The jugganaut rolls onwards in Bhubaneswar
Trip Start
Nov 04, 2007
1
24
62
Trip End
May 03, 2008
Bhubaneswar,
India
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
The next morning we left Baripada for Bhubaneswar, which is where I am writing this from. Annoyingly we couldn't travel directly as buses only left Baripada for here at 10.30, 11.30 and 12.30pm. Not wanting to endure a night bus ride, or arrive in Bhubaneswar in the early hours, we caught a bus one hour to Balasore (more of an interchange town) and then another to Bhubaneswar. Which was fine - although took about 6 hours in total.
We're not really doing much in Bhubaneswar - we're really on our way down to Tamil Nadu and have decided to break the journey here to avoid a horrendous train journey (Bhubaneswar to Chennai will be 20 hours. We really didn't want to go longer than that!). It isn't really a tourist destination town, but has a few temples and things we might go and potter around. Our hotel is wierd - again. Another concrete monstrosity (we did actually wander around a few this time, but there are lots of festivals on at the moment so we were lucky to find a room) with stern staff who, in common with everyone in the Indian hotel trade (and maybe India, we suspect) have strict ideas about The Way Things Should Be Done. For instance, we checked in last night but couldn't hand in our laundry. Laundry, the man at reception told us brusquely, was handed in to housekeeping before 8am in the morning. BEFORE 8am in the morning?! Couldn't we just hand it in now? No, he said. Huh. So, we returned to our room and thought we'd try it - we called housekeeping and two guys with very little English turned up and looked very confused when we wanted to give them our laundry. 'But we get it at 7am!' they said. Oh great. So, at 7am this morning our alarm clock went off and we hastily threw on some clothes. Someone came to get our laundry at 7.15. And then another guy came at 8am and was very confused when I tried to explain someone had already been. We are supposed to get it back at 3pm - I'm a bit worried that if we're not in the room to receive it at 3pm we'll not get it at all....oh dear...
Which brings me to another point. People don't seem to be allowed to sleep in here. Every hotel we have been in so far has found some reason to wake us up at around 7 or 8am. They seem most put out when we are not fully dressed and ready to go at 8am and seem to think we're downright wierd ordering breakfast that late. Surely the wish to, I don't know, maybe get an extra hour or two's sleep of a morning is not something unique to British holidaymakers? Do Indians on holiday really leap out of bed at sunrise?! And they must get dressed instantly as roomservice never want to give you your tea and toast at the door, but always insist on bringing it in - which has made me leap for the bathroom a couple of times as I dread to think what reaction I'd get if they saw me in short PJs. Oh yes, which reminds me...
A note on Indian males:
India has a massive problem with their male population. It is in all the newspapers, they are trying to work out how to solve it, but they don't seem to be getting very far. Shortly after we arrived in Calcutta we saw an article in the newspaper about a female British journalist who was raped in an Indian hotel. The man confessed and was given one day in prison. ONE DAY?!! I think I may have an inkling of why the government aren't doing very well at fixing this problem!
Generally India is not a comfortable place to be female. I suspect that being white and female makes it worse. Wherever we go men stare at me openly. They take photos of me on their mobile phones. They look me up and down with the air of someone assessing a piece of meat. They bump into me in the street on purpose and I am having to continually try and keep on whichever side of Hugh the most lecherous men are not. This is in spite of the fact that I have been making a conscious effort never to leave my shoulders, arms or legs exposed or wear anything tight. It doesn't seem to matter - I'm female and I'm fair game. I've managed not to slap anyone yet - I rather suspect the law may favour the man...
Hugh:
We've been learning how many words in the English language come from the various Indian languages, and actually if you think about it some of the words do sound Indian. In the state of Orissa where we are now, there is an annual festival where the god Jagannath is pulled along on massive chariots - this is where the word jugganaut comes from.
On the subject of language, we've been amazed at just how many people speak English. We expected that there would be a fair few English speakers, but not to this extent. Mind you, when you listen to Indians talking to each other it's incredible how many English words and phrases you hear in the middle of a sentence and how they seem to switch in and out of languages even when speaking to each other.
We've also been finding that we're in high demand for people to talk to. We'll be happily walking along a street and someone will start talking to us, asking us where we're from, if we are married (these are always the first two questions), and telling us that they have relatives in Borehamwood, or some other place in and around north-west London! This morning in the queue at the train station booking office we even had a chat to a guy who worked in a bank's call-centre, he told us that his pseudo-name was John and didn't understand why we thought this was funny, as we wouldn't be able to pronounce Indian names. (He also thought that London was in America and was amazed that we were managing alright in India without a guide as our accents were so difficult for Indians. He advised us against going to Chennai as no one would understand us. Hm. We shall see! - Ros)
Comments
Juggernaut
Love the juggernaut fact!