Eyes Full of Tinsel and Fire

I'm festive as this year. I did the full Chris Rea and travelled home for Christmas belting out Christmas classics. So far I've spent the time back in the UK catching up on things that I've missed. Here are some of those things:

Culture
And by culture I really mean London theatre. Anyone who has read this blog knows I go to the theatre more than anyone should.  That's not been a habit that's easy to maintain out in that India. I've managed to sneak in two plays whilst I've been back - Love's Labour's Lost (I can see why that's a play that's not put on much - about half of the story is filler - it's like the anti-Winter's Tale) and The Children (this didn't make me less jealous of Lucy Kirkwood). A couple of days in the most exciting city in the world is just a pleasant by-product.

Cheese
My cheese intake over the last few months has been almost entirely paneer, which is about as much a cheese as tofu is a meat. As in, it isn't. I had been absolutely gagging for a bit of stinky, stinky stilton, probably more even than beef - and I had missed beef a lot. Fortunately cheese owns Christmas. I don't understand why it's not mentioned in all the Christmas songs. Scrap that, I don't see why they don't just re-name it Cheesemas to make it clear what the real aim of the season is. None of that nativity bobbins - let's eat cheese.

In the last week I have eaten all the cheese. I have also eaten an above average amount of beef. And pork.

Walking
Here's a simple pleasure that I've missed.  Walking isn't really a thing in India (a mix of the places to walk being unpleasant and taxis being crazy cheap, since you ask) so I've used my time to do some strolling - Bunny Walk, Blake's Wood, that London - all way more pleasant than anywhere I've wandered in the last three months. No one has tried to sell me anything whilst sauntering for a start. 

Full Horn. Full Throttle.

So, three months in this crazy, congested, colourful place with its smog and its cows and its demonetisation. I think that's the longest I've spent in one country since this blog began. 

What's that you want a list of all the things that I think are odd? Seems a bit divisive. Oh go on then...

Everyone drives at you. I think they do it for giggles. You shouldn't worry about it unduly, they rarely hit you.

Crowds of people deviate towards gridlock. Noone will step back to let anyone pass, even if it makes their own journey quicker (nowhere is this more true than trying to leave a local train - you have to jump out knees first). But don't you be tempted to step back to let the person coming the other way through - even if this is clearly the most sensible resolution to the problem - without fail the person behind you will walk into the space that you just left, perpetuating the gridlock.

Everywhere is your litterbin. You get very strange looks if you take your rubbish away with you.

If you're a man, everywhere is your toilet. (What, everywhere? Even a street that's so narrow two-way traffic can't pass if you're there? Yep.)

Taxi drivers get offended if you put a seatbelt on. They say "not compulsory" and look angry. It's like they haven't seen the roads.

It's twenty six degrees. Everyone is wearing their winter clothes. 

They love a marigold here. No really they are everywhere. There must be fields the size of Wales just growing marigolds.

All cups are tiny. No one has more than a shot of tea. Oh and a "pint" is actually a half pint, if you want a pint ask for a "mug".

Wing mirrors are for wimps.

Don't walk on the footways. They're there for people to sleep on. I hope they are sleeping.

Personal space isn't a thing. If you're queuing and not pressed against the person in front then expect someone to overtake.

Everyone is in an awful hurry to get there but once they do they just stand in the way.

You need a luggage label on your bag if you're getting a flight. The main job of security at airports is to stamp the luggage label.

Eyeliner on babies is a thing. It's supposed to protect them from negative people but it makes them look like tiny goths.

If you're going to drink like a local you hold the bottle above your mouth and pour. You will end up waterboarding yourself.

Uturning, double parking and going the wrong way down dual carriageways are all to be expected. Note earlier deviation towards gridlock comment.

Chocolate is triple wrapped but milk comes in a bag. 

Throat clearing is a thing. So is talking on your phone in the toilet.

When you buy anything you have to give your phone number. Consequently the number of spam text messages is phenomenal. I reckon my spam text to wanted text ratio is more than fifty to one. The vast majority are written in Hinglish and mean nothing.

And most importantly of all, if you're driving a motorbike: full horn, full throttle.

Bombay Mix

Passed a disembarking coach party down in South Mumbai and got some serious stares. It was like they couldn't believe they'd been so lucky. Hadn't even made it the Gateway and already they'd managed to tick white boys off their tourist checklist.

Mumbai isn't so much a city for box ticking as a city for hanging out: a city to live in rather than a city to visit. So my weekend seemed to revolve around eating. And eating a lot. I feel like a mobility system for my stomach.

Unfortunately sitting around eating doesn't make for an especially interesting read so I'll just give you a piece of bona fide travel advice. If you ever find yourself in Mumbai airport needing a taxi, make sure you are not in the Tab Cabs queue. There's a reason it's the shortest queue. I've used them so you don't have to.

Traveller Cliche of the weekend: drink in Leopold's. Maybe I did do some box ticking after all.

Expat Bubble

One thing I've not talked about so far is everyday life. Must be difficult adapting to a whole new way of life, right? *Shuffles feet, mumbles, looks at the floor.

My name's Pete and I'm an expat cliché.

Weeknights (when I read that back I read it as "wee knights" which is a reality TV show that will be with you by the time 2018 is out). Week nights I leave work and retreat to my little compound. That makes it sound like I have a far more active role in that process than I do. Week nights my driver ferries me from the door of work to the door of my apartment, making sure that my pretty, little Western sensibilities don't get damaged by the honking anarchy that is the Indian road network.

I retreat to my fitness prison where the gates keep any non-first world problems at bay, so rather than having to worry about where the next 100 rupee note is coming from (yep, still a problem), I have the rather less problematic problems of lift politics and the maid being rubbish.

Yes, that wasn't a typo, I have a maid. Not something I've needed before, but apparently it's the done thing here. I always assumed that having a maid would be sort of glamorous. It's not. It's marginally more hassle than not having a maid. You know how if you cook someone a meal, they might help clear up, and then you have a week-long period where you can't find the chopping board? Having a maid is like that every day.

And the lift. I'm not a fan of the lift, generally, but I live quite up in the sky and if I try and walk it it makes me pooped. My lofty status has made me a bit of a lift Nazi. I tend to glare at people from the lower floors if they stop me on my way down (the lazy so-and-sos) and then I remember that eight flights of stairs is actually quite a climb (but don't stop glaring, obviously).

So what do expat cliche do for a social life (apart from gym and Netflix)? Why they hang out at the foreign embassies of course. This weekend it was the turn of the German Embassy. Christmas markets. Turns out drinking glühwein when the temperature is in the mid-twenties doesn't actually feel that Christmassy.