I'm off for up to another six months in India, this time in the south of the country. I was supposed to leave Saipan on the 17th, but my scheduled early morning flight to Guam, the first leg of the trip, was cancelled because of mechanical difficulties and I couldn't arrive in time for my connecting flights with a later plane that day. I also had to book another flight from Bangkok to Calcutta, because my already scheduled flight on the 18th was non-changeable within 48 hours of departure and non-refundable. So that cost me an extra $210 or so.
I did finally fly from Saipan to Guam on the 18th, with a 4:30 a.m. departure. Next was a flight to Narita in Japan only to find upon arrival that I was not booked on the 10:50 flight onward to Bangkok that United Airlines had told me I was booked on. After about four hours and speaking to five or six different persons, I finally did get a boarding pass for a flight to Bangkok for 5:30 in the evening. So I had a layover in Narita of about eight hours instead of one hour. I slept off and on for maybe four of the seven hours on the flight and arrived in Bangkok just before 11 at night. I got to my hotel a little before 1 a.m. and was happy to take a shower and go to bed. I'm not sure I slept at all, but it was great to lie down after the cramped sleep on the plane.
I got up on the 19th about 6, had breakfast and took a taxi to Bangkok's old airport about 7. It was a Monday morning and I was worried about the commute, but it took only an hour. The news on the radio was mostly about President Obama's trip to Thailand. The Air Asia flight to Calcutta was at 11, so I milled about the old, now mostly unused airport and noticed a group of people looking out a window onto the tarmac. I walked over and saw Air Force One and an apparently identical Boeing 747 (the back up Air Force One, I guess), along with a smaller plane with "United States of America" on it. A red carpet lined with an honor guard led to the stairs up to the entrance of Air Force One, with Thai officials, including a woman in a bright yellow dress, lined up just below the stairs. Several Secret Service-looking guys surrounded the plane. After maybe 20 minutes, a motorcade of about 40 vehicles approached, with a couple of Presidential-looking limousines, the first one flying Thai and U.S. flags, near the front. I had my binoculars and saw President Obama get out, shake hands and bound up the stairs, with perhaps a couple of others, probably including Secretary of State Clinton. He waved from the top of the stairs before entering the plane. Everyone else was relegated to the stairs at the back of the plane. Air Force One fairly quickly taxied to the runway and then took off, followed by the back up 747, on the way to Rangoon. He had spent just a day in Bangkok, meeting the king and prime minister and visiting Wat Pho, with its giant reclining Buddha.
I slept a bit on the flight to Calcutta. We landed a little after noon, Indian time, with great views of the Sunderbans, the mangrove swamps of the Ganges Delta, before we landed. I took a bus into town and checked into the hotel where I've stayed before. I was a little surprised that the main clerk remembered me. The weather was relatively cool, in the 80's, and after resting in my room, I took a short walk and got a haircut before an early dinner. I had planned to get a haircut in Bangkok, but arrived too late. So I asked the guy at the hotel to recommend a place for me and he directed me to a somewhat upmarket place called Awesome that charged 150 rupees (less than $3) for a haircut, twice as much as I have paid anywhere else in India and three to five times the usual price. The older man who seemed to be the proprietor of the place took over from the younger man who had started cutting my hair. The younger man was relegated to standing by and brushing away loose hair with a little brush as the older man did the cutting. The older man did allow the younger one to finish the haircut and he gave me quite a good head massage at the end. First two person haircut I have had. After dinner, I was tired and went to bed just after 7, sleeping well until about 3:30 the next morning. I looked out my window and saw about five men sleeping on rope beds in the little alley below.
I got up around 4:30 and went out for a walk about 6, soon after dawn. I walked for about three hours before breakfast and enjoyed all the sights in the early morning cool. The streets were comparatively deserted, but there was still a lot to see. A few rickshaws. (Calcutta has the world's last man-pulled ones.) A pot bellied street sweeper. People asleep on the sidewalks, some next to their rickshaws. People conducing their mornings ablutions at curbside. A man delivering long sugar cane stalks, depositing them next to a lamppost on a corner. Several men on bicycles carting scores of chickens tied to their bikes. A small parade with drums came along, centering on a transvestite dressed in a blue belly dancer outfit. He was followed by maybe 50 people, men and women, and danced with both men and women as the parade proceeded. Quite a few people stopped and watched in the predominately Moslem neighborhood. He was quite the performer and seemed to revel in the attention. I passed by him walking toward me on the sidewalk later in the day and he said something like, "You took my photograph!"
Eventually, following the parade, I reached the street side poultry market , with thousands of chickens in big wicker baskets. Men were binding their legs and selling them, to be taken away in big clumps on bicycles for the most part. One guy told me a chicken sold for 120 rupees (a little over $2) a kilo and that a chicken usually weighs a minimum of one kilo, 800 grams. A little further on was a street side fish market. Bengalis love fish. It was quite interesting to see the expert way they eviscerated the larger fish before selling them. There were several different kinds of fish, plus shrimp and crayfish, on sale. People were friendly and I very much enjoyed it. There is always so much to see on the streets of Calcutta, and often beneath once handsome and now derelict old colonial ear buildings.
After breakfast I booked a train ticket south for the next day and then spent the rest of the day doing errands and walking around the always interesting streets of this city..
My plan this year is to spend my time in the south of India, which I think will probably take the full six months allowed by my visa, and then go to Sri Lanka. That's the plan, anyway.
I did finally fly from Saipan to Guam on the 18th, with a 4:30 a.m. departure. Next was a flight to Narita in Japan only to find upon arrival that I was not booked on the 10:50 flight onward to Bangkok that United Airlines had told me I was booked on. After about four hours and speaking to five or six different persons, I finally did get a boarding pass for a flight to Bangkok for 5:30 in the evening. So I had a layover in Narita of about eight hours instead of one hour. I slept off and on for maybe four of the seven hours on the flight and arrived in Bangkok just before 11 at night. I got to my hotel a little before 1 a.m. and was happy to take a shower and go to bed. I'm not sure I slept at all, but it was great to lie down after the cramped sleep on the plane.
I got up on the 19th about 6, had breakfast and took a taxi to Bangkok's old airport about 7. It was a Monday morning and I was worried about the commute, but it took only an hour. The news on the radio was mostly about President Obama's trip to Thailand. The Air Asia flight to Calcutta was at 11, so I milled about the old, now mostly unused airport and noticed a group of people looking out a window onto the tarmac. I walked over and saw Air Force One and an apparently identical Boeing 747 (the back up Air Force One, I guess), along with a smaller plane with "United States of America" on it. A red carpet lined with an honor guard led to the stairs up to the entrance of Air Force One, with Thai officials, including a woman in a bright yellow dress, lined up just below the stairs. Several Secret Service-looking guys surrounded the plane. After maybe 20 minutes, a motorcade of about 40 vehicles approached, with a couple of Presidential-looking limousines, the first one flying Thai and U.S. flags, near the front. I had my binoculars and saw President Obama get out, shake hands and bound up the stairs, with perhaps a couple of others, probably including Secretary of State Clinton. He waved from the top of the stairs before entering the plane. Everyone else was relegated to the stairs at the back of the plane. Air Force One fairly quickly taxied to the runway and then took off, followed by the back up 747, on the way to Rangoon. He had spent just a day in Bangkok, meeting the king and prime minister and visiting Wat Pho, with its giant reclining Buddha.
I slept a bit on the flight to Calcutta. We landed a little after noon, Indian time, with great views of the Sunderbans, the mangrove swamps of the Ganges Delta, before we landed. I took a bus into town and checked into the hotel where I've stayed before. I was a little surprised that the main clerk remembered me. The weather was relatively cool, in the 80's, and after resting in my room, I took a short walk and got a haircut before an early dinner. I had planned to get a haircut in Bangkok, but arrived too late. So I asked the guy at the hotel to recommend a place for me and he directed me to a somewhat upmarket place called Awesome that charged 150 rupees (less than $3) for a haircut, twice as much as I have paid anywhere else in India and three to five times the usual price. The older man who seemed to be the proprietor of the place took over from the younger man who had started cutting my hair. The younger man was relegated to standing by and brushing away loose hair with a little brush as the older man did the cutting. The older man did allow the younger one to finish the haircut and he gave me quite a good head massage at the end. First two person haircut I have had. After dinner, I was tired and went to bed just after 7, sleeping well until about 3:30 the next morning. I looked out my window and saw about five men sleeping on rope beds in the little alley below.
I got up around 4:30 and went out for a walk about 6, soon after dawn. I walked for about three hours before breakfast and enjoyed all the sights in the early morning cool. The streets were comparatively deserted, but there was still a lot to see. A few rickshaws. (Calcutta has the world's last man-pulled ones.) A pot bellied street sweeper. People asleep on the sidewalks, some next to their rickshaws. People conducing their mornings ablutions at curbside. A man delivering long sugar cane stalks, depositing them next to a lamppost on a corner. Several men on bicycles carting scores of chickens tied to their bikes. A small parade with drums came along, centering on a transvestite dressed in a blue belly dancer outfit. He was followed by maybe 50 people, men and women, and danced with both men and women as the parade proceeded. Quite a few people stopped and watched in the predominately Moslem neighborhood. He was quite the performer and seemed to revel in the attention. I passed by him walking toward me on the sidewalk later in the day and he said something like, "You took my photograph!"
Eventually, following the parade, I reached the street side poultry market , with thousands of chickens in big wicker baskets. Men were binding their legs and selling them, to be taken away in big clumps on bicycles for the most part. One guy told me a chicken sold for 120 rupees (a little over $2) a kilo and that a chicken usually weighs a minimum of one kilo, 800 grams. A little further on was a street side fish market. Bengalis love fish. It was quite interesting to see the expert way they eviscerated the larger fish before selling them. There were several different kinds of fish, plus shrimp and crayfish, on sale. People were friendly and I very much enjoyed it. There is always so much to see on the streets of Calcutta, and often beneath once handsome and now derelict old colonial ear buildings.
After breakfast I booked a train ticket south for the next day and then spent the rest of the day doing errands and walking around the always interesting streets of this city..
My plan this year is to spend my time in the south of India, which I think will probably take the full six months allowed by my visa, and then go to Sri Lanka. That's the plan, anyway.
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