A very good friend, Merrill Thomas, who used to live in London but now lives near Gstaad, Switzerland, very kindly agreed to drive through India on a ‘motoring expedition’. She did it on behalf of Caron’s Foundation and I thought you might be interested and, at the same time amused, by this report of her journey.
The money has already started to come in from Merrill’s friends and on behalf of the Foundation I should like to thank them for their support and most of all, to Merrill and her driving companion Hilary, for undertaking such a hard course in a wonderful tenacious way. Many congratulations.
“Merrill’s Report”
After an extraordinary time driving the Karma Enduro Rally from Goa to Kerala, I am back, in one piece – just. This is the story of our trip.
A friend of mine, Hilary – (who had come with me as moral support) and I were introduced to our Wolsey Ambassador, one of 35 making the trip, whom we christened ‘Karma Chameleon’. Another was called ‘Bertha’ because she was big and heavy and unlikely to be a goer. Quick as a flash, we were round with the antiseptic wipes, sanitisers, (no dodgy tums for us – definitely not!). Everyone then took to their cars for a warm up drive. We were all handed our route books and I saw that as I was navigating I had a proper rally map. I’d never seen one before! Hilary had come with her advanced driving skills. I had a couple of nicely co-ordinated hats! I said ‘turn left’ and all the cars in front ‘turned right’. Then we saw them coming back. They should have turned left but the damage to my confidence had been done! I guarded my pencil like the crown jewels.
It was interesting in the car. We seemed to have no handbrake. Hilary wound the window up and the winder came off in her hand. It’s all going well so far, we said. Decorate your cars was the order. Being a pair of smart girls we bought fresh jasmine, along the dashboard, along the bonnet and up the radio aerial. We noticed when the aerial went past the window trailing a streamer of flowers, two guys driving together decorated not only their car but themselves, starting in Biggles leather hats and ending up in a pith helmet. Their car sported every bad taste thing going including a Barbie doll. We put a bindi on her forehead.
I had thought that we would do the drive, between 150 – 250 kms., per day in a few hours, leaving bags of time for sight seeing. The drive always took all day. The car had no tread on the tyres either, it was totally unroadworthy. And so was I!
The first day took us to Pelolem beach where we ‘look at the stars from your beach hut’. Shacks. Put up that afternoon. Steve took a picture of the cat asleep under the bed, and the wet cement holding the loo up. It didn’t matter though as there was no water. The mattress was disgusting. Fetid and rancid were words we used every day. There was one unwashed sheet on the bed. We wanted to sleep in the car but they were all parked a way away, so there was nothing else for it. We bought towels and … hooray for bed, bath and beyond, New York. I had bought us for $25.99 – a sleep sack of cotton each. It went up at the back to stow a pillow in, but we put it round our heads. We looked like extras from the Nun’s Story and with our head torches clamped to our foreheads, yes really, we went to read in bed. We were lucky with our sleep sacks – very smug – while the others itched for days and medicated their bites.
On we went up mountains, down again and eventually came to Shimoga, the town the world forgot. We snapped our revolting loo with its ‘sanitised for your care’ message. In one room the seat fell on the floor when they touched it. In another, the sanitising hadn’t been too successful, the loo hadn’t been flushed since the previous occupants. There were never plugs in the basins, just two mothballs to disguise the smell and deter the cockroaches.
Up more mountains. Hilary driving (brilliantly), and there was an amazing day when 5 sumps went! Ours was one. As we sat by the roadside in the most beautiful coffee plantation, I saw the biggest spider, its web hanging between two trees. All going well today we said. We limped to the next stop in the back of another car leaving our baby broken at the kerb, arriving at 9.45. We still were only half an hour behind the main group. The map directions had been so wrong they were all hopelessly lost. By coming in last, we had the market jeep mechanics and the ambulance with us so they knew the way. We stopped at a coffee shop by the road where we ordered 15 bread omelettes and coffee. Hilary and I relying on the kindness of strangers, decided to pay the entire bill. It came to £4.50! How many times have you bought dinner for 15 people for under a fiver?
We arrived at our jungle retreat, downed three vodkas, medicinal, and went to bed in the dormitory we were sharing that night with Janet and Rosie. There was a spider behind the loo so we peed outside and went to sleep. About 4.00 a.m. I felt the tummy gurgle you cannot ignore. I made so much noise scrabbling for the torch, Rosie gave me hers and spider or not, off I had to trot. As Kenneth Williams in his autobiography, ‘bowels in uproar. There’s always something’. Mortified. Out with the Imodium and whats that brown thing on the floor? What do you mean it’s a scorpion? In the car by 9.00 a.m. no rest for the wounded.
Hotels getting slightly better, perhaps the wet pair of cut offs I have dragged round for three days might stop smelling and start drying. And that’s when Hilary got the trots.
I was driving through the tiger reserve and we saw the sign ‘Tiger reserve, do not stop, do not leave your car’. It was getting dark so I flicked the switch for the lights. That’s when the black smoke and flames started. OUT!! Again we limped home in the back of another car, to our jungle retreat. Up at 5.00 a.m., for the safari drive, really fed up with curry for breakfast, lunch and dinner we had started taking it in turns to order a fantasy dinner. One night was the Caprice fishcakes, another the roast chicken and treacle tart, then there were the days it was better not to mention food at all. At the retreat we had full English. Bliss.
Watch out for snakes we were told. I usually think, mmm bags and shoes, this time I just yelled ‘coming through, go away’. As Hilary said, you don’t want it to be a spitting cobra. Or any other bloody cobra!
We finally came to our destination. Hoorah! We did it. Hilary was the best friend and driver possible. We had a brilliant time, scored the highest bill in car repairs, cut offs still wet, but a few pounds lighter. WE DID IT!!
But now, what about India? Well, someone said we would love and hate it in equal measure and that was true. The shocking cruelty to animals; horses hobbled (front hoof tied to back so it cannot but hobble), thinnest dogs in the world, cows in the middle of the roads, the scariest traffic ever. And then there’s the fragrant smell of the sandalwood and the glorious tree plantations. Most of all, the people. The dignity of their poverty. The immaculate children leaving shacks and hovels to go to school. The brilliance of the sari colours all pristine. We had showers, often cold, but showers nonetheless and we couldn’t keep clean. Most of all the wonderful smiles of the Indians that never failed as they ran to cheer us on, wave or just goggle because they had not seen a white person before. The women with pots of water on their heads, so beautiful and serene, colourful butterflies, and sadly, the men often just sitting in groups doing nothing. We wouldn’t have lasted long in that society we reckoned. The children would run to the car and ask for a pencil, that’s all. A pencil! A couple of schools were discovered and adopted during the trip and we aim to make a difference there. This will continue.
I did receive a call from Gloria, excitedly yelling ‘I can’t believe you’re doing this’!! To be honest I couldn’t, either, but not in the same way!
So please, can you send your donations to the Caron Keating Foundation, PO Box 122, Sevenoaks, Kent TN13 1UB.
Say it’s for Merrill’s rally. Gloria will put your money to the best possible use in memory of darling Caron, whose picture was on the bonnet and door of our car.
Thank you so much. Love Merrill