Chapter 1: Shattered...
School on Monday morning. Rural West Dorset.
To be in school at 8.30 in the morning meant it was early afternoon Indian time according to my body. That should not have been a problem, except for the fact we had been travelling for 48 hours if you count starting the journey at Shimla on the edges of the Himalayas. Given the events of the mountain railway and getting in late on Sunday I was a zombie in school.
I was still coming to terms with what had happened over the previous three weeks. Those final days bore into my thoughts and I was not in a position to be able to share them yet.
My classroom was there waiting for me. The cover teacher had done a very good job for me, and she had come in to collect something.
"How was it?" she asked.
I looked at her, "Never again," I said and I really couldn't expand on that. Looking at me she knew that I wasn't going to expand on it.
In time I started looking through the photographs I had taken. It had been an epic trip: the slums, poverty, mountains, lakes, palaces, cities, Gandhi, friendships and laughs.
There was a counterbalance in my head and although it was still in the negative it was shifting slightly.
One of the most cathartic experiences was sitting with my year group during English lessons and recounting the good and bad experiences. Rather than put them off it gave them a taste of adventure. They wanted to challenge themselves and experience it too. And it would be their turn for the next trip.
My year group, my India, my way. It could work. I would be prepared to go through it again, but only because it was my students, and after all my stories they deserved the chance.
Six months after our return I knew I would have to go back. India had hit me hard, knocked me down, but I was going to go back and take it on. If this all sounds melodramatic I'm sorry, but this is how I felt. I rise to a challenge, this was going to be one of the biggest of my life, but I was now able to look forward to the next eighteen months and the three weeks that awaited us at the end of it.
This is how it happened.
I was walking towards the staff room when Gilly approached me.
"Would you like to come on the India trip?"
Just like that, as if it were just like an ordinary school trip to Chesil Beach to measure stones or some museum to study the Romans.
The India trip is two years in the planning, but they were departing in three months. My late entry to the project was on account of the history teacher who had been planning to go having just handed his notice in and was off to another school.
I am not a world traveller. I like decent hotels and good communication links. I do like seeing 'real' places, venturing away from tourist centres, but this would be in countries such as Canada, The U.S., Australia, France or Italy.
India. Blimey.
Travelling to Asia is something that either appeals to people, or is the furthest thing from what they would consider a 'journey experience'.
With no real thought and just a few months to go, I had committed myself to the trip.
I should have sat and had a long think. But that side of my nature that says yes quickly and then regrets for a long time afterwards kicked in.
"O.k."
Ouch. My reply was going to hurt. It was going to make me as ill it as I have ever been. It was going to take me into the worst slums of Delhi. It was going to make see death and poverty. But it was also going to let me share experiences and meet some of the kindest people on this planet. I was going to see things that would take my breath away and wipe me out emotionally. Take every experience you have ever had, magnify them, beat them around, see a new world. That is India.
Here I was in New Delhi Indira Gandhi International Airport waiting in line to move through passport and visa control. So far, so good. It's a modern airport and no better or worse than Heathrow or Doha, our starting point and connecting point.
A distinguished gentleman motioned for me to move forward. I tried to smile in that respectful way you do when you know someone can actually make life very difficult for you. Eventually, after a series of stamps placed in the passport, he welcomed me to India and allowed me through. Amazingly this was not the last time that I would meet this gentleman…
The school group was waiting. Thirteen students and one other teacher. As far as travel to the Third World was concerned this was my first time, the same for the students (all aged between 17-18), but our group leader, Gilly was very experienced and in total command.
India was hiding behind the new airport building. I thought that all the stories that I had heard must have been exaggerated. Everyone was pleasant, I cannot think there was even a hint of what life was really like while cocooned in that building.
To move across Delhi we were meant to take the new Metro system that had been built ahead of the Commonwealth Games in 2010. This being my first trip meant, of course, there were some problems and it was not running to the airport on this day. There would be adventures on the Metro in the coming days - that would have to wait though.
Government taxis was the next option. As we moved towards the outside of the airport the heat was rising. There was some form of air-conditioning in the Terminal, the air from outside was now trying to force its way into the terminal.
Gilly duly paid for taxis for us all, gave us the address of the hotel and we moved to the taxi rank. There was a wall of heat as we exited the terminal. That kind of choking heat which creates instant perspiration and problems to breathe normally.
Under the hot sun it took a few seconds to adjust.
That heat plus the pollution is a staggering mix when experienced for the first time. Remember, we had left in the autumnal throes of October, and for me this was my first ever experience of this type of atmosphere.
What happened next was one of the most traumatic journeys that I have ever taken. It was so bad I could not even tell you how many of us were in the taxi, or who they were.
Rucksacks were placed in the boot, I sat in the front with the address and we headed from the airport across the city.
The journey was one of the worst 45 minutes of my life. Almost as soon as we left the airport we were plunged into the madness, absolute madness, of the Delhi traffic system.
You use the horn to make other motorists aware that you are nearby. You use the horn to let others know you can see them. You use the horn when you change lane. You use the horn when someone in front of you changes lanes. Every single driver on the road - using their horn. A cacophony that for some reason went right through me.
You do not brake. You do not give way. Traffic lights are seemingly advisory. Never stop at a roundabout. It was intense. Cars, lorries, buses, bicycles, tuk-tuks, ox pulled carts, cows and pedestrians all fighting for the same spaces. My foot was boring into the floor of the taxi, my senses were on overload. I had so much wanted a 'soft landing', this was hell.
Hot, noisy and life threatening.
I think it was worse being someone who was a driver. In some twisted way I was in awe at our driver. It was a great skill to weave through the traffic. Just use the horn and go. Other side of the road quieter? No problem, use that side of the road. Doesn't matter if cars are coming at you.
With hindsight, it was a Monday morning and this was as bad as it could have been.
Eventually we worked our way off the main roads and into PaharGanj, through the main market, a turn into a rundown square and our final destination outside the Hotel Metropolis.
What was I doing here? Heat, dust, noise, wires, unfinished buildings, stray dogs, rubbish - everything so intense. If someone had said I could return home immediately I would have taken them up on the offer. I was totally unprepared for this.
Travel for me had been places that you were in charge and felt secure. Here I was, with no preparation in a developing world capital and I was as far out of my comfort zone as anyone could possibly be.
I would love to be able to comment on how our students felt, but again I was too consumed with trying to hold my emotions together.
We checked in, passing our passports over. If an Indian does not understand what you are saying they tend to smile and say "yes". You have to learn when "yes" means yes, or when it is a standard reply. The Metropolitan staff were very good at looking at you and saying "yes".
A good teacher would have been up and down the stairs, checking the students, making sure all their rooms were okay. I entered my room, painted perfectly white, fridge, comfortable looking double bed with white bedding - and I was not going to move. It could have been any hotel bedroom anywhere in the world, this would do as a little oasis in my mini-crisis.
Get the t.v. on. Seven channels of cricket, marvelous. The first sign that I may be able to cope, in a western style hotel room, watching cricket.
We had given the students an hour to get washed and changed, the time difference had us up for over 24 hours (if you hadn't slept on the plane) but it was important to get out and try and last into our first Indian evening.
The golden rule for students in hotels: never open your door until you have properly identified who's at the door. I did a brisk check up and down and found most students more than happy to open their doors without the slightest check. Stern warnings were given out. (There had been a couple of stories in the newspapers about school trips where students had been attacked in hotels while on trips. We had to make them think about their safety.)
Time for a stroll into PaharGanj.
A busy, colourful and claustrophobic area full of shops on both sides. All life was here. Beggars, holy men, traders, children, the elderly, brightly coloured saris worn by both the elegant and the poor. A motorbike rider had an Arsenal football shirt on...these contrasts were still too much to take in.
Each small shop was someone's livelihood. They are all the same size, maybe 8 feet across and then descending 30 or 40 feet backwards. The fronts are generally open with goods hanging or laid out in front. Traders were happy to just sit outside, talking and passing the time of day with each other. Noticing westerners approaching they would jump up and try and engage with you. "I have the best shop, very good prices.", "You come in and look, you no buy, just look." And so it started.
With Gilly out in front we moved along the street. A small party of students from rural Dorset in an environment they could not have imagined. Smoke, fumes and spices filled the air, mixed with a tinge of animal dung, food cooking and the smell of that dry heat. Every colour imaginable, the heat, the noise - people talking, shouting, engines of scooters, motorbikes and tuk-tuks competing with car horns and the traders imposing themselves on you.
In the narrow lane it felt claustrophobic, there was no escape, just this continual assault. The horns were present, but now from the scooters that competed with the everything else trying to fight its way up and down.
My mood had not lifted - this was not for me.
We were led to a small café which Gilly knew was clean at the end of the road. It's hard to focus when there is a giant white cow eating from a sack of rubbish outside the front door, but this was the new landscape.
More rules: no meat, no salad. A strict vegetarian diet for the next three weeks. Not that we couldn't trust the food but with us moving by train to so many locations we had to stay fit and healthy; we couldn't risk illness for anyone. BUT the illness was to come...
The café served a cross between western and Indian food, catering for the tourists, but it was encouraging to see locals in there as well. There were some interesting menu items such as 'Scrumbled eggs', but Gilly encouraged us to order Indian. I chose Gobi Aloo, feeling very safe with cauliflower and potatoes.This became my preferred meal for the rest of the trip, the country throws enough at you without experimenting with the more exotic foods.
We had a decent meal, it became a safe location and we became friendly with the owner and staff.
Walking back through the market I was able to take in more of the myriad of overblown extremes of the senses swirling around. We needed to exchange some money. A spice stall trader was able to give us a better rate than any of the official money exchangers, so we dutifully queued up waiting for our cash. Giving your passport and travelers cheques to a complete stranger, who then disappeared across the street was quite worrying - but he came back, with the cash.
This was the first opportunity to speak to the locals. Traders always want to talk to you, it is not unusual to stand in the street and just start a conversation. It is obvious that you are different and this attracts a natural curiosity. What was also obvious was how English was spoken so well. There was a fluency about the language, not just something left over from times gone by, but language used to be abled to trade effectively.
Stopping to chat and really noticing the differences can be a good thing - you easily get into conversations, but it can also lead you to a lot of hassle from people paid to take your group to a specific shop. Jumping in tuk-tuks can lead to being dropped outside a shop, whether you want to be there or not!
The hours of traveling was taking its toll. Gilly purposely kept everyone awake long into the Indian day so we would all sleep well that night. Back in my hotel room I still felt uneasy and unsure. The room was a great comfort. You need to hold on to western culture to help you through. You are so bombarded that you need those small reminders of home.
6,500 miles from rural Dorset I finally gave in to sleep.
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