Letter from Delhi ( time to leave India) 1981



I dressed up in sari with friends at a wedding in New Delhi

I found my beloved India full of contradictions. I could not accept the corruption and bribery system the god fearing Indians seem to accept without any questions. I could not accept the caste system as part of their DNA, I found it difficult to accept the massive gap between the rich and the poor and  ' karma' was to be blamed for the human misery was not what I wanted to believe. The dusty roads with cows and elephants, open sewage system, constant storage of water and power in the homes I stayed where I sat by candle light for hours; rubbish every where, crowded public transport, and the extreme weather were all the experiences of India I had tasted and they started to effect me. I longed for my home comfort.

My stay in India taught me a great deal about my forefathers. I got to know about Hindu religion. I celebrated all the Hindu festivals and even enjoyed few weddings where I took pleasure in wearing Indian costumes. I taught myself to speak Hindi, after watching 30 Hindi movies in ten months. I taught myself to write Hindi too, to help me read road signs when I travelled alone. I loved the  India's passion for being none throw away society, where they recycled near enough everything; when travelling in the trains I was always served tea in hand made clay cup which went back to earth and made into a cup again and my food was often served on a banana leaf which saved a lot of washing up time!! I loved India's passion for life, her colour full landscape with her beautiful people and her struggle for survival on our beautiful planet. I promised myself ( and those I left behind in England) that I shall be away from home for whole year. However, ten months on, I found myself emotionally drained, I had enough of my beloved India!

I failed my mission, to find a suitable man. My female Indian friends kept telling me to improve my flat chested figure as men in India prefer women with big boobs, however I never seemed to be short men ( all unsuitable in my eyes)  giving me all the attention. I even took up courage to write ( and got published) a very strong letter to one of the Indian's well read pornography magazine, asking the men of India to have some compassion for a lone traveller like me; this message appeared to have fallen on deaf ears as I continued to be hassled and followed around when ever I was travelling alone.

I decided to leave India and spend rest of the year travelling as far as Japan. So I bought a flight ticket from Delhi to Japan ( the country I most wanted to visit) and stopped over in Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Shenzhen ( China) and Philippines. My return from Japan brought me back to Thailand, India through Europe to Switzerland, Germany, and then back to Switzerland  and finally home to England in on New Year day of 1982.