The Mighty IPL

We narrowly missed the 2013 season of cricket's Indian Premier League when we moved to Mumbai in June last year.  This was a great disappointment to Philip, particularly given that our local team, the Mumbai Indians, picked up the trophy.

For the uninitiated, the IPL is test cricket's younger, glamorous brother in which eight teams, each attached to a city or region in India, compete to be the champions of 20:20 cricket (each team bowls 20 overs, or 120 balls).  The teams are decided by auction each year, and include foreign players in addition to the cricket stars of India.  The eight teams play each other twice, so each play 14 games in total, in a league, then the top four teams fight it out for a place in the final, which will take place in Bangalore this weekend.

India is utterly mad about cricket.  The IPL captures this excitement in 3-hour evening matches in packed stadiums complete with cheerleaders, very loud music, and an excitingly large number of 4s, 6s and other trick shots.  To compound the feverish excitement, the IPL takes place at the height of summer in sweltering conditions. It isn't test cricket, but it's very entertaining.

The first half of this year's tournament took place in the UAE as the security required to host the matches in India was occupied with the General Election.  Unfortunately, the Mumbai Indians didn't seem to take well to this and were at the bottom of the league upon returning to India, having lost most of their early games.

Happily, once in India, their performance picked up and, by the time we went to see their penultimate match at the Wankhede Stadium on Friday, they were in with a (very) outside chance of getting through to the playoffs and staying in the competition.

We saw the Mumbai Indians play the Delhi Daredevils, the team at the bottom of the league.  Mumbai batted first and had a strong start, helped by some amazing slogs into the crowd from the opening batsmen.  Delhi fought back but it wasn't enough, so we saw a win for the home crowd.  The cricket was fun, but it's the atmosphere that makes the IPL.  The crowd are crazily enthusiastic with cheering and flag-waving, and the (very) loud music creates a fantastic mood in the stadium.  The loudest cheers came any time that the king of Indian cricket, Sachin Tendulkar, flashed onto the big screen, closely followed by any activity from Pollard, the big hitting star of the Mumbai Indians.  The scantily clad cheerleaders (all white by the way...) are a bit random, but add to the fun, and the overall set-up reminded me of baseball, with lots of food and drink (no alcohol) purveyors wandering up and down the rows.  Every other person seems to have a horn or vuvuzela, which is deafening, but all in the spirit of a good night out supporting the local team.

Wankhede Stadium - Entering from Gate 4 

Every seat has a flag!  The stadium was really well decorated with Mumbai Indians garb 

Our view 

There were several cheerleader stands around the edge of the pitch 

Once the floodlights had come on - the atmosphere was even better in the dark than in the light 

A mid-match samosa snack.  Two for 60 rupees 

 A vuvuzela in action

Looking very warm 

A frequently seen shirt in the stadium

The security to enter the stadium was high in the sense that you had to be frisked four or so times before reaching the gates, and no liquids (or much else) were allowed inside.  Saying that, I had some suncream with me which avoided confiscation through me persuading the security staff that I had a medical condition (being very fair), which was sort-of true.  They let me through with it in the end.

Going to see a live IPL game was brilliant, but not as exciting as the game we watched at home last night.  To qualify, the Mumbai Indians needed not only to beat the Rajasthan Royals, but to score 190 runs in 14.3 overs to beat the overall run-rate of the RRs, a very challenging target.  It felt impossible, but the Mumbai Indians played incredibly well, and as they approach the 14th over, it actually looked possible.

With one ball left, the Mumbai Indians had scored 188 runs, and only managed to score one off the last ball.  We all thought that was it for the Mumbai Indians; edged out of the tournament by one run, after 14 games.  Thankfully, some clever bod realised that a four or a six off the next ball would win the game for the MI, and increase the average run rate enough to qualify.  A new batsman came out and smashed his first ball over the horizon. Amazingly, the Mumbai Indian are though. 

There was one fantastic batsmen, Anderson, who lead the charge for the IPL.  The heat was evident by his need to take off this helmet at regular intervals to empty out the sweat that had accumulated!

We haven't had quite enough of the IPL yet, and will be going to another live match on Friday (the final qualifier for a place in the final) and there is now a possibility that the Mumbai Indians will be there.  Based on the last two matches, I very much hope so.

Amritsar - The Golden Temple and our first glimpse of Pakistan

In the second phase of our mini-break with Mary and Derek we visited Amritsar, the capital of the Punjab region and spiritual home of Sikhism.  We spent two nights staying in the city centre, a short walk from Amritsar's main attraction, the magnificent Golden Temple, the headquarters and spiritual heart of the Sikh religion.

The Golden Temple is India's most visited attraction, with more visitors annually than the Taj Mahal, although it sits off the main foreigner tourist trail.  Unlike the Taj Mahal, the Golden Temple is not a historic monument, it is a living, breathing place of worship.  As visitors, we saw real pilgrims and a temple in full working order.

To enter the temple complex, you must remove your shoes and cover your head.  Finding a head cover is no problem - the streets leading up to the temple are lined with men selling bright orange scarves for the princely sum of 10 rupees.  There is a long corridor of shoe storage cabins and we battled through the queues to hand in our shoes in exchange for a token.  We made sure that we kept these tokens safe - I'm not sure that we would have ever located our shoes among the thousands of other pairs without it!  To enter the temple, you must first wash your hands, then walk through a channel of water to cleanse your feet before entering the main area.

The Golden Temple is a vast complex of buildings, built around a lake (the pool of nectar) upon which sits the temple itself.  The complex is made from white marble and is pristine.  It is filled with the sounds of music and chanting, which we later realised was being piped out from live musicians within the temple.  We wandered around the different buildings on the site, including the main temple, watching pilgrims bathing in the pool and soaking up the atmosphere.  The atmosphere in the complex is special - very calm, welcoming and comfortable.  The ethos of the Sikh religion is that all men are equal and welcome at the temple; we were made as welcome as foreigners as anyone else in the complex.

There are lots of large goldfish swimming in the pool 

The temple is inlaid with memorials and slabs to mark donations to the complex 

The main entrance seen from the roof of the Golden Temple 

Mary and Derek modelling the local head-wear 

Pilgrim bathing. 

 The glorious temple.  It is stunningly beautiful

Phil looks like a rebel fighter and I look like a pirate.  I've kept my scarf, I quite liked it!

There is a small museum in the complex outlining the history of Sikhism which, rather unpleasantly, includes portraits of martyrs as they looked after nasty accidents.  It was very gruesome.  There was also a portrait of two Sikh boys who had declined to convert to Islam (several hundred years ago) who had been punished by being bricked up alive (literally building a big block of bricks around them).  All rather horrid.

The highlight of our trip was our visit to the Langar, the dining hall in which food is provided for free to any visitor, Sikh or non-Sikh, who would like to eat.  The logistics of this are incredible - thousands of meals are served a day through a military-style organisational structure - and it was tasty too.  You take a metal plate and spoon, and sit on the floor in rows whilst rice, dal, bread and a vegetable curry are served from buckets.  The food was plentiful but you had to eat quickly as the next round of hungry people were waiting to get into the hall! Afterwards, everyone files out past the washing up section, where hundreds of people are chipping in to prepare plates to be used again.

Lunch in the Langam 

Five minutes later

The pile of dinner plates 

Fed and watered, we moved next to see Jallianwala Bagh, the site of the horrific 1919 massacre of hundreds of non-violent protestors by a group of British soldiers.  Jallianwala Bagh is a large walled garden, with one narrow entrance and exit, which was blocked by the soldiers as they open fired upon the crowd which included lots of women and children, leaving no chance for escape. There is a well in the gardens, and over 100 bodies were found in this after the shooting, belonging to those who had jumped down in a desperate attempt to escape.  There had been unrest in Amritsar for several days before this occurred, and the British soldiers may well have been frightened by the crowd, but there is no doubt that this was not our finest hour. Walking round the Jallianwala Bagh as it is today, a peaceful and well-kept garden, was more than a little thought-provoking.

 Bullet holes can be seen in the walls of the park

The word "tyranny" tends to turn up a lot on plaques about the British

Next, we travelled to the second main attraction of Amritsar, the daily border closing ceremony at Wagha, the only open road crossing between India and Pakistan.  Whilst relations between the countries is generally not great (given that they've been at war practically since independence in 1947), the ceremony is a lot of fun and a change for both countries to show off their colours and engage in a good bit of pomp and ceremony.  The ceremony takes place at sunset and consists of soldiers from both countries lowering their flags and locking the gates for the night.

In itself, this sounds simple, but the soldiers are dressed in glorious costumes (and they are all very tall) and spend the best part of an hour marching around doing amazingly high kicks and shouting.  It's bizarre and very entertaining.  One of the soldiers has the job of shouting into a microphone for as long as possible, which seems to be a competition between the two sides.  There is no need for extra noise though as there are big stands set up on either side for spectators (thousands of them!) to cheer for their country and generally enjoy themselves.  There were far more people on the Indian side which was decked with flags and people dancing in the aisles to the latest Bollywood songs which were played before the ceremony began.

Pakistan 

An Indian soldier in costume 

The gate to India.  Given that he disapproved of partition, I'm not sure that Gandhi would have been keen on the idea of overlooking this border ceremony every day 

Marching towards the gate.  The kicks described above are performed with straights legs going up to above the head (almost 180 degrees).  It's pretty impressive!

Phil was keen to incorporate another attraction into our border visit, an old stepwell complex a few kilometres north of the border gate.  Our driver was very reluctant to go here, but we persevered, up to the point when we were clearly veering towards dangerous territory and we (Phil and I) had a (very vocal) exchange of views, before I put my foot down and made us turn round.  I'm happy to go off the beaten track for a stepwell when required, but not when it involves stepping into some of the world's most unstable debated border territory!

Before leaving Amritsar, we spent a couple of hours exploring the narrow streets of the old city, trawling through bazaars, buying sweets and watching a wide array of street food being prepared.  This was the real India, and a highlight of our trip for Mary and Derek.

The old city of Amritsar 

Derek enjoying a chai

The final thing that I loved about Amritsar was rain - the first I've experienced in India for over six months.  I might change my mind once the monsoon arrives but, for the moment, I long for rain.  Not long to go now...

Up into the hills - Visiting Shimla

Philip's parents, Mary and Derek, recently came to stay with us in Mumbai, and we arranged a long weekend away as an opportunity for us all to see other parts of India.  The choice of destination was narrowed down somewhat as May is the month in which India quite literally boils up.  The hottest central areas are pushing 50 degrees; and whilst Mumbai is comparatively mild in the mid to late 30s, the humidity is stifling.  We decided to travel north and spend the first part of our long weekend in Shimla, a town in the foothills of the Himalayas north of Delhi.

Shimla (or Simla) was a small settlement until the mid 19th century when the British recognised its potential as an escape from the Summer heat of Delhi.  From then until 1947, the entire British government moved north for the Summer months and India was ruled from the mountain town of Shimla.  The town grew quickly and soon looked like a piece of England transplanted into India; with a Scottish Baronial-style castle for the Viceroy, a snow white church, golf course, walking paths and a climate just like a perfect British Summer day.  Some of the key meetings leading to India's independence and partition, involving Mountbatten, Nehru, Jinnah and Gandhi, were held in the Viceroy's palace. At the beginning of the 20th century, a narrow gauge railway was built to ease the journey, which still today carries passengers up to almost 3000m above sea-level where Shimla is situated.

The Viceroy's Palace - Now an educational research institute.  We went on the guided tour which was interesting, and allowed us to see some of the former glory of the palace interiors (lots of dark wood). 

The narrow gauge railway station in Shimla 

 Derek and Mary enjoying the train journey (much more than the car journey)

NEVER stick your head out of the window of a moving train.  Unless you're in India and health & safety has gone out of the window (pun intended)

Shimla today is very different from the place described pre-Independence - it is now a bustling built-up town of 200,000 people and many more tourists, but we were pleased to see that it had retained a lot of charm, partly owing to the pedestrianised areas of the town, which allow you to escape the traffic, a rare treat in India.

 The Mall - Shimla High Street

More High Street - you can see the Alpine architecture to the right 

How to carry a fridge up a hill 

Property shopping - Cow-style

We travelled up to Shimla by car from Chandigarh, along a winding road with spectacular views as you climb up through the mountains.  I enjoyed this, although Mary's stomach was less keen, and it soon become clear that we should have packed more plastic bags for our journey!  We travelled back down the mountain on the toy train; a great feat of engineering and another opportunity to enjoy the view over the hills below.

We stayed in a homestay run by a charming couple who are the third generation in their family to own and live in the property.  The house was set a little outside the town centre, surrounded by tall pine trees and utterly peaceful.  The family cooked breakfast and dinner for us during our two night stay and welcomed us warmly into their home.  It was fascinating to hear more about their experience growing up and living in Shimla over the last 70 years.  One of the best bits for me was the bell in our room, which we could ring for the houseboys to bring us tea in the morning.  Curling up a blanket with a warm drink watching morning break over the mist of the trees and mountains was superb.

View from our bedroom balcony (best to focus on the mountains and not look down to the buildings below...) 

Some of the wonderful flora in Sanjiv and Billy's garden (our hosts)

Our lovely mountain-style bedroom - authentic Alpine / Indian furnishing

In Shimla, we visited the Viceroy's Palace, walked along The Mall, explored the church, treated ourselves to tea at the Oberoi hotel and climbed up to the top of the town to visit the Jakhu Temple, dedicated to the monkey god, Hanuman.  This is not quite true. Phil and Mary walked up to the temple; I walked halfway up and was too scared by the monkeys and came back down again, knowing that there would be many more at the top.

Shimla Church and the town library 

 I reiterate that my failure to reach the temple was monkey-related, not because I am unfit, as implied above

Monkey menace 

Giant Hanuman statue outside the Jakhu temple 

View over the hills from the temple 

Enjoying some much deserved refreshment at the Oberoi

The monkeys are the bad bit of Shimla.  They are not cute, fluffy or friendly.  They are intelligent, mean and seemingly exist purely to create havoc (and scare me).  The bottom of the hill leading to the Jakhu Temple is lined with stalls renting out long wooden sticks for 10 rupees, purely for monkey defence purposes.  In fact, we found out that if you don't hire a stick then the monkeys see you as a weak target and go for you.  Their particular favourite party trick that we were warned about is stealing spectacles, then refusing to return then until you give them food.  In light of all this fun and games, Derek and I left Phil and Mary to run the monkey gauntlet alone and sat in the sun, in a monkey-free environment, at the bottom of the hill instead.

On the train.  They are EVERYWHERE

Despite its increasing popularity and crowds, the Shimla that we saw remains idyllic and with beautifully clean air relative to what we are used to in Mumbai.  Its location on a steep hillside is spectacular, if hard for running, as Phil found when he went out to explore each morning.

Whilst Shimla is very much part of India, it retain a old-world charm and feels like a true escape from the heat and, sometimes, craziness of India.  I hope we will go back in the future.

The Andaman and Nicobar Islands - A true tropical paradise

Yesterday evening, we returned to Mumbai after spending five glorious days on the Andaman Islands.  We planned this trip several months ago; it is somewhere that we would be very unlikely to travel to when not living in India owing to the logistical challenges of getting there from elsewhere, but living in Mumbai gives us the perfect opportunity to explore this lesser known part of the world.

The Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which are comprised of over 1000 separate islands in total, are a union territory of India, albeit they are closer geographically to Thailand and are formed from a mountain ridge which runs down through the Bay of Bengal from Myanmar.  You can only fly there from India, specifically Chennai or Kolkata, although you can take a three-day boat trip from the east coast of India to the islands if you prefer.  We wisely decided against this option, and instead flew via Kolkata to the capital city Port Blair, located on the main island Great Andaman.

I could write about the history, tribes and geography of the Andaman and Nicobar for hours, but I doubt this would be of interest to everyone, so I recommend that you visit Wikipedia for more information (this will probably mention the islands' reputation for settlers encountering cannibals in the distant past...).  The Nicobar islands are all but out of bounds for tourists and most visitors instead head straight to Havelock, a tropical paradise famous for its coral and diving opportunities, a two to four hour ferry ride from the mainland.  The ferries are (in)convenient timed such that you are forced to spend a night in Port Blair upon arrival, although this gives plenty of time to explore the (not very many) sights of the town.

We spent our time in Port Blair visiting the Cellular Jail.  I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I wasn't aware of the history of this jail before my arrival; it was built and used by the British to imprison Indian freedom fighters during the 100 years before independence, on the basis that they could be kept out of trouble when isolated far from the mainland.  The British do not come out well in the museum's exhibits and it appears that the inmates were not treated terribly humanely, even once you have allowed for the anti-British bias inherent in the exhibits.  The jail itself is an interesting structure, built in a star shape with seven wings radiating from a central tower, and sweeping views of the glorious bay.

 I kept my British accent to myself...

A wing of the cellular jail - there are now three remaining 

Looking down a corridor from the central tower 

 View from the jail roof looking out to Port Blair harbour

Walking on the roof of the jail

From the tower, you can see the nearby Ross Island, a 1km square island located close to the mainland, which we unfortunately did not have time to visit.  Ross Island was once known at "The Paris of the East" and is where the British built their colonial mansions, tennis court, club houses, bakery, church and even a printing press.  The old photos of the little town look glorious, but it was hastily evacuated in 1942 owing to the Japanese invasion.  The only saving grace for the depiction of the British in the jail museum is that the Japanese come off even worse than us, which isn't really much of a compliment.  Sadly, Ross Island has since been left to crumble ever since (a dodgy survey conducted after the war concluded it is sinking at one inch a year, which probably isn't true and didn't help its revival) so it is now a collection of ruins which hint towards its former glory.

We stayed at a simple but functional hotel which did its job in terms of looking clean, safe accommodation and air conditioning, but left me with a hundred (I'm not joking) ant bites, and I found a cockroach in the bathroom, so I was more than happy to leave to catch the ferry in the morning.  The ferry was run by a private company and was very swish (relatively) so we had a smooth journey over the Havelock, arriving at our destination by mid-morning after a well smooth crossing.

The luxury catamaran - highly recommended

We had planned to stay three nights on Havelock and I'd splashed out on the most luxurious resort on the island; a eco-friendly haven with no internet, no mobile signal, and no basically no outdoor interference of any kind.  This wasn't a plush 5-star place with lots of fancy facilities, but I struggle to fault it.  The wooden cottages and tents were perfectly in keeping with the jungle and beach surroundings and the wonderful beach, supposedly one of the best in Asia, was reached by a short walk through a forest and was truly unspoilt.  This concern for looking after the environment is critical and rarely seen in India, making this resort a breath of fresh air.  There was no lighting of walkways at night, every guest was given a small torch, and shoes had to be taken off for the (great and well-stocked) bar and restaurant.  Relaxing with a beer at the bar surrounded by jungle and reading a good book was magical.

In our AC tented cottage.  Very comfortable.

Tents from the outside, surrounded by all forms of greenery 

The forest path to the beach 

The beach itself - inventive named Beach 7

There were lots of jellyfish washed up on the beach, though they didn't sting (supposedly...) 

Making footprints

Me in my not-very-trendy surfer shorts.  I had to abandon them after a day because they are flowery and appeared to attract extra insects - particular big scary black beetles - which I didn't like very much.

Conch photography.  This guy scuttled quickly across the sand.  I spent a happy few minutes following him (or her) around the beach.

These patterns in the sand were amazing and looked very pretty all over the beach.  If you look carefully, you can see the crab neat the hole in the centre. 

Sunset 

In the heat of the day

We didn't do a lot whilst on Havelock; the temptation to while away the days eating, then reading and pottering around on the beach between meals was a little too great.  We went exploring one day to find a hidden beach (a long a very sweaty walk), though failed, and caught the local bus to the main jetty to instead travel to this beach by boat the next day.  There are two roads on the island, so navigation without Phil's ipad wasn't difficult. This was well worth it in the end, with crystal clear warm water and shoals of fish and coral close to the shore.  There were also lots of local tourists paddling around in rubber rings which reduced the idyllic atmosphere slightly, but it was all very entertaining.

 From the speedboat to Elephant Beach

 Loaded up for the boat journey

Excellent pancakes for breakfast 

At the end of a hot jungle walk.  A little bit out of equilibrium.

Lots of other tourists to the right of the beach 

Peace and quiet to the left of the beach 

Snorkelling in action 

This dog was great.  He dug himself a cool hole in the sand then curled up and settled down in it. 

Enjoying a fresh fish lunch post snorkelling 

Fresh juicy coconut water

Phil's view looking up whilst dozing in the shade 

Dozing in the shade

The Andamans are genuinely undeveloped and unspoilt, although the islands are becoming more popular.  The time required to get here means that the number of visitors is naturally controlled and efforts are made to conserve its natural beauty. This beauty was tragically threatened in 2004 when the islands were nearly wiped out by the Indian Ocean tsunami.  Many islanders were killed, but the locals are now back on their feet and life is largely back to normal.

The undeveloped nature of the island does have its downsides.  We needed to catch the 9am ferry back to the mainland on our final day to catch our flight to Mumbai but it was seemingly not possible to buy tickets in advance so we had to queue in a sweaty scrum at 7am that morning instead.  This was an experience (!) but wasn't all that fun, especially because catching our flight depended upon getting tickets.  The locals are extremely relaxed but that means that things happen in their own way and at their own pace; no one is a hurry and you just have to go with the flow (not always my strong point).

As much as I liked the islands, they didn't always like me.  Being in a jungle (albeit with beaches) the local insect population welcomed me in style and I am covered with bites; ant, mosquito and other, despite my best efforts covering up and with repellent.  I'm also sad to say that I got a little bit sunburnt whilst snorkelling, despite my best efforts reapplying lotion every 20 minutes, and have concluded that the only way to protect myself is to look like a geeky teenage girl and wear a t-shirt over my swimming gear.  Sad times.

After four calm days, we left our resort at 7am on Monday morning and arrived home at 10pm that evening; two taxis, an auto, a ferry and two flights later.  If you love diving, beaches, getting-away-from-it-all and have two weeks' holiday spare, I would thoroughly recommend exploring the Andamans, though maybe in winter at a less insect-y time.  The rest of India, and the world, has a lot to learn from the island's environmentally sensitive approach, and long may that continue.