Later on.... Broken English vs Broken Gujurati
9.30am start to celebrations at the town hall to celebrate the anniversary of India’s Independence. Flag raising and speeches. Followed by procession to the local primary school for even more speeches. Some well known NRIs (non-resident Indians) who happened to be in the gaam at the time took the mic but it was no use to us as none was in English.
The best bit came with the primary school kiddies singing and dancing. Any celebration is worthy of some song and dance here. Pretty awesome, wickedly colourful and a real treat to watch. The girls wear these incredibly intricate saris and loads of jewellery. Took an absolute shitload of pictures and movie clips. So many in fact that the battery went dead.
Booked flights for the India Tour 1.0 in Navsari, though it was a bit difficult with lots of places being closed due to the public holiday. Ended up with flights from Mumbai to Cochin, to Bangalore and then to Goa all courtesy of ‘Kalpna Travel’. All three flights for like NZ$350 pp was pretty sweet. Tragedy struck when they didn’t accept credit card though: gotta go back with the cold hard stuff tomorrow.
Thought we’d whip up a feast while the olds were out, turned to the fridge and realised we had all the ingredients for toasted sandwiches! Don’t expect Camaberet, Brie or even plain old tasty around here though. In India when you want cheese you get just that ‘cheese’ (or so it says on the packet) Looked promising when we bought it as it came in a block reminiscent of Mainland or Anchor, but its actually a complete block of PROCESSED CHEESE. Think 20 Chesdale cheese slices coming together as one…. Anyway there wasn’t a Panini Press in sight so I got out a pan and violla…before you know it (processed) cheese and tomato toasties! Not too bad either, tasted kinda like Maccas cheeseburgers.
It’s a bugger not having cell phone reception in Matvad, as the guy that leases our land was trying to get hold of us for another feed at his and I was going to spend a night at my granddad’s old house. Ended up a bit confused but Mum and I got there round 8 for another mantis dinner. Tandoori chicken and other stuff, Kingfisher and even rum this time. Fuck the chicken was hot though… actually thought I was gonna DIE eating it. But they keep spooning it onto your plate and you don’t wanna offend them by refusing!
Scored few km of midnight motorbike ride to get some quilts and linen. That was pretty mean; down a deserted village road while the guy driving my bike and the guy driving the other bike tried to talk to each other through their helmets at 80kph. Slept at Vajifa that night with the leasee’s nephew (also 21) to keep me company. Pretty classic, when Mum left after dinner I realised my dictionary had left and I was on my own(ie. I couldn’t ask here what the Gujurati word for xyz was when I got lost talking to the locals) Nephew dude and myself did our best with the combination of Broken-English and Broken-Gujurati; got along quite well even. I’m officially invited to play some cricket with the ‘boys’ whenever I feel like and they’re gonna hook me up with a motorbike to use when I get back from the Tour. According to him the big cities of Mumbai and Delhi have copious amounts of hot chicks too. Haha! What a good dude...
He was cruising pretty slowly when we rode to drop me home the next morning. Not being one to get bored I asked him to “Jarak aap” (loosely translated to: Give it some!) He obliged and before long my eyes were watering from the speed with which we were cutting through the cold wind. Shot!
Just got some wicked photos of a massive peacock in our back yard. Saw it sitting on a neighbour’s roof, managed to coax it down with peanuts and before long it was eating straight out of Maya’s hand. How cool is that!
