Monthly Archives: February 2009

I found out how the place is called. It is actually a suburb of Surat called Kamrej, or Kamrej Junction to be exact. Still a couple of kilometers to Khulwar. :(

Had a couple of power outages today. Of course, with phone and laptop being battery powered, I can still use them. However, without electricity, it is too dark in the room to see the keyboard. Oh, the irony.

Went to the restaurant (which has bigger/proper windows). Talked with one of the managers. He used to work for UNICEF a couple of years ago and was in Bhuj back in 2001 after the region was struck by an earthquake. Bhuj is one of the places I want to go to. He said that for safety reasons, I should avoid cycling at night when I’m past (i.e. west of) Vadodara. Traveling during the day should be fine, though. He also told me about an archaeological excavation site, Dholavira, where the remains of a city of the Indus Valley Civilization have been found. It is located on an island in the Rann of Kachchh. Cycling the Rann is supposedly safe, too.

Had some nutrition problems (not food poisoning) yesterday and today, so decided to stay in Khulwar another day or possibly more. In a different hotel, of course.

Had a biiig breakfast – well, untoasted toast (some call it ‘bread’) with cheese and jam, and a whole melon. The ride on NH 8 was unspectacular. The truck carries a part of a wind turbine.

Swastika

Nope, this is not a ‘Hakenkreuz’, it’s a Swastika and has a completely different meaning here – wealth and good fortune. Interesting – for me as a German – to see it in wide use. On the right side of the truck is the sanskrit Aum (Om) sign, a sacred syllable in Hinduism and other religions.

Stopped in Khulwar (according to the map it could be Khulwar, but I haven’t seen any proof yet) and asked a police dude if there was a hotel in town. He gave me some rough directions and then offered to share his food with me.

Fought my way through another massive traffic jam, only to find the hotel of choice to be booked out. Ended up in a simpler guest house. The second one where I’m not allowed to take the bike into the room. Soon after my arrival, another police officer knocked on the door and demanded to check my passport and visa, and asked all kinds of silly questions. I think he was just curious and wanted to (ab)use his authority. When I left for dinner, I instinctively took all my money and the passport with me, and put a shoe as close as possible to the inside of the door before closing it. When I came back, the shoe lay at the wall. Somebody had entered the room while I was away. The receptionist (a school boy) denied everything, and I’m not missing anything so far.

Slum at the road side

Cows on the highway

Some roadside town

Swastika

The original plan was to cycle to Vapi, and then go more or less parallel to National Highway 8 on smaller roads to the north. Well, in Vapi I decided to try the highway. I expected that to be a bit faster, and I can see loads of villages once I’m past Vadodara and on the Kathiawar peninsula. So I rode to Chikhli where I’m going to stay for the night.

Chikhli is a nice little town with friendly people. Pretty much everything is written in Gujarati here (I’m in the state of Gujarat now, after all), but people speak Hindi, too. The script Gujarati uses seems to be somewhat related to Devanagari (the script that is used for Hindi), so I can read (not understand) it to some degree. –Even on TV there’s not a single English-speaking channel.– High time I upgrade my Hindi.

The hotel here is the first one in India where I was not allowed to take the bike into the room. It’s now downstairs in the hall, though, next to the hotel guard.

Cow shit

Encouraging

Chikhli

Chikhli street market

Quiet back street, Chikhli

After about 4 hours of sleep I started dreaming of some nerve-wrecking noise coming from the floor above. I went upstairs to find a kid hopping through the room on a chair. Then I woke up – but the noise didn’t disappear. Turned out they were doing some construction work on the roof. After two phone calls to reception (yeah, it’s a poshy hotel) the noise stopped.

Went to the Tribal Museum after lunch. It displays various items from the tribes that live in the Union Territory of Dadra and Nagar Haveli, of which Silvassa is the capital.

Went for a last stroll around the city. Going to leave tomorrow.

The construction work on the roof had gone on for a couple of days already, but in a different part of the building and it never bothered me much. I’d frequently seen people in the hotel who looked like they were those doing the work. Today I sneaked up there to see what they were building or fixing. I didn’t find out exactly, but I found these people. They live there, next to … no, at their work place.

In the Tribal Museaum, Silvassa

Near the hospital

Market on the street

Street scene

Holy cow

I finally got around to visiting the lions. I was the only visitor at the time, and, judging from the amount of change the cashier had, I was the first one today.

I was a bit disappointed, as I only got to see a single lioness. And she was just lazily dozing in the shade of a tree. I have no clue where the others were, or even if there actually are others. The driver insisted there’s only this one.

The lion(s?) is an Asiatic Lion. They are native to Southwest Asia and once were even found in the Balkans. There are only about 250-350 individuals left in the wild, living in Gir Forest National Park further northwestish in Gujarat on the Kathiawar peninsula.

Asiatic Lioness

SSH is now working on the phone! That means I can blog from the phone!

Back in Mumbai I chose to buy an Airtel SIM card for my phone. Buying a SIM card involves handing over your passport to the dealer, who will then make a ‘xerox’, as well as an extra passport-sized photo and proof of some local address. The latter could be a hotel invoice, of which a ‘xerox’ would be made, too. An application form needs to be filled in and all the paperwork then must be sent to the network provider. Apparently this procedure is required by the government, so there’s no way around it.

Now, yesterday I received a message from Airtel, saying they would discontinue service for me because the paperwork hadn’t been sent to them. Today I can’t make any phone calls anymore, nor send SMSs. Great. GPRS still works, though. I have no idea how to contact the store I bought the SIM card at in the first place. I guess I have to buy a new one here and hope these guys are more honest.

Two relaxed days in Silvassa. The original plan was to leave today, but last night I read about a lion sanctuary not far from here (actually I must have driven past it when I arrived in Silvassa 2 days ago). I wasn’t even aware that there were lions in India! Have to see them!

Another problem: I’m running out of batteries for the camera. Bought a pair yesterday and could take exactly 1 picture before they were flat. Again something I know from Madagascar. One option is to get the bike charger fixed, either doing it myself or have someone do it. Meanwhile I bought an AA charger, with Europlug so I can use it at home, too.

Will have to stay another night here until the first set of batteries is charged.

Slum-like dwelling, Silvassa

Had breakfast/lunch and left Jawhar around 12:30pm. The road now certainly was one of the narrower variety. Asked an older fellow on a motorbike for directions and he offered to show me a shortcut through his village. Dunno if it really was shorter, but seeing his village and riding the even smaller, even less travelled road was worth it.

Passed by a quarry, or so it seemed. Working there were old women and children. A girl crossed the street in front of me, maybe 8 or 10 or 12 years old, walking to the stone pit, staring at me. I’ve seen the same shit in Madagascar. Those people lived next to their ‘workplace’ in tents. Turned my stomach upside down. Asked myself what the f*ck am I doing here? Cycling through their land and life, watching them working and staring. F*cking sh*t.

Made it to Silvassa and decided to call it a day. Found an ATM to stock up on cash. Inside the ATM area was an old dude, the guard, who wanted to help me, even though there was no need. Anyway, he didn’t leave and watched me pull out 15.000 Rupees. Quite a pile if the biggest note is 500 Rs. Poor fella couldn’t get his eyes off the money. I tried to behave as if that amount could feed me for a life-time, too, but I don’t think it worked nor that he cared.

Check in at hotels is ridiculous. Not only do folks write down all sorts of personal details in huge registers, some of them even make a ‘xerox’ of my passport, and once I had to pay for the copy.

The guy that wanted my phone number a couple of days ago in Anjur Phata called when I was having dinner to check how I was doing. Funny.

Dude leading the way to his village