Barrett Plywood... Plywood that creates wonders!

Here's the next of my emails back home from my time in India:



"Hey again!


Subject line is presumably North India's premier plywood company. And

my favourite sign yet! It's to be found all over the countyside

alongside the road!

Last email was a bit sporadic. Lack of sleep and too much excitement

do that to me. We've now been through Agra, and that was not quite as

busy as Delhi, but it was smellier and dirtier.

Journey to Agra was so interesting. We passed lots of little

countryside settlments that were full of bustle. Some were just a

group of straw huts. It was so frustrating getting these tantalising

glimpses into these lives and then journeying on. I woulda loved to

stop and talk to the people there. However, the coupla stops we did

make, the people locally didn't seem to speak any Eglish so

ultimately, it may have been even more frustrating! I saw many animals

on the rads too - monkeys, water buffalo, boar, camels, and once,

sadly, a bear being led away somewhere.

i think I forgot to mention the smells in Delhi - it was one of the

first things to hit me! The place was very smelly - but in a good way

- the smells were everywhere and everchanging - cooking, incense, hay,

different cooking - mostly really nice smells but constantly chaning,

never settling. Agra smelt more often than not of stagnant river,

urine, and dead things. IT was a filthy city though we had two lovely

tuk-tuk drivers, Nijam and Hotilal, who didn't rip us off, didn't keep

trying to take us places we didn't want to go, and were very talkative

and friendly. Basically they were our guides of the city for a coupla

days. We saw the Taj Mahal at sunset and sunrise, and various other

things. Got offered our first jewelry scam by our hotelier who also

runs his own jewelry export company. We has one here in jaipur too.

Both were exactly the same almost to the word. Goes like this: he asks

us in for coffee, chats to us about England, India, what we do etc. It

seems to be obligatory for the guy to talk about how many tourists he

has slept with. Then, when the coffee arrives, he asks if we have a

tourist visa. He then goes on to explain that the government sets a

limit on how much they can export at a decent amount of tax. Over that

limit, the tax is 250%. What he wants us to do is sign a piece of

paper saying we bought some goods off him so they are legally ours but

no money will actually change hands. We post the goods back to

England. When we get back to England, we hand them to his contact in

England and he's evaded the tax. He will pay us 10,000 pounds because

its a percentage of what he saves on tax All he wants from us is a

photocopy of our passport and visa, and whatever payment we used (visa

card, travellers cheques etc). Now we don't know exactly what the

sting is, but there is plenty of potential there, don't you agree?



In Jaipur, the city is smaller, more upmarket, cleaner, nicer. But

still, our rickshaw drivers (Evil Salim and Viki) took us to a guy who

tried this exact same scam on us. I kept the guy sweet by seeming

interested tho cuz I wanted to buy some clothes of him. Knocked him

down from 35quid to 5 and he threw in a sarong! Our current rickshaw

driver (Good Salim) seems scared of these guys. He knows them but he's

forever asking us not to mention stuff he's told us, or where he's

taking us, or any recommendations he's made. It's all very political.

Never more evident than when we went to a restaurant with him and Evil

Salim and Viki turned up. No love lost there. Viki's trying to get me

to ditch Si, have a good time with him ("drinks, hashish, girls"), go

to Shekhawati with him etc. Presumably, to butter me up for this jewel

scam.



Anyway - unbeknownst to them, we're going to Shekhawati this arvo with

Good Salim. It's his home. It's a desert area with lots of small

villages, away from all the tourism it seems. There camel safaris and

it's all very peaceful by the sounds of it. Can't wait! Just hope this

tummy bug's gone by then!



Olly: Come to Asia!



Sandra: Glad to hear about your exams but you sound like you're

turning into a hippy!



Lucy: Just for you, I'm looking out for ANYTHING here with arnie on it!



Mahony: 2 things -

1) cuz I saved everyone's email address at bsa to my home computer, I

ain't got most of em here. Can you send me some if you have em please?



2) I think I'm secretly in love with you - you popped up in my dream

again last night! Maybe it's India - Didn't you turn into a little old

Indian woman once?"




Again, I remember this rather vividly!
We nicknamed the taxi drivers Good Salim and Evil Salim. We did eventually end up falling out with good Salim though. I'm sure that gets mentioned in a future (past) missive.

Here are our rickshaw drivers round Agra, Nijam and Hotilal: 

I feel bad. We were meant to send them a copy of this photograph. We promised we would but we never did :(

I remember they didn't charge us a fee at the end of providing their services. They asked us to pay them "as you will". If we thought the service was worth 1,000,000 rupees, then that was what we should pay them. If we thought the service worthless, we should pay them nothing. What a horrible thing to be asked! But smart. I'm guessing these guys knew we were fresh off the boat and fairly decent chaps to boot. They knew we wouldn't just stiff them and pay them nothing and also knew we had no idea what was even close to an appropriate amount. They probably knew we'd err on the side of caution and pay way too much than way too little and also knew that we hadn't gotten used to the fact that what was just a couple of quid and easily disposable to us would go a lot further in India.

We learnt a lot from them and they were very reliable and delivered on evrything they siad they would, even helping suggest meals from restaurant menus.
I can't remember what we did actually pay them. I know that we never did work out if it was appropriate or not. I know that Nijam and Hotilal didn't seem unhappy with it when we handed it over though.

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