rang Y and walked to her house which is very close and met her sister and parents. She said there were no other hotels and she would ring and sort it out. So I reluctantly agreed to go back.

After a short rest I went over to Y’s. I’m not sure why I can’t stay, especially as I’m obviously unhappy. The excuses seem a bit specious. Anyway, I helped her make supper, masala dhosa, chatted a bit, then came back to the hotel. I had to get up at 2 a.m to ask the manager to turn down his Bollywood DVD he was whiling away the night with, and the traffic and hotel clamour began well before 5.00 a.m. Men loudly throat-clearing and spitting. Bring back the Call to Prayer! I complained about the shower, because I’ve stopped being nice (Response: ‘Well, is there water there or not? Yes? Well then!’).

I’ve been stomping round the area looking for another hotel, but it’s true, there isn’t one, good, bad or indifferent (indifferent would do). We’re meeting at 10 ish, to spend the day exploring Chennai, and tomorrow is action packed too. Monday shopping, then hit the airport early for a 4.00 a.m. flight home. Think I’ll go and see what I can find for breakfast: it’s only 8.30, but I’ve been around a long time today already.

Indian Friday: A Lazy yet Busy Day in Pondicherry

My diary, revived from my trip to India back in 2007. This second part details my solo travels during the last three weeks or so.

A Lazy yet Busy Day in Pondicherry

Wednesday 28th November.

Well, up early, but not bright and early. I wrote cards and had breakfast on the balcony, then waited to talk to Cristelle and ask her advice about shopping and a masseuse. She offered to help, and together with another French guest we sped off on her motorcycle.

This isn’t us on Cristelle’s motorcycle of course, but some schoolgirls spotted earlier. The featured photo shows the scene outside their school gates before morning school.

In a shop with bedspreads, she knocked the owner’s price down a bit but was still quite critical of it. She took me on to somewhere else where I also ended up buying things. By the way, I’ve changed to a downstairs room now.

A quick lunch at @ Coffee.com (slice of cake and a lime soda) and then back for a massage with Lakshmi, whom Cristelle had booked for me at a price of Rs. 200. Cristelle had forgotten to tell me to supply oils, so my precious supply of sandalwood oil from Mysore is all gone. Still, it was interesting and I enjoyed it. Then off to arrange postage home of my purchases, buy massage oil, and find somewhere to eat.

France in India. Once, the Public Works Department; a high school; and policemen sporting képis.

Before that though, I went to the beach. Le tout Pondicherry was out walking there, so there was a convivial atmosphere – families, couples, old, young.

But the restaurant mentioned in the Rough Guide, La Coromandale, was horrible. Dirty- you needed wellies in the toilets, and the fact that only Europeans and not one local eating there was, I thought, telling. I really couldn’t be bothered to trail over to the Indian part of town, so I thought I would have to settle for European. But Rendez-vous was wonderful! Flunkeys at the door, certainly, but a busy happy atmosphere of the roof terrace, and a good mix of locals and Europeans. There was a big menu, but the Indian choices looked good, and my meal was sensationally good. A simple lentil and spinach curry, but so fresh and zingy. It may well be one of the best curries I’ve ever eaten. And I had my first alcohol in India – a beer, which really hit the spot.

I finished the day, as ever, at the great Internet point round the corner with the lovely geeky guy who helps me upload my CD with the pictures on.

Nowhere in my diary did I seem to mention my visiting the Catholic Church of the Sacred Heart, very near where I was staying. I don’t know why, as I was impressed. It was like a rather superior English Gothic Revival parish church, but in Glorious Technicolor.

Indian Friday: Farewell Thanjavur, Hello Pondicherry

My diary, revived from my trip to India back in 2007. This second part details my solo travels during the last three weeks or so.

Farewell Thanjavur, Hello Pondicherry

Monday 26th November

Rang Le Rêve Bleu and found they could take me tonight, but only in their more expensive suite. I said my ‘Goodbye and thank you’ to Gwen and took a rick to the New Bus Station. The loos there were – characterful – with no individual stalls at all. I was passed from pillar to post in search of a bus to Chidambaram, but finally established it was the oldest bus on the stand. With my luggage, I had to sit in the front seat: prime location for spotting all the near misses. It was all very slow – a 20 minute wait at Kumbakonam so it’s no wonder it took over 4 ½ hours. But still, only RS. 39. At Chidambaram I needed a pee and was a bit hungry (the railway cashews and some of the bunch of bananas I’d bought at the bus stand had been lunch). I went to a nearby cafe, and established , with no common language available, that sweet lime was made with tap water but orange was not, so I ordered orange. When it came, it tasted of orange, though it was very pale. But when the bill came … it was for sweet lime. Aaagh!

Views from the bus window en route

I had a really modern bus to Pondicherry, with Bollywood DVDs on constantly. But I had again to sit in the front, with my back against the front window, with the driver constantly shouting at me for obscuring his nearside window. It was hard not to.

The scenery became more and more what I imagined Kerala would be like on the coast. Very flat, lots of lagoons and lakes, palm trees, palm-thatched low cottages.

First view of the coast on the road to Pondicherry

Anyway, we got there, and I got a rick to Le Rêve Bleu. I couldn’t negotiate the fare very well, as I had no idea how far it was, but I turned out to have been charged a Right Royal Rip Off (RS 75, so under £, so no moaning please!).

View from my widow in Le Rêve Bleu

Le Rêve Bleu is a lovely, slightly seedy but French colonial style house, where I was greeted by a French speaking Tamil, who rang the owner, Christelle, who insisted on speaking to me on my mobile to welcome me.

I had a trot round town and ended up at an Internet cafe where one could also eat: mushroom pasta, but quite nice actually. And so to bed.

In the night:

The street cleaners sit in the road and have a nice loud chat in the middle of the road outside le Reve Bleu at midnight

Women street cleaners all chatting jovially to one another whilst working almost a street apart from one another.
9 dogs involved in a street fight, just too far away for me to take any action.
Builders renovating the house opposite arrived at 6.30 a.m. and started noisily manoeuvering bricks off a lorry while shouting merrily at each other. Some, by the way, were women.

Indian Friday: Couchsurfing

Today, for one week only, I am abandoning my diary in favour of a piece I wrote just after I had left Thanjavur. I do sound a bit smug, I know. But I stand by every word I wrote then. My time in Thanjavur still stands as one of the highlights of my Indian journey. I’ve nearly used up any appropriate Thanjavur photos though. So there is just one shot today of a building I forgot to label at the time, a sad ruin of what it must have been, But red enough for #SimplyRed.

Couchsurfing

The following is an unsolicited testimonial for CouchSurfing. No money has changed hands in the production of this advert!

In case you don’t CouchSurfing is an online community in which travellers offer hospitality, and make use of hospitality offered while on the road. It’s based on the premise that this makes travelling more affordable, but more importantly, gives travellers the opportunity to experience the community they’re visiting at first hand, rather than in the somewhat detached way hotels and so forth can offer

That was a bit of a long lead in ….

In Thanjavur I stayed with Gwen, an American doing post-graduate research at the University there. We’d exchanged emails over a month or two, so she didn’t feel like a stranger when I met her. She gave me a wonderful welcome and time with her, so I wanted to treat her on our last evening together. She asked to eat at the best hotel in town, as she’s heard the food was good, and as a student of modest means, it was she thought, beyond her reach. Good idea.

A we passed through reception, we might as well have shown our passports. Thanjavur disappeared from sight to be replaced by marble walls and floors, corporate decoration, and uniformed staff of the kind that usually frequent these places. Where were we? Birmingham? Milan? Dubai? Mumbai? Who knows? And so into the restaurant, where we pulled our dupattas tight round our shoulders to combat the cold of the air conditioning. Consulted the menu (Indian, Chinese and European) and ordered our meal. Got talking to the English couple next to us as they finished their chicken and chips. They turned out to be on an organised tour, and it looked as though their time was spoken for. They were enjoying it, but were scurrying along at the pace set by the demands of the tour, with no opportunity to go off on any tangents, and certainly no opportunity to meet local people on their own territory.

Compare my time in Thanjavur with theirs. Gwen’s American, certainly, but she’s made it her business to be part of the community she lives in. She’s learnt fluent Tamil, so has good relationships with her neighbours. So while there, I had the chance to mooch round and enjoy with her the rangoli decorations and lights put out at night for a Hindu Festival of Light (not Diwali, yet another one). I met the neighbours and was invited into their homes. Narrowly avoided a big faux pas in one. Invited to sit down, I nearly plonked myself in the nearest vacant place on a sofa. Recovered myself in time and did not sit there, next to the husband, but squeezed onto the other sofa, with the women. Gwen said it would have seemed very odd to them if I hadn’t remembered in time. Chatted to another neighbour, a Christian, who explained that she liked to keep the Hindu festivals too, and showed us her Hindu decorations taking their place alongside her pictures of the Pope.

I ran errands for Gwen, and in that way had several language-less conversations in the food market, where everyone was keen to shake my hand, because tourists in Thanjavur don’t generally go and buy half a kilo of carrots.

We zipped round on her scooter and bought takeaways. We caught local buses together and visited temples. We had meals in local cafés. I wandered round her neighbourhood when she wasn’t there, and saw a small community going about its day-to-day business.

I was woken in the morning to local sounds (actually I was invariably awake anyway, I don’t do sleep in India); the Muslim Call to Prayer transmitted by loud microphone at, erm, 5.30 a.m. The church bells ringing a few minutes after that (20 % Muslim and Christian communities here). The street hawkers who kick in at about 6.45. The day-today noise which seems to begin so early in Indian communities.

And of course it was interesting to talk to Gwen, who knew exactly what I would be finding difficult, and could guess what assumptions I might be making. Gave me a quick Tamil lesson, and more importantly a gesture one (‘Yes’ and ‘No’ aren’t the same here, I learned rather late in the day). She’s much the same age as Tom and Ellie, but that didn’t seem to matter – it didn’t to me, anyway.

And I saved money, though that wasn’t my motivation. I tried to make sure I didn’t cost Gwen anything. So what did our new English acquaintances gain from their corporate type hotel? A thicker mattress maybe. Constant hot water possibly (doesn’t really happen in India). I’m willing to bet I had loads more fun. Oh, and by the way, the meal wasn’t that good, and cost exactly 9 times as much as the meal we’d had at lunch time in a local cafe.

Indian Friday: In which Gwen is my Tour Leader for the Day.

My diary, revived from my trip to India back in 2007. This second part details my solo travels during the last three weeks or so.

In which Gwen is my Tour Leader for the Day

Sunday 25th November.

Up, and early breakfast, then took the scooter to New Bus Stand to get the bus for Kumbakonam- the 1 ½ hour journey for 2 of us cost Rs. 30.

Kumbakonam, a not exactly enormous town, has 18 – eighteen – temples. We saw 3. The first, Sarangapani is dedicated to Vishnu, and boasts a temple elephant, who for a small sum, blessed us both. We were much bothered by the monks and so on, but the carvings were magnificent and we did a little shopping too. Lots of the statues are painted here, unlike those in Thanjavur.

Kumbeshwara, the Shiva temple, was exquisite, with very fine and detailed carving.

The Nageshwara temple was not unlike the first one.Then we went and watched some bronze casters at work using the lost wax technique, and Gwen nearly bought one.

But lunch called and a hard hunt eventually found us a not bad spit-and sawdust lunch. Then the bus to Dharasuram. Again, the temple here is superb. Wonderful rows of miniature and not-so miniature sculptures, But the pavings were so hot. Really uncomfortable. Because of course, on holy ground, our feet were bare. It was great – we thought – that the sculpture was unpainted. But talk about sculpture to excess! No surface was unadorned.

On the way back to the bus we came across a park: and this friendly bunch, thrilled that Gwen could chat to them in Tamil.

Then we hunted for the loo and caught a bus home. We sat at the front, and Gwen saw someone be sick out of the window. It was that sort of journey.

I’m sorry my entry for this busy day, full of new experiences, was so brief. We went out for the evening (more about that next week) and I must just have been too tired to write more.

And I hope you worked out that my featured photo is today’s offering for #SimplyRed.

Indian Friday: A Tourist in Thanjavur

My diary, revived from my trip to India back in 2007. This second part details my solo travels during the last three weeks or so.

A Tourist in Thanjavur

Saturday 24th November

Up betimes and off. Why wouldn’t I be up early when I’d been woken by the Call to Prayer from the mosque at 5.30 a.m.?

The view from my window as I got myself organised for the day.

Gwen had told me how to get to the bus stop, so I did, and got on a bus and asked for ‘Temple’. Though he indicated he didn’t go there, he didn’t turn me off, so I wasn’t concerned, as Thanjavur isn’t a big town. However … we fetched up at the New Bus Stand, miles out. Nobody spoke English, so I chose the most built-up road, and headed, I hoped, into town. It soon petered out. I had no choice but to go back, pick on the local part of the bus stand, wait for a bus and ask any prospective passenger if it was going to the temple. Luckily it worked, and soon I was there.

It was a wonderful place. Exquisite carvings, a lovely atmosphere and I even got a good guide, so I happily spent a couple of hours there. Then the bank. It’s just chaos. Luckily I didn’t have to queue, but I still had to wait 20 minutes white a bored functionary filled in endless forms and passed me along the line to get my money.

Bank of India Thanjavur. This shot was taken VERY surreptitiously because there were attentive guards with real guns. Needless to say, they are not in shot!

A walk along Ghandiji Road (I was able to check because of the presence of a Ghandi statue); lunch at a great cafe; an hour on the internet, then back to the Palace Museum. What a dump. Dusty, unkempt, piles of rubbish everywhere, long unmown grass. But worst of all, a ‘guide’ who had the most rudimentary English attached himself to me, and I couldn’t shift him. So I didn’t go and see the Chola bronzes, the most interesting part. He also took me to a shop, which I fled from, though later I found another, with quite lovely things.

I walked back to the centre making friends with two stall holders in the outdoor market who wanted pictures sending on. Then shopping there for Gwen – very friendly people with no English who wanted to know my name, shook my hand and generally made me welcome. They laughed when I proffered Rs. 70 (under £1) for my purchases. They wanted Rs 7. Oil laps everywhere because of the Festival.

A rick home then a tour of the district on foot with Gwen to see the rangoli decorations lit with candles outside each house. It was all very attractive, and everyone was out and about admiring each other’s lights.

*Street decorations, Thanjavur. And this one’s squared to qualify for Becky’s #SimplyRed.*

We went into two of her friends’ houses and sat down. I nearly boobed in one by all-but sitting down in the easiest spare place – next to the husband. That would have been a real faux pas! The home was very sparsely furnished: these people are young academics. Gwen says two bedrooms are more than enough as families generally all sleep in the same room.

We made pasta sauce, ate… and so to bed.

The fearured photo of Brihadishvara Temple is from Unsplash, by Avin CP.

PS. One of today’s suggested tags courtesy of AI is ‘Fiction’. Really. This is not fiction.

Indian Friday: Hello Thanjavur!

My diary, revived from my trip to India back in 2007. This second part details my solo travels during the last three weeks or so.

I should explain. These next few entries cover the time when I stayed with a young American academic. I’d linked up with her through Couchsurfing, an organisation that enables travellers to stay with locals with a view to getting more of an insight into the local community than the average tourist does. Gwen was the only person who contacted me in Thanjavur, and I was a bit reluctant. An American in India? How wrong I was. As you’ll find out.

Hello Thanjavur!

Friday 23rd November.

5.00 a.m. The station was heaving with life! Such a surprise. But it was a bit too dark and gloomy to read, so off to the booking hall. What a party! Well, no, not actually.- just a score or so of boys and men sitting in convivial groups on the ground collating the day’s newspapers. This took most of the time till 7.00 when Gwen arrived … on her motor scooter.

In fluent Tamil, she negotiated me a rickshaw and off we went. And at her flat, she gave me breakfast and the first decent cup of coffee of the holiday. I really like her. She’s lots of fun, and at the same time, very committed to her archaeological studies.

Towards 10.00, we hopped on her scooter and she gave me a lift into town, dropping me off at the Chola Temple. What a place! Magnificent multi-sculpted edifices – several separate temples all on the same site. I just explored for a long time. Then I mooched round town. I can cope with this one. It has a shape I can follow, though the streets are familiar now. Internet cafe, then a hunt for lunch. No language passed between us, but I got my rectangle of banana leaf, my choice of rice, and helping after helping of the various sauces dumped onto the rice. They went out and got me bottled water as I indicated I wouldn’t have that in the jug. All for about 10 bob (50 p in new money) and ½ of that was the water.

Eventually, I found a bank: a chaotic jumble of customers, with areas of desks all over the place behind which sat officials and their untidy piles of files. More dusty files in dusty metal cupboards, and for me, no sense at all of what happens where. I was shunted to three different places and told eventually to come back tomorrow.

Back to the temple and a rickshaw home. Gwen took me out to get a take-away – a ‘parcel meal’, which was indeed neatly parcelled with cotton and cost Rs.65. Lots of talking …and so to bed.

And so today’s Square for Becky’s #SimplyRed is clipped from the shot above, where goats were lounging in a disused brick-red building in the centre of Thanjavur. They seemed very content.