Woody In India

Gliding around the backwaters of Kerala on a houseboat, trekking high in the forests and tea gardens of Ooty, being left stranded on a highway at 2 o’clock in the morning by a bus and travelling in Tamil Nadu in the wake of the recent tsunami, my adventures in India during February 2005 made a pleasant change from working in the Gulf or on my farm in England.

After a night flight from Doha to Bangalore via Abu Dhabi, I spent over an hour being transported around the city in a rickshaw looking for a hotel room. The rickshaw driver assured me that he knew some good places but after being taken to a series of hovels that were full I ended up at a gloomy place on the airport road. This place really took the cake as it was grimy, smelt of urine and faced the main road, making it extremely noisy. When I was told it would cost 1,000 rupees for the night, I instructed the rickshaw driver to take me directly to the bus station for a bus to Mysore.

“But Sahib, I can show you all of Bangalore for 300 rupees,” he said. “I am very good guide.”

“Take me to the bus station,” I instructed him sternly.

Very soon I was on a bus racing through the beautiful countryside of Karnataka heading towards Mysore, aware that I had made the correct decision as I was informed that a festival had caused hotel rooms to be almost impossible to obtain in Bangalore.

Holes in the road caused me to be flung several feet into the air as the bus wheels hit them at what seemed to be a speed of at least 90 miles per hour. The wind rushed through the open windows of the bus and the smell of kerosene wafted inside from passing traffic.

I finally reached Mysore late the next afternoon, warded off the usual hawkers, beggars, rickshaw drivers and potential guides and booked into the Ganesh Palace Inn. I then spent the evening wandering around the streets and drinking Kingfisher beer before going to bed for an early start the next day. The streets were heaving with people and the traffic was unbelievable.

The next morning I soon found myself on the streets again but this time in daylight. Like the previous evening, the traffic was intense with every form of transport appearing on the roads - ranging from rickshaws, scooters, bicycles, cars and buses, through to elephants, bullock carts carrying covered Moslem ladies and bright yellow dyed cows wandering aimlessly amongst the traffic. Hindi music blared from almost every street corner and lines of brightly attired women walked barefoot along the street, jangling their ankle bells as they walked in time with their goods balancing on their heads. A young boy dressed up as a Hindu god suddenly appeared from nowhere and performed a brief dance for which I gave him one rupee This was really another world – the real Hindustan.

Women and children periodically rushed up to me with outstretched hands shouting “paisa, paisa” (money, money), poor people sat on the pavement watching the traffic pass and the smell of incense drifted around from incense sticks that were lit and placed at various points on the pavement.

After photographing this mass of human chaos for several hours I finally made my way to Mysore Palace, one of the remnants of the British Raj – a majestic and beautiful building that has been preserved as a museum and decorated on each side by well-kept lawns and gardens. Walking around the cool interior in bare feet on a marble floor looking at paintings and artefacts with a great number of Indians dressed in an unbelievable variety of clothes was an experience. However, people were very friendly and I was approached by a group of Tamil Indians who told me that they had escaped the tsunami several weeks earlier on the coast of Tamil Nadu and were very interested in my tales of cricket. In fact, both boys in the family requested my autograph, which I gave them with a little embarrassment. One of them told me that I looked like former England batsman Graham Gooch. I had received the same comment in India years previously. Their aunt even offered to give me accommodation at her house in Madras but I had to decline as I had my own agenda.

I met many people in Mysore, but the most interesting were a reflexologist who almost broke my back as he attempted to manipulate and massage it with what he called magical sandal oil, and a 25 year old Hindu girl who chatted me up in Hindi while I was drinking a beer in the side of the road. This led to me taking her to a restaurant and bar for food and drink during the process of which she told me that she wanted to accompany me around India. The problem was that her presence with me in a conservative country caused an outrage in the locality and I became the centre of attention as everyone stopped in their tracks to stare at me with the girl. Realising the seriousness of the situation I tried politely to detach myself from the girl’s presence but it was of no use, I couldn’t get rid of her. I used an excuse to get back into my hotel and after being told by the receptionist that there was a problem I went to my room for over an hour. When I returned to the street the girl appeared from nowhere.

Kya baat hai? (What’s the matter?), she asked.

“I have a bad headache”, I told her in Hindi. “I must go to bed.”

“But I want to stay out for longer”, she answered. “I’m enjoying myself.”

“How about meeting tomorrow?” I asked. “Let’s say at 10 o’clock.”

“I’ll be waiting outside your hotel at 6 o’clock tomorrow morning,” she replied.

I didn’t reply, left immediately and retired to my hotel with the girl looking on with a sad look after my reluctance to stay out for the whole night.

I set my alarm for 5 o’clock the next morning with the intention of leaving for Ooty in the mountains and tea plantations of Tamil Nadu. Within ten minutes I was dressed, washed and walking out of the hotel with my bags. The Hindu girl was nowhere in sight and the fact that the bus station was only a short walk away allowed me to get there quickly. By luck a bus was leaving for Ooty within fifteen minutes. Twenty minutes later Mysore and the Hindu girl were in the past. I was on my way to another adventure.

The countryside of Karnataka was idyllic with small thatched houses and green paddy fields fringed with palm trees against a backdrop of hills and mountains. Oxen and plough cultivated the fields, lines of women bent almost double worked in the fields while water buffalo grazed nearby.

Very little happened on the bus with the exception of when it stopped to give the passengers a rest. Within minutes a line of beggars, hawkers, child newspaper salesmen and tea vendors boarded the bus with the common aim of making money. While a frail old beggar stood grunting over me showing me his deformed arms a small boy tried to commit me to buy an edition of The Hindustan Times. I paid the old man one rupee but I resisted buying a newspaper and very soon the bus was continuing on its way to Ooty.

As the bus entered Tamil Nadu the scenery became dramatic, almost like something out of those Romantic paintings by Turner like ‘Hannibal Crossing the Alps.’ Huge mountains and valleys emerged, thickly forested with narrow winding roads. The bus was dwarfed by the surroundings and one couldn’t help being impressed by the natural beauty and enormous size of the mountains. Unfortunately the huge number of hairpin bends made riding on the bus an ordeal as the vehicle lurched left and right at outrageous speed, narrowly missing oncoming traffic on the narrow, unprotected road. More than once my hair stood on end as the bus wheels narrowly grazed the sides of the road with frightening ravines gaping hundreds of feet below. This was not the only hazard as a small Hindu lady sitting in the seat immediately in front of me had the annoying habit of spitting from the bus window every few minutes. The problem was that the inrushing wind blew the spit back on me. I have had more comfortable bus rides.

As the bus sped rapidly upwards towards its destination we passed through huge areas of eucalyptus trees with a strong pungent smell, monkeys occasionally darted across the road while elephants and various types of deer fed amongst the trees. As the vegetation periodically parted magnificent landscape views could be seen and hedges planted by the British a century before lined the road.

Entering the former British hill station of Ooty I thankfully climbed off the bus at the central bus station and was soon on my way to a hotel overlooking the lake just on the edge of town. I felt very hungry.

The problem with eating in India is that the average Western stomach isn’t used to eating a constant diet of curried food full of hot spices and chillies, so precaution is needed. I stuck to vegetable curry for most of the time as a precaution against getting an upset stomach from eating meat, which was the case on my previous visits to the subcontinent. Even some of the vegetable curries were as hot as some of the hottest vindaloos that I have eaten in Indian restaurants back in Britain.

I was lucky in Ooty as I hired a local rickshaw driver who was honest and knew the area well. This allowed me to access every nook and cranny of local life with my camera ranging from tea pickers to agricultural workers, farmers and village residents. I also recorded some of the best views in the area and was even shown how eucalyptus leaves are processed in a village hut. This wasn’t a pleasant experience as tears poured down my face due to the effects of the fumes. Anyway, my rickshaw driver seemed to have pride in showing off an Englishman to the local population and they in turn appeared to be very happy with my presence.

Of all my experiences in the Ooty region, the most interesting was my visit to the Toda Indians in the thickly forested mountains above the town. I trekked with my equipment for several hours from the road until I reached a clearing and viewed a magnificent scene of orange cultivated fields with thatched cottages dotted across the landscape.

The Toda Indians bore an uncanny resemblance to Indians I had met in Colombia and Venezuela some years earlier. They wore red, black and white patterned cloaks, the women had their hair in pigtails and the younger ones wore long dresses similar to those worn by the Guajira Indians of northern Venezuela. Like the South American Indians, the Toda were passive, friendly but a little suspicious. Luckily, my Tamil rickshaw driver was familiar to them so this eased any tension that may otherwise have existed.

Sitting down to eat and drink with my Indian hosts I asked many questions via my Tamil rickshaw driver and learnt that they existed from land that had been awarded to them by the Indian government. They employed poor Indians to work for them but preferred to live separately in order to preserve their traditional culture.

I visited so many beautiful places in the Ooty region that I lost count, but another memorable place was Western Point where many Hindi films are shot. I kept expecting to see Bollywood film stars like Priti Zinta or Aishwarya Rai dancing down the slopes, or Amithab Buchan fighting off baddies but all I got were panoramic views and a visit to a second Toda Indian outpost where I took more photos and engaged in further conversations.

After two days of exploring the sparkling emerald tea gardens of the region my only reminder was a large bag of Masala tea that I purchased, although I did travel on the famous Coonoor to Ooty narrow gauge railway which took me through some stunning countryside and put me in contact with a group of Bengali actors who had travelled down from Calcutta for a holiday. I also felt that the Botanical Gardens were very pleasing and relaxing for an afternoon stroll and spent several afternoons there amongst the rich variety of trees and shrubs.

After four days of relentless travelling I felt that I needed to relax so I decided to depart for Kerala where I hoped to hire a houseboat on the backwaters.

My period of relaxation wasn’t given a good start as I boarded a local ‘Super Fast’ bus for Cochin only to find that every seat was taken and I was committed to stand for a seven-hour journey. Having endured the discomfort of this I got off at Cochin only to find that the Aleppey bus was about to leave. I jumped on as it was in the process of departing only to have a repeat of my previous experience. I was a little luckier as passengers got off at Pallakud and I was able to get a seat for the last stage of the journey. As in previous experiences the driver drove the bus like a madman but I managed to arrive safely in Aleppey just before midnight and was almost immediately whisked away to a nearby hotel in a rickshaw.

After bargaining with several houseboat operators I managed to hire one for 2,700 rupees a day for three days. I was told that this was a special price due to the tsunami. It included the services of a cook, a servant and a navigator and a supply of food and drink of my choice for the duration of the journey.

There I was at 10 o’clock in the morning aboard my own houseboat being waited on hand and foot while seated at the front of the vessel watching the world pass by. It was an idyllic scene of peace and tranquillity as the boat glided on and around the waterways and coconut groves of Kerala. Other houseboats floated past in almost total silence, young children waved from the shore and canoes periodically cut past laden with goods. This scene continued almost uninterrupted for the whole day. My navigator occasionally broke the silence with his conversation and my cook Mr Ram showed me some clever card tricks that he had learnt. He also took me to a Catholic church that had been constructed around a small house once inhabited by a famous Keralite saint named Kuriakose Elias Chavara, someone who is now part of local folklore, worshipped by Christians and Hindus alike. A group of Carmelite nuns look after the church and one of them kindly showed me around and explained the history of the church and the saint.

At the end of the day my houseboat was moored next to the shore where I stood to watch the sun come down and to explore the area. This particular day coincided with Republic Day so as the sun set huge firework displays lit up the night sky from nearby villages and the lights of other houseboats could be seen moving along the waterways. Unfortunately my servant was unable to purchase any beer at the local village for me as they had sold out (due to the Republic Day celebrations), but he was able to obtain a local drink made of coconut milk and alcohol called ‘Fenny.’ I made do with this then retired to my bedroom where I was almost bitten to death by mosquitoes and awoken at 4 o’clock in the morning by chanting from the local Hindu temple.

After two further days gliding around the backwaters I was taken by rickshaw to a variety of other locations, including a temple where a wedding was taking place and where I became the centre of attention for the guests. They were enthusiastic to practice their English and showed great hospitality, giving me a great variety of food and drink. I joined the guests who sat eating a variety of Indian dishes with their fingers on the stone floor.

Catching the train from Aleppey station I was soon on my way to Goa via Cochin. At the beginning I was totally confused as the railway official gave me the wrong time and the wrong train, after which passengers on the wrong train gave me information about the right train on the wrong platform. After this abundance of confusion and incorrect information I was eventually on the correct train speeding towards Goa.

The sleeping berth I was assigned was basic, the air conditioning only partly worked and the man opposite snored so loudly that I couldn’t think straight. I was mainly concerned about falling from my berth on to the floor about ten feet below. I survived the ordeal and eventually purchased a cup of tea and a paratha from one of the many vendors passing through the carriage. Luckily my stomach remained strong, as some twenty-five years previously I had spent the best part of a day crouching over a Moslem style toilet with severe stomach cramps on a train between Delhi and Benares.

At least the train was spacious, wind rushed in from open doors and windows and a long line of vendors provided a wide choice of cheap refreshment. The passengers were also friendly. A young man and his wife from Kerala explained how they were making a two day journey to northern India to attend an interview for a job in computers and ended up taking my details for possible fruit picking work on my farm.

As Goa approached the landscape became increasingly greener and the coastline more picturesque, something for which this former Portuguese colony is famous. Leaving the train at Margao and pushing my way through a large group of begging children, I travelled immediately by bus to Panjim, obtained a hotel room without a big problem and began my exploration of Goa.

Goa had changed a lot since I first visited the state in 1980. The roads and public transport were clean and efficient, poverty seemed to be minimal compared with other parts of India and the tourist industry appeared to be booming.

Calangute Beach was my biggest shock as I had first visited the place when it was almost deserted and devoid of people, restaurants and bars. Hundreds of mainly British tourists now occupied the beach, scores of others sat in the great variety of restaurants and bars eating roast dinners and drinking pints of beer. Many were almost clone like, particularly the men who appeared to be grossly overweight with shaven heads, pink skin, small mouths and tattooed arms. This was really the working man’s paradise and (apart from the female hawkers from Karnataka who surrounded the tourists like flies around a honey pot trying to sell their goods at inflated prices) this could easily have been Benidorm, circa 1984. Bars with names like Sea Face, Namaste and Palm Grove belted out the old favourites from Bananarama and other British groups. White skinned, red-faced British women strolled along the beach smoking cigarettes and Hindustani women dressed in saris with names like Bibi offered cheap body massages to those lying on sun beds.

Even having got away from the crowds, it was still difficult to escape the invading western culture as huge compounds of communal apartments dotted the landscape, occupied almost exclusively by British nationals who had escaped soul destroying jobs in the UK for a dream retirement in Lagoa Azul, Dona Paula or Millennium Vistas and were now able to continue their housing estate existence in a foreign land.

Just down the road at the crossroads near Arpura, a Tamil man with a long grey beard dressed in an orange toga sat on a decorated elephant waiting for tourists to photograph him for 200 rupees a time.

Pockets of Goa remain untouched by modern western culture and the hinterland sparkled emerald green with paddy fields surrounded by palm groves. Portuguese style buildings dotted the landscape, some unoccupied due to the owners moving to the Gulf for work or emigrating as far as Canada and the U.K. The roads remain the best in India and more are under construction.

Although many of the beaches for which Goa is famous have been exploited for tourism several delightful ones still remain. The best that I visited was Arambol Beach. Fringed with palm trees and flat, clean beaches one end is an array of shops, bars and small hotels constructed in the cliffs with narrow, shaded alleyways to walk. A rocky front gives a panoramic sea view. A perfect place to relax.

With every day packed with action I explored many parts of northern Goa. This ranged from the Basilica of Bom Jesus in Old Goa, where the shrivelled mortal remains of St Francis Xavier can be viewed, to the Bhagvan Mahavir Wildlife Sanctuary at Molem; the Parvati Madhav spice plantation at Keri to the backwaters of rural Goa. I even joined mainstream Hindu and Christian tourists on a musical night cruise around the waterways of Panjim watching Goans demonstrate traditional Goan dance and watching Hindu honeymoon couples dance Bhangra, gyrate to the sounds of Dalia Mehindi or dance closely to the romantic sounds of Adnan Sami.

My stay in Goa came to a climax on February 6th when I attended the annual Goan carnival in Panjim. A big event on the Goan calendar, it wasn’t exactly Rio, Notting Hill or New Orleans but it embodied all the fun and entertainment of a local event. Children posing as adults, men posing as women and model mythical creatures added colour and life to a happy event that stretched for more than a mile in central Panjim. It took almost three hours for the procession to pass the spot that I occupied as it slowly worked its way around the city. The crowds were huge, the police were out in force and boatloads of British package holidaymakers periodically emerged from the jetty to take up places in reserved seating areas. Unfortunately I experienced my first dose of the Delhi belly so I wasn’t fully able to enjoy the event but I stuck it out and it passed as a happy day.

With the passing of my Goa experience I thought that my adventures in India were at an end. I only had twenty-four hours to pass for my return flight to Qatar and barely a day to see Bangalore from where my flight started. Everything was set, I had accounted for everything, nothing could go wrong but surprises happen, as I was to find out on my bus journey to Bangalore.

My bus was an impressive looking vehicle, big, newly painted white with the words Dona Paula-Goa written in big blue letters on its side. When I climbed aboard I couldn’t believe what I saw. It was as if the bus had a brand new exterior and an ancient interior that was cramped, small, confined and dirty with broken seats and jammed windows. Because the bus had sleeping compartments this made the situation worse and it was decidedly uncomfortable. I viewed everything philosophically. My trip was almost at an end so I decided to make the most of an uncomfortable situation. During the night I managed to sleep after some difficulty but at 2 o’clock in the morning I was awoken with the sound of movement and suddenly and subconsciously realized that the bus was at a standstill.

Jumping from my seat I put on my socks and trainers, grabbed my small bag and jumped off the bus to relieve myself. I was partly aware that the other passengers were all back on the bus but I felt secure. Suddenly I heard the bus engine start and as I looked around the automatic doors closed and the bus took off. I picked up my bag and rushed towards the bus shouting and waving my arms. The bus driver didn’t see me. I banged my fist on the side of the bus shouting frantically at the same time. The bus went faster and I ran faster until after dropping my bag I slipped on the gravel and fell over while the bus disappeared into the distance.

There I was, somewhere in Karnataka in the early hours of the morning, still at least seven hours from Bangalore with my luggage aboard a bus that had abandoned me in the road and the time of my aircraft departure looming closer. Getting back up with blood trickling down my left shin and picking up my bag I gathered my senses and walked about thirty yards down the road to where a Hindustani man and woman were standing at a food stall. There wasn’t any street lighting, only the headlights of passing vehicles on the highway. I quickly explained in a combination of English and Hindi about what had happened, the man understood and proceeded to stop every approaching bus until a bus to Bangalore arrived. Twenty-five minutes after my original bus had departed, I was aboard a second bus explaining to the driver’s assistant about what had happened. He sympathized, demanded 150 rupees for the fare then informed the driver with details he had collected from me about the appearance of my original bus.

I managed to get some sleep on a bus that was more comfortable than the original one and dozed for several hours. As the sun began to rise just before we were about to enter Bangalore the bus slowed down then began to sound its horn. I looked out of the window to miraculously see my original bus pulling into the side of the road. We had caught up with it. I was saved. My luggage could be recovered. I could get my flight. The driver’s assistant alerted me, I climbed off the bus, ran several yards along the road and clambered on to my original bus. I was ecstatic but all the passengers were asleep, totally oblivious to the fact that I had been missing for around six hours.

Finally, the bus made it to the centre of Bangalore. As I claimed my baggage I tried to communicate with the driver about why he had abandoned me on the road but he said that he didn’t understand and only appeared to be interested in getting his 10-rupee baggage handling charge. I eventually departed on a rickshaw with all my luggage to a small hotel. My unexpected adventure had come to an end.

With help from my rickshaw driver I organized a last ditch tour around Bangalore before departing India. This included visits to Tipu Sultan’s Palace, the botanical gardens, the parliament building and two museums. Bangalore was a beautiful city with large numbers of parks and overhanging trees but it was overcrowded with people, traffic in total chaos and pollution could be seen drifting across the streets as kerosene belched from vehicle exhausts. The wind also whipped up a large amount of dust so walking around the city was not an entirely comfortable experience.

Checking in at Bangalore airport the next morning at 4-30 wasn’t an easy experience but the rickshaw I arranged turned up and after speeding through the deserted streets I was very soon on the plane to Doha via Bahrain, exhausted but stimulated after an experience in India.

David Wood 2005

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