Street life, Agra

Agra is a sparsely laid out city and to get around one requires the services of a rickshaw wallah. Sparing Agra’s already polluted air, we plump for a cycle-wallah who will peddle us around, provide a running but incomprehensible commentary and chew betel nut for us for a few pence. Our chosen wallah is a funny old chap with bad teeth (too much betel nut) who agrees to give us a round trip to Agra, waiting there while we sight-see, for 60 Rs. The cycle-rickshaw is the way to travel, except up hills when you feel like a particularly sordid slave driver putting an old man through an anaerobic nightmare dragging us two along in the heat. We do him a favour and get off on the steep ones.
The fort is chaotic outside but peaceful within and quite similar to Delhi’s. It would make a great Bond set. On the way home our wallah explains why so many of his peers are willing to offer ludicrously cheap tours. If they get their two passengers to detour via some craft shops (typically selling carpets, marble or woodwork) they get a commission: 5 Rs if the tourists just look around and up to 5% if they buy anything. It’s a big incentive given the value of the goods on sale. We decline his offer to do the same since we are paying him enough already and, like he says, “You happy. Me happy”. He learnt his English from tourists, not school. He is a remarkable chap with the most unique dental condition I’ve ever seen.
Back at the hotel, Stu and Jen are relaxing on the rooftop terrace. Stu has a big metal pole in his hand for ‘Monkey duties’ and one of the hotel staff is up there throwing stones to keep them away. We head out to a nearby rooftop café called ‘Join Us’ for a tasty meal and beers. Stuart decides to try a “Special” Lassie – a yoghurt drink laced with hash and often served as if it were tea to avoid the law. He reckons it’s pretty good but we stick to the beers. We have some long discussions about school and stuff and feel rather young in their presence. They are spending six months in India and hope to trek round Nepal before their money runs out. They met in England and have been working there for the last year.

The incredible Taj Mahal

After a very relaxing air-conditioned express train from Delhi, we arrive in Agra fresh and cool. On the train we meet an Australian (and Kiwi) couple, Stuart and Jenny. We saw them yesterday in the booking office and commented on the way Stuart’s ginger goatee and Hawaiian shirt made them stick out like sore thumbs but they seem plenty nice enough so we share a taxi to our chosen hotel, the ‘Kamal’. We’ve got the touts licked now. “This hotel very bad; very bad indeed… You come to hotel I know – very cheap.” Our reply puts a stop to their nonsense: “We’re meeting friends at the hotel.” How can they refuse?
The hotel Kamal is one of the few in Agra which boasts an unobstructed view of the Taj Mahal. This is something of a temporary advantage judging by the number of hotels nearby rapidly adding towering extensions so that they can do the same. The Taj is small from this distance but it does look serenely beautiful – somewhat out of place with its surroundings – in the early morning sun. As we are sitting on the edge of the open top roof, admiring the view and waiting for our rooms to be ready, a large monkey, nuts swinging in the breeze, comes running over the rooftops. It comes knuckling around two sides of the rectangular roof and just as we are getting up to move out of the way it takes a leap at me and ends up on my back. I jump up and it runs away but not before ripping my shirt and leaving a painful 2-inch slash across my back. The damage has been done: my skin has been broken and monkeys carry rabies.
Stuart and Jenny are quick to point out that this is not to be dismissed lightly. There is every chance that the monkey doesn’t have rabies but there is also the fact that rabies is a ‘uniformly fatal’ viral brain disease. The treatment does not sound pleasant either. Stuart recites a Beavis and Butthead sketch which includes the lines “Beavis got bitten by a dog. He He He. How many jabs will he have? Ten jabs”, which doesn’t have me running to go to the Doctors. The hotel owner doesn’t really help by telling us that in the mornings he only ever goes up on the roof with a stick. Unfortunately he didn’t tell us this before showing us up there. Soon all the other Westerners in the hotel are talking about me and my rabies. Speculation on what jabs I require varies from “massive” stomach injections to an unappealing ten spread over a month. Eventually, the hotel owner summons a Doctor who happens to live next door. It is Sunday morning and he is still in his pyjamas. He says I must have a tetanus booster today and then rabies tomorrow. He sprays the wound with Iodine and I use my sterile needle pack in anger so he can administer tetanus. He is quite reassuring but his English is not as good as I would like. Stuart and Jenny come along to watch the injection, as do at least five other Indians and their children. This is strangely comforting, as if nothing can go wrong if witnessed by so many people.

Taking my rabies jab like a man

Concerned about my future beyond the next 48 hours, I make a call to my travel insurance line back home. A Dutch woman there is very helpful and calls me back. The recognised treatment is five injections (oh praise be…) of vaccine spread over the next month. As long as I get the injections I’ll be fine. The symptoms to watch out for are flu-like but once they appear, the disease is fatal. I’ve never had a fatal disease before.
Trying to put morbid thoughts aside, we make a trip to the Taj together. Nothing prepares you for the Taj, close up. The apparently white surface is actually translucent marble with inlaid precious stones in intricate flower patterns. It is fundamentally beautiful. It took 20,000 slaves 22 years to build and is a mausoleum (or a monument to love depending on how you see it) for the beautiful second wife, Mumtaz Mahal, of emperor Shah Jahan who died in childbirth in 1631. She lies in a tomb at the very centre of the building. The emperor’s own tomb, originally planned to be an exact mirror-image “black” Taj built on the opposite bank of the river, was never built and the emperor was deposed by his son, Aurangzeb, for wasting so many resources and imprisoned in Agra Fort, forever to look upon the final resting place of his wife. Now his tomb rests next to his wife’s and is the only asymmetrical part of the entire Taj Mahal. Basking on the hot white marble outside, we wonder if there can be a more stunning monument anywhere in the world.

Roadside boy, urinating

It’s back to the buses for us and time to retrace our steps to the city we loathe. This is only necessary since all other means of transport seem to radiate from Delhi and we are headed for Agra and the Taj Mahal. When our bus arrives, flying over a bump and lifting its back wheels clean off the ground, it turns out it has suspension problems just like the last. Cue: a two hour wait while a man with a hammer does the necessary. It provides an interesting episode in observing “working class” Indians, dogs and mechanics.
Finally underway, we seem to stop every ten minutes to allow anyone who the driver fancies get on and haggle for a ride. The roads seem to be made from ploughed mud and there seem to be numerous sheep flocks filling the narrow roads. Weird. We survive on a couple of bags of spicy crisps until about midnight when we stop at a “Dhaba” or roadside cafe where a gorgeous plate of Alu Gobi (spicy potato and cauliflower) and chepatis is gratefully received. The stars are out, but tempers between both of us trying to get some sleep in the same tiny space are getting short. The night is a long one.
This time careful to avoid the touts, our time in Delhi is trouble-free. We manage to get tickets for Agra tomorrow at 6.15am and a night’s stay in the Anoop hotel – where every room is lined in cool marble like a mausoleum.

We take an auto-rickshaw to Vashisht, a village on the other side of the valley. Our aim is the hot bath complex but we are first waylaid in an interesting, though pressured, jewellery shop. All the rings are semi-precious and pretty but heavy and clumsy like you might want for stage drama. All the Indians seem to love it but it would look awful back home! Lizzie buys a small ring.

Toni & Guy, Manali franchise

The baths are an incredible establishment. For about £1.20 we get half an hour in the largest private bath I’ve ever seen. It’s a deep square white-tiled hole in the room and filled with extremely hot and very relaxing “spring” water. What a fantastic way to spend the day.
Auto rickshaws can take you to Vashisht but finding one to take you back is near impossible. Unwilling to wait for the next Westerners to arrive here so we can steal their return ride, we have to walk the 4km home.
Back in Manali, it is time for me to do something I’ve always seen myself doing in a country like India and have my hair cut in the open air. I enrol myself at a street barber whose assets consist of a small cupboard, a mirror nailed to a tree-trunk and some blue tarpaulin in case it rains. But for 30p I get an excellent, first-rate haircut and it’s all done with cut-throat razor and scissors – not an electric razor in sight (not that there is any electricity anyway). The passers-by find the spectacle very amusing. Afterwards I am offered a full “head-massage” to match my new cut but I decline after hearing the painful crunches, clicks and groans which come from the Indian next to me as he has it done.

The beautiful Rohtang Pass, by donkey

Rise early to a hearty breakfast of cinnamon whirls and chocolate brownies from the wonderful “German Bakery”. Today we’ve got two tickets on a bus to a mountain pass way up north where it is rumoured there is snow. We are the only Westerners on the bus and all the others are typically young Indian newly-weds off to see snow for the first time in their lives. Once again, it seems we have voluntarily chosen to confine ourselves to an uncomfortable bus ride.
The scenery, however, is enough to keep our attention for the three hours it takes to get to Rohtang Pass (or Snow Point). Halfway up, and in baking sunshine, we stop at a roadside shack where we can rent mittens, snow coats and wellington boots. It’s like rummaging through some flea-ridden jumble sale but the idea is sheer comedy. So we come back into the hot sun wearing two ridiculous fur coats. Our fellow travellers seem rather more in need of the full outfit – they were previously wearing flip-flops and high heels.
When we finally reach Rohtang, we have about two hours to look around. From the bus, although it is cold, there is no sign of snow: just a few shacks and a bunch of donkeys. But there are mountain peaks in the distance and a rather enchanting donkey ride takes us over the ridge to the edge of a large icy “glacier” where we get to look at, and walk on, dirty snow. The most hilarious thing is watching all the Indians walk on it. They seem to have no idea that snow is actually slippery and keep falling all over the place. They all want to have their photos taken with us – to the point when we begin to feel like weary film stars in the glare of the paparazzi. We take a few ourselves – including a mock Yeti shot – and take in the scenery and the clean, cold air.
The return journey is a rather rapid, hair raising descent characterised by very loud Hindi music blaring out of overhead speakers. Oh and there are some men who brought bottles of whisky from a dodgy shop en-route but can’t take their booze, all singing along raucously.

Bus to Manali

At the bus station in Shimla there is just as much chaos as anywhere you could imagine. Our bus is due to leave at 6.30pm but when we determine the number and locate it through a throng of people, it seems that a prompt departure is a little optimistic given that it is already 6.20pm and the bus is jacked up with its rear suspension in bits. Luckily the Indian driver and conductor are on-hand to fix it: with a hammer and, as it gets dark, a candle.
While this charade goes on, all the passengers sit around on their bags, looking on with interest and occasionally getting up and moving, like seasiders at high tide, as another rickety bus sweeps by. During this period we have an interesting non-conversation with an old toothless Indian women who has her finger constantly up her nose. She can’t speak any English but seems to think we are fluent in Hindi. Either that or she’s developing an interesting Nasal sign code. No matter what we say in reply she just keeps on talking. Oh, and there’s a hopeful porter who is prepared to wait with us just so we’ll eventually pay him 10 Rs to put our bags on the roof. Our bags aren’t going on the roof but we don’t have the heart or the ability to tell him.

Alpine scenery on the way to Manali

Finally after two hours of banging at it with a hammer, the bus is apparently mended so we all get on and the Indians make a mock “fight” for seats they have already been allocated. It’s all part of the travel experience. The porter gave up and went home long ago and our huge rucksacks fill the footwell. We end up with two seats positioned over the rear wheels which is not a bad thing since any further back and you’re basically sat on a sprung pivot which amplifies every bump in what is already a staggeringly uneven ride. The author of “Are you experienced?” got it right when describing the back seats in Indian buses: “…we travelled in a kind of sadist’s zero-gravity chamber; you spend half the time floating in mid-air and the other half having your arse spanked by the seat.”
The driver delights in taking downhill, hairpin bends at high speed – all I can see is a movie-like screen of trees passing the windshield illuminated by two yellow headlights – moving first right and then left in sickeningly quick succession. Considering mine is full of greasy vegetable samosa, the ride does nothing for the stomach.
We stop at 11.30pm for a plate of curry from a roadside shack. I decline but stretch my legs and eat a banana. Lizzie stays put. As soon as we’re back moving, the bus is full of snoring Indians. I can’t sleep a wink. The aisle is full of slumbering bodies. Unbelievable.

Resting after an exhausting journey

At 1.30am after fitful dozing, the bus stops with a shudder and the ominous smell of burning rubber. Blue smoke is drifting up from the rear axle. Even the driver seems to realise that, this time, a hammer is not enough: our bus is, temporarily at least, out of service. We are on a road that stretches into blackness in both directions. So we all get off and sit on our bags – it’s become a familiar experience. Lizzie and I sit in the cool dirt and play eye spy for three hours. Every time a truck passes, the driver flags it down and asks if they have any tools. No-one has anything except a hammer.
Eventually, a public (read “painfully uncomfortable and totally full”) bus pulls up and half of our fellow passengers dash to squeeze themselves on to it. We are too slow to even join the back of the queue – but at least we know what to do when, half an hour later, another one arrives. Piling ourselves and our rucksacks in the back door, we wake up a man lying across the back seats so we can steal the one spare one left. And for our second seat? Well, we have full access to the spare tyre. As I try in vain to find a comfy part of it, I notice, not entirely without concern, that the tread is as bald as my Dad’s head.
So it is that we end up right at the back of a rather more uncomfortable bus where the description about seating from “Are you experienced?” proves to be even more thoroughly realistic. But the lack of sleep is more than compensated for by the views of Kullu Valley as it grows light on the long trip up towards the beautiful alpine Manali. We finally arrive in the town itself, only 18 hours after we departed (and at least 8 hours late) – exhausted, sore and black from tyre rubber.

Hotel Uphar, up here

The wake up call comes far too quickly for sleepy minds. When we leave our room it is 5.15am and the hotel porters are asleep on the marble floor of the reception. No traffic outside means a rapid and bumpy ride to the station which, even this early in the morning, is packed with locals, many of whom appear to have slept here. Someone tries to claim our ticket is not valid until we pay him some money for a “stamp” – but we are hardened scam-artists now and recognise him for what he is.
The train has padded wooden seats (2nd class) but on the carriage door is a printout with “Tim B” and “Liz H” – the height of Indian Railway efficiency. The train is busy and noisy with hawkers peddling everything from newspapers, tea, coffee and ice to toy guns, crisps and Pepsi. It is a well known fact that every major city’s railway leads the unsuspecting passenger through the very worst areas of its suburbs. Delhi is no exception. The ghettos here are the worst I’ve seen: the filth and pollution in the water pools is enough to indicate the level of poverty in which people live here.
Along the tracks, as if bringing their depravity to the attention of us, the “higher caste” occupants of the moving train, are hundreds of men, women and children squatting, with their trousers down, performing their morning ablutions on the rails. People are sleeping anywhere they can find – on window ledges, taxi bonnets, benches, bikes, rickshaws, curled up under rags, sacks and boxes; the only obvious sign of life is often a protruding, deformed limb. The train ride provides a truly memorable picture of the harsh realities of life in India.

Monkey business, Shimla

A full eleven hours later, and after changing at Kalka to the small gauge “toy train”, we arrive, shattered, in Shimla, the famous British hill-station. The raised heights and mountain air, not to mention the beautiful scenery, made Shimla a favourite summer-time retreat for Delhi’s wealthy inhabitants. Before the train track was constructed, they used to travel all the way by mule. Still wary of scams, although we needn’t be here, we avoid the porters offering to carry our bags and set off at pace to find our hotel. Mistake: Shimla is very hilly. The climb, with a hopeful porter still following us at a distance, almost defeats us. The hotel we choose is right at the top: Hotel Uphar (Up Here…). But it is worth all the effort. Shimla is relaxed, beautiful and, although foggy, a wonderful change contrast to Delhi. Our tidied, evening descent back into the town with its golden-lit mock-Tudor buildings, its English church and its fabulous (and cheap) restaurants provides a much needed change of gear in our holiday.
The next morning we wake to cloud outside; can’t see a thing. When I open the window, the cloud rolls in through it and a monkey clings to our balcony chattering away. I realise now that the bars round the windows are not to stop us falling out. The hotel offers room-service (and still only costs about £3 a night) so we indulge in omelettes and toast.

We spend three nights in Shimla, recovering our sanity, enjoying fantastic food in restaurants, and exploring this sedentary place at our leisure. The ‘State Museum’ is quite interesting, not only for the long and confusing walk to get there. There is a section devoted to cartoons of and stories about Ghandi – which make clear what an incredible thing that one man achieved here.
On our final day, we walk up the hill behind our hotel to get to the “Monkey Temple”. We are ambushed half way up by pesky children whose impromptu conversation, like so many others we have in the streets, begins with “Hello. What is your country?” and nearly always ends with “Do you have a coin of your country for collection?”. We have some English pennies and pencils which we have handed out to those most deserving (!) but these bunch don’t qualify. When they start asking for Dollars and then one of them comes blatantly to the point with “Give me ten Rupees, now!”, I tell them where to go.
Monkeys playing behind the fences erected at the sides of the path are incredibly cute. Monkeys with free access to food-wielding tourists bars are a menace. We discover this to our cost when an old lady with a ‘nut stall’ sells us some packets of nuts to “feed the monkeys”. We know we’ve got nuts in our pockets, the old lady knows we’ve got nuts in our pockets and so too do the monkeys. As we reach the temple they come running at us, screeching and scrabbling to break into our bags and pockets to get at them. It is a difficult situation because they are an unknown (and muscular) threat and because we must avoid being bitten at all costs. The most striking thing as we watch them playing and fighting is their similarity to humans (or rather our human similarity to them). Profound thoughts.