On our way to INDIA

Now us – we are at sea today – crossing the Arabian Sea and will be in Oman tomorrow and Dubai on Monday. We are 6 hours behind your time. Our position has been notified to NATO because we will be entering the Gulf of Aden shortly – with pirates active in the area. Our Captain has direct access to Intelligence Reports. The area is being monitored by NATO helicopters and planes. We will be having “pirate” drill on the ship (probably today). All very exciting.


I could write a book on India – absolutely a land of contrasts. We did a Princess ship tour in Cochin but it got a bit tedious towards the end and the weather is very hot. So we cancelled our tour for Mumbai and decided to go it alone. We ended up sharing a cab with a couple from San Francisco – cost us $US30 for 2.5 hours for four of us – Patsy did the negotiating. In both places there was rubbish everywhere – in Cochin they have introduced a program for women to sweep up the streets but all they do is sweep it into piles and no one ever collects it. The main streets were better than the side streets – you could hardly walk down some of them for the rotting rubbish. The traffic is amazing. Very few traffic lights – everyone just goes and toots continuously. At one point we were on the inside lane of a roundabout with four lanes and somehow we crossed over all of them and out of it. But no one lets you in – if there is a space they go for it. Two cars in one lane and a motorbike passed us on the inside..... We saw incredible architecture, the Gateway to India, the Railway Station and the Taj Mahal Hotel; (I am having trouble describing next bit) – then absolute slum conditions like I have never seen anywhere – only the photos can give any appreciation of how bad it is; people hanging out of trains – 10 a day die from falling or wandering up the tracks; local buses – no windows, no air conditioning, women up the front, men up the back – squashed in. But in Cochin, education is free and the children were all at school and dressed in uniforms. Not so in Mumbai, and this was the most shattering part – as we stopped, small children were pressing their faces against the car window – one in particular, a beautiful little boy made gestures with his long fingers to his mouth and throat for food. But our driver told us not to open the window – that is a picture I will never forget. Apparently they all have a pimp and anything they get is taken off them. Our driver – Imran Khan had a little five year old and it was costing him 80000 rupees to send him to school – only about $2500 but to them it was a fortune. There are 60000 cabs in Mumbai. As we got out of the cab to go back to the ship – women and children were all begging for chocolate – still don’t have an explanation for that...


Waiting for the ship to leave Mumbai, we watched rats running all round dockside – and skinny stray dogs were everywhere. An amazing experience– so glad we were on the ship and able to see but not stay because I could never stay there. Captain gave a speal yesterday about how he would gladly negotiate the Gulf of Aden and pirates than have to deal with Indian Immigration authorities. How they demand food, drink, cigarettes from the staff always with the veiled threat of delaying the ship. He said he will not stand for his staff being threatened and this time they had come very close to being booted off the ship. Everything is negotiable. Even when I called you from dockside – it was at a phone with a guy sitting there – initial charge was $US1 for 3 minutes (good deal) but when none of you were there – he only charged me $US1 for the 3 calls I made. I went back later and another guy was there – I did exactly the same thing and he said that will be $US2 – so I told him that previously I was only charged $US1 and he said OK $US1 – everything is totally negotiable. Except for a little china camel and elephant that I wanted to buy from a stall and the guy said $US10 each (no way) so I walked away and went back later and another guy said the same thing – so I said no, I will give you $US10 for both and he said NO – bad luck, I am sure there will be more along the way. It all just becomes a game.