Chapter 6

CHENNAI   September 29th – November 2nd.

City and town name-changes have been happening in India for the past twenty years. Waiting at Mumbai (then Bombay) Airport on my first trip in the 80s, I nearly missed my flight to Poona (the name on my itinerary) because it had recently been changed to something nearer the original, local pronunciation – "Pune" was showing on the destination board. Madras, our next port of call, is the largest Indian city below the Deccan plain, that huge triangular swathe of land that is the heart of the country. South India, a geographical rather than administrative or titular area, begins at Madras or, since we determined that we would have to get used to the "new" name, Chennai. This change, like most, was purely political, replacing a Hindi name by one from the local Tamil language.

 

            Our flight left Kathmandu behind schedule and its subsequent late arrival at Delhi made for yet more delays at immigration (we were, of course, coming in from another country). In the queue, we chatted to some Americans, one of whom was returning to Chicago, the other bound for Ahmedabad in Gujerat  to paint for three months. Another American couple became very vocal when a group of gypsy women from Uzbechistan (amazing the details one picks up by ear-wigging conversations) tried to walk straight to the front of the queue. They were wearing headscarves and flowery polyester dresses and carrying dozens of bags and packages. The Yanks called on the Indian officials to sort the ladies out. The latter looked genuinely puzzled as to what to do and where to go but Uncle Sam was having none of this. "Don't give me all that "Me-no-understand" bullshit! You know what a goddam queue is. God, you'd be shot in the States for pushin' in like that!" He seemed pleased to have let us know about summary justice in the Land of the Free for such heinous crimes as queue-jumping. He approached apoplexy when, to get the women out of the way, the officials hurried them through ahead of us.

 

            The International and Domestic Terminals at Delhi are, as in many cities, on the same site but, in Delhi's case, entrances are set about 7km apart. This is, of course, very good planning from a taxi driver's point of view. We knew the journey from our Calcutta - Delhi - Kathmandu flights and so were quite quick finding the pre-paid taxi for the drive between terminals. Even so, we did not have long to wait before our 19.00hrs departure on the two and a half hour flight to Chennai.

 

            Mr. Haricharan Das, the TCL rep, was waiting to greet us, together with his son, Sachin, and his nephew Kishore. Das Snr., short, a little portly and with a quietly mischievous grin, was wearing a blue safari jacket and matching trousers – he had many versions of this suit in different colours and we never saw him wearing anything else. Sachin and Kishore, mid-twenties and mid-thirties respectively and dressed in neat shirts and slacks, were both very handsome men. Kishore sported a neat moustache. They presented each of us with a beautiful bunch of flowers and, as is traditional, a custard apple. The Hindu belief is that the welcome, in terms of warmth and affection, should be as extensive as the number of seeds in the plant. We felt that each of them was immediately very friendly but in a slightly cautious, reserved way.

 

            The whole party was soon roaring through the outskirts and then the streets of Chennai, in the hands of Das's driver, a young lad who, possibly because the plane had been late, drove as though we had one to catch – we nicknamed him Sennagupta because of his Formula I aspirations. The vehicle was a small Maruti Omni, a Suzuki van assembled in India. The three-cylinder 800cc engine made it very nippy in traffic. In this vehicle, over the next month, we were to spend a not inconsiderable amount of time. Its shaded windows meant that, on this first evening, we were not too aware of our surroundings. By 11pm we were in the very spacious and beautifully appointed foyer of the Taj Coromandel Hotel, of the type where one sits at an elegant table filling in the hotel registration form rather than merely leaning on a counter. We had already been told that we would not be staying at the hotel listed on my TCL itinerary (The Connemara) but imagined that the change to the Coromandel, instigated by Mr. Das, was all arranged. Unfortunately, and much to the discomfort of Mr. Das, we were not actually booked in. He was very apologetic but, since the hotel was not full and he was able to explain that Mr. Murgan Rajah, the sales manager for both hotels, was supposed to have made the arrangements, we secured a room and, still clutching our bouquets and custard apples, were glad to end twelve hours of travelling.

 

            At 8.30 the next morning, as arranged, the phone went and the voice at the end said, "Here I am Das". This idiosyncratic telephone manner – variations were simply "I am Das" or "Here is Das" – was one of the endearing individualisms of a man Pat and I were to grow very fond of over the next few weeks. Sennagupta and Mr.Das took me along Mahatma Gandhi Road and then turned left into Anna Salai or, as it was known throughout the days of the Raj and until only two years ago, Mount Road. We were heading for Mr. Das's business premises, the largest music store and instrument showroom in Chennai. Musee Musical (nobody bothered about the accent on the first word or tried to make one language of the title by writing or pronouncing "musicale") was now the Das family business. The original firm was begun by a Frenchman in the 1850s and had subsequently been owned by German, Portuguese and British businessmen. It had been in the present building for ninety-eight years and in the Das family for sixty-three of those years. The ground floor showroom had a very high ceiling befitting its age and seemed rather gloomy. I later gathered that the poor light from the ceiling strip lights was a result of low voltage available that day. This problem with power supply bedevils most places in India and was later to prove something of a headache for me in the examining room. The latter was on the first floor where there was a clutch of "classrooms " that Mr. Das leased out at nominal rents to teachers of western music (piano, keyboard and guitar) as well as the veena (the South Indian version of the sitar), drumming and Indian classical singing.

 

            My room was sizeable, air-conditioned, with fans (for when the power was not strong enough for the AC unit) and coir-carpeted. The two windows had vertical blinds to shield the dismal sight of a blank yellow wall outside. The piano was an old Brinsmead – adequate but difficult to control for soft playing. On the large table was a cover made, I was told, by "poor people" in Gujerat in their own individual woven design. The distinctive feature of this craft- work was the half-inch diameter pieces of mirrored glass set into the weave. The coastal state of Gujerat lies in the north-west corner of India next door to Pakistan and it was from there, nine generations ago, that the Das family came. There is a large Gujerati population in Chennai, keeping alive the traditions, dance and music of their original home even though few can remember anyone who actually lived there.

 

            My steward was the ever-smiling Arun, a "cousin" of Mr. Das's. This, and other, familial term seemed to be applied in a fairly random way to describe any sort of relation – I later met a "brother-in-law" of Mr. Das who, it seemed, was not married to Mr. Das's sister and who I could only presume was a close friend. However, Arun it was who kept up a steady supply of piano candidates for me throughout the morning. Lunch was a double-decker toasted sandwich and a Limca, served at my table whilst Das chatted to me about TCL and its promotion in India.  He took me down to the showroom and I was interested to see the 8-holed north Indian flute and its 6-holed southern cousin. For the first time, I had a close encounter with the small portable harmoniums used for Indian classical vocal work – hand-bellows and clever transposing bar and couplers. This is the descendant of the instruments introduced from Europe that became assimilated into indigenous music; each week, the company exports two or three to ex-pats in various European countries. Because of the tuning system, these instruments are not used in conjunction with sitars or veenas. The full-size versions of the latter, with one melody string and seven sympathetics, retailed at the equivalent of £60 but, Mr. Das pointed out, would cost six times that amount in Europe. This still sounded cheap to me if only for the amount of craftmanship that had gone into the making of the beautiful casing. There were plenty of western instruments for sale also although there was little room among the masses of sheet music and books for a stock of new pianos. These, the firm stores at the large retailer Furtados in Mumbai, sharing the container charges on the Japanese Yamahas. Two uprights, still in their containers, recently arrived to fulfill orders, were stacked near the door and I noticed the large sign on the side saying "Use 10 manhandlers!"

 

            The first couple of days set a pattern for most of the work at Musee Musical. Events were enlivened from time to time by power cuts, although the premises, in common with most, had an emergency generator that, after a while, would cut in. Often, this was too late to save the Electronic Keyboard examinee who, without a battery back-up, would find his/her rendition of The Drunken Sailor or Abide with Me rudely interrupted. Generally, this meant re-setting the instrument with the consequent effect on timetabling. My concentration was also disturbed by a lorry that three times a day would reverse into the alleyway between Musee Musical and the business next door. This entailed quite a lot of shouting – perhaps had I listened carefully I could have learnt Hindi or Tamil for "Left down a bit, c'mon, c'mon, straighten 'er up" etc. The voices mattered less than the warning signal on the reverse gear that played Silent Night in A flat major – something of a nuisance when Ear Tests were being inflicted. But at least it gave me some transposing practice as I tried to avoid too much bi-tonality.

 

             At the end of each day, Sennagupta, whose real name was Anwar, sped me back through the Chennai traffic. Most of the time, I had to hold a handkerchief over my nose and mouth as lorries and buses belched out their poisons. The auto-rickshaws were undoubtedly the worst offenders. There is a scheme for the testing of vehicle emissions and certificates can be awarded for vehicles to display. But the system is voluntary (and not free!). I wondered if/when Chennai might get round to a scheme, as in Kathmandu, encouraging electric vehicles on to the roads. The city's Millenium Project was to build a further thirty five flyovers to "solve" the current traffic problem which sounds very much as though the city fathers are considerably committed to the car culture, making it even more important that the petrol/diesel hegemony should be broken.

 

            Meanwhile, at the Coromandel, there had been developments. The Sales Manager, having been "spoken to" by Mr. Das, had contacted Pat, apologised for the misunderstanding over the booking and offered to up-grade us to a de luxe room for our four-week stay. Naturally, this would be at the same corporate rate negotiated by Mr. Das. The offer was doubly welcome because we had been aware (Pat during the day, both of us in the evening) of a great deal of banging and hammering coming from the renovation work in progress on the Coffee Shop, one of the four restaurants in the hotel. I had already complained about the work continuing so late into the evening (8 o clock) and had been assured that the work would be stopped and that this disturbance would not occur again. When we took up Rajah's offer and moved to 321, one of the de luxe rooms (two each only on the 3rd and 5th floors), we were horrified to discover that, although the room was indeed luxurious, the noise was still there. After a further spat with the Duty Manager and further meaningless reassurances, we moved to 521, satisfyingly further from the disturbance. Apart from being considerably bigger than the room in which we had started, with space for enormous arm chairs and sofa, the room had the extra touches we enjoyed – bowls of daily fresh fruit, red rose buds on the coffee table, large potted palms in the corners, and a roomy desk complete with a direct fax line. There were four elegant paintings on the wood-panelled walls and the view from the wide windows was of a small wood of raintrees, the tops of which were dotted with pink flowers.

 

            Even these hotel rooms, in common with most we encountered, had no tea making facilities. (Why would any of these rich visitors want to make their own tea or coffee when they can give someone a job by picking up the phone?). In Shillong, Darjeeling and Calcutta, we had made our own especially weak brew via an electric element that could just be stood in a cup – we had bought this in Hong Kong some years ago. I was aware that Indian hotel electrics would put any British Health and Safety Officer into a coma such were the evident Heath Robinsonesque arrangements often encountered, and I think we blew a few fuses in Darjeeling. Here, the wall plugs were particularly suspicious, with the socket only just fixed to the wall and the lead from the element became very warm indeed. Being in such 5-star luxury, we felt that asking for a kettle for the room would not be over-ambitious. The wonderful catch-all reply, "No problem", plus "I bring" brought nothing at all. The second request (different boy) brought a kettle whose plug did not fit the wall socket. This boy promised to return with an adaptor but did not. The third brought some sort of extension lead that was so suspect (especially as he pushed the pins home with a screwdriver) that we decided to play their game and opt for the verbal telephone combat that passed for room service.

 

            Whilst the standard of   English throughout this hotel and most of the others we used, was very good in a face-to-face situation, sending requests down the phone line was another matter. If we had wanted "Tea for two people", I fancy we would have been fine. Unfortunately, we tried to persevere with asking for "Hot water, two cups, one tea bag separately, no milk, no sugar". We would get the hot water and tea bag, milk and sugar but no cups; or hot water, cups but no tea bag and so on in as many permutations of incorrectitude as one could dream up. We eventually gave up saying "two cups" when this was misheard and two Cokes arrived.

 

            With Pat being around the hotel in the mornings, she had daily conversations with the room boy whose name was Venkatash. ("Boy" is, of course, a misnomer but this was the term used.) He had shown Pat how to cut and serve the custard apples we had been given and told her the Tamil name was chithapulli.They exchanged details of family – he had an eight- year-old boy – and, over the next week or so, Pat got to know that he was also caring for his mother and her widowed sister. This he managed on Rp5,000 (£75) per month before tax or Rp2,900 (£43.50) net. Discussing these figures later at Musee Musical, Mr. Das suggested to Pat that Venkatash's deductions could not be as great as he had maintained. "He was lying" said Mr. D. bluntly. He also added that Venkatash would get all his meals at the hotel and would be able to take away more left-overs than he and his family could cope with. Mr. Das offered the information that he paid his driver, Anwar, Rp3,000 (£45) per month with a further Rp50 for any extra driving (such as picking us up from the airport). He sometimes paid Anwar's rent and at festival times would give him a present, some cloth, for example. "This way" said Das "he is loyal and I can rely on him." He added that he hoped the extra rupees reached the man's wife. "He might drink it, for all I know, so might your Venkatash if you give him a tip." Still on the theme of loyalty, Mr. Das has people working for him whose parents and grandparents worked for his own father and grandfather – the old retainer system. "When my employees retire" he said "I do not give them a large sum of money – they will never have seen so much and they would not know what to do with it. Instead, I tell them to come to me every month and I give them one third of their salary, so I know that if no one looks after them, they can at least eat".

 

            We tried all four of the restaurants at the Coromandel. The Lobby Bar was a temporary arrangement during the refurbishment of the Coffee Shop. We quite liked dining there because of the very attractive sound of the resident piano/keyboards, bass guitar and trumpet trio. The pianist, we discovered, had taken Trinity exams at Musee Musical and his improvisations seemed, to this jazz layman, fluent and accomplished. The trumpet player never ventured further than the straight melody line. The repertoire was mostly standards, film music and seventies (quiet) rock. One evening, they played a BeeGees selection at Pat's request.

 

            On our first visit to Southern Spice, the South Indian restaurant, the maitre d' was most solicitous and advised us on our choice as being typically of the south but "not too spicy".  The pachaka stew, ananas menaskai, appam, steamed rice with lacha paratha and kulfi to finish were all excellent. Dinner music was supplied by ragas on violin accompanied by tabla and tambourine. The three players, all men wearing traditional white dress, sat cross-legged on a carpet, the latter being moved to one side when a different group of musicians (tabla, flute and female vocalist) took up positions. They accompanied a beautiful dancer dressed in a red and gold costume. Her single-plaited hair, which reached down below her waist, was topped with white jasmine. She had little bells round her ankles and so there was much stamping, all combined with very expressive hand and facial movements. On our way out, we were given some fresh jasmine that, I was told, I should fix in Pat's hair "as a sign of your love, sir!"

 

            From the Chinese restaurant, where the food was also excellent, we were presented with a rose and a pair of chopsticks. But it was in the top-priced of the four venues, the Patio Restaurant, that we had the strangest experience. We had happened upon a New Zealand promotion week. Not only were all the dishes of New Zealand origin (including, of course, Pavlova for dessert) but the entertainment was provided by three Maori singers in full makeup and costume. They sang and chatted at every table and I discovered that one of the young men and the girl were both following courses at the Christchurch Arts Centre where I had often examined for TCL. It seemed bizarre to be in a top-class restaurant in India and being serenaded by well-known Maori songs such as Hine, hine and Tahi nei tanu kino and witnessing the two men perform the haka. The restaurant itself was the last word in luxury. The white-gloved waiters were in full evening dress, tail-coats and all, and the food was brought in a procession, with the first waiter carrying the warm plates, the second the silver-plated covered serving dish which was held open for the head waiter to serve the food on to our plates. Completely over the top but we loved it!

 

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My examining work at Chennai seemed to be dominated by the entry for Electronic Keyboards. I heard over 150 during my stay and, sad to say, most were quite poor. The students had often been inadequately prepared and, as in Darjeeling, there was the frustration of knowing that, with only a minimal amount of qualified help, many of these teachers could be shown how to produce acceptable work. My abiding memories amongst these candidates involve the overtly enthusiastic man in his thirties who had already (he told me) passed his ATCL Diploma in piano but was now very interested in the keyboard. He was taking Grade V and his interest extended to giving me a lecture, which took two and a half minutes, on how the instrument would be set up for the first exercise. His words would have filled a side of A4 single-spaced – I do not know how he did it because it was all relevant. He indeed, as Disraeli said of Gladstone, was "inebriated with the exuberance of his own verbosity." The other particular memory of these KB exams is of the pretty little ten-year-old in a blue school uniform who, from the outset, was all at sea with the exam and its requirements. Her piece de resistance was her rendition of the hymn tune Abide With Me. This requires the melody to be played smoothly in the right hand (hardly recognisable in this version) plus automatic chords played with a single finger in the left hand (usually incorrect and in the wrong place when they did happen to be correct) and a quiet accompaniment from the rhythm box. This last played automatically in time but neither the melody nor the chords matched up with its regular pulse. On top of this, the candidate sang the words of the hymn. This unwanted element was actually correct. That eventide could not fall fast enough for me especially when she launched into verse two.

 

            Other candidates held other, different, surprises. Towards the end of one very pleasant day of piano exams, I was sitting at the piano having completed the final Ear Tests of a Grade IV exam. The candidate was a bright, confident, 13-year-old girl. As I moved round on the piano stool to hand over her music and bid her farewell, she said "Thank you, sir. I would like to leave you with a memento" and promptly kissed me on the cheek! When she got outside to her friends in the waiting area, there were screeches and laughter – presumably she had been "dared" to kiss the examiner. On another occasion, a girl of similar age stopped at the door at the end of the exam and said, "May I know your name?" When I told her, she approached my desk and said "Will you take a kiss from me?" and, without waiting for an answer, reached up and pecked me on the cheek.

 

            Other candidates were memorable for less frivolous reasons. I felt very sorry for a physically handicapped pianist who was carried in from his wheel chair by his brother (both in their twenties). He attempted Grade VII but, apart from the fact that he was just not accurate enough in terms of basic notes, he was unable to use the sustaining pedal therefore very little of this advanced music made sense. It seemed a pity that his obvious enthusiasm for music was not channelled into an instrument which did not call for the use of his legs. In contrast, the precocious young lady who bounced in with a "And a very good afternoon to you, Dr. Wiltshire" gave me a different experience. She played her Grade VI pieces ridiculously fast but had obviously a good deal of talent and a natural feel for the keyboard. But it was all ill-disciplined. As I was about to begin the Ear Tests, she embarked on a conversation. "Could I ask what part of England you come from?" Not being behind schedule, I replied that I lived in Sheffield but originated from the West Country. She asked "Is that anywhere near Bath? It's just that my father is in a multi-national company with its headquarters in Bath. I have been there with him and I thought I recognised your accent." Perceptive madam, I thought. At the end of the exam, she turned at the door and said, "I don't think I have impressed you very much today, have I? But you see, I don't have a teacher". I learned later, from two of her ex-teachers, that the poor girl was cursed with a mother who interfered so much in the lessons that there was not a teacher in Chennai who would take her (and the mother) on. A great pity. Last year, she had won the Centre prize for the highest mark of the session. She had just passed with me but the potential was there for a Distinction.

 

            Another more circumspect young lady, taking Grade VI piano, entered and immediately came straight over to my desk with the question "May I know your name?"  TCL provides each centre with a biog and picture of examiners so that candidates can know who their examiner is and, more importantly, can have an answer to the question "What does he/she look like?" Perhaps this had not been displayed in the waiting area. However, I supplied the answer and then she said, "Have I your permission to pray?" Not knowing whether this meant a full-scale pujah with vermilion powder and incense, I found myself rather ungraciously but gently saying, "Could that not have been done outside?" Her reply was calm. "No, I prefer to pray in here." Confused with my own reaction, I granted her permission and she sat at the piano, bowed her head and said "Dear Father, I thank you for giving me the strength to take this exam and for sending Dr. Wiltshire to be my examiner. If it is your will, I hope I do well in Thy name. Amen". She then proceeded with the exam in a gay demeanour but, sad to report, there was no divine intervention and she stumbled her way through all her pieces, scales, sight reading etc. and failed miserably. I hoped her faith was not too shaken when she saw her result. Incidentally, I noticed that this young lady, in common with many others I saw in the exam room, had quite extensive braces on her teeth. I can remember first noticing these on teenagers when working in Texas in the early 80s and feeling great sympathy for them. It was pointed out to me that the provision of braces was a great status symbol and that the kids, mostly girls, did not mind wearing them at all. It was not long before orthodontists in the UK were working their way through the mouths of every other pubescent middle class youngster in Britain. Now, here were middle class Indians ensuring that their daughters become of marriageable age with perfectly formed teeth. And none of them seemed to mind wearing them either.

 

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Pat's weekdays at the Coromandel were very much ones of happy confinement. On the first Saturday, we had gone for our usual orientating walk only to find that there were no shops immediately handy and that the auto-rickshaw drivers were a great nuisance at the gate, not accepting that we did not want their services and that we did indeed want to walk. This pestering continued every twenty yards as we walked along the extremely uneven and pot-holed pavements, often diverting to avoid a pile of rotting rubbish or a recumbent cow. Opposite the hotel was an Emporium selling (expensive) tourist fare. Here, we were shown, in great detail, traditional Kashmiri silk carpet-making, where the single and double knot process sets these carpets apart from anything merely "hand-woven" or "hand-made". We drank green tea as we watched but even when the salesman insisted that he would drop the price to a special £315 "because today is Mahatma Gandhi's 130th birthday", we resisted the temptation to buy a beautiful green silk carpet that would have looked wonderful near our Tibetan thanka.

 

            Thus, with the immediate environs proving a little unprepossessing, Pat's days were filled with reading and writing, visits to the Fitness Centre (where she found the obvious fitness of other women particularly depressing) and relaxing hours by the pool. Apart from the obvious enjoyment and exercise of swimming, this area proved rich in people-watching opportunities. She watched as six workmen stood around as the seventh painted the bases of the umbrella stands: the would-be "air hostesses", with their hair bundled up under inelegant swim caps, swimming a few lengths under the clip-boarded scrutiny of a panel of three men and two women: the jabbering of middle management as four suited gents decided on the colour of paving slabs for the patio outside the new Coffee Shop which bordered the pool: legions of brown-uniformed gardeners chatting and laughing as they pulled up handfuls of grass by way of weeding: a painter immaculately renewing the NO DIVING signs entirely by hand and eye: a group of workmen squatting on the ground, their little activity alternating between working, sitting silently, spitting and yawning. One man with a scarf tied around his head pirate-style, seemed to sit on the roof for the whole of one afternoon – perhaps he was holding something in place! Judged by their ragged lunghis, these workmen were probably of the Dalit caste, the most under-privileged group in India. This seemed to be confirmed at the end of one afternoon when I had joined Pat for my own exercise in the pool. A group of very dark-skinned women joined the men. Their saris were of very cheap and dowdy material and they stared around the pool area as though seeing blue water for the first time. Their fascination did not preclude a considerable amount of hawking and spitting. Some of the men joined them and two, shabbily dressed and with cement dust covering them from bare feet to greying beards, stared across at the two of us whilst at the same time joining in the conversation about the water. Before long, they were hustled away as dining room staff in black trousers, white shirts and bow ties, began to titivate the pool area for a function. Trestle tables appeared and were table-clothed, pot plants were spread all around the pool and fairy lights were strung between these and in the surrounding bushes and trees.

 

            Venkatash, too, continued to be a source of cheerful amusement and, in a sense, companionship. He was most concerned one morning when Pat, in response to "How are you today, madam?" used a term which implied that she felt a little washed out or below par. "Oh, I feel a bit pathetic this morning, Venkatash" she said. He frowned and smartly moved to the phone. "I must phone my lady!"  He rang his supervisor. "Lady", he cried, "my madam is pathetic – do you know it?" Pat explained that she was feeling "pathetic" (she wrote the word down for him) because I had been up most of the night with diarrhoea and vomiting and she had not had much sleep. By this time the supervisor had arrived and was most concerned that we had not summoned the hotel doctor. Pat was made to promise to do so if I was not better very soon.

 

            Towards the end of our stay, another word was introduced into Venkatash's vocabulary. He told Pat that he was being transferred to work on the executive suites on the top floor. "Oh", said Pat "very posh". Again, this was written down and explained. "Now I know two new words – pathetic and posh!" Venkatash obviously had great pride in his son whose name was Madana Guba or John Babu – "I only call him John if I am very pleased with him". He was so excited one day to be able to tell Pat that the lad had performed so well at school that he had been awarded a scholarship. This would help the family finances considerably. John's 9th birthday was imminent and he said that he would be taking a cake for him from the hotel. The previous day had been a school holiday and so the two had spent time together on schoolwork. "Now my son also knows two new words – posh and pathetic!" and he hunched his shoulders and looked downcast just as Pat had originally mimed.

 

            On the day we left, Venkatash rang the doorbell and presented Pat with some lovely flowers and also showed us a picture of John Babu. We promised to let him see the pictures we had taken. As well as the Rp100 we had given him at the end of each week, we gave him Rp50 to give to John as a birthday present. He grinned and said, "Oh, I am so happy!"

 

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Over a twenty-two year period of moving around the world, I have developed a healthy distrust of hotel account-keeping. One of the lessons I have learned is to settle the bill well before I actually intend to leave the premises. This allows time to query the charges for meals not taken, mini-bars not touched and phone calls not made. On a long stay, I pay weekly so as to maintain a check on these fictitious charges. Thus, after one week at the Taj Coromandel, I went to the cashier and asked to discharge my debts to date. Out of concern for my employers, I was startled to discover that I was paying far more then the sum Mr. Das had mentioned – it seemed that the various taxes were being calculated on the basic rack rate for the room, not on the discounted rate. I could not imagine Mr. Das, placid gentleman that he was, ever demonstrating anger but when I appraised him of the situation the next morning, he allowed himself visible perturbation. "I will sort it out with Murugan" (the Manager) he said and very nearly scowled.

 

            It was impossible to gauge how long this process might take and so, for the foreseeable future, we continued to enjoy the luxury of the Coromandel. I had discovered that I could buy two-day-old Guardians in the lobby shop, could watch England play Italy and, more significantly, New Zealand's All Blacks, live from Twickenham in the Rugby World Cup on satellite television, and we continued to eat excellent meals in the restaurants. There was a special vegetarian menu on during the 10-day festival of Navarathi, when the goddess Devi was worshipped. In the foyer immediately outside the restaurant there was a traditional display of golu (dolls) depicting scenes from Hindu mythology – many private houses would have the same type of display. On the marble floor was a circular design, eight feet in diameter, made of marigold and jasmine petals, together with lamps and offerings of rice and bamboo leaves. Again, we enjoyed the dancing, flute playing and drumming which accompanied our Navarathi meal.

 

            Memories of our second week at the Coromandel are a little coloured by the severe attack of enteritis I suffered during the Monday night. Throughout the tour, we both, from time to time, had slightly upset tummies. This was to be expected and usually cautious eating and, if necessary, an Immodium tablet, limited the occurrence to a mild inconvenience. Neither of us was paranoid about the hygiene situation but we were certainly very careful about only drinking, and cleaning teeth in, bottled water, as well as being scrupulous about hand-washing before food. So where the lurgi appeared from, I have no idea but it found its way to my gut and, by 7am the next morning, with very little sleep throughout the night, I felt extremely weak. However, with the assistance of Immodium, I felt safe enough to venture down at 8.30am when the call came, "Here I am Das".

 

            The temptation to throw in the towel and stay in bed had not been very great because thoughts of wrecking the exam timetable (plus the idea that it was better to try to get back to normal as soon as possible) were in the forefront of my mind. This was not just devotion to duty but as much the desire not to lose my free weekend and the trips that were planned for those days! But examining that day was a great effort. After the first three or four candidates, I was almost in a panic at the thought of another twenty or so filing through the door. Arun brought me a bottle of mineral water and I coped by sipping that every half hour. Unfortunately, the afternoon ended with some very poor electronic keyboard candidates – the worst ever – with final marks hovering around 30%. What had I done to deserve this?

 

            Mr. Das was naturally concerned about my health but had the wisdom to leave me to sleep (feet up on a chair, head against the wall) during the lunch break and, because I was moving very sluggishly over to the piano for ear tests etc., I suspect the candidates just thought "What a very old man!"

 

            On the way "home" that day, Mr. Das talked to me about Rieki, a Japanese/American/Indian concept of releasing life forces through the hands to cure all manner of stress-related illnesses. I did not consider an attack of gastro-enteritis to be induced by stress – more likely it would have been concerned with frequently playing the same piano as dozens of candidates who may or may not be fastidious in matters of hygiene – or was it the water in the hotel pool which had entered my system? However, I promised to read the literature that Arun, who was a Reiki practitioner, had passed on to me via Mr. Das. It appeared that Mrs. Das, whom we were yet to meet, was also a disciple, and teacher, of Reiki.  She, her husband claimed, could also achieve distance healing. This conversation led on to other matters of life style and I discovered that the Das family slept on coir mats on the floor "so that the earth's vibrations can enter us", that they do not use pillows "as the neck is bent up" and that sleeping thus "prevents spondylitis in old age." Bed frames were not good because "when the servants sweep up, the dust collects under the bed." Sachin did not like any furniture in the house for the same reason. And, of course, this all made complete sense to me, although I would have reservations about the "earth's vibrations."

 

            It took several days of careful eating and a lot of rest before I felt totally back to normal. Strangely, Arun seemed rather distant throughout the days when I continued to be not totally fit. On one occasion, he even passed me on the stairs without looking at me (the "boys" would normally retreat to the landing if they saw me approaching) and I wondered whether he was upset that I had not responded to "distance healing" in the expected way.

 

            At the end of this our second week, matters with Murugan Rajah, Das and myself were resolved. I had calculated that I had been paying over £100 per night for our room including breakfast. The rack rate for the room only (i.e. without corporate rate discounts) was £247 so we had had a bargain! But as I pointed out, the original arrangement was for US£100 (about £65) plus Tourist Tax and, in a hotel of this standard, Luxury Tax. He agreed to adjust the amounts to ensure that this was the daily rate I would have paid. When I explained this element to Mr. Das, he said "He will do what he says because he wants me to arrange lessons for him on the wiolin (sic) – these Tamils, when they are tense, have no way of releasing themselves from stress, so a lot of them learn instruments." Part of the deal was that we should move to the original hotel Mr. Das had booked – The Connemara. In many ways, this suited us. It was closer to Musee Musical (therefore I would spend less time in traffic fumes) and it was next door to Spencer Plaza, a shopping mall that had been developed from an old-established department store as part of the unofficial campaign to make Chennai India's Singapore. It would also, of course, give us a change of restaurants and environment. This last was important because, at the Coromandel, Pat had developed a cold and cough, annoyances she never suffers in England and which was therefore particularly upsetting in south India.

 

            Murugan Rajah (whom we never met) ensured that we left the Coromandel in style. Thus, on Sunday 17th, we were gliding down Anna Salai in a maroon, air-conditioned Mercedes driven by a courteous driver in a white suit. We wished that the new hotel had been further away! The greeting at The Connemara was similarly regal and we were soon installed in a room as large as the one we had vacated at the Coromandel – three-piece suite, direct fax on a large desk, and a roomy alcove with "dining table" in the panoramic windows over-looking the tree-lined pool.

 

            The Connemara Hotel was an older establishment that had only recently been taken into the Taj group. It was situated off Anna Salai in a street named after the English surgeon who, in 1815, had developed the house into its present state. Dr. Binny had purchased what had been a garden house belonging to the Nawab (Prince) of Arcot and, on Binny’s death, the house had been turned into The Imperial Hotel. In the 1890s, “the story goes”, the then Governor of the Madras Presidency, Lord Connemara, made a habit of enjoying the company of rather young ladies supplied to him by descendents of the Nawab of Arcot. When his wife discovered his peccadilloes, she left Government House and moved in to the Imperial where she lived until, some years later, she and her husband returned to Britain. The hotel name was changed to The Connemara in her memory.

 

            The hotel's relatively close proximity to Musee Musical meant that Pat could easily come down to the exam centre – on a couple of occasions she walked. Sometimes she would chat to Sachin (about his proposed trip to Switzerland as part of his training as an architect) or to Kishore about his promotional side of the business, or to Mr.Das about Trinity (with Pat wearing her hat as a Trinity rep). At other times, she occupied Das's office where she was looked after by Shrimati, one of the lady assistants who wore beautiful jasmine in her long hair and who, from time to time, brought her guest cool bottles of Limca. Here Pat wrote many of her letters or read from the library we were building up of novels (usually by Indian authors – Amit Chaudhuri or Arundhati Roy) and travel books on India by British writers. On one occasion, she shared the office with a teacher and pupil and observed a lesson in Indian classical singing, with the teacher sitting cross-legged on the floor playing a harmonium while the young man sat opposite and repeated the music phrase by phrase in rote fashion. Occasionally, Pat found herself on the open balcony at the top of the outside stairs used as a waiting area for candidates and their families. The latter generally merely stared at her, smiling if she caught their eye. But one mother was a little more bold and pleaded with her to ask me to hear her son play his last piece again because, in the exam, the batteries had run out on his electronic keyboard. Pat was busy explaining that she could not possibly intervene when the father, who had barged into the exam room between candidates, returned to say that sir had explained that the battery problem had not affected the performance and that sir was perfectly satisfied. (I think my smile was interpreted as meaning the lad had passed – which was my intention.)

 

            One of the most significant visits Pat made to Musee Musical, was to join me on the special day when work people made puja to their tools and machines, giving the latter a rest in gratitude for "performing" for them throughout the year – Ayudha-puja. This includes buses, rickshaws and taxis and so, like the festival of Viswakarma we had witnessed in Calcutta, all these vehicles were garlanded with marigold chains, festooned with banana leaves and sprinkled with red and yellow powder. Because of the festival, I only worked in the morning and, when I had finished, I joined Pat, Sachin and Kishore in Mr. Das's office before we were ushered into the workroom at the back of the premises. A group of eight to ten of the technical staff were gathered in a semi-circle facing a workbench that had been turned into an "altar". It was garlanded with flowers and decorated with fruit and small bowls of rice amongst, most importantly, various tools – chisels, planes, hammers and pliers. Spread on the floor in front of the altar, for protection from evil spirits, was an arc of rice, petals and halved coconuts. One of the senior craftsmen, dressed in a white dhoti and shirt, lit some joss sticks and placed them, smouldering, amongst the tools. Their sweet scent immediately seemed to give the ceremony significance. He then lit a small bowl of oil and carried this on a tray to each of the assembly. With both hands, they waved the smoke from the bowl over their faces and he dabbed a spot of red powder on to their foreheads. A pumpkin, with a small chunk cut from it to hold oil, was then lit and carried to each corner of the workshop and out into the main showroom. Mr. Das explained that nine coins would be placed inside the pumpkin, the chunk replaced, and it would be thrown outside and smashed onto the ground to release all the evil spirits from the previous year. This would mean that, from the following day, the workplace had been purged and a new year could start afresh. (This accounted for the many broken, red-daubed, skins we had noticed that day which we had taken as being rotting fruit discarded on to the street in the normal way that all rubbish seems to find its way on to Indian thoroughfares.) Many people wish to start a course of tuition on the day after this festival. Mr. Das said that his teachers would have several new pupils beginning on this auspicious day.

 

            At the close of the ceremony, Pat and I were decorated with massive necklaces of flowers and each given a large apple to hold. The group were quite happy for us to take photos and, afterwards, when we thanked Mr. Das for allowing us to be part of the proceedings, he said "But we were honoured that you were present – this made the puja very special to the men". The streets were very quiet when we made our way back to The Connemara since most shops and businesses in Anna Salai were closed for what amounted to a public holiday. That evening the hotel was holding a festival of Hyderabadi food so we continued the theme of "tradition" and enjoyed the distinctive cuisine of that city while being serenaded by a group of six folk musicians from the Hyderabad area.

            It was on another visit to Musee Musical that the Das's discovered Pat's enthusiasm for watching dance performances. The suggestion was put to her that she could go along with the family to the annual Gujerati   dance competitions. This nine-day event coincided with part of the Navrati festival of the night (with its displays of golum as per the Coromandel). The dance element of the Navrati Festival celebrates, explained Sachin, with great propriety, "Lord Krishna and his ladies and their games." Mr. Das more or less forbade me to attend. "It happens very late at night – too late for me – and you have to work the next day." I appreciated this point when Pat was picked up at 11.15pm by Kishore and Sachin, the latter wearing a very smart kurta of grey, open weave material.

 

             Pat was introduced to Kishore's wife, Neena and 8-year-old son, Chaitanja, and the party was completed by Mrs. Das. The latter had only a little English but Pat and she managed to make some sort of contact throughout the evening. They drove through fairly deserted Chennai streets and suburbs and, at the first venue, they entered a large tent pitched by the roadside. Two sides had rows of wooden seats, at one end there was a decorated shrine, and at the other were staged the musicians whose sound was dominated by some very energetic drumming. The dance "floor" was mother earth, on which people of all ages were strutting their Gujerati stuff in a wide circle. To Pat, the rhythmic movements of hands, hips and feet were limited and repetitive. A variety of outfits were worn – some were in western slacks and shirts, others wore more traditional dress including some very folksy-looking garments with the traditional glass pieces woven into the shawls. The people standing in the centre of the ring were, Sachin explained, the judges, and prizes would be awarded for the best dressed as well as the best dancers. Neena danced for part of the time. Gradually, the tempo increased and the drumming became louder until people were whirling around in a flurry of colour, energy and fun, all building to a frenzied climax.

 

            By midnight, the group were on their way to the Nehru Stadium. Although a lot of people were asleep on the pavements and at the side of the road, several food stalls were still carrying on a steady trade as revellers made their way between venues. Others still working at midnight were the two men driving a herd of cows along the main road.

 

            The Nehru Stadium, similar to, but smaller than, many of the indoor stadia around Britain, was the venue for the Garba and Dandia Rass competitions. This event attracted a great deal of support from the well-off section of Chennai society and so tickets could only be purchased in advance and there was a great deal of security in evidence "to prevent the rich people from being robbed", said Sachin. He suggested that he was not altogether happy with the way this essentially folk dancing had been so commercially exploited. The Das party filed inside through a barely open door and their tickets were scrutinized carefully.  Concrete stairs led to the seating from where they looked down on the dancing – a similar scene to the one they had left in the tent. One difference was that the percussion now numbered about a dozen and Pat was glad that my ears were spared the next hour of incessant drumming which supported two singers who screamed into their microphones. The dance movements were the same but the costumes seemed more beautiful with predominant colours of green, brown, terracotta and orange. There were fewer people in ordinary western clothes. While Neena again went down for a dance, Mrs. Das hummed along with the music and Pat began to recognise the patterns more and more to the point where she could appreciate the natural flair some dancers demonstrated. After an hour, the familiar whirling finale heralded a break for the announcement of some prize-winning ticket numbers. This took a long time as winners came from the four corners of the stadium to collect their prizes.

 

            The next forty-five-minute section was for youngsters up to the age of fifteen, this time dancing with sticks, after which, with Pat now bolstered by a bottle of Coke, prizes in all the junior categories were announced, including those for the best costumes. Pat had been able to pick out one of the prize-winners, a girl in a very striking white and brown costume. Her dance movements were outstanding even to a layperson and her prize was a camera – apparently, the adults compete for cash prizes of Rp60,000 or a three-day trip to Singapore. One of the major sponsors was a large jewellery company in the city.

 

            Sachin had several times said to Pat that she must say when she wanted to go but she hardly felt it was her place to break up the party. I suspect that it probably was and that, as the guest, she had the prerogative. However, she had insisted that she only wanted to move when everyone was ready. The drummers were due to go on playing (and the dancers dancing) until nine in the morning but at about 3.15am, it was generally agreed that it was time to go. The Das family were very anxious to know that Pat had enjoyed the experience and she could genuinely assure them of that. I was vaguely aware of her creeping in to bed at ten to four.

 

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It became well established after the move to the Connemara, that I should be driven back to the hotel for lunch with Pat. I guessed that this arrangement suited Musee Musical as, until I was unwell and insisted that I needed a doze at lunchtime, Mr. Das was never quite sure what to do with me each lunchtime. One day, the blue Maruti van was being serviced. Whilst I was happy to receive this news in terms of reliability, brakes etc., it meant that Sachin hired a rickshaw for the ride back to the hotel, an experience I was hoping to avoid. These vehicles are as uncomfortable as they look and, being open-sided, there is no escaping the fumes from the adjacent vehicle, especially at traffic lights. It proved easy, too, for beggars to reach in and tap my knee at road junctions. Mercifully, the quarter-mile dash was soon over and Sachin said that the van would be ready to take me back after lunch. At the appointed time, however, he arrived for me in Musee Musical's very own (light-blue) rickshaw driven by Hussain, who I knew as the man who carried my case upstairs every morning when I arrived at work. The van was not ready. (Why was I surprised?) Hussain took us back via the short cut that followed a private road belonging to the Electricity Company. This route skirted the heavily polluted River Cooum, the banks of which at this point are open public toilets. The smell was horrendous and the "settlements" by a stream and in the large lorry park, housed people in the extremes of poverty. Despite this, residents were always busy washing themselves or their clothes and I noticed some of the children wore school uniforms. The road had "sleeping policemen" which Hussain treated with considerable disdain resulting in, for me, a strained groin muscle that I discovered when I alighted – if that is how one describes a 6-foot person unfolding himself from these contraptions. "Very handy as a runabout" claimed Sachin "very useful in heavy traffic."

Worse was to come. After work that particular day, I had arranged to visit the Coromandel to collect the refund for the day the hotel had double-charged me. Still no van! Hussain, therefore, was detailed to take me on this much longer journey down Anna Salai and along Mahatma Gandhi Road. Sitting in traffic with the exhaust pipe of a Chennai corporation bus no more then three feet from my face was not a pleasant experience. As the bus pulled away, so did we, almost as though Hussain was ensuring that we stayed within the clouds of smoke. From the middle of the traffic lanes, with buses and lorries looming either side, the feeling of helplessness in the rickshaw was grave. Vehicles passed, separated only by the thickness of a coat of paint; the cutting-up felt yet more vicious than in a car; even pillion passengers look down into my wheeled cage. Hussain seemed to take all of this with great imperturbability. His final left hand signal, (not more than one inch of his fingertips could have been visible) taking him to the gates of the hotel, was carried off with bravado unbelievable to anyone who had not witnessed Indian driving.

 

            Since auto-rickshaws were not allowed on the drive of the Coromandel, Hussain had to wait in a nearby lane. I was tempted not to "find" him and hail a taxi but I could not leave the poor man hanging around indefinitely. On the return journey, I noticed for the first time, that, on this busy stretch of the 16-mile-long Anna Salai, there was some sort of official traffic regimentation. There were road lanes clearly marked as being for Buses, Cars and Autos (rickshaws). Curiously, the auto-rickshaws were officially in the outside lane and therefore turning left involved cutting across the faster moving cars and then avoiding the threateningly aggressive buses. It was on this journey that I decided, if I should see him, to give some coins to a young legless man whose "patch" was by the hotel. We had seen him several times propelling himself around, including weaving through the traffic, on a tin tray to which had been fixed small wheels. I had told myself that anyone with no legs, living in India and only able to move about on a tin tray, who could keep smiling as he begged, deserved some help. The illogicality of giving to this man and not to others was brought home to me when, with coins at the ready and the man nowhere to be seen at his usual traffic lights, I resolutely refused to give to the several women and children who reached out to me in the rickshaw, touching my leg and moving their hands to their mouths in the usual gesture of hunger. True, Hussain was barking over his shoulder at them as he saw them pestering me but I could not understand my own actions in keeping the money just because I could not find one unfortunate among so many.

 

            That particular day had not been a good one for reasons other than the perils of the rickshaw. My temper had been tested by the off-hand way the Duty Manager at the Coromandel had dealt with what was, in fact, their mistake, and by the ridiculous length of time it took for the cashier to carry out the transaction. There was no hint of an apology even when I pointed out that they were short-changing me by charging me our first day at the wrong rate. I insisted on having another Rp160 from the cashier, which meant further delays and form-filling. I felt this was another example of the Asian inability to admit a mistake. My composure was further unsettled that evening when Pat and I went round to Spencer Plaza to collect my APS films. We had been told in Calcutta that the only city where these relatively new film cassettes could be processed was Mumbai. I was resigned to taking all of my films back to the UK and not see the results of, for example, my Everest photos until after Christmas. Pat had been delighted when she had discovered a photo-shop in the Plaza where the manager claimed he could develop and print the pictures. When we collected them I was horrified to discover that, not only were they all the same (small) size, with no Himalayan panoramics, but that he had taken the film out of the cassettes, rendering useless all the computerized information for further copies. I was furious with him but angrier with myself for trusting his word. At least I should have let him have just one as a tester but I had let him take away all four. Perilous auto-rickshaws, arrogant hotel managers and untrustworthy retailers – Indiaaaaagh!

 

************

 

The pool at the Connemara was quite as interesting for Pat as had been the equivalent at the Coromandel. She was fascinated by the man who shinned up the palm trees to cut down coconuts. This task was presumably carried out to avoid litigation if a guest should have his or her siesta disturbed by the arrival of a hairy brown bomb. One afternoon she was treated to the spectacle of five be-suited middle managers testing the "back-up fire pump". They had apologised to Pat for the disturbance. "We will finish in short time", said one. The procedure involved wheeling out a petrol-engine-driven pump, connecting a very doubtful coil of hose, dropping its other end in the pool and encouraging the engine to start. The five men had been joined by a minion in a blue shirt and white dhoti who, it seemed, knew how this contraption worked. After much chattering, argument and failed attempts, a jet of water emerged (energetically drenching the suit which held the hose) and sailed the length of the pool. Since this had taken twenty-five minutes, Pat hoped that, in an emergency, the main pump was a little less recalcitrant.

 

            The ambience of The Connemara was very pleasant and we enjoyed some of those activities that all international hotels offer. The resident pianist and singer was the delightful Sharyn Bethe from Australia who had some beautiful songs in her repertoire. It was a pity, therefore, that the quietly sozzled Aussie punter sitting near to the piano insisted that she sang "Waltzing Matilda" – an embarrassingly "individual" treatment. We were invited to the Arcot Room for cocktails with the Manager who, of course, sent his deputy and two of the girls from Reception. One of these, I had discovered, took her Trinity music exams at Musee Musical a few years before. Other guests seemed to be business orientated: a handsome German gentleman newly arrived from Hamburg, a most polite Indian from Ootacamund who worked for Nestlι, and an attractive Swedish woman, Pernella Rosenquist, who was about to start a three year contract buying carpets and cloth for IKEA. Her husband and 18-month-old baby would soon be joining her and we wondered what they would all make of life in Chennai after the neatness and order of Stockholm.

 

            Later that evening, we dined at the Raintree Restaurant in the grounds of the hotel and which is approached through an attractive canopy of eponymous trees. Protected from any mosquito attacks by our own Jungle Juice and the coils that were lit and stationed around the table, we tucked in to some tasty south Indian dishes and watched the beautifully elegant dancer. She was very heavily made up, with much jewellery at her ears, in her nose and around her neck. The colours of her bright blue, red and gold costume were picked out by the lighting as she danced – the movements were less dramatic and forceful than the dancer at the Coromandel and, although there were bells tied around her ankles, there was less stamping. The eye, face and hand movements were highly expressive and it was not difficult to imagine something of the story she was telling. The slight downside to the evening's entertainment was the band (flute, violin and drum) which, as Pat remarked, was rather too much like an "Evening with Harrison Birtwhistle".

 

            Visiting Giggles Bookshop at the Connemara was a delight. Run by Nalini Chettur, the shop is unlike any other that I know in that it is so small that the enormous quantity of books, none of them on shelves, is stacked from the floor to the ceiling and the only way to negotiate the stock is to pass your enquiry to Ms Chelina who will then direct Charles, her assistant, to forage and clamber up steps to find the requisite volume. She started the shop "for a giggle" although added, more seriously, that she had been inspired by reading the book 84 Charing Cross Road. In its time, she and the bookshop had built up quite a reputation especially with guests at the hotel. She was quite taken with the modesty and good conversation of one visitor from Britain who asked a lot of questions. She spoke to him frankly about a wide range of issues including some political. "I probably said some things about the Hindu-Moslem problem which I would not have done if I had known he was a broadcaster" she laughed as she recounted. Fortunately, Michael Palin, in his Round theWorld in 80 days saga, did not put Shelina's business in jeopardy when she had free worldwide advertising in his series.

 

            Nalini proved to be very knowledgeable about many writers, recommending various books to us and vigorously discussing those on Indian subjects we had read. Pat had just finished reading An Indian Attachment by Sarah Lloyd and Nalini vociferously lashed out at the author for using her love affair with a Punjabi Sikh to gather material for her book and then returning to the UK leaving the broken-hearted Jungli to a nervous breakdown. We bought Michael Wood's The Smile of Murugan, James Cameron's look at 1970s Indian life called Indian Summer and Vikram Seth's epic novel,A Suitable Boy. Nalini offered to send some of these and others we bought from her (plus books we had finished reading) back to England by surface mail. This would obviously lighten our cases that we knew were growing heavier by the day as we had been buying presents in a variety of shops for Christmas and family birthdays. We entrusted fourteen books to her in all and were fascinated when she just handed the pile to Charles, asking, "How much will these be?" He weighed them in his hands for a moment and said "One hundred and forty rupees". Smiling, she said, "He's never wrong. Sometimes the post people do not even bother to check".

 

************

 

During our month in Chennai, we made several excursions from the city, on each occasion through the kindness of the Das family. The first of these, during our first weekend, was to Dakshinachitra. This, in our terms, was a heritage centre – purpose-built for the tourist industry and, since it contains buildings, crafts and trades from each of the south Indian states, was considered by a thoughtful Mr. Das to be a useful introduction to the places we would be visiting throughout the coming months.

           

            Kishore was our chauffeur and guide and he drove us out through suburbs choked with traffic, rubbish and animals. He stopped to buy us some gauze face- masks which I had noticed some motorcyclists wearing and these certainly helped since the windows of the vehicle had to be open and the street "fug" inevitably swamped us. We drove south on the East Coast Road – we had travelled another road of that name in Singapore, a city as clean, tidy, controlled and free-moving as Chennai is congested by piles of rubble and nose-to-tail traffic, mechanical, human and animal. We saw a good deal of the work on the 35 new millennium flyovers and the concrete supports rising everywhere which would be taking the new mono-rail system. In terms of land area, Chennai is India's largest city and, even though we drove some thirty miles, we were still technically in what we would call the metropolitan area. Kishore drove at a leisurely 25 miles per hour and gradually the roads became less congested the area became more rural. Many houses had thatched roofs (single or two-room dwellings) and, with the feeling of openness plus the beautiful weather, the ride became more and more pleasant. We passed many small temples, roadside cafes (dharbas) and watched fishermen casting their nets into lagoons from very small, flat-bottomed boats – the open sea was never far away to our left and we caught tantalizing glimpses of bright blue between the trees and dunes.

           

            Dakshinachitra, we discovered, was incomplete in that "exhibits" from the southern states of Karnataka and Andra Pradesh were yet to be built. Nonetheless, on this very hot afternoon, we were fascinated by so much. We were taken first through a merchant’s house, in the inner courtyard of which a group of musicians played and sang an accompaniment for a group of acrobatic Karagattam dancers – there was much clapping of hands and clashing of small cymbals. Some of the houses had dioramas and/or mannequins explaining living quarters and costume. At various points we watched a shadow puppet show, saw a potter working with mud, another decorating dried pots, and we made some purchases from yet another who, toothlessly, smiled a great deal as Kishore translated the old man's Tamil. A glassblower then created a tiny elephant on top of a small glass tube and sold it to his Western customers (for Rp20) as a cocktail stick! We also bought a set of very delicate bells from him before moving on to watch some clothweaving, saris being created and soapstone figures being polished. The distinctive Kerala houses had tiled roofs reaching down very low thus keeping out all but the very early morning and late evening sun – their coolness was obvious in these temperatures of 90plus.

                       

            We had arrived at about 2.45pm and by 5.30 we were beginning to droop. Fortunately, the inevitable shop at the end of the Dakshinachitra complex did not hold Pat for too long and Kishore suggested that we might go to the nearby Fisherman's Cove Beach Resort, a hotel in the Taj group, for tea. On the main road, we crossed a bridge over a small inlet and then turned off on to a small track that seemed an inauspicious driveway to a four-star hotel. At the corner, there was a small quarry where small, dark-skinned women were working, surrounded by children, dogs and goats. The tiny, thatched-roofed dwellings nearby were presumably their homes. A considerable number of people were tramping up and down the road and a large herd of cows blocked our way at one point. From the side of a stream, a woman was fishing, tipping her catch nonchalantly on to the roadside while other folk sat around on boulders and rubble watching; others were more obviously having a picnic.

           

            Before long we had reached the hotel. The "beach resort" concept is of rooms in separate beach "huts" or bungalows dotted around a large campus leading away from the main reception and restaurant area – a lovely idea, and when we were sitting at the beach restaurant, sipping tea and sampling apple pie, watching the waves crashing only yards away from us, the place seemed idyllic. Unfortunately, to reach the beach-side, we had literally to progress through a building site alive with workers, men and women, shifting soil, digging trenches and holes, laying bricks – there must have been over a hundred people at work. This was at six in the evening and Kishore said that they would probably continue work on the hotel extension, under floodlights, until about 8pm.

           

            In the cool evening breeze, we watched people from a nearby village walking northwards on the beach carrying on their heads pitchers of water from the local well. Even small children of seven or eight were enlisted for this task. The youngsters had one, sometimes two, hands on the vessels to keep them balanced but the women sauntered along, erect, dignified, their sensuously swaying hips not disturbing the equilibrium of the pitchers, almost as though the water jar was part of their bodies. As it grew dark (the service was very slow), lights came on along the coast and we counted the seconds between the flashes of a lighthouse up towards Chennai. Conversation turned to Kishore and his Gujerati background. He told us that he spoke seven languages apart from Gujerati (his "mother tongue”) including Tamil (the local language), Hindi, English and various other local dialects. Gujeratis migrated south eight or nine generations ago as traders and the Gujerati population of Chennai alone, he told us, was in excess of 250,000. Talking of his family, we discovered (and this was imparted with some justifiable pride) that his grandmother was related to Ghandi's wife and she had often talked to Kishore, when he was young, about the "father of the nation". Once Ghandi became involved in politics and began his various pilgrimages espousing non-violent action, his long-suffering wife became, it seems, a rather neglected figure.

           

            By mid-evening we were on our way back up the coast road. In the dark, I marvelled at the skill (or luck?) of the Indian drivers who have to contend with un-lit bicycles, vehicles with perhaps one light only, many others driving with headlights on full beam, goats, cows and bullocks by the score meandering in the road or, very often, merely sitting contentedly chewing while vehicles, horns blasting, skimmed by less than a foot from their noses. Wearing our masks, we both felt more comfortable in the increasingly dense traffic as we approached the city . . . at least, we were until we became embroiled in a road-blocking convoy of heavy lorries whose drivers were protesting about the recently-announced 35% increase in diesel prices: for ten minutes or so, with no movement of air, we both felt slightly suffocated but eventually Kishore was able to squeeze past the blockade. We reached the Coromandel at 8.15pm and, having showered and eaten a room-service meal, I settled down to watch England play New Zealand in the World Cup, live from Twickenham. England deservedly lost through poor handling, lack of invention and, importantly, missed penalties. All these elements were present in the All Black's game, notably Merhton's kicking. The "Match of the Day" syndrome (which has been with me for 40 years) was comforting and a splendid way to unwind.

           

            The following weekend, it was Mr Das's turn to act as guide although, initially, he was wearing his Trinity Rep's hat. The city of Vellore lies about 100 miles to the west of Chennai and is the home of one of India's leading hospitals. Children of the senior staff at this hospital had, for some years, been entered at Chennai for their Trinity College London music exams and would make the journey, with their parents, on the appointed day. The outing always meant an overnight stay and, as the entries grew, the hospital authorities became increasingly worried when, each October, significant numbers of staff were absent for a couple of days. The teacher concerned had negotiated with Mr. Das for the examiner to travel to Vellore for the day's examining and this had been tried the previous year to my visit. My colleague, George Lee, had found this day trip exhausting (leaving at 6am and returning at 9pm) and so, after further negotiations whereby the parents agreed to share the cost, it was decided that the examiner would travel one day and return the next.

           

            Thus, one Friday, we were up at 5.45am, ready for the "I am Das" call that did not come, however, until 6.30 when he reported that the driver, Anwar, had not arrived. We learned later that, at 6.15, Mr D had asked his wife to use her Reiki powers. "She rubbed the palms of her hands together and, holding them slightly apart, could feel the energy passing out to the driver and drawing him to the house – within ten minutes, he was there!"

 

            We were off by 7am. The streets were already very busy as we worked our way out through twenty miles of suburbs, passed factories, car lots, an area full of shops and showrooms selling cane furniture, and the usual array of animals, temples, schools and rubbish heaps. We passed an enormous, recently opened, distribution centre for Daihatsu cars which was not far from a memorial park created on the site where Rajiv Ghandi was assassinated by a Tamil Tiger suicide bomber in 1991. There appeared to be statues of various political figures in most of the villages we zoomed through. We discovered that they were all Tamil politicians. There were several striking poses from former Chief Minister M.G. Ramachandram, looking for all the world like jazz singer Ray Charles – he was, after all, as famous as a film star as a politician.

           

            What struck me about this journey, something which applied to the many road journeys we were to undertake in this second half of our tour, was that wherever one looked in India, there were people: old men with grey hair wearing lunghis or dotis just sitting, younger men making their way to bus stops or standing peeing (at one point, a squad of four by the side of their scooters), women in saris walking (to where?) and, particularly at this time of the morning in these crowded suburbs, school children. All of the latter carried bags either on their backs or, in some cases, supported on their foreheads by a broad belt as we had seen used in the north for all sorts of porterage. Some bags were gaudy satchels, others were of more local design but they all had them, the five- and the fifteen-year-olds. Their uniforms were sometimes western-type blouses, sometimes more traditionally sari-shaped for the older girls – shorts for the boys. One school, probably Christian, was lined up outside in the "playground" singing.

           

            Shops in the villages we passed through were trading busily but the road, fortunately for us, was not as choked as it might have been because of the lorry-driver's fuel protest strike. Mr. Das had (comfortingly) told us that this road had, on average, one fatal accident per day and glimpses of a large lorry on its side with the driver's cab completely smashed and of a tanker upturned, wheels in the air, underlined this grim fact. It was a relief not to have the lorries roaring up behind us or belching fumes over us when we overtook but Anwar seemed to relish this freedom and, horn blasting, seemed hell-bent on making up (his) lost time by breaking the Chennai-Vellore record for a Maruti van. It seemed to us he was more likely to break the suspension on the vehicle as he rushed over some badly pot-holed sections of the route. As frightening as the lorry driving were the antics of the bus drivers who tended to charge down the centre of the road, air-horns blasting, as though their timetable gave them carte blanche to force every other vehicle off the highway. Even Mr. Das chuckled when we saw, painted in gaudy colours on the front of an oncoming bus, the word "Terminator"!

 

            As we approached Vellore, the terrain became more hilly and these rocky outcrops provided a welcome change from the flatness of the Chennai area. Between the hills, there were paddy fields and we had frequent archetypal views of men and bullocks up to their knees in the water among the green shoots of the rice. These fields were interspersed with banana plantations, groves of coconut palms and waving sugar cane. One enterprising "advertising manager" had used the rock faces as natural hoardings and Zuari Cement was recommended to us via some crudely painted blue lettering.

           

            Vellore was reached at 9.30 (Anwar had made up some time) and we checked in to the River View Hotel – as Lonely Planet comments, "Where's the view?" – definitely two-star but the best in town. We were en suite and the bathroom had a toilet, washbasin with cold water only, a tap in the tiled wall and a head-high shower. There were plastic buckets and jugs and the bare concrete floor could have been clean – it was difficult to tell. We had some breakfast in the rather dingy restaurant with predominantly brown decor and greyish curtains. The latter were drawn open when we entered (there were no other guests at that time) which lightened the gloom somewhat. We had some tea and toast while Mr. Das took some idli – Anwar sat at a separate table. Before long, we were joined by Joseph, the exam contact at Vellore,  a former piano teacher who now worked in computer software. We all jumped back into the van and Joseph led the way on his motorbike to the house of one of the doctors. This gentleman, who we did not meet, was an eye specialist and had his own private clinic. It was on his rather pleasant Yamaha upright that I examined throughout the day. Lunch was provided by his wife, a tall, most attractive, hostess (also a doctor) who, throughout the day, kept a discreet distance. I worked through until 4.30 examining students of average standard, most of whom were successful.

           

            Pat had been able to read, write or chat to Mr. D. in the very comfortable lounge. The two got on very well throughout our entire stay and Pat found it fascinating to talk to him about the practicalities of his strict Hinduism – he had got up at five that morning to have time for an hour's puja – as well as to listen to his stories of Hindu legend.  On this occasion, she heard the long and involved story of Ganesh, the elephant headed god, and why one of his tusks is longer than the other (a detail neither of us had noticed). He also assured Pat, who continued to worry about the welfare of Indian animals, that the cows seemingly roaming free, for example, on the East Coast Road would belong to somebody who, when milking time arrived, knew where to find them and would collect and feed them. He said that the story Pat had read of cows being released to expiate sins was probably not true. He also talked about his trips to Europe and how, in Germany, he had enjoyed MacDonalds' vegeburgers. Knowing that when he stays with his carnivorous relatives in London they cook all of his food in separate utensils, Pat could not bring herself to comment that MacDonalds cook their vegeburgers on the same griddles as their beefburgers.

           

            There was more to learn of Hinduism when we left the exams behind and made for Vellore Fort. Constructed in the 16th century, the Fort had been occupied by a variety of kings, princes, sultans and nawabs before the British in the guise of the East India Company took it over in 1760. We could not, unfortunately, cross the picturesque moat to enter through gates in the imposing granite walls because the building was closed on Fridays. However, the temple area was alive with people as Friday is a popular day for Hindus to make puja. Thus we followed the crowd edging down a lane lined with beggars (hoping for alms from the worshippers) and with stalls selling flowers, oils, coloured powders and other accoutrements of worship – somewhat reminiscent of the manner in which flower-sellers in Britain set up stalls outside hospitals. When Pat took a photo of one of the colourful stalls and its owner, he called out "Money for peecture!" but Mr. Das said, "Don't encourage the rascal!" The sixteenth century temple, Jalakanteshwara, had a tall, intricately carved Dravidian gopuram. Before entering, we had to leave shoes and socks at the appropriate counter but walking barefoot through the mud was a small price to pay for the scenes inside. A two-hour ceremony was in progress in the Sanctum Sanctorum. (When and why the holiest place in a Hindu temple was given a Latin name, I never discovered.) The principal idol was being adorned with flowers, to the accompaniment of rasping trumpets and thudding drums. Such was the crush, we could not see very much and, in any case, as non-Hindus, we would not have been allowed any nearer than our fringe position. Elsewhere, the worshippers were festooning several sculptures of Ganesh, clasping their hands near their foreheads and making bobbing movements; others were putting camphor oil on to lighted flames; still more were walking a pre-determined number of times around a table on which there were different oils in brass dishes. Others were receiving some white chalky substance from a bare-chested Brahmin priest that they rubbed on to their foreheads. We felt like intruders but Mr. Das assured us repeatedly that nobody would mind our presence and he encouraged us to take whatever photos we wished.

           

            As we walked back up the steps (behind three donkeys) to retrieve our socks and shoes, we wished we had had time to visit the Christian Church (St. John's) and the mosque both of which were within the fort. But we were glad to get back to the hotel for a wash. I asked our room boy for hot water and he said, "Is coming". Ten minutes later he said the same thing and I then realised that he meant it would be "coming" in the tap. It never did. Nonetheless, we managed to wash our feet in the bucket, and, with clean clothes, felt refreshed when we joined Mr. Das for some dinner in the curtained dining room. The meal of paneer, rice and dahl was acceptable and, with Mr. Das whipping up the bill before I had a chance to mention "dessert" (or "desert" as it was always pronounced), we found ourselves back in our spartan room. Then began a long saga concerning the A/C unit that was producing an uncomfortably cold draught. Having been summoned, the room boy stared at the knob-less unit and made a phone call. This produced assistance in the shape of a large moustache above a white tunic whose owner wielded a spanner – the technical staff. The grunted reply to my request for him to adjust the temperature told me "no English", so with sign language (mostly degrees of shivering) we managed to convey our needs and the icy blast was reduced. I dare not raise the question of the bed with the room boy, so, even though we realised that the double bed was fitted with over-lapping single sheets, we decided to make the best of it and laid our weary bones on the covered board that played the part of a mattress. Lights out at 9.30pm – a first time for everything.

           

            Much to our surprise, we both slept extremely well. Pat's fears/expectations of various bed-bugs, fleas or mosquitoes had not been realised – no "bitings" reported – and, after breakfast in the dismal restaurant, we returned to the examination room for me to round off the session. This I did by 11am and I was very touched when all of the candidates gathered at the end to present me with a gift – "thank you for coming over especially for us". The young lady who handed over the present (a desk clock) and who made the little speech was, alas, one of the candidates who had not been successful in her Grade VI piano exam.

           

            The remainder of that Saturday was dedicated to a visit to the celebrated temple town of Kanchipuram. We headed back down the Chennai road and the very heavy rain dampened our spirits somewhat. Nevertheless, we munched happily on the sandwiches and fruit which our hostess had thoughtfully provided for a mobile, time-saving lunch and, having passed though Kaveripakkam, turned off to the right, across a set of railway tracks. These were un-gated and unmanned but the steeply inclined surface either side of the level crossing was not made up, the rocks and potholes ensuring that no road vehicle could possibly approach at more than walking pace – cheap and effective safety procedures.

           

            Almost immediately, we could see the towering gopurams of Kanchipuram's four main temples. There are another one hundred and twenty spread throughout the town and its environs but another nine hundred have disappeared over the last few centuries. This was Mr. Das' first opportunity to take a Trinity examiner and wife to explore Kanchi and he was not certain how to find the first of the temples, Kailasanatha. Frequent stops for animated conversations with locals regarding directions gave us the chance to see many of the streets of the town which, temples apart, is famous for its textiles, particularly hand-woven silk. The streets were often ankle deep in water because of the recent storm and the roadside puddles were sometimes flooding the piles of fruit (huge piles of bananas), vegetables and flowers set out on the ground, each "stall" being attended by a serious looking trader, sitting cross-legged on the ground. We saw a man welding bobbins for local weavers – no gloves or eye-shield. The main street was dominated by an enormous wooden ceremonial "cart" (more like a chariot) with twelve-foot-high wheels that would be used, at a special festivals in January, April and May, to parade idols from Kamakshi Amman temple throughout the town. One hundred men on either side would provide the power and the streets would be, said Mr. D., a heaving mass of celebrating people. To protect its elaborate carvings and its thatched roof during the rains, sheets of corrugated iron were in position so, because of its dejected appearance, we certainly could not fully appreciate the dignity this great vehicle would lend to the festival.

 

            As we searched for the temple, we noticed a preponderance of donkeys and monkeys wandering amongst the usual dogs, cows and majestic bullocks. Many of the latter had horns either painted in reds and greens or decorated with flowers and/or bells: this applied to the (lighter coloured) males and the (black) females. Eventually, passing a lake where several of these animals, bullocks and buffaloes were drinking or being washed, we arrived at Kailasanatha. It was on the edge of the town in a particularly poor area where illiteracy amongst all but the younger generation was rife. In this connection,. Mr. D pointed out the symbols of political allegiance (large blue leaves or green apples) painted on the side of the houses to remind occupants how to vote. A young boy approached as we got out of the van, asking us in commendably clear English, for a pen. Pat obliged and he duly showed and demonstrated his homemade "gun" made of wooden and metal tubes plus a bolt that seemed to replace a trigger – a highly dangerous-looking apparatus. Having used a swing gate as a means of negotiating the large pool by the entrance, we wandered around the outer corridors and perimeter walls of the (unfortunately closed) temple. The seventh century Dravidian/Pallavan-style carvings have survived with little or no restoration work, the details of the human figures and mythical beasts remaining incredibly clear and precise. Striking off along a sandy path across the greensward, we found a magnificent sculpture of Shiva's "vehicle", the sacred bull, Nandi. Always cast in black stone, we were to see many, and larger, examples in south India but the setting for this one was very striking, standing, as it did, somewhat aloof from the main architecture, yet dignified and powerful.

           

            The slight rain that had been falling since we had arrived in Kanchi had abated by the time we had reached the second temple, Devarajaswami, built by the Vijayanagar kings. The gopuram was enormous – over 100 feet high – and very elaborately decorated.  Dedicated to Vishnu, the temple was continually worked on from the 11th to the 16th centuries. Nearby were many of the silk shops and so the area was awash with beggars and hawkers. While I had forty winks in the van, Pat ran the gamut and moved off, barefoot through the mud, with Mr. Das, who employed a young guide who was wearing a dhoti and had the red "V" on his forehead setting him out as a devotee of Vishnu. The sculptures on the ninety-six pillars in the Hall of a Thousand Pillars were of warriors, rearing horses (some mounted), swans, parrots and dancing girls, the emphasis on movement seeming to bring the room to life. The decorations on the magnificent chair (carved from one piece of stone) were equally vivid. The "tank" within the temple (a 20 metre square pool) had two gold shrines raised on platforms in the centre and there were steps (ghats) leading down into the water from where a few people were bathing/worshipping whilst some young boys swam naked across the pool for all the world as though it were the local lido. Mr. Das commented that the ritual of bathing in the temple tank was not so strictly adhered to nowadays.

             

            They passed through an arch into a walled garden and were shown the sweet smelling flowers used to decorate the gods. The guide, whose English was very good, told Pat that his family had been palanquin bearers through four or five generations, and then, since the tour was ending, he gave Pat his card hoping she would visit the family silk shop. But, back at the van, he began pestering for our address and so, having taken his picture with Pat, Mr. Das bundled us into the vehicle to move on to temple number three.

                       

            Kamakshi Amman Temple, dedicated to the goddess Parvati, also had an imposing 100-foot-high gopuram but the main feature of interest this time was the magnificently decorated elephant standing just inside the main entrance. The white and orange paint on his trunk caught the last of the afternoon sun as it swept from side to side in what appeared to be a regular pattern. We soon realised the reason: Kamakshi (named after the temple) was collecting coins in his trunk from the worshippers, administering a blessing by tapping them on the head and then sweeping round to deposit the money with his keeper, a shaven-headed Brahmin standing alongside. The blessing was quite firm, as Pat testified after she had held up a two-rupee coin. This "performance" would take place for two hours morning and afternoon. The Brahmin, Mr. Das explained, would have been born in the temple community, would not be allowed to eat outside the temple and must bathe three times a day. The money would be for himself, for food (he certainly was well-nourished) and for the temple. Some of the children crowding round were very apprehensive when their turn came for the blessing but it was all undertaken with much laughter, as much from the temple "staff" as the onlookers and participants. Like his keeper, the elephant was obviously well cared for. He tended to move his weight from one foot to the other – who wouldn't, standing for a two-hour shift – but his eyes, underneath very long lashes, looked kindly and content. Compared with some of the beasts we saw later in Kerala, Kamakshi was obviously leading a life of Riley's Indian equivalent.

           

            Finally, we moved on to our last temple. With origins in the Pallava period, the main body of the Ekambareswara temple was built in 1509 by Krishnaderaraya, Emperor of Vijayanagar. Spread over 22 acres, it was the largest of the four Kanchi temples we visited. The gopuram soared to 192 feet – rajagopuram “The king of spires” – and, having had a recent face-lift (or at least, a whitewash), all of the details in the carvings were clear. Again, one sensed that the whole structure was alive because of the writhing snakes, leaping horses and other activity, human and animal, depicted in the stonework. The grassy compound inside was extensive. Horses were grazing and an informal game of cricket was being played by a group of budding Gangulys and Tendulkars. The temple, again dedicated to Shiva, was a labyrinth of corridors connecting the five different enclosures – almost temples within a temple. In each, there were many shrines and a myriad of statues. This time there were 540 pillars in the "Hall of a Thousand Pillars", each one individually decorated. We gleaned this information from the guide who inevitably attached himself to our party. The lighting was subdued and it was not always possible to appreciate the detail on some of the statues. Several highly decorated wooden "carts", smaller than the model in the main street, were stationed ready for specific festivals when replicas of the temple gods would be paraded through the town.

           

            We eventually reached the area of the inner sanctum, where a large group of people and several priests were making offerings at a very large, ornate and brightly lit shrine. As we moved along the corridors, we watched as a priest threw water over the statue of Abishek, a black, recumbent bull. Purifying the idol with water (or milk, curd, ghee, honey or sugar) is regarded as an act of self-purification and is a fundamental principle of the Hindu faith. We were not surprised to find that, in this enormous complex, the tank was huge, with, again, a platformed shrine at its centre and with priests standing on the ghats reading and praying.

           

            There were some striking statues of Shiva as Lord of the Dance: musicians, playing drums and the oboe-like shenai, sat cross-legged at one corner of a hall and attendant priests stood in the smaller shrines (like side chapels in a cathedral). They would motion to us, encouraging us to take photos. At one of these, we climbed the steps and entered. Mr Das placed a Rp10 note on a small tray which also held a bowl of lighted oil and dishes of coloured powder. The priest stood in front of us and, after some chanting, blessed us by lowering silver cone-shaped bowls onto our heads and placing some of the red powder into our upturned palm. We then made a mark on our foreheads using the powder. As with the puja in Mr. Das' shop, the simple dignity and sincerity was moving and we felt privileged to be treated thus. It was akin to a non-Christian being offered communion in an Anglican church.

           

            As we walked, Mr. D. commented on the fact that the British rulers in India by and large respected the buildings of the Hindu, in contrast to the Moghuls who felt the need to destroy what they perceived as a threat to the stability of the empires they had taken by force. He was musing thus when we approached an open courtyard whose centrepiece was a 3,500-year-old mango tree. The four branches are said to represent the four Vedas (holy books) and the fruit of each branch is said to have a different taste. By eating the fruit of one of the branches, a woman can be blessed with children and crudely made cradles were hanging from this branch as tokens of thanks. The black trunk was stained with various coloured powders and a steady stream of worshippers, old and young, made their way up the steps on to the platform built round the base of the tree.

           

            The temple experiences at Vellore and Kanchipuram were as fascinating and exciting as they were puzzling and provoking. Cynicism comes easily to non-believers such as ourselves. The Rp10 note Mr. Das put on the tray, the Rp2 coin the elephant took – did this make the Brahmins part of an entertainment industry for tourists or part of a con-trick played on the Hindus? Obvious thoughts occur – with the poor believing that their lot in life is pre-determined and that their hope is for the gods to be kind to them in their re-incarnation, the Marxist "opium of the masses" aphorism would seem to ring true about Hinduism as well as for any other religion. And yet, being there, in the temples, watching what could easily be regarded as superstitious mumbo-jumbo, the simplicity and openness of the believers of all castes and social classes, had a conviction that we found acceptable and understandable. Pat found the whole of India a jigsaw puzzle. Every now and again, she said, a piece would slot into place and what was incomprehensible became a little clearer. Unfortunately, the jigsaw of India has no picture of the completed puzzle on the box, hence progress in understanding the country remained, for us, very slow and sketchy.

 

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The weather on the day we were taken to Mahabalipuram was dry and very hot. Sachin and Kishore, the latter driving, took us first to the Kalakshetra dance complex to ascertain if there were any performances during our visit to Chennai. In this we were to be disappointed but we nevertheless walked around the site. Only Indian classical dance is taught here – Bharata Natyan – and the entrance was dominated by a very striking statue of the founder, Rukmini Devli Arundale –