dogster

Not all of travel is the ‘Big Picture’ – not all of travel is profound. We have to hack our way through the detritus: the check-ins, the flights, the taxis, the receptionists, the new hotels – the boring stuff – before we get to the core of the matter. Sometimes the detritus can take up so much time, effort and mental anguish there no moment left to enjoy the destination. Trip Advisor, Fodors, Lonely Planet et al are full of travellers whose holidays have been wrecked by a lousy hotel, a rude member of staff, a bad breakfast, surly service or a crap concierge.

Before you’ve even got out the door you’ve been spiked, sabotaged or worse. It ain’t just solo travellers who can get in a snit when their well laid plans fall apart around them. Complaints fly, letters to the General Manager, all the minge and grizzle of disappointment as high hopes come tumbling down around your ears.

Not all of it is deserved, of course. Pay peanuts, get monkeys – we’ve already observed the truth of that. If you pay $50 for a hotel room it would be an idiocy to be disappointed when you don’t get five star service - but people do. Pay much more and things should get a little bit different. I’ve learnt though, in India, even that doesn’t guarantee you a smooth ride.

Talking of rides...

The taxi from Mumbai airport to the Oberoi downtown takes a thousand years. Well, two plus hours, at least. And that’s not even with the Taxi-driver From Hell. [I met him later, in Kolkata]. It’s just a bloody loooong way. Had I looked on a map I might’ve realised that - but Dogster wasn’t thinking particularly straight around this time...

It was late on a Friday afternoon when I checked in – I had pre-booked for four days with every intention of staying another four. This put me back on schedule. The foyer was besieged by businessmen, they rushed about in that businesslike manner, all self-importance and suits, wheeling and dealing, demanding drinks and attention – and they, of course, got it. The Oberoi in Mumbai loves a businessman.

Apparently they are not so keen on Dogs.

I pushed my way thru to reservations, was greeted with that practiced Oberoi smile – but there was no heart to it. I wasn’t in a $500 Armani suit. They did what they had to, checked me in efficiently enough, pushed me through the businessmen storming the concierge and sent me up to the 15th floor with their latest trainee, all youth, unctuous grovel and no particular skill. Everybody has to learn their craft, I guess – I just don’t particularly see why they should learn on ME.

The room was bland, dreary, dull – the kind of room you’d pay $100 for at a reasonable hotel in any mid-American city. Nothing very special at all – nothing particularly ‘Oberoi’ about it – no, wait – I lie. It was a bit special - this room had The Smallest Bathroom In The World. It was very nearly laughable and perhaps I might have had a chuckle or two, had I not been paying through the nose for the privilege.

There was a knock at the door. Two maids came in to do the evening turn-down, to primp and faff and pretend that this was, indeed, an Oberoi.

‘Is there anything else we can get for you, Sir?’ they said, on leaving.

‘Yup. Bring me a bigger bathroom.’

Exit two maids, giggling. They knew.

Time for Dogster’s Hotel Strategy Number One. Call the front desk and grizzle, nicely.

Grizzling in India is a different art form than in Asia. One day I might compare the two but, in any rate, it didn’t work. Not even remotely.

‘Is this really a deluxe room? Do you really think a bathroom only big enough for a dwarf is appropriate? That kinda thing.

I was speaking to the trainee child who’d shown me up to my room. He did his trainee thing and fobbed me off, explained profusely that the hotel was nearly full – those damn businessmen had spiked my plan. While they were smoking cigars in the rooms I should have been upgraded to, I was clearly gonna be stuck in the outhouse, where dogs like me have to go.

Fret.

Fret some more.

Get pissed off.

The joys of solo travel - no one there to say ‘calm down, shut up, relax.’

Time for Dogster’s Hotel Strategy Number Two. After an hour or so, ring the Duty Manager.

‘I’m really disappointed. This room, this bathroom, is this really an Oberoi?... blah.. blah.. blah.. ‘

That got me nowhere. Only in India, at a five star hotel, can you be met with such a wall of polite indifference. She’d heard it all before. They were jam-packed with businessmen – their bread and butter. Dogs came and went. They didn’t give an Indian rat’s arse.

Time for Dogster’s Final Hotel Strategy Number Three.

Still on the phone to the Duty Manager. Still trying. Failing.

‘O.K., I can see we’re not going to get anywhere on this tonight.’

‘Grovel, grovel, I don’t really care, I’m just tolerating you because I have to, will you please put the phone down and die,’ said the Duty Manager [in Oberoi code, of course]

‘Let’s just discuss this pre-paid booking, then.’

I’m calm, collected – but I have a plan.

‘Tell me Miss [insert Oberoi slave name here], when I check out and change hotels in the morning, are you going to insist I pay for four nights? Are we going to have an argument over the reception desk - or will we come to an agreement now?’

There was a pause.

This wasn’t in the instruction manual.

There was gush of Oberoi grovel-speak, a clatter of computer keys as she checked the booking – a gulp, a sigh, a half-hearted apology – but the bathroom remained the same size, the Dog stayed in his kennel – and the Oberoi Mumbai lost 8 nights of Mr. Dogster’s custom, there and then.

I checked out in the morning, having easily booked a room at the Taj. I love my laptop. As I was leaving, I was handed a feed-back form by another grovel-slave who hadn’t the faintest idea what had been going on.

‘Please Mr. Dogster, would you fill this in for our records?’

I looked him dead in the eye.

‘I don’t think that’s in your best interests, my friend. No, I won’t.’

It was a hop, skip and inexpensive jump to the Taj – and what a smart move that was.

Such is the detritus of travel. Such are the diversions of the Dogster’s touring life. This is just an example of dozens of similar, silly moments, little glimpses of the ticks and scratches that divert you from the REAL business of travelling.

Take care, my friends, beware. Keep the main topic in sight. Don’t get side-tracked into snits and sulks and grief. If you can, cut your losses and go. Go back to the reason you came. Go back into India.

TracyB

Hey...we took a train from our aiport hotel to the city centre of Mumbai..so u can just imagine what a wild experience it was for us...Taking a tuk tuk to the train station...in all that traffic...then trying to find out where to buy tickets.

One person points one direction..and then the next a totally different direction!! And we finally get down to the platform!!

Imagine...two very white Westerners with a billion Indians staring at at us..I felt like i was in a movie...and it got better when we got on the train...as we were crunched in the middle of a compartment..the only white people...for 1 hour or maybe even more...we were stared at profusley!! At one time i started to laugh, cause as i looked around and saw all eyes on me...it just cracked me up...and i literally laughed my head off!!

And for awhile, we were harassed...and at that moment i hated India and wanted to go home!!

But we survived..and finally got off the train, amd met up with a guy i met off of India Mike..and he took us on a walking tour...i must say, it was one of the most
adventurous days of my life and i was never so happy to meet up with Aadil...i felt very safe and comfortable with him and nobody hassled us after that..

It was about a week later, that the train was bombed!! So i don't think i wanna take the train again..but it was a great experience...

So anyways, that is my tale of Bombay...

travelaw

Regarding street people -- we've learned the hard way, too. But food carts can also be a problem. On one of our very early trips, years and years ago, we were in a large city in Siberia, spotted an ice cream cart and decided to each of us one, and also one for the dirtyish little girl who had glommed onto our daughter as her "new friend." Surveying the selection, we spied Dove bars and became excited to see a little corner of western civilization (we had been away from our home comforts for awhile). So, we forwent the 200 Ruble local ice cream cones and went for the good stuff. (Ice cream is enormously popular in Siberia, even in 40 below weather). So we plunk down $5000 Rubles each (20,000 all together) for our ice cream bars. Anyway, a huge group forms around us and intently, with puppy dog eyes everywhere, watches us eat the Dove bars. They start moving in closer and closer. We huddle closer together and finally decide, with ice cream dripping down our hands, that we need to get away from the crowd. Somehow, we force our way through the hordes and literally jog up Leninski Prospect to get away, gobbling on our ice cream bars as we run. It was only later that we found out that we spent more on those 4 Dove bars than most people earned in a month (an acquaintance there, a university professor, informed us that she made 30,000 Rubles a month!) Yikes! We felt terrible about it -- had no idea, and if we had, of course, would have never done it. Over the years, we've given money to beggars, sometimes to see them an hour later passed out with a bottle in their hands. What a sick feeling to see that. Have offered our own food several times and been turned down -- can't support the habit with food I suppose. Anyway, now we always shake our heads no, avoid eye contact and move on as with a purpose. Ruins the ambling walk through some places, and makes you feel like a lout, but you just can't give in without repercussions. Now we do our best to find charities to donate to, and give to our local food bank. It doesn't fully assuage the guilt of being born into better circumstances than most of the world, but we hope that it helps some who are in need.
Dogster, thanks for the report on Mumbai -- as you know from another thread, we are headed there later this year. Now we will be heads up on what to expect.

dogster

Hiya travelaw:
Yup, it seems like a no-win - but you can do it - but it takes a lot of time and patience - then the cloud lifts. I'll be writing about it tomorrow. And also about the Dharavi slum tour - now there's an interesting possibility for you. See what you think.

dogster

I just need a day or so to get ahead on this report. It's no good sticking it in in little chunks, broken up by lengthy conversation - I can't get a flow, and neither can you - better is BIG chunks - but I just need a bitta time to get a stock in reserve. So bear with me - this is a lotta writing. But I'm having fun... I hope you are.

ahh lol - I'm such an diva.

FurryTiles

Dogster, I confess – I'm addicted to your trip report, and keeping fingers crossed and tossing the Dog a juicy bone, to encourage a continuation of all your flavourful (and often belly-laugh) details – and your remarkable, insightful travel philosophy.

Not to side track you – but for other readers of your marvellous journey – I highly recommend Mumbai-born Rohinton Mistry’s novel <i>A Fine Balance</i> which encompasses much of the contrasts of which you write.

Not surprised you have a beard – so does Bill Bryson!

Keep tappin’ away,
Jackie

dogster

Ahh Furry: That's a lovely thing to say - your words are just what I needed right now. It's turning in to a bit of an epic, rather more than I thought it would be.. without some kind words of encouragement there are times I just feel like stopping, overwhelmed with what is still to come out. Sometimes this report seems as long as the trip itself - and just as intense, in the writing of it.

But then I get a letter like yours and I remind myself what an amazing opportunity this is. To re-live and re-love my time in India, to write and share and receive such friendly support and encouragement - within minutes of my last post, sometimes.

It's a wonderful thing, the internet - and this Forum as well.

But no beard, furry, the dog is clean shaven. I think you got me a little confused with another poster. I'm a svelte and smooth old greyhound, despite your kindly image of me. But, gawd, I wish I could write like Bill Bryson - hairy or not.

I'm in Kolkata now - in my brain, at least. A day of tapping - I'll be back.

FurryTiles

Oh my Dogster, 'twas the other 'greyhound' in your report who ...

&quot;...sported a lifelike black beard and thick, long black hair...&quot;

And I blended the Dog and the ahhh goD.

... yes, I can relate to reliving an experience with greater intensity and unearthing forgotten - often disconcerting - details when committing it to words;
it's as if the mind regurgitates images/impressions in a much sharper focus and sometimes the process is exhausting.

But soooo appreciated! There are many here, just like me, who are waiting impatiently for your next chapter. And your entire report floats forevermore in cyberspace, accessible to all netusers for all time. So your audience is infinite. Including Bill Bryson checkin' out the competition, lol.

Jackie

Nywoman

Dogster you can not stop. Your tales are too wonderful. Your keen observations, inner conversations and very great sense of humour makes me want more and more.

This is probably one of the most entertaining and engrossing travel tales I have read.

Rohinton Mistry's first novel Such a Long Journey about Gustad Noble is set in Mumbai and I made a point of covering some of the sites mentioned in the book. It made for some entertaining afternoons.

Am not sure how you will be able to top:
&quot;Ethel was rambling, her two pink eyes rolling vacantly from side to side, lost under eyelids of such extravagant complexity that they threatened to snap shut at any moment. This was a face of such great antiquity that her skin had forgotten where to go. It hung in folds, compelled by years of gravity further and further towards the floor, desperate to escape its owner’s prattle, dangling around her neck, wobbling there like turkey gobble as she went on - and on - and on.&quot;

Then again I have complete faith in you.

Kathie

How can I go to work this morning without my fix of the Dogster's tale? I understand that you need to take a break, but please - take a deep breath and forge onward!

Marija

Dogster,
Your readers are pleading for more, more, more...

jules39

Dogster you really should gather all your trip reports &amp; put them together in a book as a series of short travel stories. I would buy it. I love reading your reports. Wish we were still in Melb could get together &amp; hear your tales in person,
J

dogster

Wow - that's a whole lot of lovely thoughts from you all.

I'm a bit lost for words right now - but it's 7.00 a.m. and I've been up all night trapped in Kolkata - you'll see tomorrow. I want to put the first Kolkata adventure here in a slab and there's a bit more to go. Soon.

What a saga this is...

But here's a little bit more on Mumbai.

dogster

The Gateway to India: how apropos of the British to erect a monument to an idea – well, I lie. The British never erected anything in India that wasn’t in some way in praise of themselves – their system of justice, transport, politics, religion, their armed forces, their monarchy – a parade of columns, domes and monumental arches just to underscore their general sense of self-importance, cultural superiority and the blinding, absolute certainty that they were RIGHT.

Well, look what’s happened to them.

That’s karma for you.

But The Gateway to India IS what Mumbai means to many people, tourists in particular. It’s where many of us get our first brief taste, the sights and smells, the highs the lows of India. Not for me – I crawled in through the back door, through Kolkata and Karnataka, Goa, Assam and Sikkim – I’d made it to Mumbai by accident, more as a by-product of a smooth talking Munich lawyer and that lump of Manali Gold.

I still had some of that hashish in my pocket as I stormed the Taj Mahal – the Taj Mahal Palace and Towers Hotel that is – and, I better confess right here and now, that little black gift from hippie heaven had quite an effect on my stumbles, bumbles and odd adventures in Mumbai. Dogster was perhaps more prone to mistakes than usual, more likely to be swept away by circumstance, by a chance encounter – of which there were many – more likely to find himself in situations that perhaps a grown man of certain years should avoid.

Alas, I must draw a curtain over certain of my extra-curricular activities – reluctantly, to be sure, but wise. The days passed by like quick-silver, a million encounters – not, I rush to say, of the Biblical kind, these were close encounters with street-life, those beggars, whores and thieves I referred to earlier, those seemingly millions of hustlers that crowd the streets of Colaba, that surround the unwitting traveller with instant friends and cronies, to draw you into their embrace.

Solo, single, solitary – call it what you will, the crows will spot you coming from a hundred yards, leap onto your lonely carcass and pick at it till it’s dry. I don’t need to go into details, far better men that I have written big, thick bricks of books on this topic. Loneliness, greed and stupidity are aphrodisia to these vultures – qualities that the Dogster has in spades.

But he’s not an idiot, not a total fool – to each their own agenda - and the Dog had one of his own. For every shark that took advantage, for every dud deal and ropey purchase there was an adventure to be had, a picture to be taken, an alley to be explored. Some of them led to disaster, some to unexpected joy – all led to knowledge, of myself or many others – ultimately this dog DID have his day.

Mumbai seems a two-note Samba – poor, rich, poor, rich, poor, rich, poor – ad infinitum. The first a single note of desperation, played out in a thousand ways on the streets – the second in the Oberoi, the Taj, the clubs and gourmet restaurants, the film studios, in late-night dance bars crowded with the Rolex-wearing, Prada-loving sons and daughters of privileged parents – but both notes are actually the same.

Money, money, money,
It’s the rich man’s honey,
Makes the world go round.

You don’t need me to tell of the children, the shanties on the streets – nor of my five star suite in the Taj Palace and the great gulf in-between. Such stories are commonplace in Mumbai – every traveller has them – it’s all we see at first. The stark wide gulf of contrast is easy fodder, the stuff of many tales, all much more profound than mine.

But I’m learning that there’s another side to Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and all the places travellers gather, one that most of us never acknowledge. Yet it’s there in front of us every day, staring us in the face – going about its business, completely unconcerned with we flash-toting tourists trapped in our five star enclave.

It’s the working face of India, the hard-slogging honest poor. You can see them in their millions – they’re all around - but they’re ordinary: neither shocking nor beautiful, neither offensive or colourful: they’re honest battling people who wouldn’t think for a moment of hustling you – matter of fact, they don’t think of you at all.

They’re too busy making a living, feeding a family of three kids or four, caring for aging mothers and fathers, repaying that parental debt, completing the cycle of life. They’re sending their children to school and making a life – one that, for the first time in their history might just be better than the one before. India, it appears, is changing, the past is the future no more.

So next time you travel to India, spare a thought for the millions who pass by you, reflect on the commonplace. Remember that it’s not all beggars and thieves - nor colourful Rajasthani dancers and turbans and temples and bells. Invisible – yet right in front of you - is a THIRD India - it’s millions and millions of hard-working people going about daily life, burdened with responsibilities, just like we are, but most with a much harder race to run.

They stumble, they walk, they crawl through the life that was given them, they smile and they laugh and they cry – and our life is richer for noticing them – of giving credit where credit is due. We ignore the obvious as travellers: tell tall stories when we return home of the wild extremities of ugliness, of deformity, beggars and chaos in India – or wax lyrical about devotion and beauty, of temples, five star hotels and luxury - while the real magic passes us by - a multiple, magical harmony with those two notes mere stumps either side.

I’m just learning how to look in the middle, in the gap between the remarkable and the sublime, to see beauty in the normal, in what I once thought of as mundane and banal.

Remember that mantra for travel?

'Everything is interesting.’

Every single thing.

dogster

KOLKATA:

Dog-paddling.

That’s the best I can do in India, a flurry of two limp paws, a desperate battle to keep afloat. Then something comes along and pushes me under: some unexplained weight, some odd psychic anchor – and I’m drowning.

Kingfisher flight Number Four, first class got me to Kolkata without feeling any pain. The dancing girls strewed my path with flowers, the marching band played, gilded attendants brought me caviar and brandy [I lie] and, before I knew it, Prince Dogster was thrust out on the roadway and into the arms of my driver, a sour young lad dressed in a grubby white uniform who attempted a running tourist commentary on the sights of Kolkata until I told him [nicely] to shut up, then pulled a face at the meagre tip he received for his efforts.

I didn’t care. I was still battered from Mumbai, saw every intrusion into my personal space as a tactic, remained stuck on red alert, devoid of trust, vigilant and aware. India can do that to you. It’s a phase.

On my first stumble around the globe, as a hippie fool in 1971 I’d experienced Kolkata. I was twenty-one and couldn’t WAIT to get out again. It was my first glimpse if India and I was, like the millions who followed, horrified at what I saw. But that was a hundred years ago – what shocked me once did no more. On that trip I thought those people huddled under blankets on the street in the morning were dead, not sleeping – that’ll give you an idea of the crushing weight of my stupidity in those days. It was a different time: fresh from Europe, I’d never SEEN such a thing before. I was but a puppy, still sucking on the teat of Western thoughts and values, a silly fretful fool.

Sometimes I wonder if anything has really changed. The streets of Kolkata are just as crowded, the sights and scenes of the drive just as intense - but now I was becoming accustomed to them – as much as a mere visitor ever can. India is still a shock to the system, but the squalor doesn’t surprise me anymore, the subtleties have started to appear.

I was to get out of the cab in another part of India – in its own way just as foreign, just as frightening and just as strange as the streets outside. This was the Bengal Club of Calcutta, established in 1827, a remnant of the Raj and bad times gone by.

I hope Maria Misra won’t mind too much if I quote a little part of her book ‘Business, Race, and Politics in British India 1850-1960’.

‘One observer of pre-First World War Calcutta considered that the prime purpose of the clubs was to separate the British from ‘Indians’ and prevent the British from ‘becoming oriental’: clubs certainly seemed to have contributed to the member’s sense of racial superiority and with [one] exception... all the British Clubs were exclusively ‘white’ until the 1940’s....

[Lowell Thomas] noted that it was: ‘one of the most cliquey places in India. They dislike the society of foreigners, adventurers, upstarts and natives. You must convince [Calcutta] society that you belong to none of these undesirable classes before you can cross the threshold of the Bengal Club, even as a guest.’

Well, I fitted three of the above categories before I’d even begun; a foreigner, an adventurer – AND an upstart. Then I dared to cross the threshold. It was all downhill from there.

Times had changed since 1916 - now at least they let the ‘natives’ in - but to look around, not much else was different. Sitting behind the reception desk was an Indian woman of ‘indeterminate’ years. When she saw me a look of pure loathing flickered across her face, but that was too much effort in the heat - so she relaxed into her natural expression: sullen contempt.

‘Sign,’ she said and pointed to an enormous ledger with one pudgy finger.

I did so, obediently, all charm, all smiles. My efforts were wasted on the Lizard Queen, gate-keeper of The Bengal Club. She knew an ‘upstart’ when she saw one. Two piggy eyes looked me up and down, her cheeks dimpled with distaste then, with a rasp, she drew breath - just enough to expel the words: ‘Room Six.’

She didn’t even offer me the key. They were lined up beside the ledger, dull, slightly tarnished silver: old fashioned keys for an old-fashioned lock in an old-fashioned door. Each had a small brass tag on it. The key to my humiliation said either 6 or 9, I couldn’t tell – so I took the one between 5 and 7 and hoped for the best.

‘Lurch’ appeared from the shadows for my luggage and led me away from the gatekeeper of doom, along a corridor and wrangled open a grille that led to a small, wooden room. He stood aside in a slovenly imitation of deference and ushered me in. For a moment I thought that this was where I was to stay - but it was the only the elevator.

The grille crashed to a shut, a button was pressed and we whirred slowly up to the second floor.

‘Right, Sir,’ he wheezed and I did as instructed until I was stopped below a sign that said ‘Gentleman’s Lavatory’.

‘Left Sir,’ he said, so obediently I turned in towards the gentlemen’s lavatory. In an alcove facing me was a dreadful choice. Two doors. One led to the lavatory and one to Room 6. Luckily I made the right choice.

After a month in India I just KNEW what was behind the other one.

dogster

Lurch left me fifty rupees happier, a look of contempt on his face. I’d tipped too much in my confusion but I was grateful to be finally in my room. It was huge, decorated in the style befitting a guest of my magnificence – a light vomit yellow on the walls, green ceiling, brown chairs – a small bar-fridge, circa 1952, stood gurbling in the distance with a tray, a jug and a cup standing guard on its laminex top - a faded red sofa leant sleeping against the wall, a coffee table standing guard in front of it, its four rickety legs just holding up a scratched wooden top inexplicably graced with three lace doilies. On each was an opaque brown ashtray, in each brown ashtray a box of dead matches. A desk and chair stood in the corner, next to long purple drapes that were drawn tight shut.

The double bed was just as vast as the room but compensated for its size by having a mattress of such spectacular thinness that I thought, as I sat pondering my outcast state, there were just bare boards under the faded regency bedspread. Three pillows lay side by side at the head of the bed just waiting to swallow my face.

There was a knock at the door.

‘Sah! Sah! Let me in!’

It was Bongo, the room-wallah. Thin, wiry and full of friendly contempt. He entered and nearly turned inside out in his attempt at an introduction. Bongo probably wasn’t his name, but by this point in my travels, they were ALL called Bongo. It was easier.

Bongo lived in a box outside the door, ready to leap into action at my every command. He was mine and mine only, Room 6 was his sole domain.

‘Anything you want, Sah, anything at all, just shout ‘Bongo!’ and I’ll be here.’

‘Thank you Bongo,’ I said, hoping he’d go away. But no, Bongo had a calling – his mission in life was to make me happy. First stop on that journey to bliss was my own personal bathroom which he led me to enthusiastically, me protesting all the way. He explained the miracle of running water, the bliss of a ‘pulling-chain’ loo, the mysteries of the hot water system, the black and white tiled shower, the magic hole where the water went away.

‘Down the plug-hole, Sah,’ he said proudly, ‘down the plug-hole and far away.’

Bongo’s father, and his father’s father, and his father’s father’s father had all looked after Room 6 – since the dawn, apparently, of time. I was one more of their honoured guests, it seems, another foreign object flung headlong into the family trust. I was a lucky man, as he was to remind me many times, lucky to be in Room 6 where he could watch over me and serve me as his father had before him – and his father’s father and – well, you get the picture.

He scurried the hundred yards to the other side of the room, threw the purple curtains open with a flourish.

‘There, Sah! Your personal veranda!’ he said proudly and led me out into the crisp Calcutta sun. Kolkata was still Calcutta in the Bengal Club, time had stood still here for years. We toured the veranda extensively; I admired the crumbling view, watched as a hundred black crows swooped on a dead rat in the car-park, breathed in the rancid air. There was a strange smell.

I thanked him profusely and pushed him out of the veranda, across the room to the door, back to his box, ANYWHERE as long as it was away. I urgently wanted to piss – or escape - I don’t know which was more urgent, but he relentlessly stood blocking my way. He was still talking as I pushed the door shut, still talking as I snapped the lock, still talking as I turned away.

‘Just call for ‘Bongo, Sah!’ he was shouting, muffled through the door.

‘Thank you, Bongo,’ I shouted.

‘Piss OFF!’ was what I wanted to say.

I took a deep breath and retreated to the magic lavatory, ‘pulling-chain’ to block out his cries. Nothing was going to stop him - I was sentenced to be Bongo’s reason for living for the next four days, subject to intimate scrutiny and invasion, epicentre of the Bongo Universe: Room 6 in the Bengal Club. I was his newest acquisition, another insect trapped in the web woven by his father and his father’s father and his father’s father’s father back into infinity – a sticky steel net stretched out to catch a foreign fly.

dogster

Of course, once again, I had no idea where I was. Everything had been booked in such a flurry, in such a drunken state there was no pre-thinking – and, once I hit India, events and the Dog collided with such magnificent rapidity that I was living entirely in the moment. Most of the time I had no idea what day it was, let alone the date: Easter came as a complete surprise, for example - local festivals, cultural events were a matter of happenstance, certainly not planning.

The trip was made easier by the self-contained chunks I’d set aside: The Golden Chariot, the M.S. Ocean Odyssey - and we’ve seen what happened to THAT – a cruise down the Brahmaputra [still to come] and a few more excitements I’ll keep in reserve to surprise you with.

I had my typed-out itinerary – a work of which I was very proud, a sheaf of pre-paid Kingfisher flights, a wad of internet hotel bookings, a jumble of notes and files and my laptop.

But, did I have a guidebook? No.

Did I have a map of Kolkata? No.

Did I know just where the Bengal Club of Calcutta actually was? Well – you know the answer to that.

I ran the gauntlet of Bongo – and all the other Bongo’s from Rooms 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 - 7, 8 and 9 – all of whom ran from their room-wallah boxes to set eyes on the new foreign fly. They chattered loudly about me in Hindi, knowing full well I couldn’t understand, discussed my shoes, my great old age, my haircut, my every single movement as I waited desperately for the ancient lift to try, try, try to make it to the second floor. They whittered and giggled like over-excited school-girls as I tugged at the grille limply, cheered as I tugged it open, waved and whittered some more as my blushing tourist head finally disappeared downwards - into Hell for all they cared.

I walked down to the reception desk and stupidly asked the Lizard Queen if she had a map.

‘Phhhht,’ she said and returned to her fatness, one corner of her thin lips curling slightly as if I’d farted in her face.

No luck there, then.

I beat the retreat. Lurch opened the front door with a flourish, expecting another tip. His face fell back into its customary snarl as I walked past him without pouring rupees into his pocket. There was another burst of Hindi sarcasm behind my back as I walked out through the driveway and into the street. I thought I heard him spit.

dogster

The Bengal Club, as I discovered, is in Russell Street - apparently the site of The Largest Public Urinal In The World.

Or perhaps Kolkata, as a whole, is the Largest Public Urinal In The World and Russell Street just a suburban franchise. I saw more men take a piss there than anywhere else in India. Men were letting fly at every open space of wall they could find – standing, squatting, out of cars, windows, doors – if there was a clear stretch of plaster, a square inch of concrete - they pissed on it. Quite where they went for their other excretory activities I did not find out for a day or so - but the briefest of sniffs was enough to know that it wasn’t far away.

All of life lay before me – spread out like a display along the street. No hasslers, no hustlers, no beggars – I wasn’t back yet in the tourist zone – just ordinary people doing ordinary things, living the Indian city life: pumping water from the pump just outside the front gate, washing cups and plates from the food-stall right next door: that same stall frying god-knows-what in a rancid pan and selling it to passers-by, the old men sipping chai and sitting on benches, students, smokers, dreamers and jokers – just the normal daily grind.

There was nothing special about this scene – it occurs a thousand times a day in a thousand, thousand streets in a thousand cities. It’s India and I was slap-bang in the middle of it.

An old man crouched on the root of an ancient tree that defiantly grew through the footpath. He looked up at me through cracked spectacles.

‘Welcome!’ he said and smiled broadly. His eyes were bloodshot, his few remaining teeth stuck out like bleached fence-posts after a storm. He was grubby, drunk but friendly - that smile was warm, fuzzy and completely sincere.

‘Welcome my friend. Welcome to India.’

I wondered WHICH India he meant.

The India of saris and beautiful dancing girls, drums and dances - the one the tourists come to see? The India of the Oberoi chain, the Taj Resorts – five star glamour and grovel at $700 a night? The India of the beaches, drugs and hippies - and the ghost of Scarlett Keeling, lying dead on the polluted sand? The India I had just left inside the Bengal Club, the colonnaded remnants of the Raj, the crumbling ghost of snobbery, exclusion and contempt?

The India of the hustlers, beggars, the thieves and pimps that that feed off the wide-eyed tourists? The rural India of the countryside, the farms, the wandering cows, the poverty and grind? The honest India of the streets, the smells, the urine - like the one I was standing in right now? Or the guileless India of his simple, drunken smile?

All of them, I guess. I really didn’t know anymore.

Russell Street led to Park Street, just a hundred yards away: a boulevard of shops, banks, offices, coffee-shops – all the inner-city detritus. This was another India – of businessmen, rich families, smooth ice-cream in tall, frosted glasses, expensive book stores, prosperous kids off to party all night, Kentucky Fried Chicken and lines of would-be diners piled up outside fancy restaurants. An India with the fastest growing economy in the world, the biggest I.T. sector, a rapidly growing, affluent middle-class, of millionaires and entrepreneurs, Bollywood and broken dreams.

Mr. Dogster, the intruder to all this, sat and sipped iced tea at Flury’s and watched it all go by. The tables were full of fat, spoiled children, doting parents, happy families, young couples and groups of chatting friends all guzzling the indifferent Flury food.

For the first time in India I was suddenly homesick, out of my depth - and feeling quite alone.

dogster

In this mood I returned to The Bengal Club for another pre-paid dose of humiliation.

Bongo leapt out of his cupboard as I returned from my jaunt on the streets.

‘Welcome back, Sah,’ he oozed.

Afternoon tea, Sah?’ he chimed enthusiastically.

‘Why not,’ said his victim in reply.

I was tired and beaten and tragic - any port in a storm was fine by me. I ached for the Manali hashish but alas, it was finished, just when I needed it most. Bongo was to be my special friend, I could see, and there was no way out – and, in that limp moment, he was welcome. Perhaps I was having drug withdrawal, perhaps a sooky attack – but Mr. Dogster needed some company and Bongo was glad to provide. It was his duty.

The fly fed himself to the spider, in the way that solo travellers often do.

He vanished and re-appeared five minutes later with a huge silver pot of tea and some biscuits then hovered and faffed in the room. He rearranged the boards in my bed, plumped the pillows, ran taps mysteriously in the bathroom, brought a towel, took one away, emptied the empty ashtrays and shook the dead matches to make sure they were still there. We chatted as he did so. I asked the obvious questions – ‘How far to the Victoria Memorial? How long does it take in a car? How much is a taxi to Howrah Bridge? ... blah tourist blah tourist blah.

He ran through the list of services he could offer: the taxi, his friends with a car, the masseur that could come to my room in the morning, the treats he had waiting in store. He stopped somewhere short of a blow-job but I had the distinct feeling that, for a paltry ten million rupees, that was on the cards as well. It was all a question of ‘Sah’s’ wallet and where ‘Sah’ wanted to go.

‘Sah’ was getting increasingly nervous as Bongo recited his list. I was trapped, like a rat, in Bongo’s cage and, like the predatory carnivore he was becoming; he circled and toyed with his prey.

Then he stopped, stood still and hovered over me.

‘Are you happy, Sah?’ he asked with a frown.

‘I’m perfectly happy, thank you, Bongo,’ I sighed.

‘Are you perfectly happy?’ he repeated and stood there.

It was a strange frozen moment. I was tired and sick of him – but I truly had no idea what he talking about.

It hit me in a moment of clarity.

Bongo wanted a tip – and he wasn’t going anywhere till he got it.

‘Ahhh,’ I said, ‘Now I must thank you, Bongo,’ and reached for my wallet. A sly smile crept over his face. I dragged out one hundred rupees and held it out. He didn’t move. Like an idiot, I took out ANOTHER hundred rupees and thrust the two notes in his pocket. There was not a flicker of response on his face. He bowed slightly, with a smirk, then was gone in an instant.

The real lesson in this transaction was not how to get him out of the room; it was, of course, not to tip TOO much. In my tiredness, I had allowing myself to be bullied. After a week of hustlers in Mumbai, my guard was suddenly down. I knew to be on alert in the streets, but I’d forgotten to be vigilant at home. Now I was a REAL target.

The foreign fly was a fool as well.

dogster

Time for dinner.

While the guest rooms in this establishment might be less than extravagant, the public areas on the First Floor are quite the reverse. This was once THE place to see and be seen and, to those who believe the bullshit, may well still be. I never really saw anybody else use them so it’s difficult for me to say.

I arrived at the restaurant at eight p.m., not early, not late - so I thought - and made my stately progress toward the door. Inside I could see a large Victorian room of epic proportions, crystal chandeliers dimly lighting the ceiling, a gallery of large oil paintings blanketing the walls. Tablecloths that looked from a distance to be white were neatly laid over a number of empty tables, each set for four.

The ghost of the Raj was evidently having a huge dinner - with a hundred invisible guests. There was not a soul in the room.

Then, from behind a pillar, a middle-aged Indian wearing a grubby tunic and a uniform that was last washed in 1964 leapt out and blocked my way. He was looking at me as if I’d pissed on his shoe.

‘Oh, you can’t be coming in here, sir, dressed like that.’

He was apparently the Maitre ‘D., obviously employed specially to be rude and condescending. What were those words again?

Foreigners, adventurers, upstarts and natives... which one was I tonight, I wondered?

Something worse, apparently – I was a man without a jacket and tie.

‘The rules, sir.’

‘What rules?’

‘THE rules, sir.’

He looked at my feet. His eyes travelled slowly up the length of my body, stopping somewhere short of my neck. He sniffed and sighed. His eyes sank back into his head and both nostrils flared with distaste.

I’d come directly from the piss in the street to the piss-elegant in the dining room.

‘A jacket, sir, at least’ he sneered, ‘do you have a jacket?’

This whole scenario was so bizarre that instead of beating him to a pulp I smiled in that limp British manner and actually went up to my room, changed from my perfectly clean clothes, clothes that I might add cost more than his yearly wage, and returned dressed ‘appropriately’ for what was going to be some considerable occasion.

Tonight I would eat The Worst Food In India.

Worse, I would eat it in an empty dining room with a row of eight waiters watching my every move.

There was a buffet standing covered on a long table down one end of the room. After I’d returned, been seated with a flourish and sneered at by each waiter in turn, I was led to this magnificent spread. Each lid was whipped off each bain-marie with a flourish, each dish explained as if I’d never eaten a curry in my life.

The first contained mouse droppings in a rich, uncomfortably brown sauce, then came a dish of what once might have been sausages but probably came from the penis fields of Badami, next a vegetable creation which looked like braised turd floating in brine, a rogan josh made apparently of lamp that reminded me of something my dog once threw up... need I go on. This had all been sitting there since six o’clock, just time enough to grow enough bacteria to kill a giraffe.

A lump of horror from each was dumped on my plate and I was escorted with great ceremony back to my table. A napkin was laid altogether too carefully over my groin and, while the whole staff watched attentively, I gainfully attempted to stomach the muck.

In moments like these – and they have happened before – I lie.

Tonight Mr. Dogster’s great fabrication was his terrible upset stomach, the cramps of diarrhoea that threaten, the traveller’s curse that is about to cut him down, just as he’s about to eat this DELICIOUS, but too spicy, food...

‘Ahhh,’ cooed the staff in unison.

‘Ahhh,’ said the Maitre ‘D.

‘Ahhh,’ said Mr. Dogster and rolled his eyes, ‘how sad, what a pity... what to do?

Tip TOO much and run, was the answer.

Now I’d done it TWICE in a row.