Adrian's first impressions

Ahmedabad 28th December
We flew into Mumbai airport by Jet Airways - noticing the shanty town by its side as we landed. International airports are usually a prestige monument to the host nation, but Mumbai airport fails to impress and as we transferred by bus to the domestic terminal, with closer contact to the neighbouring shanties, and the building work on the warehouses (unfinished so that cardboard packaged goods were out in the open) with women carrying building materials on their heads, the impression worsened. The domestic terminal is new but the expected electronic announcement boards were absent so that boarding was organised by announcements and rail way style destination boards at the gates - onto another bus to the plane on the tarmac.

We were met by Kaizad and one of his sons, with a cousin to drive a small and battered four-seat er into which we five and luggage were piled - seat belts ? - no! Nothing but the experience can prepare you for the horror of traffic in Ahmedabad - traffic in Palermo was peaceful and well-regulated by comparison. There is a continual beeping of horns to the extent that as a warning signal this exercise is pointless through indecipherability in the overall noise. There are no lanes marked - even in the few places where an all but indistinguishable mark exists it is ignored entirely - there is often no directional discipline, and crossing, entrances and exits are a complete free for all - with people and vehicles dashing into and across any free spaces. Bicycles, pedestrians from the fleet to almost lame, hand and horse cats, scooters and three-wheeled ''rickshaws' jostle with cars, lorries and buses, all without regard for each other. Not to mention ubiquitous dogs and the odd bullock grazing on greenery in the central reservation as additional hazards to be negotiated. No wonder the sky is filled with kites wheeling away in their dozens.


January 14th is the festival day or competition for the flying of man-made kites, when the sky becomes almost invisible with them, it is said. Remnants of unsuccessful kites are wrapped around every overhead wire and by the side of the road from the airport, boys were laying out lengths of white and fluorescent red threads on poles in preparation for the big day.

We were deposited at a small hotel. Across the road was an opulent 'Le Meridien' which we went into when ours did not know how to deal with travellers cheques. They couldn't deal with ours as we were not resident there, but phoned across the road with the necessary information and half an hour later a banker and his driver turned up so that we could perform a transaction in the hotel restaurant, sealed with a cup of tea and some social conversation.

Also across the road was a building labelled 'The Zoroastian Womens Ind. Coop' indicating the Parsee community of whom we were guests, and behind our hotel was a mosque, the PA system amplified muezzin of which woke us at dawn local time (1 am ish GMT).

First Impressions

Husband asks how you'd give this hotel Host-Inn, opp le Meridien, a star rating, but adds

"perhaps you'd give it an asteroid rating?"

However, at Rs1460/- per night for a double room, it costs only about 19 pounds sterling. Moreover, it is clean and friendly.

Last night we went to a party, just friends and family, but perhaps a hundred people. Zenobia wrote to me years ago about her friends Ferose and Farida, so I'm pleased to meet them. And Kaizad's friends from catering and management school and Noshir's friends from the bank where he worked. I should have remembered that when I had to change my travellers cheques.

We were introduced to everyone, initially formally as we went round a semi circle of chairs, but everyone was pleased to come and talk to us and make us feel welcome and tell us about themselves too. We met Z's brother from Bombay, who explained something about the Parsee religion. I hadn't realised how conservatively religious the family was, and that Rusi Uncle was a priest.

The party was on the grounds of a school, well out of the city centre, in the countryside - the 'jungle' is what Behzad, Z's 4 year -old grandson called it - lit by lots of tiny lights hanging from the trees that surrounded the 'playground' where we sat and ate and drank and chatted. We had lots of lovely nibbles, followed by a main course of rice and dal, washed down with sprite (or some sort of local home made concoction - this is a dry state).

Dhun (Noshir's brother) told us a lot about his media work, including with the Wild Fowl and Wetland trust in the UK and how that is influencing and improving tourist access to a mangrove park. He also told me about how Rusi Uncle passed away in 1994.

Beris, Zenobia's mother's sister-in-law told me how good the shopping was in Ahmedabad, and we've agreed to go together on 31st.

At around 11.30 we piled (7 of us) into a car, and they brought us back to our hotel with a promise to pick us up the next day (this morning) for another party.

This morning we had a cup of tea at Zenobya and Noshir's flat - I've been writing to this address for years, and at last get to see it.

Later we were driven in a rather grander car to the Zorastian temple, - you can't go right into the centre if you are not a parsi, - where there was another fine meal. We sat outside under an awning at long tables, one side only, so that the waiters could serve you down the other side.


Inside you could see them making the chappattis, and they were lovely and light and small. Then a monkey jumped on to and ran across the awning - you couldn't see it - just it's shadow, and then a long grey tail hanging from the tree where it stopped.

I met Z's cousin Rose, who lives in England, and Farida. She introduced me to her father, who said "Don't you remember me?" It was Mr Gai, the gentleman in Delhi who had so looked after Vera (McNamara) and me in 1975.

Now we are finishing a siesta in the hotel, to be picked up for the first of the celebrations for the Navjote, that takes place tomorrow.

Arrived

It's nearly seven o'clock and it's dark. We reached Ahmedabad with only a slight delay in planes when we changed at Mumbai. You fly in over the shanty towns to the international airport, go through customs and wait in a rather unofficial unair-conditioned corridor while airport staff bustle about until a bus trundles you round to the domestic airport.

We are staying in the Host Inn Hotel, which announces that it is opposite Le Hotel Meridien (that's a posh one) in the district of Khanpur. K and his cousin met us at the airport and got a taxi to bring us here. We've changed some travellers cheques and any minute are leaving to join a family gathering.

We've changed some travellers cheques, which involved quite a palaver. First we asked here, then we asked in the Meridien, who asked if we were staying there. It transpires that hotels can change travellers cheques for their own guests only. But the Meridien reception very kindly rang our reception and explained everything he had to do. And when we got back to our hotel, he looked the cheques, and my passport, and made another phone call to get the instructions repeated. Then we had to wait half an hour. Eventually, we were lead into the dining room where two Muslim men were waiting with a calculator, a black bag and a list of exchange rates. We agreed the calculation, counted it out and waited while someone was sent to take photocopies of passport and visa. We drank tea. It was all very leisurely.

I'm worrying about

• BA strikes at British airports
• missing the connections at Mumbai
• missing the connection at Paddington
  
• being inadvertently rude
• itchy insect bites
• not having a hotel booked
• not getting the travellers cheques changed and having no money for a taxi to a hotel
• malaria
• Japanese encephalitis
• camera battery going flat
• losing camera
• losing passports
• losing anything
• daughter at home may be lonely or hungry
• forget to pack something
• threat of bombs at Indian airports in January
• seeing a tiger
• not seeing a tiger,
• getting too close to the tigers in Kerala.

We leave on the 16:38 train...

Christmas passed

It passed well, hit all the right buttons, filled all the tummies and stockings, and no arguments (yet).

Post-Christmas plans

Mosquitoes!

That's what I'm now worrying about - do I need citronella or mosquito nets to supplement the malaria tablets for our two weeks in India? Will the hotel have taken measures to keep the wee beasties at bay?

Our hotel at Cochin looks a bit posh. We're there for two nights and on Thursday 3rd January we move to Munnar to stay in a standard cottage at the Tall Tree. Then into the 'wild' to see tigers at Periyar staying in a cottage. I imagine the houseboat at Alleppey will have the most mosquitoes. The final stop is at Kumarakom in a cottage at Radisson Plaza Resort & Spa for two nights before catching a plane from Cochin back to Mumbai where we stop overnight - I don't know where - we haven't heard back from the Indian friend who suggested that we stay in the NSCI club. She emailed that it might be full because of the wedding season.

We fly home Thursday 10th. And I hope we do fly, as now I've found, to add to my worrying, that there's been an email threat to blow up India airports on 12th January. Together with BA threats to strike 7th and 14th January, the trip gets a bit worrying. I hope we miss all the excitement.

Tae Kwondo demo

What am I going to do? We've had our last session till after the new year, yet the first day back we have to demonstrate something. I'm going to be jet lagged and unfit.

Daughter and grandson can work something out to demonstrate together while I'm away. Tonight I'm going to meet fellow tae kwondie over a drink to plan - can't see us practising in the pub though.

Christmas food & visitors

We have visitors on Sunday and on Christmas Day too. There are only 12 for lunch on Sunday - us five at home plus husband's brother's family and our son and his family. When the local grandchildren visit after lunch, we'll be a few more to play.

On Christmas Day we are 15. Us five plus visiting Italian in-laws and 5/6 children with their respective partners and offspring.

The menu includes a stuffed bird from Heal Farm and the usual accompaniments. I especially like their Grande Marnier tart. Yum! And I expect there'll be a little champagne.

Christmas plans

People ask me when daughter is coming home for Christmas, so I ask her father.

"When I pick her up."

And

"When's that going to be?"
"I don't know - when she tells me."

I speak to daughter:

"When are you coming home?"
"I don't know - when Daddy picks me up."

Stalemate. I'll see her when I'm looking at her.

AOTRA dinner

Aylesbury Old Town Residents Association held their Christmas dinner in the Rockwood.





I took some photos.

And some more.

Facebook

I've joined Facebook.

Facebook is a social networking electronic thing. It seems to be the fashionable update of what I've been using through Friends Reunited to catch up with people from my past (and then forget them again) and the First Class software that the OU uses to organise conferences/forums where I get so much through 'meeting' my fellow tutors and students.

Son and daughter talk about Facebook, but weren't too enthusiastic about my joining. Nevertheless, since it seems to be for university students and I'm a university student, I thought I ought to investigate it. So I've joined and now I've got three friends. One is a fellow post-grad and son and daughter have acknowledged me and agreed to be my friend. Son seems to be delighted to be the first to write on my wall - is there a competition to write on people's walls?

If you are Facebook, will you send me a message?

Vaccinations

Had various vaccinations yesterday ready for trip to India. Apparently my surgery needed six weeks notice and five and half weeks was too short, so I had to drive up to a private clinic 20 miles away, while husband got his vaccines free on the NHS through a different surgery.

It takes ages to get an appointment at our surgery. A week-next-Monday isn't unusual, but at least when I got referred to the hospital for an x-ray that happened within 24 hours.

Photographing London

I went up to London yesterday to meet fellow T189 students for a photo shoot. I took loads of photos, none of which are worth showing anyone, but I enjoyed meeting the other students and discussing the difficulties of F-stops and apertures and which way meant they were bigger or smaller and what ISO we were using.

A colleague took this photo of such a discussion. And here is a comprehensive description of where we went.
http://blogs.open.ac.uk/h807/kmb22/

Arianna's thread

You can see the latest photos of the new baby at ariannasthread.com. But even if you aren't interested in babies, it's a nice web site.

Breakfast

Breakfast - the quietest time of the day. I love the muslei I make with pumpkin and sunflower seeds. I soak them overnight in fruit juice so that they just start to sprout at breakfast time, crunchy but delicate with extra flavour. I chew them a little bit longer to get all the flavour. mmm. I take a big spoonful.

"Mum!"

I mumble a response. "Is it d-tunnel, that proxy?" "mm-mm", I reply, still savouring but teenage daughter blithely carries on.
"How do you spell it?"
I try to gesticulate at her that my mouth is full, but her back is turned!
"How do you spell it?" she insists as she butters her bread.
"Mm-mm-mm-mm-mm-mnte" (meaning "I'll tell you in a minute")) I answer hopefully, but she goes "What?"

I'm now stressed and not enjoying what remains of this poorly chewed mouthful. She doesn't get a contentful answer. I think she'll probably ask me another question so there's no point in continuing eating now, so I go and tidy and wipe the kitchen. Neither of us talk for 10 minutes. She takes my newspaper and reads it while I clear up.

Now she's gone to school, I'll go and finish breakfast in solitary peace.

Poppies

Granddaughter's year group at Elmhurst school embroidered a plate of poppies and displayed it in our local church.

Divali

Knock at door at 8.30 this morning. Nice neighbour, Kenyan Asian lady with her two younger children on their way to school smilingly offered me a present and "Happy Divali!". I've never had a Divali present before. Aren't I lucky?

They are sweet cakes and I've brought them into the office to share around. There are never many people in on a Friday so it's nice to be sociable and have something to share.

Paying for university

I thought it was bad enough that the government gave so few years warning that my children would have to pay to go to university. I don't see it as unfair to have to pay, but would have liked to have known when they were much younger. Son is now building up his debt, having a living expenses loan of £3000 a year, and £3000 a year paid to the university. So that's a lot at the end of a four year course.

He applied to five universities, and now his sister is going through the UCAS process and applying to study maths at Oxford, Bristol, Bath, Warwick and Surrey. Their aunt in the states has just emailed to ask

"Do you have to pay to apply to universities in Britain? (Son) paid about $300.00 per application."

Thank goodness that's one expense that we don't have to pay yet.

Daughter has an interview at Surrey next week, an acknowledgement from Bristol and Oxford, but not yet Warwick and the offer of an interview at Bath in January.

Essay writing

Son might come home this weekend to see the new baby, but he says he has heaps of work, including an essay to write. He informs me he needs a day to write this essay:

"No, two days because I have to get the books."

Middle Step Daughter is also studying part time for her surveyor qualifications, and she tells me she's taking a day off work next week to write and essay.

I'm impressed by their discipline and the speed with which they write essays.

Baby born

The phone rang at 7 o'clock this morning. Baby born at 1.45 a.m. She weighs 8lb 11oz. Mother and father are home and resting. We didn't tell J&R immediately, cos they were still in bed asleep but the phone woke J so she came down and asked what the news was.


Lunch time: there are photos of mother and baby on the family web site. It appears near the top of a google search list if you put in two of our surnames. Big brother and sister have gone home to meet their new sister.