An Ahmedabad Sunday

An Ahmedabad Sunday – 25th April

With the urge to explore the city on foot, I set out at 9 am before it got to hot. Let me tell you now – there is no ‘before it gets too hot’ at the moment, it is simply ‘too hot’. I thought I’d try some street food, and opted for the safety of fruit which I peeled with my own knife. There are a lot of friendly people on the streets of Ahmedabad. ‘Hello, how are you?’ came from all sides. In the strangeness of the surroundings there was a very real fear of becoming hopelessly lost. Streets have names on the map in the phone book – streets do not necessarily have names on them. Well, if they do, they’re written in the local language, for I haven’t noticed any. I found I was obliged to avoid eye-contact with the Tuc-tuc drivers, who would crawl alongside the second you glanced at them, until waved away. Most of the shops were shut, although I understood that some would open after 10 am – but not for me. I was only out for an hour, but even so, needed to recuperate in the hotel foyer before tackling the stairs. Pretty weedy eh?

I was conscious that I may have consumed more fruit in that hour than was good for an omnivore with a western stomach, but touch wood, nothing so far has disturbed the internal equilibrium and I retired to my room with a cup of ginger tea and the laptop. With the afternoon devoted to blogging and writing up the Sintex notes, I felt ready to tackle the city again in the cool of the evening. Another learning experience – there is no ‘cool of the evening’. The vast concrete metropolis spends 12 or so hours absorbing the sun, and in the evening this giant storage heater releases its heat. It’s the same temperature but without the sunshine.

Sunday evening, and Ahmedabad had come to life. There was now a row of stalls on the ground along the street out side the hotel, and along the main street. There was more of a market atmosphere, more clothing sellers in addition to the usual food vendors. I wasn’t too bothered about losing my way this time, having decided that any tuc-tuc driver could get me back. However, I was starting to attract the attention of little street urchins as I walked, and several ran out of side streets to join my parade. This Pied Piper decided it was now time to catch the eye of a Tuc-tuc, hopped in, and said ‘drive please, round the city’, and made good my escape. The city was really busy; many streets lined with clothing stalls and filled with shoppers. He took me to markets, and past temples and gardens with fountains, pointing ‘look, look’, as we went by. Don’t gripe about the winter potholes, friends in the UK, we don’t understand about potholes. Some roads here are all potholes. To be fair, some roads are being resurfaced. One section of an Ahmedabad street had recently been done on the right hand side, but was raised some 6 inches higher than the rest. As there is no lane system, I had the uncomfortable experience of straddling this gradient in an open-sided vehicle trying not to fall out. To make matters worse, tuc-tucs have three wheels, and a decision needs to be made as to whether the front wheel will run on the high section or the low section. Or both, as in this instance.
Eventually we pulled into the side of the road and I saw we were back at our starting point
‘Hotel President, please’ It was that easy.