10/06/2018
I have been in India for the past month. Here is one of my most recent posts, but you can check out the rest on my page, under ChiefWiggles or Paul Holton.
India IX
Leaning up against two fluffy pillows atop my quilt-top mattress, now in the clean and quiet confines of my room at the J.W. Marriott New Delhi, I decided to write one last journal entry before my trip in India comes to an end. Way too much has transpired over the last few days for me to let the story stop with journal entry VIII. Oddly, there are now no sounds of crickets and birds chirping outside my window, no barking dogs, and no monkeys rustling through the trees. Those sounds have all been, somewhat strangely, replaced with the ever so familiar sounds of a large city; cars honking, people chattering outside my window and a faint voice can be heard calling out “House Keeping”, down the hallway.
Just now the ringing noise of my doorbell interrupted my thoughts, as hotel customer service just delivered two large bottles of chilled Perrier sparkling water to my room. With no fridge in my previous hotel accommodations, a couple of days ago I would have died for a bottle of chilled Perrier. Yet another reminder that I am no longer high up in the mountains of northern India, in the hill station of Ranikhet, just outside the Indian Army base of Chaubatia, a cantonment town in Almora district in the Indian state of Uttarakhand.
As the day arrived for the remainder of my team to be departing, Chin, my jogging/walking companion for the past several weeks, and I decided to go out one more time. With just hours left prior to the bus arriving, we took off down the dusty road for what turned out to be an hour jaunt. For perhaps the last time, we both just wanted to enjoy the benefits of our mountain retreat; the fresh cool mountain air, the tall pine trees reaching heavenward, in what appeared to be a never ending green forest with its thick underbrush, and all the wildlife that lives within it.
About 10 minutes into our mountain trek, I caught a whiff of hot tar and asphalt and heard the sounds of a road crew chattering. As we rounded the curve in the road, we finally came upon the crew actually paving over the old dirt and gravel road. Although I had previously seen road paving materials, such as gravel and sand, being piled up along the roadside, I hadn’t actually seen them paving. I had never actually witnessed how you pave a road, without certain key pieces of equipment, and only have manpower to throw at it.
As we passed by the paving operation, avoiding stepping in any of the black tar, I noticed one person tending to a wood fire, to heat up several large black 50-gallon sized barrels full of tar. With straw baskets full of sand and gravel on their heads, several men were seen carrying and dumping their obviously heavy loads into the one machine they did have. I am not sure what it is called, but the sand, gravel and tar were all put into this mixing machine that spit out the asphalt slurry. Another set of individuals would then carry off the slurry in wheel barrel like handcarts to provide the next few feet of paving for the guys raking and pushing the hot tar/gravel mix along, one foot at a time. I can only imagine how difficult and backbreaking it was to spread that heavy asphalt slurry.
With my team’s imminent departure just minutes away, around 10am Monday morning, I was able to get the team, begrudgingly, to come together for a quick group photo. Afterwards the team boarded the bus and took off down the mountain for what was expected to be a long day of traveling. After a 3 hour bus ride, and a 6 hour train ride, and a one hour hotel shuttle ride from the train station to the hotel, the team was expected to be in Delhi at the J.W. Marriott Hotel for their one-night stay prior to departing the next day.
I was left behind, as the sole government rep, to deal with the mission of getting all our equipment shipped back to Korea. With that task in mind, the first step was to get the 60 tuff boxes of computer equipment loaded. Using the same Indian Army Sikh soldier workforce we used when we first arrived, all of us showed up ready to load trucks at 1300. But, in seemingly Indian fashion, the three Indian commercial semi-trucks didn’t actually arrive until 1500.
The importance and relevancy of time takes on a whole different meaning over here, as the majority of Indians have openly and honestly expressed. The conversations usually go something like this. One huge problem that exists in India is that people in general don’t do what they say they are going to do, when they say they are going to do it, which usually equates to a one to two hour difference between the what and the when (keep that in mind as this journal entry continues). Ultimately, we were able to get the trucks loaded, covered with tarps and tied down by 1800 that evening.
On a slightly nippy cool mountain morning in pitch black darkness, my driver and vehicle arrived as my transport, to help get me and the three trucks to Delhi. Traveling back up to the rally point, we hooked up with a much larger convoy of vehicles; to include 6 additional semi-trucks with military gear, one police es**rt vehicle, one security force vehicle, and two civilian SUVs. Departing at around 0545, the convoy made its way down the single lane winding road, I had become accustomed to.
Over, what ended up being around 16 hours, the multiple vehicles of our convoy traveled through towns and villages, up and down hills, on a variety of road surfaces and through all types of neighborhoosds and surroundings. We traveled on one lane roads with vehicles going in both directions in the space of one lane. We traveled on two lane roads that sometimes had the quantity of cars jammed together into what should have been 3 or 4 lanes of traffic. As one Indian told me, the lines for lanes are just a suggestion here. We traveled down alleys, through crowds of people, along with every mode of transportation imaginable; from cars and trucks, to motorcycles (many times transporting up to 5 people on one motorcycle; a combination of adults and children), bicycles, horse and oxen drawn carts, thousands of three wheeled rickshaw vehicles (Google that), and of course people on foot everywhere.
As you might imagine, we continually struggled to keep the convoy together; being forced at times to pull over to wait for everyone to catch up. Sometimes having to wait 30 minutes or so, before all the trucks were back in convoy formation. But, of course it was impossible to maintain any semblance of a convoy in this type of chaotic environment, where everyone is jockeying continuously for position.
At one point, when I thought we were actually going to hit an open freeway (with two lanes in both directions) to speed up our progress, we ran into a herd of water buffalo being driven down the road. Further down the freeway, there were horse/cow drawn carts parked alongside the freeway full of apples, further impeding our speed of travel. I am sure someone woke up that morning and thought it was a good idea to sell apples to passing travelers on the freeway.
One of the high points of my trip was the short lunch stop we made at KFC; two pieces of Kentucky Fried goodness with French fries and a Pepsi, what a treat that was.
As the sun set and the darkness of night fell upon us, we finally arrived at our first destination the US Embassy 25-acre compound. Of course we waited for about 45 minutes for my three trucks to catch up, so we could proceed on our journey towards my final destination. Leaving the 6 other trucks, the police es**rt and one of the SUVs, myself in my vehicle along with my three trucks and the security force went on our way towards the Indian Army base nearby, where the three trucks were to be parked for the night. Under the watchful eye of my Sikh soldiers, I felt comfortable in having them guard my equipment on an Indian Army military base until we could head over to the UPS Cargo office at the Delhi International Airport the next day. My driver and I took off for the Marriott, but my driver had quite a difficult time finding my it’s location (being lost for about 45 minutes, him having not having lived in Delhi before).
The next morning around 1000, in one of the Marriott Hotel’s vehicles (loaned to me for the day), I hooked up with my security folks and the three trucks and headed over to the UPS Cargo office at the airport. Little did I know the fun and games I was about to encounter over there.
Based on my UPS contact’s vague instructions, we arrived at the airport at 1000, but had no idea where to go. Calling my POC, we were first instructed to wait in the military vehicle parking and he would send someone over in a few minutes; which turned into 30 minutes and then turned into an hour. We were then instructed to head over to Airport cargo, park in the large truck lot and wait for one of his reps to come over. At this point not unexpectedly, his rep took about another hour to show up.
Once he did appear, he said he needed to sticker all the boxes with an airway bill number barcode, before they would be allowed through the gate Indian Customs controlled. Without even looking at how the boxes were loaded, at first he wanted us to unload all the boxes, so they could be stickered and then reloaded. Thankfully, commonsense prevailed and a few soldiers and him were able to sticker all of the boxes while they were still in the bed of the trucks.
By the time the boxes were stickered, the green light to entry the cargo area turned to a red light, due to the fact that the customs gate was then closed for lunch. At this point, my security team had already departed for their long journey back to Chaubatia/Almora and I was forced to guard the trucks with their drivers through this prolonged lunch break. Once we were able to enter, which at this point was about 1430, we were forced by Indian cargo process to take a number and wait in line with many other trucks waiting for a dock to pull up to. When all was said and done, the cargo was unloaded around 1700. I was so relieved to finally be able to turn over responsibility of the boxes to UPS, for the flight back to Korea, which surprisingly has now happened as I type. And I am not even going to touch on the amount of paperwork, forms and US Embassy letters that had to be filled out and the problems associated with all of that. You don’t even want to know about that.
As I sat in the Marriott Hotel restaurant last night and watched, who I assumed to be, native Indian affluent families, able to afford a $50 per person buffet for their whole family, my mind contrasted that with the austere poverty I had witnessed on a very large scale throughout the country. I was quickly reminded of the discussion I had with my daily assigned driver, who stated he makes $170 a month.
Over all my travels through India this last month, one thing I have realized that has also been confirmed and reconfirmed over and over, is the stark contrast between the haves and the have nots. I am told by Indians that the majority of Indian wealth is in the hands of 2% of the population.
But, I have also been reminded again and again that money doesn’t make them happier and better off; they are extremely close with their friends, very tight knit with their families, and very seemingly happy people, even without anything materially. They are quick to share, quick to give and very warm and personable. Glad I came and learned about the Indian people.
That is it from India.
Chief Wiggles
“Doing it the Wiggles Way”
