Post script on India

In the incredible everything that is India the detail is what goes first, so this is a post script of the trip. I am no longer young in years but surprisingly young in spirit and with friends like Philippa Kaye the temptation to return and explore more is strong. This trip must be remembered for what spoke to me on all the days I was there. 

The colours which remain undiminished and undimmed in spite of the dust and dirt.

The little tots travelling in a tuk- tuk driven by a very old man, barely even moving in the busy traffic. Aged four or five in their uniforms, sitting any which way on the tuk- tuk. No safety belts here, not even an adult chaperone. They were chatting ten to the dozen while he plugged away at moving forward and towards home. 

Going past the Amber Fort which is so majestic no one sees the hillside to its right which is graveyard of kites or if you like the  fancy -dressing up of trees. 

Just beyond, a girl in a red and orange sari rides side- saddle on the back of a motorbike texting - no hands holding anything other than her phone. 

Two young men on the back of a lorry lost in a bed of onion sacks dreaming ... of onion bhajis.

Three tolls on our way 60, 58 and 121 rupees. Please explain the rationale of those numbers. 

Watching mynahs skip and scurrry among the big lorries waiting in line at the tolls. The Stuntmen of 

the Bird world.

The picture could not be complete without cows - making their mangers in the central reservations among the rubbish and chewing studiously on a newspaper. Are they any wiser ?  

Finally and with enthusiastic applause, my thanks to Balwant Singh, patient driver and user of his indicator - a habit which is not a given on Indian roads. He negotiated me ably in and out of traffic jams, cows walking across our path, and cars driving the wrong way up the motorway. Smart and able he was a careful driver but also gave us insights into politics, history and the Indian world as he knows it.