I will attempt to recapitulate the high points about the remainder of Nicole’s visit.
Early on Tuesday Dec 18 we left Ghaziabad by train for Roorkee. Ghaziabad Station is old and grimy unlike some of the smaller stations I saw elsewhere which are cleaner and prettier often embellished by shade trees and/or small gardens-cum-rest areas. At about 7:45 a.m. we boarded the train and then dragged our luggage through several coaches until we arrived at the correct one and found our seats. The train (Janshatabdi Express) is a comfortable way to travel and the country side scenes from the train more appealing than the continuous strip development visible along the highway. We also were served breakfast that was included in our tickets. After a relaxing trip we arrived in Roorkee at about 10:30 a.m. From the station we hired a bicycle-rickshaw to take us to the campus of I.I.T Roorkee and my apartment.
While on campus Nicole joined me and my professor friends for our regular 6:00 p.m. tea sessions at the K.I.H. Café. She also met my younger student friends, Sarah from Mongolia, Chintamanie from Guyana, Ravindra from Calcutta and others at the K.I.H Mess and Café or at the trendier Nescafe Cafe. She also came over to the office to meet my colleagues and use my computer. I.I.T. Roorkee is known more for simple pleasures of tea and conversation plus the delightful lawns and gardens. The bird life is also varied and at times noisy. While Nicole explored I had to go back to work.
On Friday Dec 21 we left on another adventure via rented car some 250 km to Ramnagar. This town is at the south east corner of Corbett National Park: India’s first nature reserve which is named after the English writer and naturalist Jim Corbett. Corbett lived most of his life in the area and was famous for hunting down man-eating tigers that were once a problem here. His books are well known and still in print after more than 80 years. Corbett was one of my father’s favourite authors and I remember reading some of his stories in Jamaica when I was 10 or 11 years old. I did not imagine then that one day I would visit Rudraprayag District scene of one of Corbett’s most famous books! But I digress. We did not realize that we had chosen the most popular weekend of the year for visiting the park. This limited our options. The lodges within the park were all full and the day long safaris all booked up. Our only option was the afternoon (4 hour) tour through the southern part of the park on the afternoon of December 22 (I spent most of the morning at the park office lining up to get our permit). For our safari we hired a Gypsy (Suzuki jeep) and guide. The park is located on the flanks of the Siwalik range of the Himalayas and lies partly on the plains and partly in the hills. The Ramganga River and its smaller tributaries Mandal, Palain and Sonanadi flow through the park. The river is controlled by a dam at Kakagarh and its reservoir also lies within the park. This location provides a wide variety of habitats and is reflected by the exceptional variety of plants, birds and animals that are found in the park. In the park we encountered a fair variety of bird life, notably: water fowl, a pair of eagles and their nest, peacocks in their roosting area, etc. We saw many deer of three varieties, sambur deer, spotted deer and barking deer and troops of langur monkeys. We saw lots of tiger tracks in the dust, a tiger den but no tigers (we were told that there about 143 tigers and 60 leopards in the park based on the last census). As we were leaving the park we came upon an elephant family: father, mother and baby. This in part compensated us for not seeing a tiger; unfortunately, it was too late to take pictures.
Friday and Saturday nights we stayed in a pleasant two star hotel in Ramnagar. On our last day Sunday Dec 23 we traveled to nearby Corbett Falls and Kaladunghi where we visited Corbett’s home which is now a museum. Then we headed back to Roorkee. On the way back we had time for a quick visit to Haridwar to see the famous bathing ghats along the Ganga and lo and behold I bumped into one of my acquaintances from I.I.T. Roorkee! At this time of year the crowds are small but during the summer pilgrim (yatri) season the visitors are numbered in the hundreds of thousands!
Next evening it was Christmas Eve and we decided to attend the campus church. We joined a camp fire for songs (just a few) and tea. The small group seemed to be mostly the pastor’s extended family. The next day we attended the English service that was led by one of the students. Nicole was recruited to join the choir of 3 or 4. They wisely did not extend an invitation to me. The sermon went well for about ten minutes but the speaker kept on for another 35 minutes but added no further enlightenment. Later that afternoon we visited Dr. Satya Prakash and wife Ilona for tea and pastries. Satya was a post doctoral student in Budapest many years ago where he met and married Ilona. So it was an occasion to swap stories about Hungary. We finished the day with Christmas dinner prepared by Cintamanie in his apartment. Chintamanie has come further than anyone else to study at Roorkee. His home is Guyana in South America. I am the second furthest travellor!
On our last night (Dec 27) we were treated to supper by Snigdha Sanyal a horticulturist and architect. Since this meeting Snigdha has married and moved to England where she has recently fond a job as a landscape architect (Nicole keeps in touch).
Nicole’s last day was Dec 28. We left by train to Delhi arriving at 11:00 a.m. and headed over to the YWCA where I had reserved a room for the night. As her plane did not leave until the wee hours of the Dec 29 we had most of the day to explore other sights in New Delhi; so after lunch we went over to the railway museum to view the trains and carriages of earlier times, some quite familiar to me from the 1960’s during the last days of the age of steam.
Note added by Nicole:
Back in New Delhi, we returned to the Kwality restaurant for a final meal before my flight. Yummy mutton kebabs, peas pullao, lentils and tutti-frutti ice cream were on the menu.
Our kind and friendly waiter, tentatively struck up a conversation with us. (Dad’s ability to communicate in Hindi was often a source of curiousity).
It turned out that the waiter’s grandfather, a retired Gurkha, had worked at the Canadian embassy in Delhi, and as a child, our waiter used to play with the Canadian children
(Wait – it gets even more interesting!)
If Gurkha, then Nepal! This provided Dad with an opportunity to speak some Nepali – and need I say our waiter was delighted. I hazarded to ask him where he was from exactly and he replied, figuring we’d never have heard of his village.
But then Dad surprised him again, but saying he’d even stayed there overnight in a hotel!
There was laughter and, taking a photo of us with his mobile phone as a souvenir, he shook our hands and with smiles, greeted us a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
What a great way to end my visit with Daddio in India!
Me again: After an early supper and a few relaxing hours at the YMCA we left by taxi to the airport 2½ hours ahead of the scheduled flight departure. I left Nicole to fend for herself in the chaos of the airport. She managed well enough but needed the full 2½ hours to get through all the formalities.
It was fun to have company over Christmas and Nicole also enjoyed her holiday with Dad. Enjoy the attached pictures.
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