McLEOD GANJ. October 23rd-30th.

At McLeod Ganj. First few days in McLeod I tend to sleep a lot, read a lot and have lengthy breakfasts and lunches - not a bad life, if you don't weaken. I have a bad moment Sunday night, as I'm low on cash, and can't get any sense out of the one ATM in town. Return on Monday am, and finally work it out, viz : that once you've put your pin number in DON'T touch the screen, only use the key pad, (despite the screen encouraging you to touch here, and touch there, etc).
Also on Monday I get my 'phone working for India (have bought an Indian sim-card and credit in Delhi, but am only able to SMS Oz and vice-versa). I ring a Delhi customer care number, and get this man who can speak English to some extent, but keeps veering off into Hindi. I can tell it's all frazzling him out a bit, but I persevere, and when none of the things works that he tells me to do with the 'phone (he missed the obvious one), I get him to repeat it all as I write it down, so that I can muck around with it later. Everything hinges on a subsection of 'Settings' which is called 'Network Settings', and which I don't have on my 'phone. Before we end the call, he asks me what I suppose is an obligatory question : "Sir, are you fully satisfied with my performance today?" but in high-pitched tones that are obviously battling with the frustration that he really feels, so much so that I burst out laughing, and say well look, all I want is get my 'phone working, and you did great, really. As I'm paying the 'phone shop man after this lengthy 'phone call I say to him - well that was a complete waste of 75 rupees, and after he has asked why, and I tell him, he picks up my mobile, and in about 15 seconds has rung his 'phone at the shop, and it is ringing. Something or the other that you need to go in and activate, (which I meant to write down, and forgot), but anyway now I can make local calls, and one of the scores of Vodafone India text messages that I have received recently informs me I still have 191 rupees credit (local calls 1 rupee).

I shared a table at lunch one day with another epic adventurer, a young English guy from Romney in Kent. He has been staying in McLeod a month, but not by choice, he told me. Apparently he bought a motor-bike in Delhi, and while travelling in this area managed to stack it, and himself, onto the front of a bus. He was in hospital 4 days, and has been advised to rest for a while, with some ominous-sounding condition related to 'compressed discs'. He drove from England up through Scandinavia to the Arctic Circle, and then sold his car in Norway. Headed east on the Trans-Siberian, then through Manchuria, Mongolia and China. Headed towards Tibet, but access was denied because of the Olympics. Went further west, and down through the 'Stans (excellent railways apparently-that the Russians left behind), then through Afghanistan and Pakistan to India. He was fair-haired with a fair skin, and I asked him how he went travelling by local bus in Afghanistan. He said he got a tribesman's hat with the long scarf attached and kept his face half-covered most of the time.

I started to think that by Wednesday it would be time to go for a decent sort of a walk, and on Tuesday avo I did a couple of short circular walks to the east of the main street, so as to loosen up. An old man with a small kiosk that was selling drinks, tobacco, etc called me over and asked where I came from. Turned out he had been in the Indian Navy, and once on manouevres had visited every Australian port, and still had vivid memories of all of them. I told him he's probably seen more of Oz than a lot of the locals have.

I had designated Wednesday as the day of the great de-hibernation, and starting out early, had brekkie at a new place, 'Nicks' Italian Cafe' at the the 'Kunga Hotel' on the Bagsu Road. Great spot, with an extensive open-air dining area, and mighty views, but strangely enough, no Italian food on the otherwise extensive menu. Afterwards, walking up the road towards Bagsu, I got overtaken by an elderly American-English lady, who I think must live here semi-permanently. She mentioned that she was going to a friend's house up the hill to have a shower,
and I told her that where I'm staying a notice in the bathroom says that it is forbidden to bring visitors in to use the shower. Straight away she said 'I bet you're staying at that 'Ashoka' place, I stayed there once - they are the most stingy people in McLeod' etc, etc. I must admit that they run a pretty tight ship, but from my point of view the 11.30 curfew ensures a quietish night.

She did point out a side track where you can go to the Bagsu waterfall. I took a photo along the valley, but it didn't look as if the falls themselves merited the long walk there and back. Not long after leaving there I managed to wander off the track, and ended up climbing to the next high spot along a devious and rocky creek bed, finally hoisting myself out at the 'Welcome Tea Shop'. Here I reclined on a mattress between very low tables, sipping Chai, and watching part of the first morning of the 3rd test in Delhi. My map of Upper Dharamsala (McLeod Ganj), has a warning on it 'not to scale', and I had actually travelled about 4 times the distance that I thought I had, almost off the map in fact. From there I travelled, again via a couple of goat tracks, to the 'Henna Tea Shop',and more lashings of chai. I was thinking of going via a track that is due north on the map, but the young guy there was doubtful, first muttering something about 'wild animals', and then said that there were bad people in the villages there 'and you are alone', and it reminded me of a warning in Lonely Planet 'don't walk alone at night between Mcleod and the surrounding villages'. So I decide to give the bad people a miss, and strike due west, and I eventually come out at the 'Himalayan Tea Shop'. It's an unusual type of walk, because you walk in bush for an hour or two, not seeing any people or buildings, and then suddenly there's another teashop, in the middle of nowhere. Tea and croissants this time. My intention is to head west from there to 'Dal Lake' a local beauty spot, but somehow I end up going north, (near the lands of 'the bad people'), and then west for 3 or 4 km over a real goat track, which comes out above the lake. I scramble down what appears to be a creek bed towards the lake, and must have been tiring by now, because a woman carrying about two cubic metres of kindling on her head speedily overtakes me. After resting at the lake I ask the way back to McLeod, and decide to take the 'short cut', which turns out to be yet another goat track (of which I'm getting rather tired of by now). But I arrive back before dark, intent on going back to 'Nick's Italian' for dinner, but chicken out when I see an inviting looking place near where I'm staying. I couldn't fault the food, and I was (uncharacteristically) ready for a big feed, but I think they only like to cater for Indian people, which coupled with the rather strange staff, and the enormous wooden tables and chairs, made it a bit depressing. One thing I do know - I slept the sleep of the dead for the next two nights.

Thursday morning I had a very late breakfast, again at Nick's. Haven't had much luck trying to ring Oz lately, but today the 'phone lady at a new internet shop I'm using pointed out that you shouldn't prefix the number with 'OO', and I was able to get through straight away. In the afternoon I walked to St John's Church in the Wilderness, which is about a kilometre out of town on the Dharamsala road. It was built in 1852. After the Mutiny (1857), Queen Victoria took on the title of Empress of India, and the Governor-General became the Viceroy of India. The first Viceroy was Lord Elgin, a Scottish peer who loved India, and his wish was to be buried at Dharamsala when he died. He was buried in the churchyard, where there is an Elgin monument.
Other people have told me that they found the church locked up, but luckily there was a man doing some work inside, and he let me look around. There were several memorial stones around the walls, mainly relating to officers of the First Gurkha Regiment in the 1860's, and one I rather liked was for Lieutenant Fortesque, who was "taken by a bear near Dharamsala". I took a few photos, but they were too 'corrupt' to upload on to the blog. This happened to me in Ypres, and again in Texel. The photos are still in the camera, but won't upload.

Apparently McLeod Ganj later became a 'summer' capital to rival Simla, but was abandoned after being demolished by the earthquake of 1905, and languished until it was discovered by the Dalai Lama's people in the 1960's. My mother always used to refer to this event as 'the Quetta earthquake', (Quetta is in present-day Pakistan, near the Afghan border), so perhaps Quetta was where the epicentre was.

Later I went to a place where a number of Tibetan people live, where they have a drop-in class between 4 and 5 of an afternoon, and English speakers are encouraged to come in and talk with residents who are keen to improve their English. I talked with Nyema (nye-ee-mah), and Dhudnbtashi (dih-doo-tra-si). Nyema was a student until he left Tibet at the age of 22, seven
years ago, and is still studying. Dhud.....was a farmer until he left Tibet 5 years ago at the age of 35. He used to harvest plants (and presumably herbs) in the mountains, which were used for Chinese medicine. I spoke with two girls who have also been dropping in there, Yvonne, who lives in St Kilda, and actually worked for a number of years a couple of streets away from Chisholm Dandenong, and her friend, xxxx, whose name I've forgotten, who lives in Burnley (RICHMOND!!), very near to where I once lived. Small world, and as they are now barnesblogspotters, I have to tell you what attractive and charming girls they both were. I promised I would go back. However, they say the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and every afternoon since, the old tum has been playing up, and I've rested instead.