Last week I was telling you about the Albesia wood village in Indonesia.
This week I'm in India. I needed to get to Kolkatta from Yiwu in China, that's tricky there are no direct flights, so I ended flying to the northern city of Kunming and changing planes to fly to Kolkata. Kunming is in the middle of nowhere, but has a beautiful modern airport and did a pretty good sales pitch on me as a place to visit properly one day. Misty lakes high in rocky mountains, something called ice wine, and a culture of intricate dress and dance almost Thai like. A Shangri-La of a city.
On the plane, half Chinese business people and half boisterous excited (to go home) Bengali guys. In mid air, bouncing over some clouds - it hit me. Of course... I was flying the HUMP. I'd read about it lots. The most dangerous scheduled air route in the world. Calcutta to Kunming and back. In 1942 as the Japanese had an almost complete China blockade in place it was the only way to bring essential supplies to China. The British and Americans built an air bridge over the Himalayas and across Burma, which was a hairy jump made worse violent winds, blinding snow and Japanese fighter planes coming at you. Hundreds of people died, why we did it, and what good it did, is all but forgotten, but it was a mammoth operation for it's day. The Hump.
Today we land at Kolkata international terminal in the middle of the night. It's hot and sticky and a battered hump-era bus, smelling of curry is waiting in the gloom to take us to the terminal. The culture shock for the Chinese is complete, they are taking pictures of the broken windows and threadbare plush red seats. The terminal is a delight, practically colonial, faded and smelling of corruption complete with a magnificent painting of Bengali tigers prowling for the kill. Beneath it old school Bengali immigration staff, khaki uniforms, fat bellies and eyes prowling for the backhander. Almost all the Indian airports have smartened up, even the Kolkatta domestic airport is first class but this is the business. Real India!
We line up for passport control, there are no signs in Chinese and even the English signs are confusing. NRI here, SAAC here. Of course the Chinese all get in the wrong lines, which hugely amusing for the young Indian guys. There are immigration forms to fill. In China it's a tiny slip of paper, here it is long form. It must be filled in English, and to satisfy these rheumy eyed old timers on the desks - it must be tip-top and correctly filled in. The Chinese who are pretty slap-dash at form filling have filled things in on a random basis. They keep getting sent back to the end of the queue with new forms. It becomes clear to me that non of the officials speak Chinese, not a word. And most of the Chinese left in the hall have very little English.
So there I am my awful Chinese being stretched to the limit as I try to help all these Chinese fill the forms to a satisfactory level. Even I get ticked off for not filling the full address of my hotel, what chance have they got. The weary official stamping my forms, sighs and rolls his eyes, "they come here with no English" and then, "help this guy here, would you". After half an hour - I too am filling the guys forms for them... randomly. Chatting in Chinese the best I can and putting any old date in. Translating for the official.. "He says he's here for two weeks" - (when he told me he didn't know how long). I'm damned if the old boys are getting any bribes tonight.
Finally I'm though and at 3am spill out into the warm night air. The good thing about India is little luxuries come cheap. As everyone else is scrambling for dilapidated ambassador taxies, I'm met by a smart guy in a grey suit and peaked cap, a sign with my name and a waiting limo to whisk me to the hotel. "Pleasant flight sir?" asks the chauffeur. Interesting I tell him.
More news next week.
