India Christmas1989
I was only in India for a relatively short time, and saw a minimal fraction of this vast sub-continent, but I came away with the impression that it was a combination of the dramatically beautiful, worderfully fascinating and brutally violent.
My initial plan had been to visit immediately after leaving my job teaching at the Ministry of Defence Language Institute in Kuwait in the summer of 1989, and I had secured a visa for this trip, however, I had had a serious operation to remove a lump from my neck shortly before the summer holiday was due to start, so I had to delay the trip until the following Christmas holiday.
My destination was Goa, once a Portuguese colony about half-way down the west coast of India, but in order to get there, I had to change planes at Delhi International Airport. While I was at the immigration counters, there were long queues for the non-indian visitors. After waiting in line for around half an hour, I had nearly arrived, finally, at the counter when an official came marching up to me and said in an aggressive voice "You! Come to this line!", while indicating the end of a much longer queue nearby. I followed instructions calmly enough, imagining how humiliating it must be for many Indian people arriving at British airports for the first time. When I had reached the end of this second queue, my passport was stamped and I was on my way to board the flight to Goa.
I arrived there in the morning of the following day and took a taxi to the resort I had booked in advance. It was fantastic! I had a small beach bungalow to myself, not far from a beautiful, golden, sandy beach. I rested first, then had a shower and went down to sunbathe in style. The next day, I headed off to visit the nearest town, which happened to be the capital of Goa, Panaji. It was during this half-hour bus ride that I got my second heads-up that I was not in a culture I recognised. I was sitting towards the back of the bus, by the window, when I saw we were approaching an elderly man tottering along on a bicycle. I imagine that the bus driver didn't see the cyclist, but whatever, the bus mowed down the old man and left him in a heap by the side of the road! I was expecting people on the bus to shout out and warn the driver to stop the bus, but no one said anything, and the old man was left to his own devices. I thought to myself about how the value of a person's life can vary from country to country. Panaji was a fascinating town located on a river estuary. I spent quite a while exploring, mesmerized by the aromas of the herbs and spices in the Panjim market, I was attracted to some fireworks which were on sale, but my time before flying off again was too short to contemplate buying some. Goa was once a Portuguese colony, and seeing the Iberian style church was a big surprise. Then in stark contrast, in a small side street, I came across a small Hindu shrine. As usual, when exploring new towns and cities, I headed up a hill in order to get a better view of the overall layout of the place.
Back at my cabin near the beach, I could spend one more day relaxing on the beach, and then it was time to head off to the big city. In those days, it was known as Bombay, but has since changed its name to Mumbai. I was travelling by myself, so I asked the taxi driver who took me to the airport for my flight if he could stop on the way and take a snap of me. It seems strange now to look at the moustachioed character looking back at me from the scanned photo! I had made the decision to grow a moustache while recovering from the operation I'd had in Kuwait, but after returning to Oman from this holiday, I decided that it wasn't for me. The flight arrived in Bombay at about 7pm, and this time there were no airport problems. It was on the way from the airport to my hotel in the city centre that I experienced my third brush with an alternate reality to the beach cabins. We passed through a slum in the suburbs, and through the window I was privy to a scene which looked like it had escaped from a Hieronymus Bosch painting of hell. It was dark and crowded, and a painfully thin man with no legs, wearing only a loin cloth, was using his hands to push himself along the road on a skateboard.
It's important to stress that poverty and violence exist in every corner of the world, hidden to a greater or lesser degree depending on the per capita wealth of nation states. I'm not saying that India is more brutal than Belgium or the UK, and historically speaking, both these countries have colonial pasts which are shameful in many ways (as does the Indian sub-continent, as quick search for the 1947 Amritsar train massacres on Google shows). Nevertheless, for me, at that time in my life (I was 28 at the time), these sights had an equally strong impact on me as the positive experiences I also enjoyed.
What was the most shocking, on reflection, was the juxtaposition of the scenes of abject poverty, followed almost immediately but the luxury of my hotels and tourist sights. The view of Bombay from my hotel balcony also highlighted these contrasts, with small houses in a wood, next to modern skyscrapers, and a mixture of modern and oriental architecture. The next day, I walked down to the Gateway to India, where I had been told that I could take a boat to an island about 10km away called Elephanta Island, or Gharapuri. There were temples built in caves on the island, and monkeys running around. I asked a friendly local tourist on the boat to take a photo of me on the way to the island, and was struck, once again, by the amazing beauty of India on the trip back to the city.
Unfortunately, my time in India was too short, but my overall impression was very positiive. I never felt in any danger whatsoever, and everywhere I went, the locals were warm and friendly, with one exception - Delhi airport!!!
