Escape from India

Afer a ridiculously long (4 1/2 hour) flight from Cochin to Goa, with not one but two stops, we finally arrived, and were greeted by an affiliate of the tour company who would only speak to Derek, the person in our group of Indian extraction. The guy is Canadian, and moved there from Trinidad, so he is NOT Indian. But he was Indian enough for the local guide, who ignored the other seven of us. Actually, it was kind of funny, having him ask Derek how many vehicles he needed, and whether he'd like a minibus, and what time he'd like to do the city tour, with Derek vigorously protesting that he couldn't make the decision for the other seven (non-existent, non-Indian) people in the group.

Dinner was fine, although still not spicy (how could I manage to spend 4 weeks in India and not have a single spicy dish?). Afterwards, as (bad) luck would have it, we stumbled upon a karaoke bar full of down and out western tourists, all with skin like leather from too much sun, booze and smoking, belting out crappy songs I'd never heard before. For reasons unknown, the English kids wanted to stay, so we did. For a while. Until it got too awful even for them (although the girls did want to go out clubbing after). Instead, I found myself in my room by around 11, watching a terrible made for TV movie with Annabeth Gish as a nurse at a group home for adults with brain damage (also starred Ethan Embry as a patient and Ed Begley, Jr. as his overbearing, work-obsessed, overbearing father). I watched the entire thing. I can't believe I'm admitting this, because it was seriously awful. Hallmark Channel awful.

The next day, after seeing no more of Goa than the road to the post office, I headed to the airport. Okay, a word about the road to the post office and cab (and tuk tuk) drivers I've encountered in India and southeast Asia. They suck. I find bargaining over the fare in advance seriously annoying. But what I find even more annoying is their insistence on taking you to their friends' shops, even when you tell them that (1) you need to get to the airport or you will miss your flight (Goa, Bangkok) or (2) you need to get back to the hotel to get medicine because you are desperately ill (Cochin, Hanoi). And it could be worse: the people foolish enough to go to these shops never get taken where they're going. Me, I just get a headache having to scream at the driver for ten minutes as I explain that I don't care whether he gets a free t-shirt and that a 40 cent discount on the fare is not a sufficient motivator for me to miss my flight. Also, why can't they think it through on their own: someone who is flying out of the country in a couple of hours has zero incentive to go to a tailor shop. I'm just saying.

I made it to Mumbai in one piece, but was then confronted with 40 -- okay 5 -- guys who wanted to give me a ride, some of whom wanted to take me to a hotel of their choice. Foolishly, I ended up in a tuk tuk (again) because the price was right. It would have been more righ if he'd turned on the meter (about 50 cents), but I settled for the $4 I'd agreed to pay. Problem was, the guy kept trying to get me to change hotels, telling me that mine was too expensive. Shockingly, he didn't understand why I wouldn't go to the significantly cheaper he got a kickback from, despite my telling him that I'd already paid for my "expensive" hotel, and that it would be even more expensive to pay for two. Please let it be years and years (or at least a year) before I'm in a tuk tuk again.

I loved the hotel. Best hotel I'd been in for a month. Hyatt Regency. Sunken bathroom. Hardwood floors and complimentary slippers and a flat screen TV and room service. Just like any other nice western hotel. I deserved it. It was a hard month. I could have stayed there forever. Sadly, I only stayed until 2:45 a.m., because I had a 5:10 a.m. flight out of India.

The airport was its own kind of hell, but I was expecting that. What I wasn't expecting is what happened in Doha. My flight was already boarding by the time I cleared security. I had to motor. And yet, when I got to the gate, I encountered a huge stumbling block: a moron who didn't think I looked enough like my passport photo, and insisted that it wasn't my passport. He sent me to another area on another floor to have someone confirm my identity, telling me only that I needed to be back in five minutes (with identity confirmation) or I'd miss the flight. So, frantic, I go to the designated desk and explain the situation. Which, like any other half sane person, the guy behind the desk thinks is ludicrous. There are three basic reasons I don't look identical to my passport photo: 1) I cut my hair, 2) I have a tan (the natural result of spending 4 months near the equator) and 3) I've lost some weight (and not even that much. Just possibly enough that my cheekbones are slightly better defined). As for the photo, though, it's a no-brainer: I've got the exact same facial features. No one who saw me last in September (when the photo was taken) is going to fail to recognize me. Also, who else would I be? Some American black woman impersonating some slightly lighter, longer haired, chubbier American black woman in order to fly from Doha to Cape Town? Anyway, I made it onto the flight (a good thing, because otherwise I would have had to kill the guy and get stuck in some crappy prison in Doha awaiting execution).

Apparently men in some parts of the world have a real problem with women having short hair. Although the guys at the airport in Delhi knew that I was the person in my passport photo, they both wanted to know why I'd cut my hair (and made me explain the whole hassle of having to get it blown out straight and how no one in their country, or most of the countries I'd visited, knew how to do hair like mine), which is really none of their business.

I'm in Cape Town now, and things are much better (although much colder).