Paris by night

Paris (France) – The taxi speeds through the empty streets.  It’s a typically mild but humid night, with a bright moon bearing down on the sleeping city.  The street lights drop circles at their dark bases like lime lights.

Oumar has been driving all night. I can see his dark, chubby face reflected in the rear-view mirror; there are heavy bags under his eyes. On his stereo he plays Malian wassoulou music on loop and taps his fingers in time on the steering wheel.  Another few hours – some airport runs, drops to the major television and radio stations, a shift worker or two – and he’ll be home.

We pass the big bars on the Boulevard de Clichy.  The red-neon sails of the Moulin Rouge are still turning but the doors are shuttered and balled-up flyers promising ‘an unforgettable night out’ litter the footpath out front.  Next door, the Irish bar’s terrace is still full.   It’s Tuesday night and sunrise isn’t too far off, but tanned, young tourists in casual shorts and sandals are still working through pints of pale beer, at ease in the world of backpacking where the days of the week and time of night never matter.

Past the bars and fast food restaurants we drive into the quieter residential areas.  The shutters are drawn and the homeless are taking advantage of the lull in foot traffic to bed down in the doorways.  One man in a thick, mottled winter coat leans on a shopping trolley piled with coloured plastic containers, shopping bags and tins he salvaged from the rubbish bins.  In the whole street only the windows of the boulangerie glow orange.  A baker in white overalls is pulling fresh pastries from a tower of trays, and stacking baguettes into the baskets behind the counter.

The lights change, we drive on, drawing parallel with a night bus.  Two men in suits with red faces and loosened ties are locked in a fit of laughter.  The rest of the passengers, a collection of weary party-goers and bleary eyed blue-collar workers in uniform – watch them absently.

Finally, we round the corner and the taxi draws up outside Maison de la Radio.  The avenue is deserted and there is a full row of Velibs lined up across the road.  Inside, the broadcasters’ day has already begun.  Soon Paris will be waking up, hungry for information.  While the city slept and the young partied there will have been bomb attacks, rebellions, murders and stock market fluctuations.  Soon we’ll clear our throat, take the mike and patiently watch the clock tick to the top of the hour, to smile: “It’s four hours universal time, six am here in Paris.  Good morning.”

Je défends – Standing up for Parisians

Paris (France) – “Aïe! Touch my dog and I’ll show you!”

The woman’s threat comes hurling across the quays over the din of morning rush hour.  There are dozens of honking cars arranged in crooked lines, vying for a spot in one of only two lanes, with two-wheelers and pedestrians weaving brazenly around them.

In the midst of this noise and aggression, a big, black Labrador had preempted the green light and trotted straight into the path of my bicycle.

“Zut!”

That cry was mine.

I clamp down sharply on the breaks, swerve and with the owner shouting the kind of profanities that should leave her begging onlookers to excuse her French, keep on cycling.  Just another weekday morning.

Steve and I have been living in Paris for almost three months and swapping stories of Parisian flare-ups is part of our daily routine.  There’s the time a man in a tweed suit chased a cyclist who brushed against his Union Jack-crowned mini.  “But you broke the red light!” cried the cyclist, peddling for his life.  There are the scribbled notes in the lift of my friends’ apartment building reminding the occupants of the studio on the fifth floor to take off their shoes before walking across the floorboards on a Sunday morning.  And the man who snapped: “do I look like your personal map reader?” at another friend asking for directions.

“Paris would be just perfect if it wasn’t for the French,” one American tourist said to me. “People say New Yorkers are rude, but they’re just under pressure.” She had wandered into the boutique I ran for the first two months of our stay in the city.  It’s the kind of shop where the handbags on display have more breathing space than the average Parisian toddler.

“Parisians are under pressure too,” I wanted to argue.  But I didn’t, knowing that those who think life in Paris is easy are just as likely to think the city is flat.  Walking the broad boulevards of the Champs Elysées and the Rue de Rivoli, admiring the 16 km of exhibition space in the Louvre, or gazing up through the hollow frame of the Eiffel Tower, you don’t see how little room Parisians have.

Peak hour, Paris Metro (France)

There are over 2.2 million people crammed into the urban centre’s 105 km2, placing it firmly among the most densely populated areas in the world.  The capital of the Philippines, Manila, at the top of the list, has 43,079 people per square kilometre.  Another famously crowded city,  New Delhi in India, has 29,155.  And Paris?  In the city of lights and love 20,807 people live in each square kilometre.  Consider also that the suburbs of Levallois-Perret and Vincennes are even more densely populated, and that a huge number of their inhabitants travel into Paris for at least 35 hours each week.  Add to that over 15 million annual tourists (Paris is the world’s most visited city) and you begin to understand why Parisians treat so many exchanges as invasions of their precious, personal space.

Too many people and too little space mean higher rents.  Accommodation is advertised by the square-metre: 9 m2 for the former maids’ quarters favoured by thrifty students, 25 m2 for a basic studio, upwards of 50 m2 for a two-bed and 600 m2 if you’re the disgraced ex-finance minister, Hervé Gaymard.  But, that’s another story.  Every additional metre counts and Parisians expect to sacrifice anywhere from a third to over half of their salary for the added luxury of a separate kitchen-living area or a balcony the size of a window box.  Then there are charges communes to pay, lengthy contracts to negotiate . . .

. . . And usually a significant commute to your workplace/friend’s house/occasional dinner date.  Cue hours spent in traffic or in the metro, shoulder-to-shoulder with hundreds of other strangers who would rather not be several metres underground in stuffy carriages.   Getting from A to B takes too much time, and additional obstacles – indecisive tourists, pram-pushers, sidewalk cyclists – spark frustration and worse.  There is one surprising bonus, however.  Blatant traffic offenses, queue-jumping and disruptive, mass protests are more likely to be met with empathy than anger by the general population and the police.

These inconveniences don’t put people off and in the last twelve months over 10,000 people  joined us in moving to Paris.  It has a reputation as a centre for arts and fashion and has attracted the world’s biggest multinationals.  But, the competition for each job is tough and we have met more than one university graduate working in hospitality or retail simply because the market in their area of expertise is saturated with over-qualified, young hopefuls and, as a result, the pay as a waiter or shop assistant is better.

All of this leaves little time or disposable income for the pleasures most of us associate with Paris: croissants in the morning, café terraces and museums.   Visitors will say the Parisians are rude or arrogant, perhaps they’re just épuisés.

As for the newspaper vendor who balled up the receipt, threw it in my face and shouted: ‘what?  You can’t put it in the bin yourself?’ . . . I don’t know what his excuse is.

Swapping generators for candles

Bandipur (Nepal) – It took five hours of travelling on shuddering buses with collapsed seats to get our first break from the dust that had been burning our nostrils since we arrived in Kathmandu five days earlier. Finally, clinging onto the roof rack of a jeep, wedged between our backpacks and someone else’s shopping, we found ourselves riding above the dust cloud and breathed in the fresh mountain air.

It took 40 minutes to climb the last seven vertical kilometres to the Himalayan village of Bandipur.   Suddenly freed from the myopia imposed by Kathmandu’s pollution, we greedily took in the view before us:  layers of rolling green hills sliced by glowing, green terraces; a strip of clear, blue sky and, rising above the clouds, a half-dozen jagged, snow-covered peaks.

In Kathmandu we had grown accustomed to never seeing more than a few metres ahead.  Walking through the chaotic network of narrow streets, we kept our eyes fixed on the motorcycles and bicycles rickshaws that swerved carelessly around pedestrians.   We expected the twice-daily blackouts, and learned to navigate our hotel room by torchlight until the owner fired up the spluttering generator.  We knew that even by hiking up to the city’s highest viewpoints the surrounding valley would be shrouded in an impenetrable grey haze, and our eyes would reach only to the flat rooftops of the nearest suburb.

Children play with spinning tops in Bandipur's streets (Nepal)

In contrast, Bandipur was a visual feast.  The sun was setting when the jeep rolled to a stop at the edge of the village, and the main street was bathed in the day’s last rays of sunshine.  Low-ceilinged, mud-brick buildings with wooden balconies and shuttered windows leaned into the paved main street.  Between them, steep, dirt tracks dropped off into the valley and down to the cottages below.   Villagers, dressed in the colourful caps and clothes of the Newari people, leaned in doorways, observing the day coming to an end.

“Namaste! You need a room?” A grubby, little figure with faded jeans that barely reach her ankles bounces out of the shadows.  “You need a room?”  she asks again, and eases into bargaining mode.  She’s no more than 11-year-old but converses comfortably in English.  “Ok, the room is 500, but for you, sister, 400.  Attached bathroom . . . Hot water?   No hot water in Bandipur, sister.  Only buckets.”

This girl, it emerges, is one of the more persistent members of Bandipur’s pint-sized workforce.  For many centuries Bandipur was an important stop-off point for traders ferrying goods between India and Tibet. Tourism and the need for English is relatively new to the village.  As a result, the restaurant and guesthouse owners have come to rely on a staff of teenagers and schoolkids to deal with the questions of the increasing number of tourists that pass through.

Storekeeper in Bandipur watches cartoons (Nepal)

We leave our new friend and start the search for a cheaper room.  Just a few paces down the road, we come across another guesthouse.  A young boy with gelled hair is sitting behind the counter.  His homework is spread out in front of him and the cartoons playing on a television set flicker across his face.

“Do you have a room?” we ask, jolting him into action.  He nods and beckons us to follow him through a low door.  We scale a short, wooden ladder and pass his stooped, raisin-eyed grandmother peeling vegetables on the beaten dirt of the kitchen floor.  Another ladder takes us to a dark landing, and he opens a wooden door into a small room with two, thin-mattressed beds, a pew-like bench, and a shuttered window opening out onto the street.  His mother, wrapped in her schoolteacher’s sari, supervises the bargaining from a distance.  He knows the routine and, once the price is agreed, reminds us that the family also has a restaurant and tells us that should we want food or anything else, to come find him.

 

Ganesh Shrine, Bandipur town square (Nepal)

Outside the darkness has thickened and the villagers are pulling their shutters across for the night.  The young workers fold their exercise books closed and store them under the counters.  Somewhere in the distance a radio fades out; floor boards creak as families roll out mattresses to sleep and suddenly Bandipur, its valleys and mountains, are completely still . . . and no generator kicks in.

Snapshots from Sri Lanka

Many of the stalls in the Midigama market still remain empty since the 2004 tsunami (Sri Lanka)

Train from Colombo to Hikkaduwa (Sri Lanka)

New age monk, Kandy (Sri Lanka)

Flag bearer outside the Temple of the Tooth, Kandy (Sri Lanka)

Offerings for sale outside the Temple of the Tooth, Kandy (Sri Lanka)

The Sabarimala Pilgrims

Kumily, Kerala (India) – There were six of them: barefoot, with crumpled black dress shirts and fading orange lungyis.

hitched up to their knees.   When the train pulled into Bengaluru (Bangalore) Junction they hoisted cloth bundles onto their heads and swung overnight bags over their shoulders, releasing a spray of marigold petals from the garlands around their necks.

“Ayyappa,” they chanted, marching single file up the platform.    “Ayyappa!” they shouted again, pressing their way along the platform and into the crowded confines of a sleeper class carriage.

Twenty-four hours earlier they had left their homes in the eastern city of Hyderabad and boarded a bus to begin the long journey to the Sabarimala temple, deep in Kerala’s Western Ghat’s mountain range.  The drive had been long, but they were in high spirits. Crowded onto a bottom bunk, they pooled their English and tried to explain their excitement.

“We go . . . ,” began the youngest hesitantly.  He was a fresh-faced teenager, reluctant to take over as spokesman for the group.

“Darshan. Lord Ayyappa,” the others, arms wrapped around each other’s shoulders, chimed in.

And across India, hundreds-of-thousands of other men, with the same garlands of marigolds and bright turmeric and berry-red dots smeared on their foreheads, were on the same pilgrimage to the country’s most remote Hindu shrine.  On January 14 they would converge on Sabarimala to witness the annual lighting of the sacred Makaravilakku fire and pay tribute to the deity, Lord Ayyappa.

The pilgrims spend up to a year’s savings to take the trains, buses and rickshaws into the mountains and then complete the last 40 or so kilometres through the jungle on foot.  Some of the most pious walk hundreds of kilometres from cities as far away as Chennai and Mumbai with strips torn from lengths of cotton to bandage their blistered feet and bundles of offerings balanced on their heads.  All would endeavour to arrive in a state of absolute purity; shaving and washing daily, abstaining from sex and alcohol and eating only small, vegetarian meals.

These routines and restrictions would be strictly adhered to for the 41 days surrounding the festival, but did nothing to dampen the spirits of the Hyderabadi pilgrims.  It was after 10pm when the train pulled out of Bengaluru, and the other passengers were ready to settle down for the night.  It was almost another hour before the chatter of the pilgrims died down.

In the morning they were the first to rise, breaking the rhythmic chorus of snoring and whirring fans with their singing and joking.   They passed around a small plastic jug, and took turns rinsing themselves off at the carriage’s only sink.  While they waited they sat cross-legged on their bunks, picking apart their wilted garlands and discarding the petals on the floor between the bunks.  The others stomped over it, oblivious, leaving orange stains on the blackened soles of their feet.

At 8am they gathered excitedly around one of the top bunks with their hands joined and eyes fixed on the ceiling.  The folding table between the tiers of bunks was pulled down, and the oldest member of the group – a heavy-set man, with a thick beard and dark eyes – hoisted himself onto it.  The younger pilgrims gathered around, chanting fervently. From the top bunk, the oldest pilgrim produced a metallic bowl containing a small fire and passed it to the men who touched it reverently with their finger tips.   The other passengers watched curiously.

Five minutes later the ceremony was over.  The fire was extinguished and the overnight bags were pulled from under the bunks.   They zipped them open and shared around huge bags of dried snacks and jars of spicy home-made chutneys.   They ate hungrily, showering crumbs over the mess of marigold heads.  The train was pulling into Ernakulum. The next stage of their journey was about to begin.

The day after the culmination of the festival we would hear that over 100 people had died in a stampede of pilgrims at Sabarimala.  The local media reported that in the rush to catch a glimpse of the sacred fire a packed jeep had ploughed into a crowd of pilgrims and overturned.   At least 20 of those who died were from Hyderabad.

Riding into the Sunset: The Enfield Experience

Palolem, Goa (India) – The Royal Enfield Bullet: the iconic Indian cruiser. Its design has remained largely unchanged since it first rolled off a production line north of Chennai back in 1949; a smooth, rounded fuel tank and shiny chrome exhaust stretching from the 350cc engine that packs a roar to rival two-wheelers twice its size.  Back then the bikes were manufactured for the Indian army.  Fifty years later, the Bullet has been in production longer than any other motorcycle in the world and has secured a dedicated following of motoring enthusiasts across the world.

Within India, the Bullet’s devotees are mostly thrifty backpackers in search of “the real India”.  Crossing into the state of Goa from the north the mercury rises, the traffic eases and the road trains and honking rickshaws are replaced by thundering Enfields with drivers grinning from behind expensive sunglasses and long-limbed, golden brown girls mounted on the back.

“I got mine for 40,000 rupees (US$900),” grins one young Canadian proudly.  “I mean it’s a bit beat-up, needs new tires, that kind of thing.  But, at least the horn still works”.

And a working horn is crucial.

One Israeli rider explains: “On a motorbike you are no one.  The bus drivers are crazy.  They drive fast, they brake suddenly.  So they are at the top.  Then you have trucks, then cars, and then even the rickshaws.   You come after the rickshaws!  Only the pedestrians get less respect than the bike riders.”

And negotiating traffic isn’t the only difficulty.  For decades, the Enfield carried the distinction of being India’s most reliable motorbike.  Times have changed.  The Bullets ripping across Goa are bought on backpacker’s budgets and beginning to shows the signs of neglect from a string of short-term owners.   Ageing and struggling across the exploded road surfaces the motorbikes are renowned for breaking down unexpectedly, leaving their passengers scrambling for parts to patch them back together and coax them back into action.

“It’s part of the experience,” sighs the Israeli’s pillion and part-time human indicator (the best way to conserve battery power for the horn).  She looks over at him and adds wearily: “You break down and then you fix it.  He likes that part.”  She, evidently, does not.

Intrigued by the stories of the backpacking bikers, we set off in search of our own Enfield Experience.   The beachside town of Arambol in northern Goa is full of locals keen to part with their two-wheels for a day in exchange for a couple of hundred rupees.  Most try to pawn off their Honda Heroes and rusting scooters, and an hour passes before a gruff guest house owner agrees to rent us his Enfield.  It takes another hour to secure two helmets.

“In India, only the driver wears a helmet,” he grunts.   Ignoring our protests, he snaps: “I have 15 bikes! You think I don’t know?”  But the offer of 50 rupees sends scores of people scurrying into their homes only to emerge with a sorry collection of scratched-up helmets, long separated from their visors and chin straps.  Most look more like World War II relics than protective gear.  We chose the best of the bunch, perch them on our heads and cruise out of Arambol.

A fresh sea breeze whips the narrow road snaking along the beach.  Down on the sand, cows stroll lazily along the water; tourists stretch out on sun loungers, sipping fresh juices and swatting away nomadic sarong sellers.  We overtake well-dressed businessmen on struggling scooters, and weave around bouncing delivery trucks with Steve humming the theme tune to ‘Top Gun’ in his head (I’m guessing).

Beachside Bullet, Palolem (India)

The road takes us south, past the quieter beaches of Mandrem and inland into Mapusa, the last big town between us and the state capital,  Panaji.  We find ourselves locked in late morning traffic and witness the traffic hierarchy first hand.  Jostling for road space with the other vehicles, we veer down a side street, past some parked cars and back out onto a busy intersection.  Temporarily disoriented, we roll to a stop, just metres away from a man in a traffic police uniform half-heartedly signalling at the vehicles circling the roundabout.

“Namaste, sir.  We’re looking for  Panaji.” I smile politely and wave to get his attention.  No need.  He has already seen us.

He takes a few purposeful steps in our direction and beckons for us to follow him to his parked motorcycle where his colleague is waiting.  He clicks open his pen and flips through his notebook for a fresh page.  He strokes his thick moustache into place, adjusts his hat and without looking up asks Steve for his licence.

His colleague meanwhile is rocking on his heels, fixing his gaze on an imaginary distraction in the distance and following through with the kind of polite questioning we are subjected to daily in India:  “Please ma’am, what is your good name?” and “Which country?”.

I ask for directions again.  The first officer, busy copying Steve’s license details into his notebook, mumbles: “First you pay fine, then you go to Panaji.”  What?  “You passed a road block.  It’s not allowed.”  He points vaguely in the direction of the way we came.   “And your number plate? . . . Ah, paint on the number plate?”  He raises his eyebrows at his colleague, who doesn’t return his gaze.

I try again:  “Sir, we really didn’t know and we’re sorry.  Perhaps you could just point us in the direction of  Panaji and we’ll be more careful.  We really didn’t know.”  Steve, meanwhile, is already fingering the wad of notes in his pocket, calculating the implications of our imaginary crime and pondering the bargaining etiquette for traffic offences.

A mumbled good-cop-bad-cop exchange takes place and miraculously, the first police officer puts down his pen and closes his notebook.  “Fine,” he grunts. “First offence.  Go.”

We walk back to the Enfield, trying not to show our surprise and relief.  We spend the next few hours taking in Panaji and the brightly coloured houses built by Portuguese colonialists.  On the way back we detour through Old Goa where a majestic UNESCO-listed cathedral, convent, tower and handful of churches are all that are left of a cholera-ravaged city that between the 16^th and 18^th centuries had the same standing as Rome, with a population to rival Europe’s biggest cities.

Six hours later we arrive back in Arambol.  Sun-soaked, wind-swept and saddle-sore, we gratefully hand back the keys of the Enfield.   Another unique experience, signée India.

Between a road and a hard shoulder: The bus from Jaipur to Udaipur

Udaipur, Rajasthan (India) – After a day spent recovering from a mercifully mild bout of food poisoning we were more than ready to swap congested, polluted Jaipur and its repetitive collection of forts and bazaars for the comparative tranquillity of Rajasthan’s most romantic city: Udaipur.

We calculated that a late morning bus would get us to Udaipur in time for a moonlit dinner by the lake, but the state government had other ideas.  The only two official buses – one an air-conditioned sleeper, the other part of the highly-coveted, luxury Volvo fleet – were scheduled to leave after 9pm and arrive long before sunrise.

But, as always in India, if there is a will there are many ways.

Around the corner, Mr Niwal sat outside his tour agency with his feet up on a desk he had dragged from his first floor office.  “Udaipur?” he mused “Only night buses.”

Lesson two of travelling in India: if you persist you may often get an answer closer to the one you were hoping for.

So, no afternoon buses?  Mr Niwal closes his eyes and shakes his head in that unsympathetic way Indians have of indicating that they can’t and won’t help you. Nothing in the morning?  “No.”  I prepare to pack up.    “But, there is one 11am bus.”  To Udaipur?  Tomorrow? (Sceptical)  “Yes.  Special tourist bus.  Sleeper bus.”  A sleeper bus at 11am?   “Yes.”  I’m not sure we want a sleeper . . . “Seats too, if you like.   You want front, middle or back?”

The next morning we return to Mr Niwal’s office.   A toothless bicycle rickshaw driver is waiting out front, chewing lazily on a wad of pan.  “The bus will leave at 11.30,” Mr Niwal says, and motioning to the rickshaw driver: “He will take you to the bus stop.” We squeeze into the back of the rickshaw with our backpacks on our knees, daypacks heaped on top and the guitar hanging over one side.  Laughing to himself, the rickshaw driver pushes into the traffic.

Fifteen minutes later we pull up to an illegal bus stop on the side of the highway out of town.   Two battered buses are already waiting.  The first is a rundown Indian-made Tata with “Volvo” half-heartedly painted on one side.   The other, the one that will take us to Udaipur, has no such delusions of grandeur.   Its rusting orange paintwork almost matches the grubby upholstery of the bunks inside and the fading curtains of various lengths pulled across them.

Our seats line one side of the bus, boxed in by two tiers of bunks across the aisle and another above us.   As we settle ourselves in, feet resting on our backpacks, passengers discard their battered, leather shoes and bundles in the aisles and disappear behind the curtains – one, two, three, maybe more per bunk.  There are, predictably, no other tourists.

At 11.45am the bus splutters to life and we set off, jolting and jerking into the lunchtime traffic.   Barely an hour later, as we swap Jaipur’s sprawling suburbs for open road, the bus comes to a grinding halt.   Up ahead are kilometres of trucks loaded with Rajasthan’s most lucrative export and the cause of today’s bottleneck: marble.

Our driver groans, smacks the steering wheel and mutters something in Hindi to his conductor.   He revs the engine, shifts gears and suddenly we find ourselves careening onto the hard shoulder and bouncing and swaying past the stalled traffic.  The other passengers are unphased.   “I wouldn’t worry.  There’s no ditch, so we’d probably make it if we turned over,” Steve chirps, unhelpfully.

A few kilometres up the road, the driver miscalculates as he attempts to squeeze between a petrol tanker (of the kind Steve once described as “the equivalent of a 20 tonne bomb”) and a flatbed truck.  A piercing scratching noise fills the cabin as the truck inches past, taking a layer of orange paint and the bus’ right headlight with it.

Our driver is furious.

He stops the bus (no need to pull over, seeing as we’re already on the hard shoulder), and drags the driver of the flatbed truck out onto the road.  Surrounded by a dozen finger-pointing witnesses, the men gesture wildly as they argue their cases.  Passengers poke their heads out from the bunks to get a better look, while others use the opportunity to slip out, buy some snacks and use the facilities.  After some pushing and shoving, the dispute fizzles out, the men jump back into their vehicles and we’re on our way again.

Dusk gives way to night, our estimated time of arrival comes and goes, and as the road narrows and winds, the driver becomes increasingly reckless. Through the darkness, we can just about make out the steep ditch falling off to one side, and the wall of unforgiving mountain on the other.  Up ahead a trickle of marble-carrying trucks trundles along, providing our driver with the perfect opportunity to practice his overtaking . . . on blind bends.

A cluster of lights in the distance edges closer and eventually we’re bouncing our way past blocks of shops, restaurants and barbers working into the night, with rows and rows of Honda Heroes parked out front.

Udaipur.

Gratefully we stumble off the bus and a less than an hour later we’re tucking into a feed of dhal and bread in a rooftop restaurant with the hotel-lined lake twinkling below us.

“If they made us pay excess baggage charges we’d just take the train”

New Delhi (India) – So the latest Lonely Planet guide to India has a glaring error.  It does not cost US$25 to fly from New Delhi to Mumbai.   Nor will US$35 get you anywhere near Kolkata (formerly Calcutta), our new Indian friends scoff.

It appears Sarina Singh et al have left out at least one crucial zero.

And there may be a very good reason the airlines have to charge hundreds of dollars to ferry Indians from one city to another within their own country: luggage.

“Indians do not know how to pack,” Maitri, one of the girls, explains.   “Well, if you think about it every outfit has three pieces: the kameez (tunic-like dress), dupatta (scarf) and churidar (leggings).”  And then there are the gifts.  “They will say: ‘you don’t have one of these for your house? You must take it!’”  The result is that, for most people, 20 kilograms of check-in luggage per passenger might just get you to your destination, but it certainly won’t get you back.

That is even truer if going overseas.   A couple of newly-weds tells us that on their honeymoon to Thailand, they left with 20 kilograms each and returned with an additional 36 kilogram suitcase.   Forty pairs of shoes for her, and a handbag for every female member of the family.

How could Steve and I possible travel for several months with just 17 and 12 kilograms respectively?   And how could Europeans go away for a weekend with just one cabin-size suitcase?   “If they made us pay extra for check-in luggage,” Maitri laughs. “Then everyone would just take the train!”

Soft landing, New Delhi

New Delhi (India) – The smells, the noise, the chaos. When people talk about their first impressions of India they use words like “confronting”. They talk about the culture shock, about the colours, and the crowds.

This is not the India we’ve been introduced to.

A driver, sent by our friend Rajat, was waiting at New Delhi airport to take us to our guesthouse in a quiet, middle-class neighbourhood in the city’s south. The following days were to be the most important in Rajat’s life: his wedding. In preparation, he was confined to his parent’s house, leaving him plenty of time to organise logistics for his guests by telephone.

The driver sped through the late evening traffic with calculated recklessness. With hundreds of other cars, bicycles, mopeds and buses in various stages of decay vying for two lanes and a hard shoulder, getting from A to B depends on identifying invisible gaps and swerving in and out of them. Having your right hand calmly but firmly on the horn is as important as having your left on the gear stick.

Having a driver at our disposal was an unfamiliar luxury, and so too were the eager staff at the guesthouse. When we asked to borrow an iron, the guesthouse worker insisted on pressing our outfits for the wedding himself. “And breakfast?”. Yes, we’d like breakfast. Maybe around 9. “What would you like?” Oh. Blank faces. “Tea or coffee.Bread?” Yes, tea and bread. “Butter.” Yep, sounds good. Then Steve suggests jam. “And eggs? Maybe omelette”. Excellent.

Sure enough, shortly before nine the next morning, two cups of tea are delivered to the bedroom and waiting in the dining room was bread, butter, two spicy omelettes and one brand new jar of jam.

Outside, the driver was already waiting.