Journey to Mumbai

10/06/2013

Up at 06:30 to catch the train at 9am and get Will’s suit on the way.  As usual when I need to be up I slept terribly.  I had laid awake for well over an hour after going to bed at about 12:30 then I had seen a guy let himself into our room (a white guy in PJ’s, in hindsight it must have been a dream) so I courageously threw back the covers screaming “What the f**K are you doing in here!!” and charged at him! He turned and ran out the room.  Will then jumped out of bed and I screamed “There was a man in here! He just ran out! Let’s get him!” Will’s about to run out the room after him and I notice he’s completely naked!  (I can just imagine him chasing an intruder shouting threateningly at him with his flaccid member swinging from side to side and his buttocks jiggilng).  Unwiling to let him wrestle with an intruder with his meat and 2 veg swinging around (as utterly hilarious it would have been inhindsight) I told him to get some pants on first.  He then questioned whether this actually happened to which I annoyingly assured him it had as I was wide awake and then he tried the door and it was locked....from the inside.  He’s still willing to chase after this guy but I start doubting myself.  I’m convinced he was in the room but can’t see how he could have got out and re-locked the door so quickly.  I conclude I must have been dreaming and go back to bed wide awake and wired and unable to sleep at all.  By the time the alarm went off I’d had no more than 2 hours sleep but at least we are going to be on the train all day and I can get some sleep.  (Just the thought of Will running out into that hallway completely b*llock naked makes me laugh out loud.  Not even a ‘lol’, an actual laugh out loud).

We picked up his suit and headed to the train station way before we needed to be there.  We drove through the centre of the city with all the modern shops where there would have been wifi and wished we’d stayed there.  In the end I’d had to text my Mum to ask her to book us a hotel in Mumbai so we had somewhere to go when we arrive. In true Mum form she needed me to send 5 expensive texts before it could be booked so I dread to think what that cost!

We only had 120 rupees in change to tip the driver but he decided to be a martyr and not accept anything.  If he hadn’t said ‘I spent 4 days with you’ I’d have thought he was just being nice but he was cutting his nose off despite his face.  It was either 120 or nothing as we didn’t have anything more and there’s no way the grumpy sod was getting 500Rs from us. 

He left 120 rupees lighter and it didn’t bother us that he didn’t take a tip, only him. I might have felt a bit guilty if he’d not refused to go to Ghost Town and had let me stop to take bloody photos when I asked him to and hadn’t tried to take us back to the hotel at 4pm every day.  But he did, so screw him. 

The train we’re getting is the biggest I’ve ever seen.  It must be 20 carriages long!  The sleeper section looks horrendous. It’s for the locals (it’s really cheap) and they’re all just sat on benches all squashed up together all still wearing their smart shirts and trousers like they all do here.  This train journey, end to end, is 21 hours long and these folks can’t even lie down! 

The station reeks of faeces, it’s stomach churning.  The toilets open straight onto the track but I’d have thought they’d ask you to not defecate in the station as it’s not cleaned but obviously now.  It’s a really sickening smell. 

We’re in 2^nd Class Air Conditioned so we have beds and bedding and AC.  The only difference between this and first class is first class is booths of 4 whereas this is separated only by curtains.  It’s the same as I’d used in Thailand and that quite a nice journey and I had a good night’s sleep.

Bunks on the train

Me and Will squeezed into his bottom bunk (we didn't sleep like this)

Since we’ve been on here I’ve seen random people jumping off the train for a wee either right on the tracks or just on the grass to the side (including small children) so I’m guessing they don’t have toilets in the sleeper section.  The toilet for us (luckily has a seat) but is just a hole straight onto the track, I can’t see how it would cost a lot to give the sleeper section a couple of these to use.  The track in the station smelled like a sewer and was making me retch so someone was defecating somewhere!

Luckily they’re trapped in their sleeper section like cattle and they can’t get into our bit.  That might sound mean but when you’ve spent the last few days having people follow you, blatantly stare and take photos and show no shame you don’t feel overly confident about sleeping with them around.  I’d probably wake up to stripped naked and smeared in curry paste with them all dancing around me.  The workers on here selling food have already congregated in the booth opposite so they can brazenly stare at me with no shame whatsoever.   There’s actually a poster on the wall in regards to fines and prosecutions for things such as taking flammable items onto the train etc. and one part is about harassment of women.  There’s a 2 year jail sentence for it and it lists what classes as harassment and staring is one of them (curry paste isn’t mentioned though). You’ve got to feel for anyone with a lazy eye on these trains. 

I tried having a nap earlier but every time I drifted off I was woken up by either “chi coffee chi” from the hot drink man or “cutlets” from the food man.  Those 3 words are going to haunt my semi-conscious state for the considerable future.  When it was neither of them waking me up it was Will moving me so he was more comfortable.  In the end I just gave up trying to nap.  He on the other hand slept for about 2 hours then when I gave up he went to the top bunk and slept for another 3 hours then came back down to my bunk and drifted off again for another hour!  I honestly don’t know how one person can sleep so much!  He’ll then sleep all through the night after that too.  If I have a nap for more than an hour and wake up after 7pm I can’t sleep until after at least 1am then I’m really restless and have weird dreams normally involving people being in the room or my bed being somewhere it shouldn’t like a car park or the office.  That’s the reason I can never sleep naked as I dream my bed is somewhere public and there’s someone in bed with me and I can’t get out of bed because I’m naked.  After many restless night I committed to pyjamas.     

There’s lots of families on the train which is the only place I’ve seen husbands and wives together.  In the street the women seem to go around in groups and the men seem to hang out with other men.  The kids can all speak English from quite a young age which is impressive.  There’s a young girl on the train that keeps speaking to me, she’s probably only about 8.  She came up to me at one point and told me I was very beautiful :o)

A man walked through the carriage earlier with a holstered gun on his belt.  That wasn’t overly comforting as I thought if he decided to rob the ‘rich white folk’ they’d get my iphone, netbook, tablet, ipod and my camera leaving me with nothing.  (I lot to take on holiday with you, I know, but I am going to be away for 6 months).  I don’t know if you can get a licence for a gun here or if he had to be un-uniformed police or what but he seemed to get off the train before it left the station luckily.

The toilet got progressively more disgusting in smell and someone with a bad aim managed to empty their bowls all the way down the side of the bowl.  As it is open straight onto the track there’s no water so that didn’t shift for the duration of the trip.  Will added to it later on too, just to ensure all toilet experiences tested the gag reflex to the maximum.  

I spent most of the afternoon writing up the previous days journals and the time went quite quickly and I had just enough battery on my laptop to do so.  I settled down to try and sleep at about 11pm and went to brush my teeth.  I didn’t see anyone else (except Will) brush theirs which surprised me as these people aren’t poor and I would have thought they’d have some element of dental hygiene. 

Being up on the bunk the motion of the train was exaggerated and I was getting thrown around like a ragdoll in addition to being squashed by Will’s big backpack and my rucksack as there was nowhere for luggage to go (major design flaw).  Will had to have my suitcase at the foot of his bunk! 

I just lay in bed for hours then when I did half drift off I was having weird dreams (me? Weird dreams? Surely not.  I’ve not even had any cheese since leaving the UK!) that the train was failing to get up a hill or was careering down the other side out of control.  Luckily that was the extent of my sleep adventures, I was worried I’d go sleep walking (which is why I took the top bunk to make it harder for myself) and I’d end up falling out of the train as the doors are all left open when the train is in motion (I’ve tried leaving hotel rooms in the past so it’s not an absurd fear).  I had just got off to sleep at about 3am when the people opposite decided it was time to get up (that explains why so many people are out and about playing sport at 5am!) so they woke me up which I was ever-so grateful of.  I drifted off into a restless sleep at about 4am and then woke up 2 hours later ready for the train’s arrival. So that’s a total of 5hrs sleep in 2 nights now.  I usually struggle on less than 7 in a night!

Mumbai; Day 1

11/06/2013

We arrived in Bandra station and followed the crown out of the back exit.  The stench in the train station was unbearable.  Someone really needs to get a pressure hose out once in a while.  Will had read somewhere that you’d experience the best and worst smells ever in India, so far I’ve only experienced the worst.  I don’t think I’ve smelt so much faeces in the last 10 years of my life then have in the last few days. 

We’ve noticed a few older men with dyed hair, normally bright orange.  Apparently it’s done by henna; the more you put on the more orange it is.  It’s funny how at home that would be seen as the least desirable hair colour yet they seem to love it here.  We just found it interesting that none of the women dyed their hair too.  Women at home dye their hair regularly and yet they all have the same colour hair here so you’d have thought they’d want to gain some individuality.

After another standard overpriced taxi journey from the train station (900Rs) we got the hotel.  He’d showed us the price on a tariff card but it must have been titled ‘Naive Tourist Prices’ sat next to ‘Tourist Prices’ and then ‘Locals Prices’. 

The hotel is right on the sea front which is nice as there’s a cool breeze and it has a great view.  Unfortunately it’s really foggy though so couldn’t take any photos (I took these the next morning, it still wasn’t sunny but was better than the day before).

Walking around it’s immediately apparent that our Caucasian celebrity status is over.  We’re yesterday’s news here in such a cosmopolitan and western influenced city.  It’s just so unceremonious!  One minute they can’t get enough of us and are all giggling and queuing up to have a photo taken with us and then we don’t even get a sideways glance!  I can see why washed-up has-been’s end up on ‘I’m a Celeb’ now.

We started off on a walk around the city and ended up at India Gate which is quite a grand sight.  It was built to celebrate the arrival of King Edward and Queen Mary in 1911 (if my Roman Numeral interpretation serves me correctly).  It’s another of India’s grand gestures marking the arrival of royals, it must have taken a lot of money and time to build such a thing.

After spending 10 minutes batting off the advances of an over-zealous tour guide my stomach reminded me we were in India and I had got by unscathed for too long.  Making a quick dash to find the nearest toilet I was on the cusp of body slamming the begging children who wouldn’t let me go without buying one of their stupid items.  I know they’re only trying to make money for food but when you can’t walk anywhere without them grabbing you, trying to take your belongings out of your hands for them to keep, shoving the things they’re selling in your hands and then following you for ages you start to lose your patience.  Especially when it’s such stupid things!  Do I look like someone who wants a giant (and I mean GIANT, ¾ the height of me) weird balloon thing shaped like a pear that would be impossible to carry around with you?  Do I look like someone who would want a motorised boat you put in water?  Do I look like I want a coffee table?  Do I look like i want a carpet?  We’re clearly not local and the chances of us having arrived on a private jet are slim so we’re probably just normal tourists with a suitcase with a weight limit.  A suitcase that is never going to be big enough to include a carpet and a weight limit that is never going to include a coffee table!  Come on now, you’re salesmen, assess your potential customers.

After fending off the massively annoying kids I saw a bar and dashed inside sending Will to buy a bottle of drink to appease the barman.  As I burst into the one toilet available I am, of course, greeted by an Indian style toilet; the good old hole in the ground.  I dashed out and opened the next door in the vain hope they’d be a western style next door but I was just greeted by a broom cupboard and a man telling me there was only1 toilet.  Brilliant.  So my Delhi Belly finally gets a hold of me and all I have is an Indian toilet.  It’s beyond me why anyone would rather squat over a hole trying to avoid splash-back (and in cases of urination, failing) when they can sit on a seat!  The trains have both styles right next to each other so people can choose.  I don’t see the requirement for debate!

In the street you can get a haircut or a shave just sat on the pavement.  I saw a guy getting a shave and wanted to take a photo as it’s quite a surreal image so I thought I’d be polite and ask.  I was met with immediate refusal for a photo.  After all the countless photos I’ve had taken of me against my will the last few days and they refuse to let me have 1!  I should have just taken it rather than be polite.  I’ve learnt my lesson now.  I was tempted to go over the other side of the road and utilise my impressive zoom then flick them the bird as I walked off but he did seem to have a traditional cut-throat razor and after seeing a specific emergency number just for crimes against women, children and the elderly I didn’t want to antagonise the crazy barber.  I’ve not seen Sweeney Todd but I didn’t fancy making the Bollywood version.

We strolled through a street market and bought 5 pairs of sunglasses between us for 100Rs each (about £1.15).  Will had 3 pairs of ray bans in different colours and all with different takes on the name; Roy Boys, Ry Don’s and Ray Bon’s.  All of course assured at the point of sale of their authenticity.  It’s very amusing when the sellers come at you with a price of 350Rs and pointing out the name.  “Yes, they’re all fake.  Fake is fake.  One is no more fake than the other so if these were 100Rs then so are they.”

We wandered past a military gate and stopped on the other side to check our map of where we were going.  One of the guards blew his whistle and waved us to walk on.  Somewhat annoying as we were hardly posing a threat to their safety but what was really pathetic was his mate coming out a few seconds after, seeing us walking away he blew his whistle 2 more times and when we stopped and turned to look at him he waved us to walk on!  What an absolute power hungry jobs-worth!  I was tempted to start walking back towards him asking him what he wanted but the idea of Indian imprisonment wasn’t overly appealing so I settled to just bitching about his pettiness instead.  Absolute tool.

The taxi’s round here are awesome.  They’re really old cars from 2^nd world war times (I’m pretty sure they’re the exact same car that I drove around Berlin when I was there a few years ago, they definitely look very similar and both have the gear change on the steering column).  They have so much character and it’s amazing they’re still going strong after all this time and all these miles driven.  Indian’s cabbies don’t strike me as the type who’d commit to regular servicing and general motor vehicle care.  

The streets here are nice and clean, there are green spaces, fountains and statues making it an enjoyable place to walk around and take in.  Where its overcast the temperature is far more manageable too.  The old British buildings are easy to spot as they’re so grand and individual in their style.  Victoria Train Station (named after the Queen) has to be the most grand  train station I’ve ever seen!  (Externally that is, inside it’s dirty and it stinks.  Where they get all these smells from is beyond me, I think they must buy them in cans, how can a train station smell equally of sewage and fish otherwise? ‘Genuine Indian Train Station Odour; Gutters and Garbage’ or the best selling ‘Faeces and Fish’.  Buy one get one free).  There are also modern style buildings and sky scrapers and high rise apartment buildings but then you’ll have a run-down hovel stuck in the middle of them all.  Even in the expensive parts where the Bollywood stars live there’ll still be a little shack or a house with windows missing or part of the roof.

Victoria Train Station

We stopped at a camera shop and the prices of India impressed me yet again.  I’d considered buying one of those gorilla tripods before coming out, the ones with bendy legs so you can use it on non-flat surfaces or even secure it to a tree branch.  As I’ll spend most of this trip on my own and I’d like the odd picture with me in I thought it would be handy.  After going to LA alone and managing to only get a picture of me sat on a fountain and on a bench as they were the only spots with appropriate level flat walls nearby I thought the £20 cost on Amazon was a justified one.  (How Will had laughed when he saw me posed on a bench, gazing out at LA and asked me “who took this photo?” Er, that would have been me..... How the passers-by would have laughed observing me setting that up.  Oh well, better a moment of embarrassment for a life-long memory caught on camera.  The memory of me being a tit but a memory all the same). They sold these tripods in the camera shop and I asked how much they were; 100Rs.  That’s a saving of nearly £19 on what I would have paid at home!  Result!  Whilst I was there I also picked up a memory card reader for just under £2 and a pack of batteries for the same price.  Thank you, Mumbai!

The humidity was causing some serious perspiration (Will more-so than me, see pic below) and upon seeing the gold-dust esque ‘free wifi hotspot’ sign we dove into a coffee shop.  The drinks were pretty over-priced but it was air conditioned and it had wifi so we didn’t care, I just wanted to find the nearest pharmacy and get same anti-diarrhoea tablets.  Every other country I’ve been there seem to be pharmacies everywhere but here they were as elusive as bloody wifi!  We settled down with our expensive drinks (Will realising he’d unknowingly ordered a coffee which he didn’t like so didn’t drink) and attempted to log on to the wifi.  Our excitement ended swiftly when we realised we needed Indian phone numbers to get the activation code.  Con sarn it!

Our day continued just wandering around, taking in the place and taking photos.  It’s so different from the other cities we went to over here it’s hard to believe it’s the same country.  People walk through the streets with laptop bags talking on mobile phones (in Jaipur there aren’t really any pavements), people go jogging here (in Jaipur they probably don’t eat enough to have the energy spare to exercise).  People here walk dogs (in Jaipur they walk around with cows).  The women mostly wear western clothes and the only sari’s I see are on older women.  Apparently the women should wear Punjab suits until they are married and then wear a sari but none of the younger generation seem to bother with the traditional clothing at all.  The people here seem to walk around in couples and in families more whereas in Jaipur I noticed it was only ever groups of women and groups of men.  The men hold hands too as a sign of friendship. 

On the walk back to the hotel we finally found a pharmacy...who told us to go over the road to the other pharmacy as he didn’t have any shower gel.  Over the road we finally found a pharmacy that sold shower gel.  We even got a free washing thing, the poufy ball that lathers up your shower gel so it goes further, I have no idea what it’s called.  We still needed anti-diarrhoea tablets so we asked the guy in the medicine section and he, of course, had no idea what the word ‘diarrhoea’ meant.  We tried ‘poo’ and ‘soft poo’ and ‘runny poo’ but he just stared at us blankly.  I looked and Will and he looked at me, the realisation in our eyes that we were going to have to act this out.  Will took one for the team and put on a sterling performance of poo shooting out of your backside.  Sound affects and all.  Eureka! The shopkeeper understood!  He understood enough to tell us that they didn’t sell any.  We took our shower gel and left. 

I wore my sari out to dinner and it proved very popular with the locals!  (Getting a taste of my old fame again it’s like a junkie having a secret hit).  One lady even stopped me to tell me how beautiful I looked.  We walked down Marine Drive and sat on the wall like all the locals do.  There were hundreds of them all just sat around chatting.  Groups of friends, couples and families.  Despite the road being right next to you with all the relentless beeping it still managed to be relaxing watching the waves and enjoying the sea breeze.

Goa Day 3

15/06/2013

Another very non-eventful day.  We headed down to the reception desk to arrange booking mopeds.  As usual they were 3 members of staff just sat behind the desk doing absolutely nothing whilst one guy was cleaning all the rooms himself.  One of them is an arrogant little sod too, we’ve taken a dislike to him and his swagger.  We wanted mopeds so we could explore the area but just as we were about to pay the heavens opened and it started chucking it down.  There’s no way we were going to ride mopeds in India on wet roads so the poor guy who had to ride a moped round to us in the rain had to take it back again and we just went back to our room.  We needed to arrange the Sri Lanka leg of our trip anyway so we spent the day deciding what we were going to see and how.  There’s a lot to see on the island, annoyingly Colombo airport is on the west coast which is the area affected by the Indian monsoon and we don’t have enough time to trek to the east side of the island.  It’s annoying as the beaches look incredible, some of the best in the world no doubt, but you just don’t appreciate a beach on a grey, cloudy day when you’re soaked through every couple of hours by a horrendous downpour.  The areas in the centre seem to be ok for weather and that’s where the main attractions are such as Sigiriya, Adam’s Peak etc so we should get a good amount of sunshine.   

There was a lot of Sri Lanka discussion, a little TV watching (from Will) and a trip to the cake shop to buy more chocolate fudge cake.  This time we upgraded to a dark chocolate truffle cake which was even better so Will cleaned them out for all the slices they had.  We’re not allowed outside food in the rooms so we had to smuggle it in.  What kind of hotel doesn’t let you eat in the rooms?!  Especially when they don’t serve food until 7pm at night.  We ended up getting chocolate on the white bed clothes so they will know what we did.  They’ll know we were bad. 

When you walk through the main streets in Goa all you get are people shouting ‘taxi’ at you.  I’m not really sure where they think we’re going?  We have no bags with us, we’re casually strolling along chatting; are we giving off the impression that we’ve just embarked on a reluctant pilgrimage but a pilgrimage that forbids us to ask for help and only allows acceptance of help offered by strangers?  “No thanks bud, think we can make the 100 yard walk to the bar on our own.  It’ll be a struggle but hey, burns a few calories!”

The funny thing about Indians is so many of them look like people you know.  If I’m not looking at one thinking I already know him I’m looking at one thinking that’s an Indian version of someone I know.  They say that everyone has a double, I’ve been to France and can vouch for that fact that at least half of them live in Paris alone wearing patent puffa jackets and I can now confirm the other half of our doppelgangers are Indians. 

We had decided the best option for Sri Lanka was to hire a car and driver again (the roads outside of Colombo are apparently pretty quiet but you can’t drive there on an international driving licence).  We’d emailed a few companies for a quote and just as Will was composing a confirmation email to one the internet rolled over and died on us.  With no sign of reincarnation we considered heading to the bar next door when the whole grid went down in a power cut.  I don’t think the locals of a small village in Goa are overly experienced electricians so I wasn’t expecting anyone to jump to the rescue so we just sat around and waiting for it to kick back in, which it did after about ½ an hour.  Then it went down again, then came back on again, then teased us with a few flickers.  The rain had stopped by this point so we went next door to the bar and ate large amounts of chicken nuggets and played ‘Pub Quiz’ on my phone (we were a good mix of surprisingly good and surprisingly lucky when it came to correct answers which served well in boosting our ego’s that we’re more clever than we realise). 

A weird dog followed us back, I didn’t like how he moved his mouth randomly nor how he had barked constantly the whole time we were in the bar.  (After 20 solid minutes I was heading outside with my fork to stab the thing to death).  I fended his advances off with my umbrella, worried he might have rabies (for no other reason that I hadn’t had a rabies vaccination so I’m a bit paranoid and obviously unlucky).  We managed to get back to the hotel without being bitten though.

Will snapped a coat hanger between his butt cheeks and that ended our extremely chilled out day and we went to bed. 

I’m quite unsettled sleeping under a ceiling fan, I can’t help but think it’s going to fall out of the ceiling and chop us up in bed.  The fittings are far from secure here too which doesn’t little to alleviate that fear and the first hotel we were in the whole fixture moved with the rotation of the fan, how it was still fixed to the ceiling after going all night is a small miracle.  Maybe they’d used some of that Taj Mahal glue on it.