Retail Therapy

Phil is currently away in the UK for three and a half weeks before I travel there to join him for ten days in July, after which we will both be returning to India.  I therefore have had three full weekends in the city in which to entertain myself.

Last weekend, my first without Phil, I visited several shops which I had seen recommended online and was keen to explore.  My system of shopping usually involves looking at every item in a shop, then going round everything again making a shortlist, then deliberating for ages before deciding what to buy.  I quite enjoy this, but it isn't compatible with Phil at all!  It is far better for me to scout out what's available on my own, then visit again together when he gets back to India.

I visited four places in total, all of which were brilliant discoveries.  Three of the four shops were in the old Fort area of South Mumbai, and so were packed with character, and the fourth was in Worli; a little south of Bandra at the other end of the sealink bridge.

If you are expecting a Christmas present from us then it's quite likely to come from one of the shops listed below.  This is a warning before you read on!

So here is where I went and what I bought:

1)  Chimanlals sells beautiful handmade stationary at incredibly cheap prices.  As soon as I walked into the shop I was excited (I know that's a bit sad) by the incredible range of colours and products on offer.  I piled my basket high with cards, writing paper, wrapping papers, gift tags and card gift boxes and envelopes.  I've done a quick audit and think I bought 150 - 200 individual items, all of which are delightful, and managed to spend £13.

Gift envelopes.  These are used a lot in India, in particular when giving any kind of money gift to someone else.  I would love to learn how these items are designed, printed and produced for the shop.

The huge array of cards are displayed on the back wall, and the wrapping paper rack on the right of the picture is one of four stands of paper from which you can choose.  In the centre, there are many varieties of card gift boxes that you can construct yourselves, along with ribbons and other pretty things.

2)  Contemporary Art and Crafts is a homeware shop which is both Indian and modern, and packed full of colourful quirky gifts and fresh, original designs.  I could have bought a lot in this shop but ended up a bit bamboozled by choice, so took away lots of ideas and will certainly return to buy more in the future.

The highlights for me were the beautiful colourful quilts and interesting kitchenware, though in the end my purchases were a framed Indian-style picture, a tea cosy and matching tray cloth (probably as a gift) and, my favourite, two metal tumblers covered in bright yellow / green Kashmiri glass.  Anyone who has lived in India knows that metal crockery is everywhere, and these tumblers have the best of both worlds.  Classic metal but bright and colourful too.

Padded quilts.  These are very common in India instead of duvets.  We are still using our UK duvets at the moment but may well switch soon.

A huge variety of quilts, in different styles from different parts of India, designed to be the top cover on top of other blankets / sheets on the bed.

3)  Kitab Khana is a bookshop in an old building in South Mumbai.  It is antithesis of online book shopping and bland chains which, whilst they will sell you a book, do nothing for the soul.  Kitab Khana is in a classic old colonial building in the Fort area, on a street crowded with stalls and hawkers selling their wares, but is an oasis of calm once you step inside.  The walls are lined with tall wooden bookselves, the ceiling is double height and it is made for happily whiling away an hour or two.

Unfortunately, I neglected to take any photographs which I attribute to hunger as it was well past my lunchtime when I arrived.  I sated my hunger quickly with a trip to the excellent independent cafe at the back of the shop which had a delicious selection of vegetarian food including homemade sandwiches, salads, bigger meals and cakes.  I eschewed the sensible savoury option in favour of a big slab of pear and walnut cake with icecream.  This was plenty to set me up for more shopping in the afternoon.

I left the shop with three books, which I didn't really need, but I liked Kitab Khana so much that I felt compulsed to buy.

For those who would like to see a photograph or read more, the website link is below:

http://kitabkhana.in/

4)  Magnolia Home Store was our last, and my favourite shop of the day.  We almost didn't go as, although it was on the way home, the traffic was terrible and I was feeling a bit too hot and grumpy as we approached it (and Sagar took an unfortunate wrong turn, which added 30 minutes to the journey!).

I am, however, very glad that we did as this shop put me in great mood as it is frankly brilliant.  This is essentially a furniture shop but with lots of accessories, lamps, rugs and other trinkets too.  The furniture is fantastic, designed by the owners and made from teak to look like old products, but without the antique tag (which is complex from an exporting / customs perspective).  There are also lots of brass items and metal used in the furniture.  Everything is high quality, sturdy and looks great.  Further, each item is individual and personal, and you can change and tailor upholstery and other details of the design where you choose to.

My photos don't really do justice to the full selection in the shop as I haven't yet mastered taking shots on my ipad without my finger over the lense, so the photos below are simply those which are finger free!

Writing desk with metal legs.  I bought one of the brass pen holders sitting on top.

This photograph isn't great, but this is a large metal lamp studded with glass beads and it looks amazing.  This is high on my list of things to buy in the future.

Stools with metal legs and colourful seats.

 A classic Indian chest and brass lantern / pot (I can't remember which)

 I really liked this chair, but when I went back a week later it had been sold:-(

Nested wooden tables, now sitting in our living room

I bought the tables above, which were polished up for me and I collected a week later.  They are heavy and robust - Sagar and I had to carry them up to the apartment between us!  I also bought a brass pot and other metal ornament, just because I liked it.

I would compare the prices to a value range at John Lewis or M&S, whereas the quality would be at the top of the range for those shops, and with an additional quirky and personal touch.  A large teak side dresser or chest of drawers, for example, is around £300, which is a lot by Indian standards but very good for the quality that you get.

I must have been excited by my purchases as I managed to leave my debit card there, which I only realised when trying to buy something the day after my trip.  The shop owners had kept it safe for me and Sagar was able to pick it up the next day - another good example of customer service.

The picture below shows my total shopping haul for the day, excluding the tables above.

My purchases:  One framed picture, three books, 8 sheets of wrapping paper, oodles of cards, writing paper, tags, gift boxes, a tea cosy and matching tray cloth, two Kashmiri glass tumblers, a brass pen holder, and a metal ornament.

This might seem decadent, but the total cost of everything shown above was around £75.  I hope to go for another shopping trip very soon!

Poha

Poha is a traditional Maharashtrian breakfast food.  Its principal ingredient is flattened flakes of white rice (the "poha") which is cooked with onions, peanuts, spices, and whatever else you fancy.

I have eaten poha cooked by others a few times and loved it.  It is a classic example of an Indian dish which is packed full of flavour but, unlike most of the dishes that you'll find in a curry house in the UK, it is light, healthy and can be made in a few minutes.

Yesterday, I decided to try it for myself.  I still struggle slightly with spiced food for breakfast (I prefer my fruit and museli!) so rustled up some poha for dinner instead.
 

Apologies for the inelegant presentation.  I'd eaten most of it before I thought about blogging, so this picture is a good as it gets!

Poha ticks all my cookery boxes is that (i) it uses simple / store cupboard ingredients; (ii) it takes 10 minutes to make; and (iii) it is very tasty, but healthy too.

Here is the recipe I used for those who would like to try it at home.  The recipe produces a generous portion for two, or a light snack for four people.

1)  Take 150g dried poha and put in a sieve under cold running water until all the poha is damp and soft to the touch.  Top tip - do not over-soak the rice as it will go mushy and turn into a single rice blob, which is not what you want!

2)  Heat 3 tbsp oil and add 1 tsp mustard seeds, cooking for a minute so that they can crackle in the oil.  Top tip - they will spit everywhere if you're not careful so watch the temperature and keep a sensible distance away!

3)  Add 2 tbsp peanuts and fry for two minutes.  Add one large finely chopped onion and cook together until the onion is translucent.  Then add one finely chopped green chilli and 10-12 curry leaves.  Finely, add 1 tsp turmeric and salt to taste, stirring well.

4)  Tip in the poha, stirring well so that everything looks yellow and the rice is well coated.  Cover and cook on a low heat for two to three minutes.  Turn off the heat and leave covered for one to two minutes more.  

5)  Squeeze over lemon juice, stir in chopped coriander and season to taste to finish.  If you've got it, grating fresh coconut over the dish at the end gives an extra-zingy finish.

A night out at the Canvas Laugh Club - Indian stand-up comedy

On Thursday evening, we had a work night out to see a stand-up comedy show at the Canvas Laugh Club in Lower Parel, a short drive south of Bandra.

My view of the stage - we kept a sensible distance from the action

I have seen stand-up a few times in the UK and the format was very similar; with a compare followed  by two main acts.  The rules of behaviour were the same - do not sit in the front row or do anything at all to draw attention to yourself unless you want to get hassled.  There was a student in the front row taking a four year degree in footwear design, which provided enough material to keep the intro act going for a while!

Saying that, stand-up comedy is a great platform to observe key differences in culture in terms of what engages people and forms the centre of the routines.

Two main areas of material were Bollywood and politics.  It appears that I have acclimatised in India well as and had a pretty good idea who and what was being discussed, and what the jokes actually meant.  There was also plenty of the universal stand-up comedy topics, mostly rude and puerile, but entertaining never-the-less.

In terms of understanding though, there was a bit of a barrier in that two out of the three comics spoke changing freely between English and Hindi so, for me, understanding each joke involved piecing all the bits of English together to work out what it was all about.  This also though taught me that so much of our communication is actually driven by expression, tone and action, as I could tell what was going on despite not having a full grasp of what was actually being said.

The most surprisingly aspect for me, though, was the level of controversy included in the routines, which were far more irreverent than I could have imagined, particularly regarding topics that would be taboo for the vast majority of the Indian population (and certainly in a public area).   This is reminded though that Bombay is most liberal and western city in India, and becoming more so among certain groups and classes.  My colleagues said that the routine is ok in Mumbai and Bangalore, but would not be acceptable in more conservative cities like Delhi.

Anyway, it was a decent night out and I would happily go back again (possibly with a Hindi dictionary next time).

Freak tidal waves...global warming in action?!

The monsoon is here!  Well, sort of.  It was officially supposed to arrive in the city on Tuesday and, four days later, we have had some showers but it has been rather lacklustre so far.  The experts are predicting a light monsoon this year, which is good from a practical perspective but worrying given the existing water shortages in the city and potential for drought in rural areas.

Although the rain has been light, a separate watery phenomenon hit Mumbai on Thursday which was extremely bizarre.  With no warning, a 4.5m tidal wave came in on Thursday lunchtime which caused minor chaos, waterlogging coastal parts of the city and washing tonnes of rubbish inland. 

On the coast of Mumbai on Thursday

I have several colleagues who were born and brought up in Mumbai who were astonished.  The city is expected to flood in the monsoon, but the rain hadn't arrived on Thursday.  The flooding was purely owing to high tide and a cyclonic storm miles out in the Arabian Sea.  No one seemed to remember anything like this happening before, and we couldn't believe the pictures being published online.

The water had receded by Thursday evening when I travelled south for a stand-up comedy show, including driving over the Bandra-Worli sealink (don't worry, this was perfectly safe!).  The sealink bridge usually stands a long way above the water but, on Thursday, huge waves were surging up to just beneath the level of the bridge.  It was awesome, and quite terrifying.  Whilst I was safely in the car, hoards of locals were enjoying standing on the coastal wall with the waves crashing close to them.  This, in my view, is crazy behaviour.  The water is extremely powerful, and also filthy, but they seemed to be enjoying themselves.

A sobering thought is that hundreds of shanty homes along the coast were washed away.  This was noted in the newspaper reports but now, two days on, is old and forgotten news.  Those who lost their homes will have few possessions and must now be looking for somewhere else to set up as quickly as possible, before the rains arrive in force.

According to newspaper reports, there could be more of this to come during the next week whilst the tide remains high.  There are more pictures and detail about the events on the pages linked below.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/Freak-tidal-waves-flood-Mumbai-shoreline/articleshow/36451646.cms

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/slideshows/nation-world/freak-tidal-wave-hits-mumbai-city-dwellers-issued-warnings/slideshow/36489015.cms 

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.