With Thanks To:

Our Cool Car in Cool Chettinad!
In chronological order: a few people of note, not our friends or family we intended to meet


Fiona n.z. -on the bus with your flute!
Ali and all your family,
Maggie - pure oz, Jaipur style
Shankar- cool operator of the Shakantullam!
Ravi- the right hand man!
Moon - driver, cooks a mean lamb
Vishna- tuktuk man, outtalk a Londoner on religion
Andy-intrepid traveller,prison officer
Belgians - 5 kids,did shopping big time!
John & Sonu -Hey! we'll sell you some beauts of bedspreads!
Sean- Duvet Covers ,with 'Up the Spurs!'
Aladdin- salesman of the year
Handsome- Could sell a blarney stone to a paddy!
Liaka- Kindest voice in Jaipur!
Killik- The Finest Tel Aviver we could hope to meet!
Dan and Mas - the finest Danes, intrepid souls...
Alan u.k. - malaria and diabetes, he's beating them both!
Quentin - master gardener, overwinters in Goa!
Shane & Louise - Aussie & Canadian. Met @ Jacs birthday in Rajasthan. Then in Goa. 1st comment from Shane:'You don't scrub up bad for an old bird!'
Marcus- reggae buff, Benaulim
Adam and Amy - Got to include those two names, eh Daisy?
John the failed Businessman - talk the pants off anyone, sell them nothing!
Canadian Adam - fulfilled our rosy view of Canadians
Tilo - Energie meister, teutonic madman for sure...
der Oberguru - tribal, ayurverdic, octogenarian health wizard, self.proclaimed
Welmet Bapu - astrologer and druid, sunning it at Palolem
Mrs Kher - Indian business lady,
Lolita & the Day family - Perfect guesthouse and family, Anjuna
Misha - from Moscow, on his first holiday outside.
George & Alison - Ramashwaram together
Amil - made that bus up to Kodaikanal much more interesting
Vicky & Lindsay - sister in Kerala!
Erik, Pauline, Steve, Sonia - Partners in Christmas...
Lakhshman & brother & Thilini - lovely man, daughter and brother, guesthouse in Kandy George Thompson & music garden friends - pure Sri Lankan folk music, in Lakhshman's garden Pip, Holly, Nel - Yoga partners, Kandy
Mahesh - Yoga teacher, Buddhist meditation centre, Kandy
The Chandrullah family - a sad tale from the Tsunami, but such a happy man...
Simon & Valentina - English and Argentinian
Simon & Gan - spent a few happy days in Luang Prahbang
Lori - Graceful Italian, Dondet
Martin & Andy - Laos residents, fun loving business-headed, Buddhist couple, Dondet
Mr Vong - the most cheerful guesthouse owner, ever!
Alison & Ben - such a nice English couple
Steve with Gout - I met him a lot, Jackie never did!
Carla - intrepid Kenyan, shared Angkor Wat experience, and Phnom Penh
Roger - English artist, did paint workshops on the beach
Roger - Roger, Roger - over and out! Malaysian gentleman
Bert - thanx so much for Kuala Lumpur hospitality...
Justin and Fiona - true Victorians and bon viveurs
Annie Slaughter - magical
Caz, Helen and Jess'ies mates
Martin & Tanya - reach for the sky!
Wendy from Brum- our next door neighbour..
Stu and Megan - Big thanx for the stall!
Bill and Maureen in Fiji
Lindsay and Kevin, usually submerged
Karen, Courteney,Justin & Foster- from Yellowstone Park
Rick and Lesley
Mario and Pancho, thanx so much
Sean Donogan
Stewart from Texas


Tom Wolfe - A Man in Full
Bill Bryson - Neither Here nor There
Notes from a small Island
Philip Pullman - Northern Lights
Dan Brown - Angels and Demons
The Da Vinci Code
Mitch Absolom - The Five People you meet in Heaven
Salman Rushdie - Midnight's Children
Mark Billingham - Sleepy Head
Robert Heinlein - Stranger in a strange Land
Jack Kerouac - On the Road
Minette Walters - The Shape of Snakes
Loung Ung - First they killed my Father
Gregory Roberts - Shantaram
K Sri Dhammananda - How to Live without Fear and Worry
Marlo Morgan - Mutant Message Down Under
John Grisham - The Last Juror
Alain de Bouton - The Art of Travel
Dervla Murphy - One Foot in Laos
Pamela Stephenson - Billy Connolly
Fred Vargas - Seeking Whom he may devour
C Trehern - The Galapagos Affair
Mark Haddon - The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night
Gavin Pretor-Pinney - Cloudspotting
Tom Wolfe - I am Charlotte Simmons
Bill Bryson - A short History of nearly Everything

AND THE WINNER IS, BOOK OF THE YEAR:

"SHANTARAM" Gregory Roberts

Absolutely rivetting.Fantastic! Lugged it round as a 900 page hardback! Worth every moment!

Hampi - another wonder of the world!

Hampi - ancient land of temples - stone chariot, about 600 years old...

On From Goa.....back in to India.....

Get Out and Push,lads!






Just a few metres behind Palolem beach, India waits, enticing you back in.
During December we made our trip to Hampi and Gokarna, hopefully see separate article, but a couple of days after Christmas we set off on the night bus to Bangalore. Night buses actually have sleeper bunks installed , we had used one for our Hampi trip, and this time found ourselves squashed into the back of the bus, readily prepared with our bed cover, bottle of water and a sleeping pill, bought over the counter just before we got on...to no effect! Maybe being in the back of the bus did not help, but we shook, rattled and rolled our way through the night, even smashing our heads onto the roof above as we accelerated over sleeping policemen, potholes, manholes and anything that got in our way. After a toilet break one hour before we got to Bangalore, we staggerred out 13 hours after leaving Goa into the centre of town, left our luggage at the station, booked tickets out on the SLEEPER train(!) that night to Madurai, and did our day of tourism. Revived with an egg curry,mmmm...., we chose Lalbagh gardens to relax in, 260 acres of relative peace in this cosmopolitan city. The gardens were a bit of a shambles, but I enjoyed the wide selection of mature trees, and we both enjoyed dozing on the lawns, then wandering around and inspecting the glasshouses, designed to emulate the original Crystal Palace! Eagles!
Having to wait till about 9pm for the train, we treated ourselves to a pot of Tea at the Oberoi hotel...250 rupees!...but what a nice place to do it, even enquired about a room,.............
250 DOLLARS! No, took the train.

We needed no sleeping aid that night, slept like babies and awoke about 6 heading in towards Madurai. Madurai is the temple of all temples. The town revolves around the temple, which is bang in the middle. As Caroline & Simon were heading here we actually waited till they arrived before we visited it, as Simon is an excellent temple guide! Our journey left us shattered and seemed to take a couple of days to get over. Madurai is Tamil Nadu, a poor state in India, but a friendly place and teeming with all the 'chaat' of daily Indian life. On our street there were a handful of hotels which catered to western tastes i.e. food served on plates not banana leaves, an occasional beer, but otherwise you go local and enjoy it the best you can. We celebrated New Year here, watching the fireworks and crackers from the hotel roof but we didn't do the hokey-cokey or sing auld Land Syne! As usual!
The temple is awesome, covering several acres of the town centre, and in constant use, pilgrims visiting shrines, bathing, praying, meditating, painting...so alive this religion, and always hundreds of people doing everything everywhere! To try to begin to understand the gods and what they do and who they are would require us to become Hindu for several years!
We're not!
Another daytrip took us down to Chettinadu, home of rich and prosperous traders, bygone, with their beautiful and sumptious houses, courtyards and landings, decoration and artwork, all now heading towards decline, but some preserved and cared for.
From Madurai Jac and I went down to Ramashwaram for a night and a day, the place nearest to Sri Lanka on the map. Another 4 hours on a bus, but this temple could not match Madurai for us, and Ramashwaram is very poor, and very dirty, and we got wet, very wet...oh well, back to Madurai, and a visit to the best museum I've seen in India - a Gandhi museum, told the whole history of the Raj from an Indian point of view, and finished with the blood stained tunic Gandhi was wearing when shot...sobering.

From Madurai we left to a Hill Station- Kodaikanal, 2000 metres high in the southern Indian hills, a promise of cool air and lots of tea! Cool air certainly, in fact it felt freezing, and WET!, and in the end we were glad to run away from this place with our clothes wet, no heat in the hotels! -
and not a decent cuppa anywhere! Until we got to Munnar in Kerala -wow! - now thats what I call a hill station! Rolling hills of tea, hedges of Poinsettia, 2 metres high with brilliant new red growth, and trees, unknown to me, covered in orange blossom! &Unfortunately only one night here since our time was shortening that we had left in India and we still wanted to get to Kochin to see Vicky and Lindsay, but the tea was great! At last!

Kerala has the highest rate of literacy in India, and it shows. I think its more prosperous, its bus drivers more daring, and the communist party is still strong! While Ernakulam is a bustling, modern commercial place, Fort Kochi where we headed is a genteel and cultured environment, with art galleries, traditional Chinese fishing nets operating off the wharves - I helped the fishermen pull their nets, a bit like tug of war, and paid for the pleasure!, cool fish restuarants, bijou shops, and local Keralan dance shows - totally amazing. And you should, but we didnt, cruise the 'backwaters' of Kerala...Still, you can't beat spending time with your sister, which we did, and of course, one last thing, who turned up 5 minutes before we left for the airport and Sri Lanka, but Tubby from St Denys - a regular at the little guesthouse we ended up in, one of them chance meetings you know will always happen when you're 5000 miles from home!

Photos to follow! t.b.c.

Plumb - Line - all India guide to personal and society health...

Wonders of the World, Water, Happiness!
After several stays in a range of India's guesthouses and hotels, we were forced to think about the plumbing issues which confronted us: these are a few notes, not written to expose the difficulties which these hotel owners face in maintaining their buildings, in any derogatory way, but rather to link what we found to personal issues, and international issues...

.Hotel Ajunta in Delhi was fine: hot water and a bath, and the whole bathroom worked, what was expected for an expensive hotel, approx $25 per night booked from the UK. ($ = Pounds)
.Hotel Siddartha in Agra was wonderfully close to the Taj Mahal, friendly staff, pleasant courtyard garden, $3.25 per night, cold water only, but a drip drip drip, with an open connection to our neighbours room, so we could each listen to our neighbours ablutions!
.Shakantullam Guest House will remain close to our hearts for ever, and we may well return there, and recommend it fully. See accompanying photo of shower...Dodgy sparking switch outside fired up the geyser, sometimes. Sometimes no water at all, ask for more to be pumped to the room. Power cut every day between 8am and 10am, you can set your watch by it! Forget your morning shower! Oh yes, I dismantled and reconnected the showerheads, and advised on how to remove limescale without buying remover (fresh lime and tissue)!
.Mandawa Heritage Hotel, Jac's birthday, treated ourselves to 2 nights @ $25.00 per night! Took the Maharajah Suite! (Best Room). No Water, had to use next doors bathroom and listen to the boys hammering at the plumbing system till the early hours!
.Castellos Beach Huts, in Benaullim, nice refreshing cold shower. By the way, I havent had a warm shower since November @ Shakantullam, but thats not an issue, its usually too warm! Usually... anyway, a cute frog lived in our bathroom, with a voice more grating than Maggie Thatcher!
.Day's Guest House at Anjuna, getting expensive @ $5.00 per night, was a lovely clean place, light and airy with a cool and pleasant garden and a delightful family eager to nurse us through our ailments. Lovely clean bathroom: toilet, showerhead, gully, no sink!?...Repeated shower head cleaning exercise...
.Sea View Beach Huts, 2 showers shared by occupants of 20 huts, myself anf Jac both had nice little electric shocks... good for your elbow joint I say!
.Surya Paradise, Gokarna. Saw the first cleaning agent I have ever seen in India - a bottle of Bleach! And didn't it need it! We cleaned the loo... after that, ok really.
.Palacete Rodriguez, a mighty $10.00 + per night, and we had to ask for permission for hot water to be turned on. Allowed one hour at a time.
.Homestay, Kochi. Share tiny loo/shower with adjoining bedroom. So lock their door when you go in, lock yourself in, unlock their door when you leave, unlock your own door, then lock your door after exit! If two choose to use loo at once will probably break doors, bash foreheads and fall, wrestling, to the floor!
.TM Lodge, Madurai. It works! mmmm...nice cool shower!

So, at the end of the day, this is just a sympton of a society struggling to adapt to the modern world. I would not choose to be the person responsible for ensuring that the Mumbai sewage system can cope with the demand of the 21 century. Water, and the lack of it, may well be the predominant factor that makes people go to war in the coming years...European water is full of chemicals to keep it 'clean', here, most people can drink water that would make me ill...but, this water sometimes kills many when the fragile sewage system cannot cope.
I don't know the answers, but I have realised that the 'chemical cleanliness' of the west is not the answer for people who can teach us many a lesson about 'purity'...and that when I came out to the heat, sometimes dryness, sometimes moisture of India, what should mess up first with me? ... my own plumbing system!!