'The first condition of understanding a foreign country is to smell it'. TS Elliot on Rudyard Kipling

"Rishikesh sat 11th March


I'm sat on the steps of the river Ganges with a little old lady I met somewhere in the lanes; Judty seems to know everyone in Rishikesh. She hops down next to me wearing piles of orange robes and smokes cheerfully, hiding her stone behind gold tinted glasses. Turquoise green water glides past, the surface ripples and spins but beneath looks thick like wet tarmac, sliding and squeezing through the mighty hills ahead. From the foot of these dry mountains the world bulges up to the top of the world, over the Himalayas and falling into Tibet and China thousands of miles to the north. It  rained last night and the streets are cool and damp under plump grey and white clouds floating heavily. Litter clogs the street gutters and cows chew at the clear up.

I think I love India. Its amazing how a place can be so full of noise and life yet be calm and peaceful too. Everyday is beautiful, ugly, filthy, happy, weird, surprising, confusing and occasionally very annoying. The Ganges slopes past silently, then a bombardment of fire crackers erupts behind me. I'm relaxed but not bored, its a good mix.

People must miss the endearing daily disorder of India when climbing on the same old no.23 bus back home. But some 'Indianisms' are just too Indian for a man fresh from the organised, polite world of shiny price-marked supermarkets to understand. And that is half the problem, trying to understand it. India will do what she wants, all we can do is pull a smile and let it all happen. But this boisterous, free land can irritate, anger and ruffle a fresh westerners feathers to say the least. Moments throughout the day put frustration on a rolling boil - bewildered at how a country can work like this.

A walk across town is like an amazing, massive obstacle course, dodging traffic from trucks to tuk tuks that rattle on through life dodging disaster. Its a drain on the senses.

Life flicks around us endlessly, the air is heavy on the eyes and the smells can hurt. We head down a quieter road to avoid the pestering of street sellers and tuk tuk men fighting to fleece the foreigner. A lull settles for a moment, a peace soon sliced with a screaming knife of a tuk tuk revving up behind and beeping a wincing stab down my ear hole - "tuk tuk??!". An anger begins to simmer and can brew throughout the day.

"The only way to keep solvent and moving was to keep polite but firm around crowds. I hated to do it, but I started to adopt the same disinterested expression I'd seen on sacred cows, a kind of contrived detachment, gazing over people's heads as if they didn't exist." Jason Lewis The Expedition on cycling across India.

The cow gazing didn't work for me. We reach the train station quite sweaty and join the back of a static queue for the ticket desk. I stood patiently like a true Brit when someone stepped around me and peered over the man in front. I lightly pull on his arm wondering if they were travelling together. But no, he saw the two foot gap in front of me and thought best to fill it. What carnage! He looked at me with a kind-curious, 'how can I help you' smile. I learnt quickly and joined the scrum.

Arriving at the window with a sweaty forehead, the man hands me a form to fill out. Passport details and (weirdly) a copy of passport, home address, phone number, arrival in India, visa details, do you want a seat for the whole journey? or just for a bit? And so on.

Then I join the queue again, less patiently this time, jabbing the form through the hole in the window. The man at the desk rattles on a keyboard and squiggles down notes, his tired eyes drained yellowy-white from punishing long shifts. He mumbles "you can buy a ticket, but the train might be full". Its like a really crap bookies, betting on whether you'll get a 18 hour train or not. I still don't understand how it works, but perhaps the crowds of sleeping corpses in the waiting room is evidence that it doesn't. It looks like people have camped out there for days, waiting and hoping that one day they'll get on a train.

The Indianisms are becoming less charming since I left the hotel this morning. Things irritate me more, the stinks seem stronger, the stares more intrusive. We sit in the station on our bags, heads hanging like we're guilty of something. Locals stand like zombies, blank in the eyes watching our every move. I have weird stare off matches with grown men for minutes, until one of us cracks into a smile. Somehow India missed out on the time when staring strangers dead in the face stopped being cool. What is so fascinating? Yes I'm putting my jumper on now its a bit chilly, your wearing one too. Yes, Im drinking a chai now, so is everyone else, we're in a cafe. As one weary traveler put it "I feel like a monkey in a zoo!!" Its so hard to handle and when pot bellied men hack and spit in the street watching Gayle pass with skin-crawling lust behind the eyes, it makes me want to walk up and push them over.

Finally the train rolls in, often bringing a new scent to the station. Everyone jumps up and charges for the open doors before its even stopped, us included. I don't know why we do, as the train sits in the station for half an hour while the driver has a tea. Eventually though, when India feels ready, the train heaves into life and the carriage becomes cooler with wind filtered through the drop toilet, sweeping right through the train giving everyone a sample. Some gusts are worse than others. Gayle wines like a pup, hiding her nose in her jumper "Ah! what is it?" - "don't ask that question" I reply. We climb on our bunks and get comfy, we'll be there for about a day.

The carriages become filled with snores and breaking wind as it rattles ever on into more India. And dread hangs in the air in the approach to my inevitable turn in the toilet. You never know what you'll find in there, sliding open the rusty lock and stepping inside the rocking stink tin. I'm sorry to say, but when nature did finally demand a call, I stepped up to a whole horrifying cow pat of a turd, lying like a road kill two feet away from the intended hole. What had confused the culprit? Poop where everyone else poops please! Maybe I'll do mine right here on the steps!

Anyway, like I said, I love India.




In so many ways India shouldn't work, but some how it bumps and bangs along. Sit at a chai stall and watch the chaos for an hour, it's a flowing example of how not to live...Don't drive the wrong way around a roundabout you might die, don't throw rubbish in the pile because the pile is now bigger than your house, best not play cricket by the motorway, just because.
But, the world could learn so much from India...smile more, sing on the way to work, eat well, be close with your family, work hard but don't rush.

Judty decided she wanted a chai and stuck some headphones in my ears before we went on the hunt. European house music boomed in my brain as we walked the bridge, Jutdy leading the way, her little figure slinking through tiny gaps in the crowd. She stopped randomly over the water causing a bottle neck of tourists and plucked out an ear phone to listen in and started dancing - "now you dance!", her little grin encouraging and unashamed. I bobbed for a second, incredibly self conscious. Dozens walked by smiling and curious - ' what a strange couple!' - I kept my head down and danced. And for a moment, bobbing to the woops of Judty, I forgot my ego. Embarrassment was lost - we should dance in the morning! We should sing with our chai! The future doesn't exist! And then I glanced up at the face of a smirking tourist and snapped right back. I'm not quite the enlightened floaty eyed foreigner just yet.