India Day 4: Shimla - Mandi (OJG)

Day 4 started with a quick wander into town before we left for Mandi. We found the opticians and both Em and I bought a pair of RayBans. Although cheap at about 40 quid each, it meant we needed to exchange some more money. We found a bank that was open, but for some peculiar reason they would not do any money exchange until 10:30. In the end we just used an ATM.

As we were leaving the hotel, the manager quickly shouted out to me asking for the key. I had nearly managed to leave the hotel and the city with the key still in my pocket, a feat that I succeeded in accomplishing the following day! A kleptomaniac in the making? I really hope not!

John organised a taxi, and we all hopped in. The drive to Mandi was a lot longer than our previous drive to Shimla, about four and a half hours. During that time we overtook countless vehicles and trucks, saw loads of animals ambling around the road, and speeded through many villages and towns.

To give an example of driving in India, and probably Taxi driving in particular, it is hectic! It is quite common for the taxi to overtake a large bus, whilst that bus is overtaking a truck, and this on a bendy road with a blind spot about 60m ahead. Oh and sure, everyone has their horns blowing continuously to warn any oncoming traffic that they are there, but that does not always work!

On this drive we really did have 2 lucky escapes. I know they were lucky because the driver slowed down afterwards, albeit for a couple of minutes only. The worst was when he tried to overtake a man pushing his wheeled market stall on a 120 degree bend (cannot see anything past the bend), while a bus was overtaking a car on the other side of the bend towards us. It was seriously close.

We drove through the industrial town of Sundar Nagar, from afar it looks like some sort of factory behemoth shimmering in the haze, with a tiny town at its base. The result of this, was a ten-fold increase in trucks on the road. All the trucks in India are basically the same, and nearly all are made by Tata, a mega corporation that does everything from tea to mobile contracts, from cars to satellite broadcasting, from china plates to home loans. Of course there are bigger companies in the world, but I don't believe any of them have quite the diversity of products that Tata supplies.

So, getting back to the colourful trucks. Although we saw a lot of trucks on the road, we saw a lot more on the side of the road waiting for the night to arrive. They prefer to drive at night as there are less cars on the road. Allegedly they can travel in closely knit convoys of up to 100. And with all this night time activity comes a complete night time sub-culture of eateries, mechanics and of course prostitutes. Truck drivers have the second largest amount of aids cases in India, the prostitutes being the first. Unfortunately, education on these matters is very poor and the number of HIV cases in India is expected to reach 12 million by 2010.

We finally arrived at Mandi in the late afternoon, and headed for our hotel the Raj Mahal (not to be confused with the Taj Mahal). We had a pleasant late lunch in the garden restaurant and afterwards we went for a walk around Mandi's famous two storey sunken market, called Indira market. In the evening Emelie felt tired and went to bed, whilst John and I went to the hotel bar and discussed mostly Indian politics (a common Indian pastime) whilst consuming beer and poppadoms. It felt quite colonial.

map link day 4