It's Shoe Time

We have spent the last few days in the splendid Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur. During our time here, both Rory and I have taken advantage of the numerous knock-off market stalls and have now replenished our wardrobes to suit the far more humid Malaysian climate. You will be interested to know that one item in particular has has caused a great deal of controversy in the Peel-Mills camp, Rory's new flip-flops.

Rory had been in the market for a new pair of flip-flops for quite some time, so when he spotted a lovely pair of blue Surfer's Paradise filp-flops with white strap, he simply had to have them. The new flip-flops came in various sizes, as you would expect, but Rory was torn between large and extra-large. I told Rory that the large pair were ample in size and the extra large would only be surplus to requirements. Rory ignored this advice and walked away from the shop happy with his new extra large footwear.

After a day Rory was incessantly complaining about blisters caused by the new flip-flops, so I helpfully reminded him that it was probably due to their excessive size. Rory said that he had larger feet and therefore required a larger shoe, but was surprised to find my smaller flip-flops were a good fit. We then compared the size of our feet and discovered something quite interesting. My feet, which have quite happily weighed in at a size 9.5 for some years now, were in actual fact considerably larger than Rory's so called size 11's in both length and width.

Since this breakthrough, a sledging battle has commenced and both parties have been locked in some serious verbal combat. Rory's main argument lays in the fact my flip-flops are visibly straining under the pressure of holding such podgy hooves and they could literally buckle at any moment due to such overspill. Also, the fact I consider my feet to be far more dainty that they actually are, is to make up for my less attractive thick-set limbs. The return argument is that Rory, being of a money cautious nature, wished to get his moneys worth from the new flip-flops. The extra large option, could not only be used as trendy beach footwear, but could also double up as skis or emergency life boats. I also believe that Rory's gross overestimate of shoe size, lies deep within his childhood subconscious. I'm guessing he has been subjected to many years of 'shoes he could grow into', leaving his body and mind disorientated when entering shoe shops i.e. Clarks. He has been left thinking that if he can pinch the toe and get a good thumbs worth of excess cavity, that's a good economical, and therefore comfy, fit.

Both sides have come up with some good points, but sadly, I feel this is one argument for which no conclusion shall ever be found. Well, unless Rory admits his shoes are too big for him anyhow.

February's Caption Competition

Same rules apply as last month:

Please send your entry's to:

jpeel@live.co.uk

• Applicants must reside in the UK
• Multiple entry's are welcomed
• Please include you full postal address with each entry
• The winner will be announced when I get round to it
• Finally, Good Luck

Singapore Sting

As much as black is the opposite to white, Delhi is opposite to Singapore. The place is immaculate. Even my mother, who prides herself on having a house cleaner that a surgical theatre, could learn a few things from the people of Singapore. They have an underground that you could eat your dinner off, but its not advisable as it would incur a £500 fine for littering. Every building looks practically brand new, the parks and public conveniences are wonderfully maintained and you can taste the freshness of the air. The people are even ridiculously friendly. In the airport while queuing at a bureau de change, a local man walked out of his way, laden with heavy bags, just to inform us there was no queue at the equivalent branch upstairs. Coming from Delhi, we were so used to giving anybody who approached us the cold shoulder, we must have seemed two of the rudest people he had ever encountered.

Singapore is a fantastic place. However, this all comes at a price, a price a long way from our rapidly diminishing budgets. Chocolate bars cost about £1.50, a new book would set you back £20 and for a pint of beer you wouldn't get much change from a tenner. So rather begrudgingly we have moved on and are currently staying in a small town in Malaysia called Malaka where the beer is only £1. So on that note, until next time.....

A Passage to India

Well that's India concluded. I do hope you have enjoyed the posts and accompanying photos. I must admit, I am guilty of including the odd cliché. I try to avoid travel guide vocabulary where possible, such as jaw-dropping, overwhelming & picturesque but in some places no other words are up to the job. No words contained within in my pitiful vocabulary anyhow. Writing a sentence about the Taj Mahal, which hasn't been written 1000 times before, and expressing how good the night in the desert under the stars turned out to be, were both tasks far beyond my literary skills. I did however, wish to summarise India and my time there in some way. So, I have tried my best and this is what I've come up with. Being as I'm sat on a plane, with a 5 hour flight to Singapore ahead of me, what better way to spend the time than a bit of reminiscing.

India is generally a dirty place, especially the bigger cities. Littering, spitting and urinating in public are all part of everyday society. Cattle graze the streets, eating cardboard and other general household waste, then replace it with a waste of their own and there are more Beggars than you can shake a stick at. When I first arrived this really threw me. Mainly because I had rarely strayed far from home and certainly never past European soil. The culture shock of a country, that in most places has dirt tracks for roads, was sizeable to say the least. But after a few days I soon acclimatised and the everyday annoyances of cold showers and commission touts soon became part and parcel. Even the begging children, that really startled me at first, soon escaped my conscience. It didn't take too long to discover that the majority are crafty little tykes who go out of their way to appear as dirty as possible to play on the heart strings of unfamiliar tourists. Begging in India is more of a franchise than an unfortunate circumstance.

There are of course people who genuinely require support but these don't tend to be the people tourists see on the streets. Sadly, the Indian government don't seem to offer the real needy much assistance. We witnessed first hand the level of corruption with the car crash incident, and also got held up in a protest in Delhi in which people held placards with the slogan “Help people, not Co-orprations”. I get the feeling India likes to show the western world they aren't too far behind, but scratch under the surface and you soon see it for what it really is. Government bailouts for large commercial companies and a growing economy seem more important to the political parties than road maintenance or basic healthcare. The Indian government can send a shuttle to space but they can't send a child to school.

That's enough of a rant for now. I really didn't wish to paint a negative picture, although I feel for many readers I may have already gone too far for them to consider a nice city break to Delhi. If you can live without a few home comforts, India really is a beautiful country in many different ways. It is only spoiled by the small minority. Sadly, it is the minority that target the tourists and cause the hassle.

India is vastly rich with culture and has the scenery to match. It is a country with thousands of years of fascinating history. In its past, India has been the birthplace of major world religions and the home of many of history's greatest empires. Amazingly, Indian people have managed to preserve many of the architectural aspects, artefacts and traditions that resulted from such a history. In less than a month and only covering a relativity small area of the country, we managed to visit the spots where Hinduism and Buddhism were conceived, multiple forts of Muhgal emperors, luxury palaces of the Indian Raj, various geographical environments ranging from vast deserts and the large mountain ranges and even got to see Mahatma Gandhi's flip flops. To name but a few.

I can honestly say I'm gutted to be leaving. I can only hope, that I get the chance to return one day. Return with the knowledge and experience I have gained in avoiding the annoyances. And living as comfortably as possible in the conditions. If anybody wishes to hire a reasonably cheap, English speaking guide, I'm available from late September.

On a lighter note, there is one characteristic of the Indian people that both Rory and I just can't understand, the Indian head gesture. For those unfamiliar with this phenomenon, the Indian head gesture, as I have named it, is a nodding of the head which combines both a horizontal and vertical motion. A cross between a “yes” nod and “no” shake of the head. The closet thing to the Indian head gesture, in the western world, is the nodding dog. You know the ones, they can usually be found on the parcel shelf of a tastefully decorated car and can be seen in commercial breaks barking “Ohhhhhh Yes” in a deep northern accent. After an entire month I am still unsure as to weather it indicates a positive or negative response. For an example of the Indian head gesture's application, I have recreated a scenario that we experienced in script format:

Setting: The small enclosed environment of a taxi

James : (Wishing to make small talk)

“Raj (Parker), do you like cricket?”

Raj replies with an Indian head shake

James : (Assuming the previous answer was positive, despite the lack of clarity in Raj's response)

“So, Do you play cricket?”

Raj replies with an Indian head shake

James looks at Rory with a puzzled expression

Rory : (Searching for clarification on the response)

“So, Raj, Are you a batsman or a bowler?”

Raj replies with an Indian head shake

Needless to say, we never did discover Raj's sporting credentials. He was slightly overweight and moved awkwardly, so in his case I would put my money on all responses indicating “No”. Another one of my favourite Indian traits is their ability to multi-task profession wise. In the western world people, myself excluded, tend to stick to a single trade. An individual may be a butcher, baker or candlestick maker, but very rarely all three. In India, individuals, who may have no previous experience in a given industry, will try their hand at anything for a days wage. You see children, who in the morning are milling flour, are laying tarmac on a motorway in the afternoon. This jack-of-all-trades approach to life is no more evident than in the Bazaars. We were sat having a tea late one night in a busy Delhi market when a man walked past with a table on wheels. Upon his table he had a cabinet containing cigarettes, a selection of toilet roles and remedies, multiple eggs, and a gas cooker. Obviously, this man was a professional omelette cooking, tobacconist who had seen a gap in the market for street level pharmaceuticals. Ill give £100 to anybody who has that title on their payslip. This was not an isolated event, it happened everywhere. If we walked through a market, stall owners would go to almost any length to sell us something. In Jaisalmer we went to a book shop. Just outside the shop was the owner so I asked him “Do you have any Bill Bryson?” He replied “Yes come inside”. Once the wisecrack had me in the shop, and the door shut, he then japed “What was it you were looking for?”. Displeased, I walked away from shop and as I did the shop keeper started to shout the names of various items he did stock. Items that might provoke my interest. “Carpet?...... Turban?......... Wooden Buddha?........ Incense sticks?.........”. Just before I was out of ear reach, he went for the last ditch attempt items “Indian Sauce pan?....... Plastic cobra in a box?........ Sundial?....... very good price!

Who could possibly need a sundial that is only accurate to the nearest hour, it's 2009. Rory would really struggle with a sun dial, his sleep pattern means that some days he's practically nocturnal. The absence of Sunlight can play havoc when time-telling with a sundial in the early hours of the morning.

They say, all good things must come to an end, and so they have. But I do have the next leg of the adventure to look forward to, Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand. I should imagine the extent of culture I experience there will be in the form of pro-biotic yogurt, but we shall have to wait and see.

Himalayan Holiday

Our latest travels have brought us to Shimla in the western mid-hills of the Himalayas. Our journey here was quite an adventure in itself, as we took the narrow-gauge toy train up the hills. As its name suggests, this is a small train that rides along a thin track over dubiously constructed bridges and through pitch black tunnels. It also has horrible little toy seats not quite big enough for a fully grown adult human. We spent 6 hours on this train, but the Himalayan scenery made all the discomfort worth while.

Shimla is an odd little town to say the very least. Its quite different from anywhere else we have been so far. Other than the inhabitants and location, it shares more in common with a Victorian British dwelling than an Indian one. Littering and smoking in public can result in a £7 fine or imprisonment, there are numerous tailors specialising in tweed jackets and the majority of buildings have mock-Tudor timber frames. We even saw an Indian gentleman taking his Bulldog for a walk. As you can imagine, it was all rather surreal upon arrival. After further research however, I discovered that Shimla was used as a holiday resort for the colonial British back in the day. They tried to make the town appear as much like Britain as they could and done a pretty convincing job.

As well as the strange settings we have also witnessed other oddities during our stay. We have been approached by an Indian man who asked "Please can my wife have her photo taken with you?". We watched the filming of two scenes from a Bollywood blockbuster. In one of the scenes, an Indian man pushed a disabled beggar child off his crutches and with a level of acting ability seldom seen outside of junior school nativity plays, he then raised his hand to his head and pulled a facial expression which suggested he had a migraine brewing. I think he was aiming for guilt but got it all terribly wrong. We trekked up a hill to visit the monkey temple. The temple, as the name suggests, is inhabited by hundreds of wild monkeys. We had to hire a stick to ward them off when they got too close as they have been known to attack humans and steal their belongings*. And finally, we slept in a cloud. I'm not sure where the cut-off point between thick fog and cloud lies, but it was freezing cold all you could see out of the window was a white fluffiness (I think that's the term meteorologists use). This, in conjunction with the fact we are thousands of feet up a mountain, has led me to believe we were in a cloud. In all, Shimla is a fascinating place that I hope I get a chance to visit again.

*No monkeys were harmed in the making of this post.

Tour de New Delhi

Our 18 day tour of Rajasthan is finally over and we have returned to the place where it all began, Delhi. The chauffeur driven expedition was very well received by both Rory and myself. However, I feel we were both extremely glad to see the back of Parker. I think if he had attempted to use me in one more tourist commission scheme, I would have been forced to suffocate myself with the flashing Shiva doll on his dashboard.

"The worst thing about having a driver was the driver."

Today we decided to go for a stroll round New Delhi. This is the part of the city that was founded by the colonial British empire and today the home of Delhi's more wealthy businesses & inhabitants. We purchased a day pass for the underground and were very impressed with how clean, reliable and efficiently run the whole system was. These are words that are seldom used when describing anything in this country but Delhi's metro could genuinely teach the London underground a thing of two. The main purpose of this outing was to find an electrical retailer so that I could purchase a new camera. But rather unexpectedly, it turned out to be a nice little insight into modern Delhi and a side of India we had not yet explored. Instead of the tightly crammed market streets that we have been used to, New Delhi has an assortment of large western brand name stores and restaurants. As a tourist I much prefer the other side of India, the dirty, crowded, noisy, animal filled side. New Delhi is too westernised and fake for my liking, if I wanted a Star Bucks I could just go to Norwich. But then, I'm sure I could find millions of Indians that would happily swap.

On the way back to the hotel I commandeered a pedal rickshaw. After a bit of persuasion, the actual driver jumped on the back alongside Rory and I took to the streets of Delhi navigating my way through the busy traffic. I couldn't stop laughing as I weaved through the cars, trucks and bikes, narrowly avoiding the obstacles as I peddled. I got the feeling Rory wasn't enjoying himself quite as much under my control. The Rickshaw I borrowed was possibly the only one in Delhi without a bell or horn so I had to settle for shouting "Beep" when bemused pedestrians crossed my path. The driver still had the cheek to demand 20 rupees at the end of the journey, no wonder their economy's flourishing.