Taken From All About My Hat The Hippy Trail 1972 ISBN 978-0993210716
The following day Al was up early and went for breakfast and bought some bread and fruit and water for the journey. He was now really hoping that there would be some money waiting for him at American Express in Delhi.
Al felt that he had been a burden on Keith, and Keith had not been too happy about it. He didn't want to end up being a burden on Miriam. He had thoughts of picking up money and going to Nepal with her.
Mid-afternoon, Al had said cheerio to Keith as Keith headed off towards to railway station. He met up with Miriam near the dining hall and soon Sher appeared with an older man, his father, the mango dealer. They called for a three wheeler motor rickshaw with seats for three and waved goodbye to Sher.
Father took Al and Miriam across town, where they tasted yellow mangoes, then across town again to taste green ones, and then back across town to try red ones. Each time he gave them a few in a bag, so now they had about ten of them. But they were all delicious.
Then he took them to the outskirts of town to what looked like a truckers' stop. He took them to a small building and introduced them to all old man with a long white beard.
It was some sort of religious groups. There were many old-looking books and pamphlets, including one in English. Al read it – it was some sort of Ashram, a shelter for practices of Yoga and read that the Universe was made by an all-powerful God called ParaBrahman. He realised that the old man was some sort of priest, teacher or Guru – he was very pleasant, constantly smiling – he had a symbol painted on his forehead.
The old teacher chap told Al and Miriam that he had arranged for them to go to Delhi but the truck was not leaving until midnight. He invited them to dinner and soon another delicious vegetarian meal with Nan bread arrived, followed by the Lassi drink flavoured with mangoes!
It was late into the evening before the truck was ready to leave, and Al did not know or care how long it would take to reach Delhi. He had a bag of food, lots of mangos, enough water for a couple of days, and Miriam to keep him company.
When they reached the truck they discovered it was laden high with large rope-tied bundles – they were shown to climb up and found enough space for them to comfortably sit or lay down, in front of the bundles. They set off into the night.
Of course, there was not a lot to see at night but they did pass some lit areas, maybe small towns or villages. They chatted on, shared some joints using hash that Miriam had, and felt good. When it got too cold, they huddled together under Al's sleeping bag.
But suddenly after a few hours the truck halted abruptly and some of the bundles shifted so there was a danger of them toppling down on top of the duo. The truck carried on and every now and then the bundles shifted again. Their space was restricted and Al began to worry for their safety.
He began to try to bang on the roof of the cab to try to get their driver's attention but to no avail. So he thought to try to climb up so that he could dangle something down in front of the cab window so the driver would stop. He used a dress that Miriam took out of her bag.
After a while the truck stopped. The driver got out and Al motioned to him that the bundles were about to topple down. Climbing up, the driver tried pushing up the bundles with Al's help, but they hardly moved. They tried repositioning the ropes. In the end they had made little progress so the driver jumped down and straight away they were on the move again.
Al was still worried about the bundles but the advantage was that Miriam huddled up closer.
So on they travelled until daylight and on into the day, which got hot very quickly.
They made two stops and the driver bought them Chai (sweet milky spicy tea). Each time they tried tightening the ropes.
At the third stop, Miriam bought a hot meal for Al and for the driver. It was now late afternoon.
As they were about to climb up to their space on the back of the truck, the driver handed Al a small black lump of what Al now knew to be opium, motioning for him to eat it. Al broke it into two small pieces and he and Miriam ate one each.
It was a few hours later after the opium had induced a sort of slowed-down dreamy state, that, now dark again, the truck was passing through lit-up areas. They were on the outskirts of Delhi and soon the truck pulled up at a large roundabout that Al later learned was called Connaught Circus. They climbed down and the driver motioned across the busy road and made a gesture meaning sleep.
So Al and Miriam tried to cross the road – the effects of the opium did not help. The traffic seemed to be speeding past, trucks, coaches, three-wheeler motorised rickshaws, cars and even donkey-pulled carts. It was taking ages. The traffic seemed non-stop. There was a great honking of horns.
Well, they did eventually get across the road and headed off in the direction that the truck driver had pointed, soon to find a street with several guest houses on. They selected the second one that they were passing. It had dormitories, some for boys and some for girls, no mixed rooms. The dorms were set around a small courtyard with tables and chairs and a water pump. Inside the dorm that Al was shown to there were six beds, and it looked like three were taken, so he chose one saying hello to his fellow travellers and sat down. One of the other lads started speaking to Al in English: he was German and told Al that he was on his way back to Germany after travelling around India for six months dressed like a Sadhu, in robes with just a begging bowl and chillum. Al knew that Sadhu's were supposed to relinquish all their possessions and their homes and families, worshipped a god called Shiva and smoked lots of chillums.
There was a Spanish guy there. He spoke English. He told Al about an 'Ashram' called Prem Nagar, in the foothills in the town of Haridwar on the Ganges, the Holy River, where they accommodated people free of charge. Then he told Al about the symptoms of Infectious Hepatitis, a yellowing of the whites of the eyes and the finger nails, how urine would look dark yellow to red, and stools would look pale. Al thought it was strange to be told that.
Then Al went to the courtyard and found Miriam sat drinking fizzy orange. Not having slept a lot the previous night, it wasn't long before Al said goodnight and was asleep.
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