We wake up about 10 minutes before our train is to stop at some junction starting with a consonant and consisting of a few vowels. Mr Evil has finally left us and Lindsay is back to his normal happy-chappy self.
We wait for about an hour for our connecting train to some other unknown place. Once we climb aboard we face a 3 hour journey in cattle-class. No seats at all this time. Instead, Lee parks his ass on the floor next to one of the doors and Lindsay stands precariously close to a wide open door as the train rushes past beautiful open vast spaces of South-Eastern India.
It wasn’t that bad a journey – truth be told. Even though our carriage (and the other 112 similar carriages) had 150 people over capacity in them, everyone smiled and greeted us like friends. It was nice – and that’s a very pleasant change.
We finally arrive at somewherenearly an hour away from our aimed destination, and after a 40-minute wait we hop on another train to take us straight to that place - Pondicherry. Even though we had a full seat to ourselves, this journey was nowhere near as pleasant as the last. We think the driver;
- Was on the first day of his new railway job and was incredibly excited
- Brought his 9 year old kid to work in accordance with the India Rail Annual “Bring Your Kid To Work Day” Scheme
- Was out of his face on drink or drugs
- Was indeed, a 9 year old kid.
The reason we’re assuming at least one of the above options is because, for the entire 40 minute period, our train driver honked his horn at least (and this is no lie) 400 times – more than 10 times every minute. We were right up at the front of the train and it was deafening. So, naturally, Lindsay put his headphones on and melted the torturous noise out with some… Lilly Allen (he fancies the hell out of her but we’ve heard that she’s got one in the oven and that makes Lindsay very sad indeed).
Pondicherry station meets us and we quickly get off that bugger of a train and gesticulate our discontent at the driver’s cabin. Luckily, a tuc-tuc is already at the station and so we jump in and give the driver the name of where we wanted to stay (this reluctant decision was based on the recommendations of Footprint).
27 wrongs turns, 19 stops to ask people for directions and eventually, 56 minutes later, we arrive at a completely different location altogether. Annie Dare said that the guest house we “wanted” to reside at over the next few days was to be found 15 kilometres from the railway station – this distance was used by the tuc-tuc driver to calculate his fare of 150 Rupees.
Not surprisingly, we only travelled no more than 5 kilometres. So, still holding onto our Scottish roots, we diplomatically and calmly debated with the man, explaining that we were not paying £2 for what ended up being a third of the distance initially agreed upon.
We don’t think the man liked our get-our-moneys-worth-stance and so he stole our luggage. Lee (uncharacteristically) went berserk – shouting at the man and rather unconvincingly threatening to call the Police (neither of us knew their number). Whilst distracted, Lindsay took the opportunity to free our kidnapped luggage from the taxi and moved it into a small restaurant.
Sensing that Lee was making idle threats, the tuc-tuc driver walked over to the bags, which were now on the ground beside Lindsay’s feet and began to pick them up one by one.
Excuse me friend, but I think you’ll find that’s theft – Lindsay said in a very polite, and calm manner (extremely uncharacteristically). The driver continued and so, Lindsay resorted to puffing his chest up like a cock(erel) and a lot of pulling from each party finally resulted in us having full control of our belongings.
Lee continued to shout and wave his arms around but the will of the tuc-tuc man was too strong. We finally gave in and handed him 150 Rupees. When did we fall so weak?
Anyhow, with no help whatsoever from Annie, we eventually found a decent room just off the main road in a little place called Auroville, or somthing like that. Finally, we could afford to each have our own rooms! More importantly, each room had a telly!
You have not truly lived until you have sat down and watched an entire Bollywood movie – Lindsay has learnt so many new dance moves and can not wait to show them off.
We stayed here for three days and nights – there was nothing to do whatsoever, and we think that’s exactly what we needed. Me and Me time.
Pondicherry is ok. If you are 93 years old, Swedish or a Hippie, you’ll love it. The beach is appalling but one good thing is, you can hire a moped for the day for only 120 Rupees!
Prohibition is in force and nowhere sells alcohol (if you stumble across a restaurant that does, then the taxes on the drink are extortionate) so, rather than face a forced detox, on night one, we hired another tuc-tuc driver to take us to a bar.
We agreed a price of another 150 Rupees. This time the driver was instructed to take us to beer and wait for us whilst we drink lots of said amber before taking us back to our guest house.
He turned out to be a nice tuc-tuc driver and chatted away to us in broken, but charming English. We decided to buy him a drink as a token of our appreciation. Expecting that he’d say no, or at the very most, that he would opt for a small (and cheap) cola – it failed to shock us when the small-framed man ordered a bottle (yes… a whole bottle) of Brandy.
Luckily it was only 40 Rupees and, considering the way the average sober Indian drives on the roads, we didn’t batter an eye-lid at the possibility of a tipsy taxi drive home.
We’re going to make a stereotypical comment here – and it’s fact. Indians can not drink. Our little driver (who was a 37 year old, married man with two kids) had a few sips of dark matter and within minutes he was out of his tree!
After much stuttering and swaying he left us to join some of his friends. We continued with our beers which tasted so much better, knowing that they were forbidden here.
An hour or so passed and the driver came wobbling back over to our table. We told him we were ready to be conveyed home after his enquiry into our status. But, he insisted that we should go and see his family first.
Fearing we’d insult the poor man’s generous invitation, we hesitantly accepted the friendly offer. Into the tuc-tuc we got and after a five-minute-all-over-the-road petrifying ride we pulled up at his house.
He shouted over to a group of people and we assumed that the extremely disapproving and angry woman, was our chaufers wife. He must do this sort of thing a lot. But, we shook her hand and the hands of about 9 other locals and eventually pleaded with the driver to take us home as we were extremely hungry.
He finally obliges and 15 minutes later we arrive just outside our pad for the night. Lindsay handed over 200 Rupees and awaited the change. Our driver, by now, was incoherent and all over the place. He took the money and put it straight into his top left shirt pocket.
“Change please?” Lindsay patiently requested. “No. I don’t take any money from you. You, you and me – we are all friends. I see you tomorrow” came the reply from our drunken pal.
He had, in all of 6 seconds, forgotten that he had just been handed 200 Rupees and was insisting that we didn’t need to pay him. Obviously we had shown him a great time and this was worth more than any value of money.
Eventually, after much explaining and pointing to his pocket, Lindsay managed to get 100 back from the man and so, Lee ran to a nearby shop to get change. We then handed over 50 Rupees and both of us ran away like little school-girls from our scary new friend.
The next few days went rather smoothly and very relaxingly. Needless to say, both of us had no more alcohol.
We washed all our clothes ourselves (Mummy will be so proud) but, Lee forgot to separate the colours from the whites. His entire wardrobe is now of psychedelic tie-dye style. Lindsay washed all his clothes but confusingly, everything now smells like stale curry. Never mind though, he ate lots of coconuts and that’s always a good thing.
You may have noticed that there are no bad words in this journal entry. That’s because we’ve become aware that a lot of kids are following the site. Plus, our Mum has shown her disapproval and asked where we learnt so many swear words.
We’re quite f*cking impressed with ourselves.
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