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Written in Raxaul on the Indian/Nepalese border
Excuse me if the letter is confused but I’m suffering from dysentery and am in a mild fever. It’s the 4th session of the runs I’ve had on this trip and the worst by far. I can’t remember if I finished telling you about the trekking but I’ll continue from there.
After walking 17 miles with only one stop we arrived at Palagham where we ate our first food that day. The bus back was the usual overcrowded suffering. Our room on the houseboat was taken so we slept on the floor on a mattress that looked like it had every disease impregnated on it. We covered it with the tent. I started with severe runs and was pleased of the toilet at the end of the boat but the trouble was it was a communal one and people tried to get through our room to it but we stopped them.
Feeling ill so we do washing then Joy shops. Feet are very tender and Joy’ boots have nails coming through. I wear Doctor Martin boots with air soles so my only risk is punctures. A kind Japanese guy we met on the boat before we set off had given us a small Karimat mattress, nylon jerkin, woollen gloves and emergency freeze dried food. He was like a messenger from heaven; the karimat made innersoles and the emergency food was very nearly used.
We visit the tourist centre and see maps that show where we should have gone, every valley we went up was wrong! We should have walked to the Kolohoi glacier. So much for the local guide’s advice. Never trust an Indian, we think for a while!
We visit the headmaster of Tyndale Biscoe School which is a fee paying smart school. We ask about working there as teachers but the Headteacher cannot off us jobs by we have tea and an interesting chat with Mr & Mrs Rae who gave us some addresses of other schools. We rush around the shops to buy souvenirs and get only a sari for 110Rs for 5yards of printed silk. I wanted to get some wood carving but we ran out of time.
We take the bus to Jammu. Thankfully my runs have stopped thanks to the antibiotics that we brought with us. The journey is fantastic. I had not seen it on the way up to Srinagar because of having the runs and taking knockout pills to help. It’s like all the alpine roads joined end to end for 11 hours of motoring with a mile long tunnel in the centre.
We could have caught a train that night for Delhi but if you don’t book a seat then you have to sit in the corridor if you are lucky or if you are unlucky you lie under seats or on top of luggage racks. People literally hang onto door window and the roof. So we found a large single room for 10Rs and slept on the floor. I had some local beer which tasted like home brew lager for 42p a pint.
Up at 5:30am for the bus to Delhi for £2.30each. At least we have a seat and some water and fruit but the driver stops only for a lunch break in the journey of 8 hours!!
The lunch meal was awful and when the manager asked for some baksheesh I told him what to do in detail. 5 hours later we reach Delhi and painlessly find the tourist campsite near the centre.
It’s 12Rs a night 84p for the campslte but it is the cleanest place we have found since England. After anyone uses the shower a boy cleans it. The toilets are sit down ones, not the hole in the floor, hurray. Food is expensive, 42p for chow mien etc compared with 28p for veg curry and rice in low grade places.
We wash and rest then rush into Delhi in a three wheeler taxi. Delhi is one of those places that it’s best to get out of fast! We don’t like cities and tourist attractions, ruins and the like. We go to Connaught Place and find the walking on roads and pavements too much for us and get irritable. I don’t realise how much that travelling takes out of me and I’m too proud sometimes to admit it; I’m whacked. We are directed around two post offices to arrive eventually at the Post Restaurant. Thanks mum, it makes a huge difference to read a letter from home. I’m looking forward to receiving Kev’s letter in Kathmandu. We go to the bank then the railway station to arrange tickets for the train toward Nepal but after being sent to 4 queues and wasting two hours we find we are in the wrong place to book tickets. We need the Transport Headquarters called Baroda House to reserve a carriage compartment for tourists so we arrive so frustrated that we queue jump.
I leave Joy sunbathing and suffer incredibly overcrowded buses and am violent with the pushing and shoving crowds. I get a form from Baroda House with amazing ease, the first case of efficiency in India, though why couldn’t that office be in the train station for tourists wanting to purchase train tickets? Then I search for the Post Office but am directed to Old Delhi. I sent my films registered book post. You should get them in about 4-6 weeks. Look at them if you want but please don’t get them out of order or I’ll forget what and where they are of. In the railway queue a few people try to push in but I threaten them with violence and they move away, manners do not exist here. A New Zealand girl tries to push in because ladies seem to be allowed to queue jump and I tell her no go but since she goes on the same train as me I buy her ticket for her as well as ours.
I rush a meal at the camp site and rush to a place where Joy wants to see dancing but there’s only classical singing which will probably sound like wailing to us. Back to the site we meet some English guys who threw an expedition together, 5 guys 2 gals and very naughtily tried to climb in Kulu above Manali which is the area I was hoping to go to and had contacted Paul Bean about. Naughty because they didn’t have liaison officer or paid peak tax. Tragically they were hit by the freak storms that also flooded India and their leader was killed in an accident and they had to abandon the who thing.
They said that instructors are wanted in Manali and Kulu for taking Indians walking and sailing and skiing and climbing and canoeing which I can instruct in. We’ll have a go at getting an instructing or leader’s job or just doing the sports after Nepal. A kind German gives us a holdall, handy.
Up early for the train. No real problem getting it. It stops frequently and is pulled by an electric overhead loco then a diesel then after another stop a good old steam train couple up to pull us to the border of Nepal. I go and admire the steam belching beast and I am invited onto the footplate. The reserve sleeper compartment is only booked to Sevastavol and for our 65Rs each we get wooden seats which fold into wooden beds. We use our karimats to protect our travel weary bums. We were drinking local water which I sterilised with purification tablets but I start getting stomach cramps in the night and it turns to severe runs, the worst yet in the trip.
During today I get quickly worse and develop fever and aches in joints and headache and am sick with loss of appetite, dehydration, kidneys hurting and couldn’t stand up so had to lie down and not move. When we changed trains I could hardly carry my rucksack and couldn’t sit upright without severe discomfort. Fortunately by coincidence the compartment was a sleeper and though for this part of the journey we had no reservation it was not too crowded and they could all see that I was quite ill and a kind guy suggested rearranging the luggage off the top sleeper shelf so that I could stretch out.
Finally after a tortuous ride we arrived in the dark. We were so knackered that we left the water carrier and cups behind but a hassler found a hotel and rickshaw for us for 50p each. The Tourist Hostel at Raxaul was 10Rs 75p a night and the premises and food were a further health risk. Joy caught mild food poisoning even though she had to leave two meals unfinished. We had to stay two nights so that I could recover and have a rest day. The town had just been flooded so there was a cholera outbreak and we were warned that it was a high risk malaria area and we were careful to use the mosquito nets around the bed at night.
I rest in bed, very ill and weak. Joy washes.